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Sonshine77's avatar
4 years ago

I Lost At Least 2 Saves

Hi, I just played my one game save last night only to discover that it had gone back at least 2 saves w/no option to go back to where I was before. First of all, my game did crash, but I know I didn't lose *that much info. On the previous save, my  sim owned a business and had done about 1 day's worth of operating it. I was continuing the story and the game crashed. Secondly, the other night *after my comp was turned off, we lost power for a moment. When I loaded the game, I expected to see some continued progress like him still owning the business which was at least 1 save before the session that crashed. When I loaded my game last night, he was back 2 levels on his career and had NO business at all! The bldg wasn't even there! I had the bldg there at least 3 saves ago, but didn't have him buy it until the next session. Anyway, long story short, is this normal to lose that much info on a crash? Thanks!

10 Replies

  • @Sonshine77  No, that's not normal, but losing power can have a serious impact on data integrity.  However, it's also possible there's an issue with your save itself.  Before you do anything else, make a backup copy of your saves folder and store it somewhere other than your computer.  An external drive or USB is ideal, but if you don't have one, you can zip the saves folder and upload it to the free filesharing site (Google Drive, Dropbox, etc.) of your choice.

    Next, please play it forward for at least a sim-day, then save your progress, then immediately after (you can wait a few sim-minutes) use "save as" and rename the save.  Quit the game, restart your computer, and let me know whether the new save you created with "save as" is present and whether the old save reflects the progress you made in that session.

    Please also let me know whether your computer uses Windows or macOS.

  • Sonshine77's avatar
    Sonshine77
    4 years ago

    Thanks Puzzled Addict! I did play it for a bit last night, but didn't use the "save as." Another thing is that the magic tree going to Sylvan Glade was sealed and I had to open it again. That goes back several saves. Silvan Glade is also acting up in that the wild plants are brown instead of green and there was originally a cherry tree there. but that is nowhere to be found. I'm thinking about moving the fanily to a different save. 

    I never knew that a power outage could damage data when the comp is off!

    I use Win OS

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    4 years ago

    @Sonshine77  A power outage shouldn't affect computers that are shut down, but the way they shut down can leave them a bit vulnerable even if the risk is low.  Depending on your settings, a shutdown can write the data from that session to the drive and then read it when starting up again, thereby saving a little time, rather than restarting from scratch.  That's why restarting your computer, as in, selecting Restart from the power menu, is an essential part of troubleshooting.  It forces Windows to load everything anew rather than saving some data.

    I do think it's more likely that something else is going on though, especially because I've seen other reports of progress reverting in existing saves.  Are the entire save files gone, or just progress in the saves while the files are intact?  That's one reason why I asked about "save as": that would make it easier to tell whether the files were disappearing or just some of the progress of your saves.

    If only some progress is disappearing, it would be helpful to know exactly what stays the same and what reverts, for example that new business you built is gone but it's still sim-Thursday like it was supposed to be, and (as you've said) the magic tree is sealed even though you know you opened it a sim-week ago.  If you could make at least a partial list—no need to be completely thorough, just whatever you notice or can check easily—that would be great.

  • Sonshine77's avatar
    Sonshine77
    4 years ago

    Boy, I don't know! I believe everything was lost for several saves. Right now though, my house is frozen. I just moved them in to a new  house. I'll try restarting my comp to see if it works. Otherwise. I'm going to try evicting them (move out first, then evict if that doesn't work).

  • Sonshine77's avatar
    Sonshine77
    4 years ago

    I just rebooted the comp and the house is unfrozen, but lagged. Is there any kind of cache files to clear?

  • Sonshine77's avatar
    Sonshine77
    4 years ago

    On this one, I tried going back to previous saves (I saved the file "slot.00000002.save" to a place on my desktop and renamed "slot.00000002.ver 0- 4" to just .save), but it didn't matter which file I chose, it was always the current one regardless of what the save date on it was. Is there no way to recover and older save or is my game totally messed up?

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    4 years ago

    @Sonshine77  That is strange indeed.  Do you use OneDrive?  If so, are there any Sims-related files in OneDrive's Documents folder?  How about a third-party antivirus (and which one)?

    Please also load this save, make one obvious change, use "save as" to rename the save, quit, restart your computer, load the game, and let me know whether that change is still present in the new save.

  • Sonshine77's avatar
    Sonshine77
    4 years ago

    Hi again Puzzled Addict, Sorry for the late response, I've been pretty busy. Anyway, in my last attempt to try to find my lost saves, I think I must have been half asleep! I was pretty tired and not thinking straight.  I tried again tonight and made sure I opened the old game each time. The saves were indeed different. However, I was not able to recover any saves that I lost. In the real game (the saved as) I am rebuilding what was lost. She topped her career and he topped his and now has almost everything that he had before. He just needs to either graft a couple of plants or fish to get some Dragon Fruit. I have the Bonsai now and just need to get an Orchid. I got tired of waiting for the cherry tree in Sylvan Glade to produce fruit in spite of waiting and waiting, so I went to Oasis Springs to get it. Only had to wait until the next morning for it.

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    4 years ago

    @Sonshine77  No worries about the late reply.  At this point, it's difficult to know for sure what happened, but it's definitely a good idea to make backups of your saves as well as save any builds you like to the in-game library when you're done.  If this happens again, please let me know, and we can poke at it further.

  • Sonshine77's avatar
    Sonshine77
    4 years ago

    I will definitely do that! I never expected something like this to happen. Before now, I've always been able to go back to the previous save pt. : /

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