Corrupted Saves?

[hedgekat]

I just got the game (purchased) this month and started having problems with crashing as soon as I started patching.  I have tried deleting cache files, monitoring temp, and reinstalling.  Computer specs are well above minimums.  Problem started before adding any CC and no mods.  I patched up to 1.7 with each patch making crashing worse.

After reinstalling I patched to 1.3 only  and added a few hairs plus nomosaic.  Played fine for a while then started crashing again.   Removed saved games and started a new one. Played fine for two days then crashed again.  And this time the saves won't even load.  A save I had backed up to desktop will load and I can start a new game and that save will load  but others drop to desktop. 

Something appears to be corrupting saved games.  Is there anything I can do to stop this occurring or to repair the corrupted games?    I found the decrapify thread but it doesn't really seem to apply to such a vanilla game.

[The_Goddess]

Problem started before adding any CC and no mods. 
   I found the decrapify thread but it doesn't really seem to apply to such a vanilla game.

I'm confused; are you even using AwesomeMod?  Shouldn't you be sending hate mail to EA?

[hedgekat]

No, I hadn't gotten to the point of using ANY mods.  I wanted to see what the vanilla game was like before modding it.

I am simply trying to find out if there is any way to prevent of fix corrupted game saves. 

I have no intention of sending hate mail to anyone.

[Tangie]

Are you getting any error messages when saving? The reason I ask is that when I get an error 12, I just exit the game, go to my Saves file in the Electronic Arts directory in my My Docs folder, and delete my game - it's easy to spot because it will have been renamed with an extension that says .bad. Bad file is bad. I delete it and that automatically creates a copy of the game from the back-up file. I just re-start and my game will be there. You might want to go take a look at your saves to see if you actually have .bad game files.

I've only experienced one instance of being unable to open a saved game, and that was with a custom world. I don't know what happened and I haven't attempted to use that world since, so I don't know for sure but it might have to do with creating the game and then installing HELS. Playing old saves after updating seems to be problematic for many people, but since you're creating new ones I don't know what's going on.

I can tell you though that I get a lot of crashing since installing HELS and the latest patches, plus various bugs and quirks that can be very irrating. In addition to the occasional error 12, I've recently experienced the basement/pool tool crashing problem, and yesterday I rotated through some created sims that I placed in my neighborhood and I experienced two instances of instant aging to elder status. In one case it was probably a delayed normal aging but in the other I know darn well that both sims were close in age and now one of them is an elder way before the other.

Anyway, I digress. I find that frequent saving helps. I try to save every 15 minutes or less. Also save often if you are adding items to the household or remodeling a lot. The game seems to have difficulty with trying to save a large number of changes all at once. Yesterday I lost an entire remodeled basement because the game crashed when trying to save it all at once. So for me at least, the crashing seems routine at this point. The game's a mess, and yet they're busy working on another EP. 

[ciane]

I'd suspect the hairs. If the hairs were made with tools that were pre-patches or post-patches, they can affect the game (or maybe it is just their really high poly count). Really, with Sims 3, it doesn't seem to be just the mods that you need to test. Objects cloned from certain items or with early versions of tools caused the blue lots that totally toasted neighborhoods. So, first take out those custom hairs and test again.

I use the CFF-Explorer to keep my game from crashing or getting those errors on saves, but I removed certain hairs from my mods folder as well. With them in, the game would crash when I used them. Without them, I had no crashing. Maybe they were just the straw that broke the camel's back for me and pushed my system over 2 gigs of RAM. Anyway, without them in and with the CFF-Explorer (and no WA or HELS), I haven't had the crashing or problems saving anymore.

I did have a problem with my game when I tried the CAW tool for a few days. All three games that I played with it installed wouldn't open for me again after I uninstalled CAW. (I had used system restore to undo a windows update I didn't like.) Even when I reinstalled CAW later, those games were toast. I had to revert to the copies I had on my desktop.

[hedgekat]

No error messages of any sort when saving the game or when it crashes. The majority of crashes occurred when I clicked on a sim or something in the house and the game just disappeared.

Yesterday I played for about eight hours and had three crashes, all when trying to load a different save. (Same three saves that wouldn't load the night before.)  I set a timer and saved every 15 minutes or so but had no crashes during paly. I exited the game a couple of other times, deleted cache filies each time and re-entered to make sure my most recent save worked. I put back in the game the saves of previous games that I had removed and tested all those and had no difficulty with any of them.  So I apparently only have three saves that are so corrupted that they can't load. I wish I could figure out what I did to mess them up so I wouldn't do it again. All three were saved after I split up a family in Edit Town and moved half of them into a different house.  The save I had backed up before that move loads fine though I didn't try playing it yesterday.

As far as the hairs being the cause of crashing wouldn't it be more consistent?  I was having the crashing during game play for a week before I ever added the hairs.  I played for a couple of days with no crashes after I did add the hair.  I don't think any of them are high poly.  I like short, neat hair so none of them have a lot of sprigs sticking out or much overall mass.