More Awesome Than You!

I was surprised this morning to discover that the patch for FreeTime has been released! Only on the german TS2 site typically. Anyone dare to test it out and make sure it won't make our game explode? http://www.diesims.de/files.list.asp?id=583 (I think it has different languages)
   
The patch is now avaliable on the official The Sims 2 website: http://thesims2.ea.com/update/getpatch.php?appVersion=1.13&languageCode=

I bet it is 'Prank'. I noticed it was missing from the interaction menu.


Could they before? Yuk, never noticed that.


They sound fabulous.


Had anyone noticed this? :D

Cheers, Alex. However, I think I'll wait until it is released on the US site first.

I think those wallpapers are the pool ones, I saw someone complaining they've gone.

Correct translation of Patch Fixes.

- Sims will now remember which side of the bed is theirs to sleep on.
- Crash will no longer occur when users attempt to load another lot while associating a neighborhood using the Advanced Neighborhood Options panel.
- "Neon Flamingo" is no longer missing from Buy Mode.
- In Audio Options, Custom Station icon no longer blocks the Stop button.
- University Service NPCs are now able to join a dance contest in a Secret Hobby lot if they are not on the job.
- Sims will no longer pop back onto the screen when Sims walk to a Secret Hobby Lot.
- "Electrono-Ticket Machine" will now correctly turn off when you move a Home Buisness lot into the Lots and Houses Bin.
- Saved lots with an in progress dance contest will now reset correctly when placed into the Lots and Houses Bin.
- Sims can now watch UFOs with the "Astrowonder Telescope".
- Sims can no longer mark items for sale on top of the "Upright Pottery Wheel by QuicKraft".
- Iconic Hobbyist NPCs can now be reached by telephone after meeting them.
- "Socialus Butterfly" can now be caught for the Bug Collection.
- Sims will no longer teleport when you cancel the walk home interaction in a community lot.
- Primp interaction is no longer missing from the game.
- First woohoo memory will now occur when Sims woohoo for the first time in a tent.
- The reduced bladder effect from the "ShowMeOff Rack of Glory" will now trigger correctly when Sims are in range.
- Career outfits are now hidden in Create-A-Family.
- Sims reading a book from the cooking genre will now correctly gain Cuisine Enthusiasm.
- Preoccupation will now work correctly at level 10.
- Pets will no longer chew or scratch cribs if they are in use.
- Garden Club members are now treated as townies.
- "Afhairmediumcenterpart" hair will now appear correctly in Create-A-Family.
- "Carefree Koi Pond by Simulated Life" no longer displays an enviornment score.
- Teen and Child Sims will no longer receive the unachievable Bird Watch Want.
- College Grades in German, French, Polish, and Brazilian Portugeuse is now displayed correctly.
- The Sims 2 FreeTime credit section has been correctly updated.
- Violin Tip Jar will no longer cause an unusable tile after being picked up.
- Child Sims will no longer pop when asked to "Clean Up" the juice tray.
- Vampire Sim can no longer receive a Want to turn Bigfoot into a Vampire.
- Using the Draft Scene interaction will no longer apply a sketch filter to in-game camera snapshots.
- Parents and their children no longer have the option to flirt with each other.
- Motive decay on the "H-O-R-S-E of course Basket Ball Hoop", "The Goal of Paul", "Teeny Tikes Activity Table", and "One Man's Junk Car from Mechanically Minded" objects and Go Hiking interaction has been retuned.
- "Basic Blue" and "Gripping Green" wallpapers will now appear in Build Mode.
- Sims will no longer receive a phone call for magazine subscription at level 2 Hobby Enthusiasm.

Thanks go to saraswati for the translation :-*

I wonder about

- Teen and Child Sims will no longer receive the unachievable Bird Watch Want.

Basically this means that there is no birdwatching for teenagers. Why???

That's weird, I used it yesterday and it was there.

Usual EAxis stupidity.

It did find it weird how they were avaliable this time around.

Um, okay?

Hey I got it right. But that's just disturbing, so I'll have to try it out now!

Thank focaccia for that! It was so annoying having sims playing basketball or soccer for like, two seconds and immediately passing out, peeing themselves and starving to death.

Thanks for posting that. Still seems as if they've neglected to look at secondary aspirations though...

AFAIR bedside was borked ever since BV first came out. Why does it take more than half a year for a bunch of paid programmers to fix* it, when Pescado alone was able to provide the fix in a matter of days?  I almost assumed that increased decay of BV seashell collection was in fact an intentional feature. Some are even older bugs dating as far back as NL/OFB, like afhairmediumcenterpart hair or missing Primp. At the very least, they could yoink Pescado's fixes already, just how could that be so difficult?  ::)

* Not that I'd believe it until I install the thing myself.

Because they believe it's critical that we know who was responsible for this borked EP.

Thanks for the translation.  :)

I wonder if that is EAxis idea of a April 1st joke ...  ???

Rose

I would call prank, but there is a link to a sims2ep7 exe?

I think it's an elaborate prank, but if it's there tomorrow, I'll take it back. Until then, I don't believe it.

Maxoid Sam is listed as the producer in the FT credits I think, but he left for another project before work began on Freetime afaik so they may be referring to that.

Oh, come on. Every release date (patches included) is like April 1st to EA. They're just such jokers when it comes to taking people's money for things they can't actually deliver.

Actually the patch was released yesterday, not today. It was also reported last thing yesterday, but I only saw it this morning.

Still no fix to pottery prices (bad plates give more $ than good plates when appreciating overnight). This would be ridiculously easy to fix.
Still no fix for the occasional cops & robbers freeze, which started with Seasons.
No fix to the ballet bar, which usually has sims losing fun and energy at alarming rates.

But, thank goodness we'll now have two more fluorescent wallpapers!

I used the flamingo neon light the other day too, I wasn't aware it was missing...

You mean Sam wants to clear his name?

Maybe it was just missing in the German game? Seeing as this appears to be a German patch?

But don't most of the European versions come from a single Multi-language install? That's what I used... Of course, now I can't remember if German was included in said install, but logically it would've been. It just makes you wonder how just ONE language in a multi-language install would have this problem.

Last time, the UK site got the patch first, this time the German site.  Maybe they are using them as Guinea Pigs, to see if it borks things before releasing it in North America? Because otherwise, why not just release it to everyone at once?


Anyway, patch is right on schedule, if maybe a week early. Kitchen and Bath is due in 2 weeks, and they always patch right before the next thing they want you to buy. (and then bork those things again because the new L&P was made with the unpatched code.)

Unfortunately my attempts to get my elderly sims to flirt with their children have thus far failed, granted it was between Luis and Victor Aspir (I couldn't be bothered to load another neighborhood) but it still should have done something.

I'll try Dora Ottomas next though, seeing as that family's screwed up enough without incest coming into the equation.

Oh yay! It's almost time for a new FT Patch Borked/Patch Didn't Fix thread! The original FT Bork thread is getting long and unwieldy anyway. So, who wants to start placing bets on what the patch breaks?

Fun.
Crash will now occur when loading another neighborhood using the in-lot toolbar.
Textures removed, flamingo is now flashing blue.
"Summon Aliens" option has now disappeared.
Catching that last butterfly and then viewing the collection causes the game to freeze. Upon re-entering, the neighborhood will crash and then wipe itself from your harddrive, to be replaced by the hidden "Butterfly" neighborhood.
Lies. All lies.
Please. This is an obvious ploy by EAxis to trick players who heard of the bork into creating the collection so that all sims will be hit by an even more extreme bladder decay.
Once interacted with, a Garden Club member fails to be recognized in that role and the inspection is cancelled, giving your sim a bad memory of failing. The Garden Club member is then stuck on the lot indefinitely, as it no longer is categorized as an NPC and does not receive the "Leave" queue action.
As a bonus, it will now be silent, just like the piano is for me half the time.

Maybe because Euro 12s know how to make an error log that makes sense? Other than American 12s that are constantly saying, "I have inSim in my game and I get all kinds of weird errors! Whut? Wait for Insim update? Whut ish dis of witch jou speak?"


Again, this is something I didn't know was an issue, as my Garden Club members show up on community lots and interact with playables and townies just fine... Maybe I just didn't run into issues with them because I either ignore them or because I never marry-in nonplayables into my families.

Come to think of it, I've seen nothing but Garden Club NPCs! Actual townies have suddenly become very rare, to Bella Goth/Base game proportions. Garden club NPCs and the Paper Girl are being brought home every day. The pool wallpapers are indeed missing after all.

All FreeTime outfits hidden in Create-A-Family. Elders no longer wear career outfits.

The CS icon is now very large and blocks the entire "Audio Options" panel.

The butterfly is indeed catchable. Sims instantly get a crush on butterfly upon capture.

Sims can now WooHoo their children.

As do mine. There are a few bugs being fixed that I've not seen at all, especially the incestuous one.

I say it's time to take bets to see how long it will be before EAsshole has to release another patch to fix what that one breaks.   ;D ;)

I'm saying at least a month for now.

*Has* to release a patch?
Or actually *does*?

Those could be two different moments in time.

I noticed that in this patch they didn't fix the Pre-FT stuffit objects that are missing pie menu options. Which... being considerate enough to TRY in the first place, that they could've made sure it was done properly.

Are these your fun predictions, or what the patch is actually meant to fix, supposing it exists? Because I've had that exact thing happen. The garden club sims just acted like visitors, but when I tried to get a new inspection, they said I'd already had one, apparently. And this is just with BV.

I'd really like for my sims to have hobbies, or at least the pottery wheel and violin, but it looks like this final EP is so buggy it can't possibly be fixed or hacked better.

Prediction, but based on experience. I've had the same thing happen, except that they did eventually leave.

Many of those things are already Awesomefixed. I wouldn't bother updating until an updated noCD comes out. Otherwise SecuRom might bork your computer.

Of course there's no fix for the "craft badges taking a month to earn a friggin bronze",  AKA the one thing I haven't been able to find a hack to fix.  ARG!!  >:( But at least the CREDITS are fixed! oh my that was terrible!  ::)

It's up on the US site now. http://thesims2.ea.com/update/getpatch.php?appVersion=1.13&languageCode=

And yes, they'll patch again. Right before the mythical EP8. The 2nd one is the only patch that fixes real issues.

I was just going to ask about that. So I take that to mean that some speedy hacker hasn't made a new noCD crack yet?

I don't want to install any more patches,but also I don't want to waste anymore time searching and fixing fuckin' EAxis bugs.
Seems more reasonable simply to make extraction of correctly fixed and really needed for game BHAVs from patched version and upload them as separate mods or fixes.In this way will not be need to install stupid EAxis patches and to bring next mess in game.
From whole list I think really need may be 5-7 fixes.Will be great if somebody able to do this.

Well, the sheep over at the BBS are already complaining about patch bugs. Loads of install errors, and now apparently room service doesn't actually show up - but the sim gets charged for it. Go figure. That thing is not touching my game until (and if) it is fixed.

Room service was already borked with BV, or at least for me it was. So it looks like they maybe fixed it with the last BV patch and then reborked it with the FT patch. Nice one!

I already downloaded it. But I won't install it judging from reports here. Probably delete it.

Trust the Awesome. Don't trust EA.

I  thought I'd be a guinea pig so I tried to install it. Lo and behold: "There was an error with the installation. Please reinstall The Sims 2 FreeTime, your saved games have been immediately deleted make sure to backup your saved games folder first".

I guess our thoughts of the patch rendering the game actually unplayable weren't far off...

Now I remember why I've been playing The Sims 1 again lately...

How lovely of them. They release a patch to fix all the stuff they borked with FT, then just bork stuff up even more.

Completely agree there - Sims 1 was brilliant, never even needed 'patching'.

Yeah, I downloaded it too-and it is sitting on my desktop. I don't think I am going to install it after all.

The Sims 1 did need patching. I remember this because of the big brouhaha about needing to buy the next expansion in order to obtain the necessary patch. Yes, that's right, the patches were in the next expansion.

I will point out though that the Sims 1 was still far more stable than the Sims 2, there's no way they would've gotten away with that 'buy to patch' crap this time around, no-one would even play that long.

Sure there were numerous bugs in TS1, but at least bugs fixed in previous EPs STAYED fixed in new EP. Back in the days, Maxis had the common sense to build new EPs on the base of already fixed files, not to go back to borked old version.

The only drawback of TS1 is that to uninstall one EP, we have to uninstall the whole game and start from the scratch. I could have lived with that, given that the alternative we've got now is one humongous borkpool.

The other drawback that I recall was that Sims1 EPs had to be installed in order.  So if you bought House Party after you'd installed Hot Date, you'd have to uninstall before you could reinstall the game with House Party. 

I remember when I was installing on a new computer with all EPs up to Unleashed, I'd just about done with the dance of the disks when I realised I'd stacked them in the wrong order and had therefore left out one EP.  Was annoying to have to uninstall and reinstall, when it was due to my own carelessness like that.

I still install in order with The Sims 2 for some reason. Maybe it's my delusional belief that less things can go wrong that way (seeing as it does overwrite some files right?), but does it really matter? As it's been pointed out, EA keep building new eps off borked versions so they all a big pile of bork anyway.

Wasn't that because they made you insert the disc from the previous expansion before they'd finish the install?

And is it sad that all the only thing hype about the Sims 3 is doing is making me want to buy the Sims Complete Collection?

Like Prescado said, he made fixes for a lot of these things.  Are these problems due to hack conflict? Or is it from a clean game?  I ,personally, still have my hacks in-- I have back-up so I don't care. In limited game play, I don't notice a problem yet.

Bug reports on the BBs are usually not that reliable. It's usually a hack conflict, or a problem with people not understanding their hacks, or how the game works, or reporting a problem that existed before the EP. It's hard to know what is actually the result of the expansion pack, and what is only being attributed to it.

Unfortunately people are too stupid to under what "Try taking the hacks out first" means...  :(

I never do that. I leave most of them in, and then do a binary type search to find the problems, and update as needed. Most stuff doesn't actually break, but taking the hacks out DOES make everything screwy.

Or they only download from the Exchange *shudder* and have acquired a whole bunch of incompatible hacks with hashed filenames without realizing it.  :P

I downloaded it, but didn't install it.  I wanted to find a new .exe before installing.  I remember all the problems I had when I had installed the BV patch and used the old no-cd.exe. *showing evidence of learning from mistakes.  ;D  Besides.  The patch didn't not fix the problems that annoy me the most.

I'm waiting for a new .exe too, but I hope the crackers get one out soon, because I really want the fix for the new sports items to keep sims from plunging into red energy after playing basketball or soccer for an hour.

Thankfully, after I braindeadly patched and realized it wanted to play from the disk (and put SecuRom on my computer) I remembered System Restore.  I was able to "un-patch" and will now wait for an updated noCD.   :P

That one is interesting- I think it was Gwill who was searching for that last elusive butterfly.

Oh, thanks for that :) Now I have Bobby Goldsboro in my head.

We're showing our age -- my head went to the same place. :)

"Don't be concerned; it will not harm you...."

No-DVD/Fixed EXE for Freetime 1.1 is out. GameCopyWorld is your friend :)

Oops, sorry- it's only me pursuing somethin' I'm not sure of.

Now that's a cracked exe for the patch, what's the Awesome recommendation?  To patch, or not to patch?

My recommendation is more on the cowardly than the awesome side.

At the moment I have a known quantity, Freetime with the various borks, most of which have been addressed by hacks.

On the other hand I have a patch and crack of unknown quality, with many reports of the patch being borken.

I will sit and wait.

I would recommend patching at your own risk. Some unlucky people have even said that after reinstalling, they loaded up the game only for it to crash and auto-destroy their downloads folder. Who knows what they programmed this patch to do? I'd personally wait for the supposed "fixed" version of the patch. If you can get it to work, then great.

I patched, and have had no problems so far.  But I'm not running a no-CD crack.

Karen

I patched, I am running the no-cd crack, and it's working fine -- played about 3 hours last night, and the only glitch I saw (which may be hack related), is that sims constantly start and stop the 'study parenting' thing. They'd get the book, read a bit, then stop, and have to be directed to do so again. Fortunately, 'macro/concentrate' keeps them from doing it, but I'm also going to check to see if a recent hack I added is causing the issue.

Otherwise, the big issue for me looks to be fixed -- the energy doesn't plummet when they play soccer or basketball.  It still seems to sap energy faster than other activities, but not nearly as fast as before.

I installed patch and crack.. I did not have a "active" neighborhood when I did so. I am not having any trouble. If you have a dedicated neighborhood that you wish not to be borken, you might wish to wait.

Just a hunch.

I had that problem without the patch, I had to drag my sim's fun bars down to get them to settle down with the parenting book. If it filled up while they were studying, they were fine, but it they started with a full fun bar, they threw fits. I'm gonna try making them concentrate next time.

Patched and applied NoCD. So far, no major showstopper for me. In unpatched game, Sims refused to blog complaining bad mood while the ticket machine is on, even they're in perfect mood. This bug seems to be fixed by patch.

Too bad they didn't fix that annoying lag that happens every time Sims leave or arrive at the lot by car, or when Sims leave for/arrive from the community lot.

Ah, that's probably it, then -- it was a permaplat pregnant sim, sitting next to snapdragons, so all her bars were full green.


I seem to be getting more lagging in general than I did under the unpatched version.

I just macro...concentrate when they study parenting.

Patch and no-cd crack here, working great so far. Have about 12 hours in.

I'm going with "has to".  From what I've been reading, those jerks couldn't properly program a game of Solitaire!

The patch has been removed!

It simply mean wasted time for all who have patch already installed.Next EAxis mockery

http://bbs.thesims2.ea.com/community/bbs/messages.php?threadID=118f9ddcadaa648d3c59068d133041ea&directoryID=217&startRow=1&openItemID=item.217,root.1,item.43,item.104,item.41,item.127,item.23 (http://bbs.thesims2.ea.com/community/bbs/messages.php?threadID=118f9ddcadaa648d3c59068d133041ea&directoryID=217&startRow=1&openItemID=item.217,root.1,item.43,item.104,item.41,item.127,item.23)

Wow. The entire BBS summed up in one thread. Makes for some very interesting bedtime reading indeed.

Ahahaha, this makes me so glad I stopped giving EA my money. I did go ahead and install the patch but I took precautions. About 6 hours of play and I'm not noticing any cock-ups.

What is with that lag with entering and exiting anyway? At times it locks my camera if I am in "cameraman" mode. What hacks are not needed anymore after the patch?