We are collecting information from any user experiencing issues with Sims and/or User Interface that have gone missing or invisible and made the save game corrupt or unplayable.

At the moment, there isn't alot of help, if any, for this situation so any information you can provide will be of help to us as we try to build a database of issues and what users have tried to correct the issue(s).

There is a page in the Wiki now: Game Help:UI and Sim Issues^wiki

Copy and Paste the questions below in a New Post and submit to the thread. Leave a blank space between questions so it doesn't get all jumbled up and difficult to read.


1. Which game(s) do you have?
2. What game version/patch level?
3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
4. Do they have an icon or not?
5. Do you have any UI issues?
6. Were the sims traveling?
7. How many traveling?
8. How are all travellers related?
9. Which country are the sims in?
10. How many days?
11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
12. Returning together or separate?
13. Are you using SuperComputer Twallan's MasterController+Overwatch+DebugEnabler or AwesomeMod?
14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
15. When did the issue start?
16. What were your sims doing?
17. What things have you tried
18. What worked?
19. What didn't work?
20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]

I have a MacBook, which is completely within and my game has run fine so far (even if it's a little slow) but then my UI when missing in one of my neighborhoods as well as my sims. I've noticed a large number of other people are having the same issue and I hope it will be resolved soon.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
World Adventures

2. What game version/patch level?
2.9.10.007001

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
One, but there's only one sim on this game

4. Do they have an icon or not?
No

5. Do you have any UI issues?
It's completely gone (even the pause thing around the screen is gone)

6. Were the sims traveling?
Yes, but he got back a day or so ago

7. How many traveling?
Just one

8. How are all travellers related?
N/A

9. Which country are the sims in?
China

10. How many days?
5 days

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
When the vacation was over

12. Returning together or separate?
N/A


13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
No

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
No

15. When did the issue start?
Yesterday


16. What were your sims doing?
Talking to a ghost at the graveyard

17. What things have you tried
getting rid of all exchange cc (though not sim store stuff), restoring from backup 18. What worked?
Nothing So far

19. What didn't work?
Everything so far

20. Anything else you would like to add?
I've tried a number of different things to get the ui and my sim to appear again but have had little luck so far. Next I will probably try removing cc entirely and see how that goes. Even though my other games (saved files) work, I would hate for all that time to have been wasted. I know my computer is functioning fine and I'm not really sure what else to do.

Any help would be much appreciated

Note: I just realized I cannot remove all of my cc as the town that is broken is Riverview and I'm not entirely sure what would happen if you tried to play with a neighborhood that doesn't exist.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Sims3/WA/HELS/AMB

2. What game version/patch level?
Updated to AMB 4.0

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
One Sim, on three different occasions.

4. Do they have an icon or not?
Not when he is invisible, just thought bubbles and a plumbob.

5. Do you have any UI issues?
NO.

6. Were the sims traveling?
NO

7. How many traveling?
n/a

8. How are all travellers related?
n/a

9. Which country are the sims in?
n/a

10. How many days?
n/a

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
n/a

12. Returning together or separate?
n/a

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
SuperComputer

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
No Story Progression at all.

15. When did the issue start?
After a few Sim weeks of play.

16. What were your sims doing?
Two times he was just invisible after loading a save. One time was directly after using a board breaker on a community lot.

17. What things have you tried?
Twallan's debugger, loading older saves.


18. What worked?
I have retrieved him once via Twallan's debugger, and twice through reverting to older saves after deleting cache files.

19. What didn't work?
Everything else, including using old save files without deleting the cache files first.

20. Anything else you would like to add?
The 4.2 patch released today supposedly has some fixes to this problem.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Sims 3

2. What game version/patch level?
1.0.631.00002

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
All the sims i have downloaded from this site. About 10 or so.

4. Do they have an icon or not?
Nothing appears in the CAS premade sims.

5. Do you have any UI issues?
n/a

6. Were the sims traveling?
n/a

7. How many traveling?
n/a

8. How are all travellers related?
n/a

9. Which country are the sims in?
n/a

10. How many days?
n/a

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
n/a

12. Returning together or separate?
n/a

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
AwesomeMod

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
No Story Progression at all.

15. When did the issue start?
Installed them as the helper says into the savedsims folder. Then opened sims 3 to use them and they weren't there.

16. What were your sims doing?
n/a

17. What things have you tried?
updating version/game patch, different mods, installing using monkey installer, reinstalling sims 3


18. What worked?
Nothing.

19. What didn't work?
updating the game version, different mods, using monkey installer, reinstalling sims 3

20. Anything else you would like to add?
I am not too sure what is happening and why but i can't update the game version to the latest update. that could be the problem but i tried reinstalling and nothing works

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Base Game, World Adventures, Ambitions

2. What game version/patch level?
4.2.32.007001

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
One

4. Do they have an icon or not?
Sometimes. It disappears sometimes and reappears sometimes (but I think that is due to SuperComputer attempting to bring the missing sim back.)

5. Do you have any UI issues?
No

6. Were the sims traveling?
The sim has traveled in the past, but there were other sims in her household that traveled more recently, came back, and suddenly she (not they) became invisible.

7. How many traveling?
Of the sims in the household, 4 sims have traveled, including the disappearing/missing sim.

8. How are all travellers related?
The disappearing sim is mother of two travelers and mother-in-law to one of the travelers (her daughter's French husband.)

9. Which country are the sims in?
They live in Sunset Valley, but one of the sims in their household moved in from France.

10. How many days?
They have been at home for some time now. The last vacation lasted for 8 days.

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
They returned when the vacation was over.

12. Returning together or separate?
Together.

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
I installed SuperComputer AFTER this issue began happening to see if it would help in fixing it, but so far it hasn't.

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
Twallan's Story Progression

15. When did the issue start?
The issue started after the disappearing sim's two daughters returned from a trip to China.

16. What were your sims doing?
The only thing I can think of besides traveling that could have contributed to this issue was marrying in a French sim but that happened long before this sim started disappearing so I don't know.

17. What things have you tried
ResetSim cheat. SuperComputer. backup saves. Removing all mods.

18. What worked?
So far nothing has worked. Now, since downloading the latest patch, I can't even load my saved games from this household. The loading screen gets almost completely full and then just freezes and won't load any further.

19. What didn't work?
See all the methods above.

20. Anything else you would like to add?
The most recent patch has apparently made the household with the missing sim completely unplayable. Now my save games won't load at all. Even backups won't load. The most recent patch was supposed to fix this disappearing sim problem so maybe that has something to do with why I can't even load this household anymore.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Base, WA, HELS, Ambitions

2. What game version/patch level?
4.2

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
1 - Not the sim himself, just the icons

4. Do they have an icon or not?
No

5. Do you have any UI issues?
Yes - it disappears when trying to switch households

6. Were the sims traveling?
No

7. How many traveling?
N/A

8. How are all travellers related?
N/A

9. Which country are the sims in?
N/A

10. How many days?
N/A

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
N/A

12. Returning together or separate?
N/A

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
I use Awesome Mod, though I read somewhere that Twallen's story progression was better, so I switched the SP and the UI still disappears.

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
Awesome - then switched to Twallans

15. When did the issue start?
I only noticed it after last patch. It could have been going on longer but I was playing a legacy and never switched families until last week.

16. What were your sims doing?
Using Edit Town to move my sims girlfriend and daughter in with him.

17. What things have you tried
Removing all custom content - no help
Deleting cache, thumbnails, etc. - no help
Download Delphy's dashboard - no mod conflicts found
Reinstall Sims over current installation (after backing up of course) - no help
Starting a new game - Worked, but that doesn't really help, honestly.
Going to an older save - that was fun, they wouldn't even LOAD all the way!
I can't honestly think of what else - I've done everything I've read about doing on the net - working on it for two days.

18. What worked?
I didn't have the problem with just starting a new game - but then I lost all the progress on the family I was working on!

19. What didn't work?
Everything in #18

20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]
The problem I'm experiencing may not be the same one this thread in about. There was no traveling at all. My sims girlfriend got pregnant so I went through all the interactions to ask her to move in - but she went into labor before he actually asked. So they had the baby and he went to her house instead of his, but I couldn't find her or the baby in the house, so he went home. He invited her over and went through everything again, asked her to move in, she did, the menu came up, I chose her, the daughter and her sister (to have a babysitter) and it got stuck in processing. After 20 minutes or so (usually about a 30 second process) I force quit. I restarted and just tried to move her in through edit town, it again got stuck in processing, force quit, tried again but did the 'switch households' thing and moved her with no active family. It took! I then tried to make them my active family and the UI just went away, and I had to force quit. Then I tried to switch to another household, and the Sim never came home from work, tried to switch back to the original household and lost the UI. I think it must be corrupted, however there is not a save that has .bad at the end, there is no .backup either, which I found odd. The work around on the Sims 3 site says to rename the .backup or the .legacy - I don't have either of those.

This has also been all over the sims 3 website, even a supposed 'work around' that didn't work, because I didn't have error messages. I'm also on a Mac, so I could have problems PC users don't have. Also, my sim hasn't disappeared, just his icons, but that was only after reloading the same save a dozen times or so. Also, I haven't uninstalled and reinstalled - that's just the biggest pain, and I've read numerous things stating it didn't help. I may try that tomorrow. Sorry for making this so long, but I wanted you to know how it started and every detail in the way - perhaps her having the baby in the middle of him asking her to move in caused the corruption?

Edit: Typos

1. Which game(s) do you have? Base, World Adventures, Ambitions
2. What game version/patch level? 4.2.32.007001
3. How many sims are missing/invisible? 1
4. Do they have an icon or not? no thumbnail, he went invisible so i deleted him and went back to main menu thinking it would bring him back like in the Sims 2
5. Do you have any UI issues? n/a
6. Were the sims traveling? not this one, had issues with another member of the household who went travelling with his wife but while he came back to the house she wasnt there...still married but not living together and no thumbnail, so i made him break up with her now married with another lady
7. How many traveling? 2
8. How are all travellers related? married
9. Which country are the sims in? they were in La Simhara, egypt
10. How many days? 3
11. Did the sim(s) return 3via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over? when the vacation was over
12. Returning together or separate? they were meant to be together
13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod? n/a
14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story? not sure
15. When did the issue start? last week
16. What were your sims doing? on holiday the husband was in a tomb, other member of household was celebrating his birthday at home, stuck doing that at least 3 times before i deleted him, plumbob still there but he was invisible, then reappeared but not aged
17. What things have you tried just deleting him, then main menu but not back then splitting household up to see if he'd reappear in edit town but when i did that the screen froze so i had to restart my computer twice, maybe 3 times
18. What worked? nothing
19. What didn't work? he didnt reappear so i had to use another sim with the same name i'd created previously, now his ex wife has a new boyfriend
20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre] i made the first couple (man who returned after travelling and new fiance and daughter) move out and after playing with them i wanted to change active household to play with the 2nd part of the household and when doing that again the screen froze...half loaded on their house then stopped...very confused

thanks

1. Which game(s) do you have?
base, world adventures

2. What game version/patch level?
2.9.10

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
as many as go traveling, I've replicated the problem many times

4. Do they have an icon or not?
once one went invisible but had the icon and was able to perform tasks, but the real problem im having is they are not traveling to the worlds and are MIA on arrival.

5. Do you have any UI issues?
I basically get stuck in travel, arriving with no sims to control, and only through editing the town can I sneak back into choosing a new household, but the sims from home are gone, and if I use the phone to return home, the new foreign household members return in their place!

6. Were the sims traveling?
yes

7. How many traveling?
1-3 at a time so far

8. How are all travellers related?
family

9. Which country are the sims in?
china, france

10. How many days?
3

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
no, when the trip was over the forgieners returned in place of my traveling home sims.

12. Returning together or separate?
?

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
awesomemod

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
Im not sure, my config says awesomemod, but my options menu still has story progression checked.

15. When did the issue start?
just recently, i suspect the new release of awesomemod, but am not sure

19. What didn't work?
I have not found a way around the issue, other than not traveling at all.

20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Base Game (The Sims 3)

2. What game version/patch level?
1.12

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
None (look At Next Question)

4. Do they have an icon or not?
Their Icons Disapeard

5. Do you have any UI issues?
Yes Cant Control SIms, their icons disapeard too

6. Were the sims traveling?
No They Were AT Home

7. How many traveling?
None

8. How are all travellers related?
Not Traveling, But Theyre Family (Grandpa,grandma,dad,mother,son,daughter)

9. Which country are the sims in?
Sunset Valley

10. How many days?
wrent travelling

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
Werent Traveling

12. Returning together or separate?
Werent Traveling

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
No

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression,
or Awesome Story?
No sotry progression disabled

15. When did the issue start?
After A Few Minutes Of Playing A Newly Created Family

16. What were your sims doing?
Talking, Watching tv

17. What things have you tried
Restarting game

18. What worked?
None

19. What didn't work?
Restarting game

20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]
have weapons system by desecrate,cars by fresh prince,and other custom content from modthesims

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Sims3/WA/HELS/AMB

2. What game version/patch level?
AMB 4.0.87

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
So far none n/a

4. Do they have an icon or not?
Yes

5. Do you have any UI issues?
If I player just over 1 hour, in build mode once a blue moon it will turn black and today my house icon from the load game is missing although I still can play the game

6. Were the sims traveling?
Yes, occasionally to Shang Simla, I haven't been to Al Simhara and Champs Les Sims

7. How many traveling?
3-4 so far

8. How are all travellers related?
family vacation 1 alone

9. Which country are the sims in?
China but currently in Twinbrook

10. How many days?
1-2 days max

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
via the phone

12. Returning together or separate?
together except if my sims is alone

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
MasterController v3 aka SuperComputer

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
EA Story Progression, then I tried testing with Awesome just for few minutes and it worked, then switch back to EA and I saw Twallan's SuperComputer. But finally I'm using MasterController since it's AMB compatible. I used more than 2 Twallan's NRAAS mods.

15. When did the issue start?
less than a week as I'm writing down the answer

16. What were your sims doing?
The usual chores and improving their skills

17. What things have you tried
rebuilding cache for the missing thumbnails, and as usual deleting and rebuilding but no luck.

18. What worked?
What worked? hahaha the game worked just for 1 hour before "expire" after an hour playing. A smart one always made a backup just in case he screwed up. It saves me a lot rather than starting back again to day one.

19. What didn't work?
After playing 1 hour or less when I was saving the game, the usual Error Code 12 appeared. Restarting the game does the trick or restarting my PC.Did everything but to no avail and will never prolong above 1 hour playtime. Let see, screwed the library, can't create anything with TSRW 2.0, some error appeared. Missing house thumbnails from the load game menu. Game loads too slow, over 25 minutes (yeesh!) Is that normal? I remembered it took me less than 5-7 mins even with extensive mods installed in Sims 3 and before that I installed basegame and AMB and it loads perfectly. I'm beginning to think that having additional 3 addons might be the culprit. Fishing problem, groceries problem, planting problem, sometimes when invited a sims they got stuck at my sims lot, tried to interact but failed, so use the magic word "resetsim blablabla" Noticed that it will have impact if a simbot was around, and many more you name it. Or perhaps some of the mods might be the cause, IDK.

20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]
After reading "the missing sims" now I feel "unsafe" to travel elsewhere other than staying in Twinbrook.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Base game, WA, Ambitions

2. What game version/patch level?
4.2

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
All active sims. See below.

4. Do they have an icon or not?
No icon.

5. Do you have any UI issues?
No.

6. - 12.
The issue was entirely unrelated to travelling. I noticed it when I sent a sim on vacation, though. On arrival there were no active sims and no icons. I've investigated a bit and the entire active household was null, so the sims didn't actually transfer to the vacation world. The TravelData still had the travellers' IDs, but trying to recover them only made the game crash with an access violation. In the affected savegames it's also impossible to access the vacation worlds via the edit town menu. The game will appear to load the vacation world, but then just jump back to the home world.

I can narrow the time when the damage occured down to a time-frame of about 2-3 hours of actual playing. There was no travelling in that time. The savegame was still ok when the sims came back from their last vacation and I did nothing special afterwards.

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
Not in that savegame, i.e. not until the damage was already done. I have a couple scripting mods in the game, but since I wrote them I know quite well that they couldn't cause damage like that.

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
EAxian Story Progression in that savegame.

17. What things have you tried
Resetting all sims, resetting all objects, using a couple of EAxian fixup methods, AwesomeMod's fixall. With no success. Every "investigative" code that supposedly came near the damage made the game crash.

18. What worked?
Deleting townies, residents, service NPCs, basically every sim I could get a grip on, except my active sims. I ran out of patience, but the damage was either in the ties of my active household to an inactive household or one of the inactive households/sims was severely borked. Someone with more patience might have chosen a more delicate approach, i.e. deleting a single or only a few households at a time to figure out which one was actually borked.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
--- Base, WA, Loft
2. What game version/patch level?
--- 3.5.8.007001
3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
--- None
4. Do they have an icon or not?
--- No because the UI is gone
5. Do you have any UI issues?
---Absolutely. It is gone and I cannot retrieve using F10 per readme file
6. Were the sims traveling?
--- The "parents" just got back from a trip to Egypt. They walked into the house and began interacting with the family. I then saved the game and exited.
7. How many traveling?
--- 2
8. How are all travellers related?
--- Married
9. Which country are the sims in?
--- Egypt
10. How many days?
--- 6 but I called and ended the vacation on the 4th day (for both) - too boring!
11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
--- Prematurely - together
12. Returning together or separate?
--- Together
13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
--- Neither
14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
--- Isn't story progression part of the game (unless you choose otherwise)? So I guess I'm using EA's...not using a mod except I've had a mod that changes up the time spent being a child but I've been using it for weeks with no side effects.
15. When did the issue start?
--- Started this evening. I played the game this afternoon...vacation, early departure (parents only), went home, saved game, quit, resumed later in the evening, no family thumbnail then no UI.
16. What were your sims doing?
--- This is something with the launch so I'm guessing my sims weren't doing anything! :-)
17. What things have you tried
--- Tried punching in a bunch of keys, F10 per the readme file didn't work, Alt+Enter to switch to window mode and back didn't change it, restarted computer, testingcheatsenabled true/false...
18. What worked?
--- So far...nothing!
19. What didn't work?
--- So far ... everything!
20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]
--- I've not removed CC simply because the problem has occured without there being any change to the game...no updates, no additions or removals, etc. Prior to this neighborhood, I was playing the NH that came with the game and a problem occured with the save and I lost ALL of the sims. However, this doesn't seem to be the same issue.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
world adventures, ambitions

2. What game version/patch level?
4.2.32.007001

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
one (possibly more since I had another household inactive in the same safegame which I can't access without the UI, obviously)

4. Do they have an icon or not?
no icon

5. Do you have any UI issues?
it's missing

6. Were the sims traveling?
not at that moment

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
neither

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
neither

15. When did the issue start?
when I started the game today; however, the last time I played the sim wouldn't change his clothes anymore (went swimming in his everyday gear) and his face was missing from his thumbnail, just the current mood background colour was visible - it seemed odd so I saved and quit

16. What were your sims doing?
when I quit - meditating

17. What things have you tried
F10, tab, alt+tab, resetSim, relaunch, relaunch, relaunch

18. What worked?
nothing

19. What didn't work?
F10, tab, alt+tab (it did maximize/minimize but could not solve my problem), resetSim, relaunch, installing High End Loft Style, crying and swearing

20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]
while launching, there was no family icon picture either, just the ea customary one. when I enter the lot of the missing sim, I can't use page up/down to access another floor, I cannot click on any items exept for the lights.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
WA, Loft, Ambitions

2. What game version/patch level?
4.2.32.....

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
None

4. Do they have an icon or not?
No icon

5. Do you have any UI issues?
No

6. Were the sims traveling?
No

7. How many traveling?
None

8. How are all travellers related?
_

9. Which country are the sims in?
_

10. How many days?
_

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
_

12. Returning together or separate?
_

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
Both

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
Twallan's Story Progression

15. When did the issue start?
Happened for the first time weeks ago, so I started a new fresh game in Twinbrook, and then it happened again yesterday

16. What were your sims doing?
One was at work (Twallan's Family career)
the other was drawing an architecture concept
Other situation : Sleeping

17. What things have you tried
quit and remove some hacks then try to load that save again/load an older save

18. What worked?
load an older save and often "save as" (work sometimes but sometimes saves get corrupted again)

19. What didn't work?
hmm...everything

20. Anything else you would like to add?
(it only happens with a particular household, and it happened when I added lifetime rewards to my sims while one was at work and he had a carreer opportunity)

1. Which game(s) do you have?
All2. What game version/patch level?
Latest
3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
One missing from household of two
4. Do they have an icon or not?
No
5. Do you have any UI issues?
Yes, completely disappeared
6. Were the sims traveling?
They had got back from France the night before7. How many traveling?
Two from same household
8. How are all travellers related?
Two elder roomies
9. Which country are the sims in?
Sunset Valley
10. How many days?
8
11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over? When the trip was over
12. Returning together or separate? Together
13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod? No
14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story? Just normal ageing
15. When did the issue start? They went to bed after arriving home from trip, i exited and saved game. The next day when I loaded game the issues were there. The sim that had disappeared wasn't there and her bed was made.16. What were your sims doing? Sleeping
17. What things have you tried Nothing really, the remaining sim i can control and get to do clickable things.
18. What worked?
19. What didn't work?
20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre] When I wanted the disappeared sim to go to bed (before the problems happened) she couldn't get into the bed for some reason and i had to delete the bed and buy a new one. She then went to bed ok and i exited.

1. Which game(s) do you have? Sims 3 and World Adventures, for Mac

2. What game version/patch level? v. 1.00.004169

3. How many sims are missing/invisible? One sim was temporarily invisible.

4. Do they have an icon or not? Yes, plumbob was visible.

5. Do you have any UI issues? No.

6. Were the sims traveling? Yes.

7. How many traveling? One.

8. How are all travellers related? N/A

9. Which country are the sims in? France

10. How many days? Three (VISA level 0, first trip to France)

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over? Quit game without saving.

12. Returning together or separate? N/A

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod? I have only one mod, the Excavate fix, and only the base game, official content, and World Adventures installed - no downloads from the Exchange, no other mods.

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story? No.

15. When did the issue start? Immediately on arrival in France my sim was invisible.

16. What were your sims doing? In "arrival" mode, then started to walk into bookshop.

17. What things have you tried? I immediately quit the game without saving.

18. What worked? That seemed to work, when I reloaded my sim was back home and visible.

19. What didn't work? Didn't try anything else - panicked and quit game.

20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre] iMac 2.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2 GB 800 MHz DDR2 SDRAM, ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro, OS 10.5.8. I have the graphics settings in the game on the default installation settings.

unfortunately, i'm experiencing this problem right now.


1. Which game(s) do you have?
world adventures, ambitions and high end loft stuff.

2. What game version/patch level?
4.2

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
my one sim in my current saved game went missing.

4. Do they have an icon or not?
no.

5. Do you have any UI issues?
all traces of the u.i are completely gone/invisible. the game looks like it does when you press 'tab', although pressing tab again doesn't work.

6. Were the sims traveling?
nope.

7. How many traveling?

8. How are all travellers related?

9. Which country are the sims in?
twinbrook.

10. How many days?

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?

12. Returning together or separate?

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
i'm using naraas master controller.

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
ea story progression.

15. When did the issue start?
just right now, actually. my sim was going to work on a vaccination or something at a health clinic in the park (she's a paramedic) but while she was going there i had to quit and save my game because the sound wasn't working. after uninstalling/reinstalling my sound drivers and whatnot, i returned to the game but i noticed before when i was saving it, it took a particularly long time. before i reloaded it i also moved some unmerged packages from my mods folder into another folder on my desktop. i deleted a 'young adult babysitter' mod as well, but i know that it didn't cause the game to mess up because i closed the game and put the package back. it didn't bring the ui back or anything.

16. What were your sims doing?
just on her way to the park to give a vaccination or something. i never experienced health clinics in my game before, so honestly i was a bit excited for that.

17. What things have you tried
removing a package file, but now i think i'm just going to experiment with removing other things and see what happens.

18. What worked?
nothing so far.

19. What didn't work?
removing one package file.

20. Anything else you would like to add?

1. Base Game, World Adventures, Ambitions.

2. Newest (1.14, 2.0.86, -, 4.2).

3. Entire neighborhood (56 Sims according to the Invisible Sim fix from twallan's DebugEnabler).

4. No icon when clicking on the household in Edit Town. Otherwise don't know.

5. No.

6. Not when it happened and I only traveled (Egypt) once the second time it happened, but saved and switched households and loaded that household again afterwards without any problems. The first time it happened I never traveled in The Sims 3 in my entire life...

7. (1)

8. (-)

9. (Neighborhood is Riverview.)

10. (-)

11. (Returned prematurely.)

12. (-)

13. No.

14. twallan's Story Progression

15. Beginning of this week (02. - 05. Aug. 2010) and again today (08. Aug. 2010).

16. Sleeping, in both cases.

17. Loading up a copy of the same savegame (was also corrupted). twallan's DebugEnabler fix. Deleting cache-files (the 4 regulars and the contents of the WorldCache folder (which caused the saves to be unloadable)). Restarting (also rebooting PC...) and reloading several times. ResetSim. Evicting. Changing household.

18. twallan's DebugEnabler fix (but unsatisfactory to me).

19. Everything else.

20. Well... Seeing as this issue seems to happen quite randomly, I do not want to confuse people with my version of the story... but here goes anyway: It happened in both instances with one Sim in the Stylist profession who happens to be heavily tattooed. After doing a few makeovers, in both instances I did a makeover that crashed to desktop after completion (at the loading screen that gets you back into the game). The first time, upon loading the game up again, it happened, but the second time, after loading after the crash there was no problem. I kept on doing some makeovers, went to bed, saved the game with everything fine, the next day I loaded up (with the Stylist Sim still active) and the entire neighborhood was invisible. I don't know if these crashes have anything to do with it, but I doubt it, as I do not get to save whatever repercussions there might be if I crash to desktop...

Also, I can move the invisible Sims around and have them do stuff, but whenever I try to make them shower or change their outfit (anything that affects their outfit), they stand there, frozen and I can't cancel the action (I can cross it out, but it stays there with the red x over the action).


21. Mods installed: jonha's sliderhack, some sliders, twallan's WrittenWord, Woohooer and StoryProgression, jonha's (possibly outdated) random baby gender mod and Rothchild's Ambitions no mosaic




EDIT
Update: About 2 days of (irregular) gameplay now. With the other two savegames it took me about a day to get the neighborhood invisible. This time no problems. Difference is that I completely stayed away from the Stylist profession and Makeovers so far. (Also didn't travel yet but I don't think that's the issue.)
Update 2: Still nothing, still not doing makeovers and Stylist profession. Playing as usual.

1. Which game(s) do you have?

Everything up to and including Ambitions.

2. What game version/patch level?

Newest (1.14, 2.0.86, -, 4.2)

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?

Four, but I've also had this happen with just one sim.

4. Do they have an icon or not?

No.

5. Do you have any UI issues?

I have no UI at all, so yes.

6. Were the sims traveling?

Yes.

7. How many traveling?

One on one occasion, four on the other.

8. How are all travellers related?

Mom, dad, and two kids.

9. Which country are the sims in?

I don't remember the first instance. On the second they were travelling from Sunset Valley to Shang Simla.

10. How many days?

Three on the first instance, 12 on the second.

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?

No.

12. Returning together or separate?

In both instances they were going out, not home, but I have had glitchy/crashy behaviour when returning home several times (always together).

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?

AwesomeMod.

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?

Awesome Story.

15. When did the issue start?

I began playing last week, so -- last week.

16. What were your sims doing?

Travelling.

17. What things have you tried

Deleting cache files, making sure no custom content is in Shang Simla or on the travelling sims, and eliminating all unnecessary mods.

18. What worked?

Nothing. The game still has no UI.

19. What didn't work?

All of it -- I'm not convinced that this issue is custom content or cache related at all, and my computer certainly is capable of running the game (and possibly, the galaxy).

20. Anything else you would like to add?

Thank you for trying to sort this out. I shall be watching this thread like a hawk.

1. Which game(s) do you have? world adventures

2. What game version/patch level? 2.09.10.007001

3. How many sims are missing/invisible? 1 was missing.

4. Do they have an icon or not? no

5. Do you have any UI issues? yes but only with one family.

6. Were the sims traveling? yes

7. How many traveling? 4

8. How are all travellers related? mother, father, son, son, son, and some roommate.

9. Which country are the sims in? sunset valley. they visited all of the other worlds earlier.

10. How many days? egypt:3 france:3 china:3 (they traveled to china twice)

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over? once prematurely. the rest once it was over.

12. Returning together or separate? together

13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod? no

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story? no

15. When did the issue start? a few days ago

16. What were your sims doing? just standing there. one of them was carrying a baby

17. What things have you tried? resstarting computer, restarting game

18. What worked? nothing. still no ui

19. What didn't work? everything.

20. Anything else you would like to add? i hope u can think of a way to help. thanks for everything.

I have a workaround for this problem, or at least some instances of it -- hope it can help track the underlying issue!

1. Save before travelling out.
2. If arriving OK -- enjoy. If the UI is missing, however, quit without saving.
3. Reload game from last save.
4. Play 1 day at home, then travel to -another- destination. I.e., if you were going to China, pick France instead.
5. Enjoy vacation.
6. Return home, wait 48 hours, travel to original destination.

It seems that sometimes, something in the destination files get corrupted, but that if you wait a bit you can overwrite the corrupted file with a new one by visiting another destination in the meantime.

1. Which game(s) do you have? Base game
2. What game version/patch level? 1.14
3. How many sims are missing/invisible? 15-20
4. Do they have an icon or not? Some don't
5. Do you have any UI issues? Yes
6. Were the sims traveling? No
7. How many traveling? N/a
8. How are all travellers related? N/a
9. Which country are the sims in? N/A
10. How many days? N/A
11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over? N/A
12. Returning together or separate? N/A
13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod? No, but I am using the Baxim's Extended Game Core.
14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story? No, I am using Nraas's story progression mod and Nrass's Overlord mod.
15. When did the issue start? It happened for the first time two months ago and so I started a new game and it happened again.
16. What were your sims doing? Both times my sims where just at their house. The first time the affected sim was sleeping. The second time the affected sim was just standing still.
17. What things have you tried? Both times it happened after creating a new sim family. The first time I saved my game and when I reloaded I entered my original SIm houshold that had two girls living there and though both where still in the house, one of them was unselectable and stuck in bed. Their icon was missing from the left hand corner, and there was varios graphical glitches with the UI. When I checked the town view I noticed 90% of my sims where gone and their houses empty. Only the Goths, Bunches, the last family I had created, and the two girls where left. I copied my main household and placed them in a new town. That seemed to work for about two months when the same thing happened all over again but this time it was a different family that had three of the five family members unselectable and a messed up UI. Just like before the majority of the other households where gone. This time though I reloaded my backup save which restored all of the missing households, but oddly enough the one household still has unselectable sims.
18. What worked? Reloading a backup save will bring back housholds but not fix the UI, or make unselectable sims selectable.
19. What didn't work? Clearing known caches, starting a new town worked at first, but eventually the same problem occurred.
20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre] The fact that reloading a backup save doesn't 100% fix the problem means that there is a cache somewhere which is corrupted. The cache file would have to be specifically keeping track of housholds. I have tried deleting all of the known caches, with no luck. I am going to try pulling out my saves and saved sims, reinstalling the game and reinserting the saves.

There seems to be two seperate issues. One dealing with traveling in world adventures and the other with the base game. The base game glitch causes Sims to become unselectable even though they are still in the household. This glitch also effects the rest of the town causing some or all of the residence to dissappear. Nothing seems to effect this glitch. Unknown if it is a mod conflict, but removing CC has no effect. Could be related to the Dressed Baby Doll virus. Reloading older saves that where originally in good condition only returns missing family's but main household with unselectable sims still borked. This points to a cache file but deleting standard caches has no effect.

UPDATE: Removed game saves and saved sims, unistalled game then reinstalled, updated game and then placed saves back into game. Loaded saves and three of the sims of the five in household are still unselectable, and have missing UI elements (no picture of the sim, no moodlets, and non of the personal tabs like career and so on.

The reason all of this is so odd is that no matter what save of this town I load the glitch is added to it in the exact same way. The save I'm using now, loaded without glitch when I first made it. It then was saved as a backup and I made a new save. This glitch is localized inside of your game save yet some how spreads to any save of that town. Basically this should be impossible. If one save is currupted there is no reason for the game to then put that curruption into other game saves unless it was a cache, which it is not because I reinstalled the game which clears every single cache known to baby jesus. The only remaining possibility is that Maxis designed the save system to access multible saves and insert code even if that save is not being activly used. What ever the glitch is it has some how burrowed into both my current and backup saves at the same time. Though I would like to make clear that other towns I have saved are not effected. Only saves refering to this one town.

Also something to note is the the family can not be moved or evicted but they can be saved and then replanted. the only problem being that the original sims will still be there.

UPDATE: The cause may have been found. Desecrate's weapons system seems to be the linking factor. I'm not saying it is broken or buggy but it may conflict with other things. Both households that bugged out both had just gotten a gun that is used with the mod. I have removed and will see if it resolves the problem. I never put two and two together till now.

1. Which game(s) do you have?
Sims 3 World Adventures
2. What game version/patch level?
The regular one
3. How many sims are missing/invisible?
4.
4. Do they have an icon or not?
Nope
5. Do you have any UI issues?
6. Were the sims traveling?
Yes
7. How many traveling?
4
8. How are all travellers related?
Mom and two teenage kids plus her little sister
9. Which country are the sims in?
Egypt
10. How many days?
6
11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
Not at all
12. Returning together or separate?
N\A
13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?
no
14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?
no
15. When did the issue start?
Last night
16. What were your sims doing?
They arrived in egypt and never really got there.
17. What things have you tried
I tried saving and then restarting the game the next day (reboot)
18. What worked?
nothing
19. What didn't work?
I can no longer view that family.
20. Anything else you would like to add?[/pre]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As an overview, it has been happening a lot since 1.14, it happens to me multiple times a day and there is nothing that I can do to recover from it short of start a new game.

1. Which game(s) do you have?

All

2. What game version/patch level?

1.14

3. How many sims are missing/invisible?

Usually all in my family except my main Sim and sometime him too.

4. Do they have an icon or not?

Usually all in my family are missing their icon except my main Sim and sometime him too.

5. Do you have any UI issues?

Zoom from map view won't work with a mouse click on the ground. Sim panel won't pop out by click or hotkey. Usually can't click on self. Just a grey arrow, no balloon indicating I'm not available or anything.

6. Were the sims traveling?

No.

7. How many traveling?

zero

8. How are all travellers related?

n/a

9. Which country are the sims in?

n/a

10. How many days?

n/a

11. Did the sim(s) return via the phone prematurely or only when the vacation was over?
12. Returning together or separate?
13. Are you using SuperComputer or AwesomeMod?

SC

14. Are you using EA Story Progression, Twallan's Story Progression, or Awesome Story?

Twallan

15. When did the issue start?

1.14

16. What were your sims doing?

Something different almost every time. Different actions, different environments, different playstyles.

17. What things have you tried

Cache flush, process of elimination, remove all mods, remove Sim 3 folder, fresh installs.

18. What worked?

Nothing.

19. What didn't work?

Everything.

20. Anything else you would like to add

It is as if most custom content will "infect" my save game. am 99% sure that nothing will fix my game once it hits this state. Avoidance is the only preventative solution and I am convinced that any core modifier will eventually wreck my game. Awesome, MC, tunable core, will all do it. Sliders have been the likely game breaker too. However, note that I suspect that it is very possible that a custom Sim could be the culprit as unlikely as that may seem.

I'm determined to do as many clean reinstalls necessary to figure it out. My next project will be to use minimal Nraas mods and zero custom Sims. No sliders, no makeup, only a few hair styles and very little clothing.

Of course once I figure it out, the next expansion will be here and I will have new train wrecks to clean up.