I'm playing on Super Collection for Mac and my Pleasantview keeps getting stuck on the loading screen. I tried some fixes with batbox in my backup as this solved the problem last time I had this issue, and it's helped temporarily but I keep running into the same issue and having to apply the same fix constantly.

The issue that keeps coming up on batbox is under fix/disabled autonomy- every time I fix this it reappears later in the play session. Even if I fix this issue at several points in a play session it's still only been intermittently successful in stopping the loading problem and I keep having to restore backups- I'm currently backing up after every time I finish playing a household.

I've also tried increasing my file limit and removing some files, but the problem still persists.

Does anyone know where the 'disabled autonomy' issue comes from and if it's a sign of something bigger going wrong/how to fix it more permanently?

Specs:
MacOS Monterey
Processor-1.6 GHz Dual-Core Intel Core i5
Memory-16 GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3
Graphics- Intel UHD Graphics 617 1536 MB

Turn on debug mode and post the error log.

Thanks for replying! Sorry if this is a dumb question but where do I find the error log? No errors are actually popping up in debug mode, the problem doesn't show up until it actually freezes when trying to open the neighbourhood, unless I check for it on batbox which is where the 'disabled autonomy' option comes up under the fix menu.

If there's no error popping up in debug mode, then there isn't an error. Are you sure you're actually waiting long enough for the neighborhood to load? Disabled autonomy is just a flag that some sims can have set for whatever reason, it doesn't cause errors or loading issues.

Ok thanks, the app's saying 'not responding' when it freezes during loading but I'll try loading it for longer and see if I have any luck. I've had the issue before because of corrupt memories and clearing those with batbox solved it, but can't find any of those now and I'm clearing gossip regularly as well so idk.

I've tried leaving the neighbourhood to load for a long time while I do other things, and it's definitely not loading. I now can't seem to play at all without it freezing the next time I play (whereas before I managed to restore backups and get it to work again for a few more rounds) so idk if that means it's some corruption that was just taking a while to take hold?

Update: I set up a bootcamp partition to run hoodchecker; however when I try to load the neighbourhood with the version I ran through hoodchecker the game crashes entirely.

Do you have your computer set up to save your files to cloud storage automatically? For example iCloud.

Does this happen for all neighbourhoods or just this one?

Yes, I think I have it set to backup to iCloud.


Seems to just be Pleasantview.

I've attached the hoodchecker report in case that's helpful (forgot to attach it before).

Does your iCloud backup of the neighbourhood have the same number of files in it as the original copy does?

It looks like a lot of data was missing from your hood, so I wonder whether you hit the process file limit or perhaps a cloud synch caused an issue? Check whether your iCloud is set to synchronise automatically, or on a schedule. If you are playing, the game is writing data to the hard drive whenever you load, save or exit a lot. If the cloud is synching when this happens it's possible that data could be incomplete or oldversioned, if two processes are reading and writing to the file at once.

Just checked and it turns out my mac is synced but my desktop and documents are not, so I don't have a copy of my sims files on iCloud:

Not sure if it's automatic or on a schedule, it doesn't say anything about a schedule so I'd assume it might be automatic?


I do have manual backups so I'll have a look through those. I did wonder about the file limit (although I have adjusted it to be higher) but I tried removing some files and my game's previously run fine with more files than I currently have- unless I hit the file limit a while ago and didn't realise at the time/didn't see the effects straight away, in which case it becomes a problem of isolating when it happened.

Ok, I've done some digging through my backups, mainly looking at ones I've marked red because there was an issue with playing from that version- some of which were issues that appeared to be resolved at the time. One backup in particular had a much lower number of files than expected- only 13,920 compared with the 53,835 of the backup immediately prior (which obviously would've been the one I restored when the broken one stopped working) and the 53,836 of the backup immediately after. My file limit per process is a little over 61,000 by default and I've adjusted it to be 100,000, so file limit doesn't appear to be the issue as far as I can tell.

I'm going to try running the backup with the low file number through hoodchecker, as well as the ones immediately before and after, and see if the results differ. I'll also see if I can find out which files specifically are missing from that version and if they match what was missing from my latest version of the hood.

You just need to compare the number of files in the actual neighbourhood file, not your downloads etc as well. What I was looking for was, have you lost some files from the neighbourhood? Also remember that the process limit will include all of the game data files too, as well as your userdata.

Ok, in the neighbourhood file there were a few files lost after I ran it through hoodchecker (my last backup had 42,556 and the version I ran through hoodchecker has 42,550). However my older backups from when the freezing issue started and just before don't seem to have this issue. The only other backup that has this issue is the scrapped one from further back I mentioned above, which only has 1,177- the backups before and after this are normal again.


Yes, sorry, I should've communicated that more clearly- my game data files come to 6,410, so my total still adds up to be under the file limit even before I adjusted it.

Are there any character files missing? Lots, screenshots etc., can be added and removed, but there should be a character file for each sim.

The character files all seem to be intact. Interestingly it lists 870 character files but when I view the characters listed it only goes from 0-857, I looked into this and there are a few character files which seem to be repeats, i.e. there's 'N001_User00838.package' and then 'N001_User00838.1.package'. I don't know if this is normal or if it might indicate a problem?

There's a problem. That's a split character file, and it may or may not cause trouble later.

The FIRST thing to check is, if you have SimPE and if so where is it located. If it's UNDER your game folder (The SimsTM2...), move it (the whole SimPE folder and everything in it) out from under - you can leave it right under EA Games if you like, as the game can't find it there. I had a lot of grief with split character files one time when SimPE had accidentally slid under my game folder (that was not where I put it originally, and not where I wanted it). Moving the whole SimPE folder out from under resolved the problem and it hasn't recurred.

If that isn't the reason, I'm sure other people have additional suggestions.

I don't have SimPE as I'm playing on Mac, thanks anyway for the suggestion though.

That's fine, split character files aren't a problem and are the way the game deals with characters when one part of the character data is overridden. For example, I have mods which allow townies and NPCs to use the fat body shape, so quite often I will see split character files if a fat butler with is generated. The game deals with split character files just fine, it's just that some programs (such as SimPE) can have difficulty displaying them in some instances. There should be no problem for playing, but of course they do increase your file count!

I think then that perhaps, if you can use your backup version of the game, as the hood checker version crashes, you'll need to revert to that. One final test- keep a safe backup copy! Drag your entire Documents/EAGames/ The Sims 2 folder to the desktop. Run the game so that it generates a fresh set of userdata, without any mods in. Now, close the game and copy your backup of the neighbourhood into the Neighborhoods folder that has just been generated. Run the game and load the neighbourhood. Does it load now? (Without mods, the game should have fewer files to load. So this will tell us if either we are hitting the file limit, or if there is a mod or CC that is causing the loading to stall).

Success! Tried this and while the hoodchecker version still crashed and my latest backup still froze, the backup before that seems to be working ok so far (I only played a few short test rounds, but given that before it was starting to freeze again after one round every time I restored that backup, it looks promising).

Sorting through/cutting down all my CC is going to be a struggle though, half of it is stuff I brought over from a previous game and I have no idea what it is from the file names.

Thanks so much for all your help!

Try doing the 50% method- divide your mods in half and see which half causes the issue, then divide that in half and so on.

Game Help:Finding Problem Custom Content^wiki
Remember of course to keep a safe copy, and once you've sorted out the problem, put the safe copy back.

Ok, I've divided my mods and each half seems to work individually; it also doesn't seem to be a file limit issue as I managed to cut about 1000 files from my downloads folder (mostly from deleting excess subfolders) without it making a difference and the file number doesn't seem to be going up at all between the backup that works and the point it starts freezing, so I'm assuming it's a mod conflict.

I tried running my downloads through HDCU Plus on bootcamp to look for conflicts and a few came up, but even after resolving these the problem is persisting. I also tried downloading SiMidge in case this picks up a conflict that HDCU missed, but I can't get it to work on my Super Collection files even after transferring them to bootcamp (I think because there's no objects package in the mac version afaik, or at least I can't find out where it's located).

I'll keep testing with the 50% method to try and find the conflict, unless there's some workaround for using SiMidge on Super Collection files?

After continuing with the 50% method, it doesn't seem like it's a mod conflict after all as different combinations of the files all seem to be working- it's only when they're all in that there's a problem, so ig it must be the file limit after all. I would've thought removing some files would make a slight difference in how long it works for but presumably it was already at the file limit even in my working backup and I just didn't cut enough files to make a difference.

Most of my file bloat seems to come from excess snapshots in my storytelling folder, so I'm working on deleting those. The problem is I use the family album feature a lot for story purposes so I don't want to delete snapshots en masse from the folder itself- I can't tell from there which snapshots I've actually used in the album and which ones are excess, so I don't want to delete from there and accidentally get rid of the ones I need (even with a backup it would take ages to find the right ones to put back in).

Because of this I'm currently just deleting excess snapshots individually in game, which is going to take a while as there's so many. Is there a way to select multiple snapshots to delete at once from within the game?

The snapshots are just .jpg files, so you could move the snapshot folder outside your game folder and sort them out later. Also, check for backup files (.bkp or .bak or similar) - they are usually unnecessary too.

I don't think there's any way of bulk deleting images in game, easier through the file explorer.

What you could do, as you have Bootcamp set up with a Windows partition, is to use this program to make your story albums:
https://modthesims.info/d/60033
That way, you could completely remove them from your gamedata files, but continue to make the stories and keep track of your sims' histories. Their current site is here, if you want to see screenshots:
http://www.geocities.ws/coltswalker/s2album/index.html