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Instructor
Original Poster
#1 Old 18th Jul 2022 at 5:50 AM

This user has the following games installed:

Sims 2, University, Nightlife, Seasons
Default Community lot - all contents vanish upon saving
I'm creating the famous junkyard, a community lot for my "Hawkins, Indiana" neighborhood. It will be a hangout space for my Stranger Things teens, filled with trashy decor and trashy-looking, but functioning items (bang-on-a-can bathroom fixtures, beat-up sofas, etc.) There's even the abandoned bus (although it's just deco; they can't actually barricade themselves in it to shelter from demodogs). The thing is, it won't save... the lot (I started with a 3x3 empty, community-zoned) is there, it has a name, but although I save frequently, and again upon exiting, I get to the neighborhood view, and it looks like a blank, bluish square, and sure enough, when I return to it, it's totally empty. Have I maxed out the number of lots in my hood, or something? Have I placed a CC item that I don't have the requisite pack for? I would think a CC issue would cause freezing, or blue flashing objects, or error messages, but not the entire contents of a lot to vanish. Unlike some other lots, this one has no structures, and there's no layers of built-up stuff... everything's outdoors, in the open, so I COULD, if necessary, document every single thing that I place there, and track them all down to make sure they're "healthy". Mostly it's just deco - old tires, trash piles and rats, with a few appliances/electronics to make it a place worth hanging out in... the only weird thing there is something called the "Ambition Miner", a 3to2 converted object which I've never used before, and included only because it looked like an old junky piece of industrial machinery. If that's what it is, I'll happily leave it out, but I'd be interested to hear theories. This happened once before, a long time ago, in a different hood, and I can't recall what the issue was. The other piece of evidence I can offer is that this is a brand new lot - no Sim has ever set foot on it. And, I can go to other lots and edit them, no problem. It's just this one lot. Any ideas?
<-- The Miner
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Field Researcher
#2 Old 18th Jul 2022 at 6:55 AM
What do you mean with bluish? like blue flashing or like water? Can you maybe show a picture of the hood view? Things that you could try (Idk if you already did) trying to take out the downloads folder (back up the neighboorhoods though first cause taking out some kind of mods can cause corruption) and place something on it to see if that stays or building a second lot and try it on that one instead and delete the old one... maybe that is glitched somehow?
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#3 Old 18th Jul 2022 at 7:21 AM
I think they mean blue as in community lots are normally blue (res lots are green)

OP If you were on a windows pc I would say run hood checker and check that your anti virus can't read sims 2 files and that Onedrive is disabled/uninstalled, but you don't have any of those things.
I would try placing another lot down and trying to build upon it. Save, exit and reload and check.
I do know that Mac's have a cc file limit but I have not heard of this particular issue.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Instructor
Original Poster
#4 Old 22nd Jul 2022 at 2:05 PM
@joandsarah77 yes, blue as in community-zoned. If an entire lot was flashing blue in the hood view, I'd be REALLY worried... Although, I HAVE seen lots before that looked - in the hood view - to have a "missing recolor" blue flash, only to find, upon entering the lot, that there wasn't anything wrong. ANYhow, I'll try building the lot again, without the Ambition Miner, and see what happens.

Quote: Originally posted by joandsarah77
I think they mean blue as in community lots are normally blue (res lots are green)

OP If you were on a windows pc I would say run hood checker and check that your anti virus can't read sims 2 files and that Onedrive is disabled/uninstalled, but you don't have any of those things.
I would try placing another lot down and trying to build upon it. Save, exit and reload and check.
I do know that Mac's have a cc file limit but I have not heard of this particular issue.
Mad Poster
#5 Old 22nd Jul 2022 at 2:56 PM
Flashing blue items in the neighborhood could mean how the item appears in the NH is glitchy, such as missing seasonal states (if it's cloned from a tree/bush), or there's something wrong in the LOD settings, or similar. Can be fine on-lot, or only misbehave during certain seasons (if it's a tree/bush).
Instructor
Original Poster
#6 Old 22nd Jul 2022 at 6:44 PM
Default Riddle me this...
Okay, this is going to seem crazy, but here's what happened.
1. I tried rebuilding the lot, without the Ambition Miner, in a slightly different location, a 3x3 empty Community lot. Saved, went back to the hood, and poof! Everything vanished, as before.
2. I said, what the hell, let's just make it a different size, and started a 2x2 empty community lot, filled it with all manner of junk, saved it. This time it kept everything. I'm guessing that, if I added the Miner now, it wouldn't amke any difference.
3. I made a brand new 3x3 lot, and only put two things in it: a deco wrecked car, and the deco terminator bus. Saved, went back, poof! Empty. My game just doesn't like the 3x3 size, I guess. I've made them in the past. What could have changed? Across the street is an even larger lot for the quarry, a community lot also, no problems there. Go figure.

The NEW 2x2: a little crowded, but otherwise perfect.


At right, the new 2x2 lot in the Hawkins hood, Junked items clearly visible, including bus and car. At center, the new 3x3 lot, supposedly containing bus and car, but in reality empty. Foreground, the larger quarry lot.


I'm satisfied with the outcome, but still mystified as to what the heck is going on. Any guesses?
Mad Poster
#7 Old 22nd Jul 2022 at 6:57 PM
Maybe it's some kind of bug in the Mac version. There are a few of those around.
That other community lot looks a bit weird too, but I'm not sure if it's supposed to look a bit like that?

I don't play with community lots often, but there's a few in the original hoods, and they're a lot bigger - never had any bugs like this happen with those.
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#8 Old 23rd Jul 2022 at 12:03 AM
A lot can also flash blue from missing terrain paint -and that can be the entire ground, quite creepy.

As for this, I do know that Mac's have a hard cc file limit and that once reached something will vanish, perhaps it also has a limit for how many things are out in a hood? I have never seen or heard of things not saving on a pc unless it was the result of a program like an antivirus, but you don't have that. I am not up on Mac's, know very little about them. There use to be one Mac user on here who knew their stuff, hope they come back and post.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Instructor
Original Poster
#9 Old 23rd Jul 2022 at 5:13 PM
[QUOTE=simmer22]Maybe it's some kind of bug in the Mac version. There are a few of those around.
That other community lot looks a bit weird too, but I'm not sure if it's supposed to look a bit like that?

I've definitely built 3x3 community lots before, though... It just irritates me that something would stop working, just because. I mean, I do have one heck of a lot of downloads... I had to increase (i.e. triple) the file limit on my laptop, which... will probably come back to bite me eventually. It can't be an issue with the number of lots in the hood, though, because I can still add new lots of other sizes, just not community 3x3. I'm gonna try 3x3 residential, just to experiment. I haven't built Murray's hideout yet, although technically, he's supposed to live over the border in Illinois. Maybe there's a premade, mostly empty comm lot that I could download, where I wouldn't have to delete very much before building; I guess that would be one solution. I can't really imagine what that would be though... maybe a pumpkin patch.

The other lot in the picture is supposed to be a limestone quarry, so the terrain elevation is quite unusual. I tried to get the water to be just at the very bottom, but it wasn't very co-operative. Unless you mean weird - as in it's also bluish around the top? Could that just be because there's not much built there? I'd have to go look at it; it might be gray rock terrain. But yeah, it does look a little odd in the screenshot.
Mad Poster
#10 Old 23rd Jul 2022 at 6:37 PM
The bluish outline is usually how community lots show up in the hood (residential lots have a green outline). The outline doesn't always show, not entirely sure what causes that - but whether it shows or not, it doesn't necessarily signify a bad thing (unless you suddenly get the wrong color after rezoning).

I was referring to the terrain elevation and some of the items which looks like they're hovering in the air.
Instructor
Original Poster
#11 Old 23rd Jul 2022 at 7:11 PM
Ah yes, no worries there... I have steps descending down into the quarry so the Sims can go fishing there... the hood views are somewhat lacking in detail. In the Netflix series, the school bullies force Mike to jump from the rim, and Eleven saves him with her telekinetic powers. I wonder if I could get the Sims to jump in by putting a pool at the bottom and using some elevation-restraint code... hmmm.

And, if you notice, the junkyard lot has no blue outline. Curious, huh?
Mad Poster
#12 Old 24th Jul 2022 at 11:41 PM
I've had the colored blue or green outlines stop showing up after starting to do any kind of building or editing on my community lots as usual when I set up a new town and that bug of the lot state not saving can be caused by and overloaded computer hard drive which can be solved by buying an external hard drive compatible with your system.I buy ones made to work with Windows 7 or higher as my ten year ols laptop is WIndows 7.I would also in my case use 7 zip to hale redice the load by compressing files taking up space I'm not currently using.
Instructor
Original Poster
#13 Old 25th Jul 2022 at 2:58 AM
Yes, the curiosity in this case is not that the one built-upon community lot DOESN'T have a blue outline, but that the larger one DOES, despite being built... or appears to, anyway. As I say, it may be that the color of the terrain I used is causing that optical illusion in the neighborhood view.
My hard drive currently has 550 GB free out of 750, so I don't think it's a lack-of-space issue. I'm intrigued by your idea, though. Would it actually work to have my Sims folder stored externally? I've always just left it where it was originally installed, and put it in the same place when I migrated to the new laptop a couple years ago. As for compressing all my unused files... that sounds like waaay too much work, to keep track of what I'm using or not at any given time. I do have far too many downloads, but I think the only solution to that is to purge.

Quote: Originally posted by TadOlson
I've had the colored blue or green outlines stop showing up after starting to do any kind of building or editing on my community lots as usual when I set up a new town and that bug of the lot state not saving can be caused by and overloaded computer hard drive which can be solved by buying an external hard drive compatible with your system.I buy ones made to work with Windows 7 or higher as my ten year ols laptop is WIndows 7.I would also in my case use 7 zip to hale redice the load by compressing files taking up space I'm not currently using.
Mad Poster
#14 Old 25th Jul 2022 at 8:40 AM
It's possible that Windows 10 or later versions might have a strange setup that is causing the issue I have thousands of files and it's likely more than almost anybody else with my game not doing any of the strange things yours is doing which make me think it's more like your computer is trying to run too many things in the background at one time and it might be a Norton issue as I had one earlier this year with Norton breaking my UC install and was forced to disable Norton until I get it uninstalled.I'm not alone in having issues with Norton as it went viral when minr started as Norton released a suspect update.I've actually gone beyond the build and buy mode CC limit at least a few times and my game still runs smoothly except for when the hard drive needs defragmenting which newer SSD ones don't need like mine does because it's the older knd.
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#15 Old 25th Jul 2022 at 9:49 AM
Quote: Originally posted by TadOlson
It's possible that Windows 10 or later versions might have a strange setup that is causing the issue I have thousands of files and it's likely more than almost anybody else with my game not doing any of the strange things yours is doing which make me think it's more like your computer is trying to run too many things in the background at one time and it might be a Norton issue as I had one earlier this year with Norton breaking my UC install and was forced to disable Norton until I get it uninstalled.I'm not alone in having issues with Norton as it went viral when minr started as Norton released a suspect update.I've actually gone beyond the build and buy mode CC limit at least a few times and my game still runs smoothly except for when the hard drive needs defragmenting which newer SSD ones don't need like mine does because it's the older knd.


@TadOlson
They're on a Mac so they have none of that.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Instructor
Original Poster
#16 Old 26th Jul 2022 at 12:13 AM
Quote: Originally posted by joandsarah77
@TadOlson
They're on a Mac so they have none of that.

True dat.
I was also beginning to have this thing where ANOTHER type of lot wouldn't save, and also where the game would quit out of CAS when I tried to create a new Sim. So... I discovered a whole mess of duplicate downloads, trashed them, and now my folder is back under 10,000 files... not FAR under, but I feel better, and the game has started co-operating again. Many of these duplicates turned out to be bodyshop meshes, where I had downloaded it twice, once under the "Meshes Needed" section, and then again because the creator had later included the mesh in with their recolor or whatever, and forgot to remove it from the other location. Nowadays, I try to use the magnifying glass to check for meshes, but I didn't always do that. I'm gonna try making a 3x3 community lot again, to see if that's better too.
Needs Coffee
retired moderator
#17 Old 26th Jul 2022 at 1:26 AM
Possible it is all related to the Mac hard file limit then.

"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives." - Unknown
~Call me Jo~
Mad Poster
#18 Old 26th Jul 2022 at 4:44 AM
I almost bought a Mac though I ended up with my laptop instead and I'd look into switching to a Windows computer if I had money to spare and I've been taking care to not let the system get overeloaded with too many things running at the same time.I had that issue once with my game on an old family computer when it's hard drive became full.
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