The Sims 2 Presents: Foster's Valley!

[Sparky]

Oh by the way, I never did hear back from EA. Guess they didn't want women, or people who didn't have Bon Voyage, didn't own a Wii or something. If they're looking for something specific it'd have been cool of them to say "are you blah blah, then email us" rather than asking for your name/age, what Sims titles you own, and what consoles you play...whatever.

[Cassini90125]

In the mind of the Simmaster, earlier today...

I wish I could figure this out. Why won't it load? Okay, next attempt. Dorispepsi recolors deleted, defrag completed, net unplugged so that vicious little spybot can't do anything... what else can I do? Maybe if I jettison my custom neighborhoods, it might help... (drags custom neighborhood files to desktop) ...Foster's Valley, Downshire, Aridia, Crescent Bay, Autumn Coast, all removed to desktop. Eh, I'll leave Aridia in, there's only a few Sims there and they've never been played; if the game loads I might be able to package them and get 'em out of there, maybe resettle them on my old system. Okay, in goes the disk, now we wait. And wait. And wait. Up to two loading bars now. That's as far as it ever gets before it stalls. Time to go make a sandwich... (departs room; prepares and eats a turkey on whole wheat sandwich; returns) ...Let's see - hello! Five loading bars! C'mon, just one to go... there it is! Now, do I see - yes, there it is, the "Custom Content Enabled" screen. Click, it goes away, and well look at that. The "Neighborhood Browser" window. There they are; Riverblossom Hills, Pleasantview, Strangetown, Veronaville, and Aridia. Now, can I actually enter any of them? Guess I'll start with Aridia. Or should I try one of the others? Maybe Pleasantview? (mind starts to race.) Sarah's in Pleasantview. (heart starts to race.) I could get Sarah out. "OH MY STARS I COULD GET SARAH OUT! HANG ON HONEY, I'M COMING!!!" (clicks Pleasantview) I don't believe I just yelled that. Idiots upstairs must think I'm crazy. I don't care, they're a bunch of as- why is this taking so long!?!? Load, dammit, load! (fidgets). C'mon, lo- there it is! I can see Pleasantview! The Tomlinsons, the Hamlins, The Chamberlyns, Wayne Goulet, Bianca Modron, - there. Sarah Sussman. (clicks to activate the packaging program). Oh, please, this has to work, it's got to work... it's taking so long. She was my first Sim, her file must be huge by now. This has got to work. How can a single woman living in a small house take so long to package? Please, this has to work. If I can only save one, please, let me save Sarah. Please. She was my first...



The scream of pure joy was heard throughout the Simmaster's building. Sarah's file, all 150+ megabytes, had been packaged and saved.

Over the next two and a half hours, all the Sims in five neighborhoods were packaged and moved to the safety of the F: drive. Whether or not their neighborhoods, or the remaining four neighborhoods and their inhabitants, can also be saved remains an unanswered question. But for at least some, there will be another chance.

[antgirl1]

Woo hoo!! Foster's Valley and Everywhere Else has been saved by Cassini!

[jekylljuice]

That's good to hear. It would be a shame if the Foster's Valley Sims were to completely disappear. I don't think I ever took the opportunity to comment upon them while I had the chance, but I always got a real kick out of reading every new update on the Foster's characters' Sim counterparts. Here's to hoping we'll be seeing more from them soon.

[Nyo]

WOOHOO!

In your face, SecuROM! (I can't beleive I said that >_>)

[Cassini90125]

Uh, guys? Maybe you'd better reread my last post. Foster's Valley was dragged onto my desktop; it wasn't one of the neighborhoods that was loaded. It may load when I drag it back to the Sims 2 folder, but it may not. The neighborhood has some additional issues which aren't connected to SecuROM. As an experiment I copied it to my old system and installed it there, where it did load after a long time. The fact that my old system could handle it at all is astonishing, but it didn't handle it too well. I was unable to see the neighborhood itself, but I was able to click on the various houses when the mouse pointer passed over where they would be, and eventually I was able to locate and enter Foster's. The residents and the interior of the house do not look the same as in the pics you've seen, because the downloads folders on each system don't have the same content; Wilt's skin, for example, isn't red on my old system, and his hair is different, too. I can't run the house or the Valley there because they're just too large for the old system to handle. However, the fact that it loaded there at all is encouraging. What I've been doing today is cleaning out the downloads folder on my main system, getting rid of duplicate items and other stuff I'll never use, in order to lighten the load the system has to deal with and hopefully shorten the loading time (which is currently around 10-15 minutes). When I'm done with that, I'll drag the Valley back to it's proper folder, activate the game, and hope for the best. Hopefully it'll run; when I left for San Diego I left a number of Sims in sort of cliffhanger situations, including Wilt, and I'd kind of like to resolve some of this stuff.

[jekylljuice]

Fiddlesticks. Well, best of luck with that. I applaud you for your dedication.

[Lynnie]

Ugh, I understand the frustration and worry all too well. Here's wishing you the best of luck on that, Cass.

[antgirl1]

I must pray for the best.

[Cassini90125]

The Valley successfully loaded earlier this week. I have spent the past few days using the packaging subprogram to get everybody out; I expect to finish sometime later today. Getting everyone into a new neighborhood without bringing along the problems that afflicted the old one is another story entirely, as doing so will require the use of a third-party program ("SimPE") that manipulates the game data in ways that the designers never meant it to be manipulated. However, I've successfully used the program for this purpose before (albeit not on this scale), so there's a fairly good chance that I can pull this off.

If anyone who's familiar with the empty neighborhood templates in the "Create Custom Neighborhood" window wants to make a recommendation or two, now would be the time to do it.