Ideas

New Spectator

2 days ago

Status:

Needs More Info

Photos turning black (Patch 1.121.342/2.28)

When I place photos taken with phones or cameras in my Sims’ house, they turn black when I exit the game and come back to play!!!! 😢😢

Every time I take a photo with my Sims, the picture works normally while it is in my inventory. However, whenever I place it in my Sims’ house with a frame—for example, hanging it on the wall—once I exit the game and load it again, the photo turns completely black and there is no way to recover it. This is extremely frustrating, as I am losing all the important memories of my Sims.

Edit By crinrict: Adjusted Title, merged a few posts.

Note by crinrict

Could everyone in this thread please provide the following info

Are you using mods/cc and if so, did you remove them ?

What is your game version ?

What platform are you playing on ?

Is this happening to existing photos that were fine before the patch ?

Does it happen with new photos/paintings

Does it happen on new saves ?

Does it matter how you take the photo or if you add any filter ?

How big is your screenshot folder in documents ?

Other threads

Photos placed from the library going black: Photo Booth/Graduation Pics turning black when places from Gallery/Library | EA Forums - 13157274.

Photos taken with filters on camera going black: Photos taken with filter turn black after changing filter again (camera) | EA Forums - 13161807

Paintings: Painting by reference Turns white (Patch 1.121.342/2.28) | EA Forums - 13155844

Cross-Stich: [COL] Cross-Stich by Ref turning white/blank | EA Forums - 13016359

Puzzles: Please create a new thread.

Note from EA_Solaire:

Hello all,

If any of you are still encountering this on the latest game version (without mods), would you be willing to share your save file(s) in addition to the info above from crinrict?

If so, please send me a private message with a link to the file. Instructions can be found here: https://forums.ea.com/idea/the-sims-4-bug-reports-en/information-how-to-send-user-files-to-the-sims-4-team/5048472

Thanks!

build and buy

live mode

mac

35 Comments

Kritterly
Seasoned Newcomer
8 hours ago
Thankfully I restored a back up file and the older save is just fine. I sent the link to the damaged save file to EA_Solaire.
Anakreon7
4 hours ago
This patch broke more than they promised to fix.
Momofmanygirls17
Seasoned Newcomer
4 hours ago
I have never had an issue with black photos until the newest update yesterday. Every photo on the wall taken by a Sim is now black.
IndusNoir
Rising Spectator
3 hours ago
I'm afraid you have misunderstood how this bug occurred, based on all my own testing + the testimony of players, the bug specifically affected unloaded households. This is why rotational players where particularly likely to experience this problem, while people who only play one household might be lucky to avoid it.
The bug appeared to trigger during saving the game, where pictures not currently loaded into the game (either on lot or in Sim's inventories) would fail to be saved properly, leading to missing data. Once the save file is then loaded, the pictures would be blank due to missing data. This also caused save files to noticably reduce in size.
The real issue here is lack of communication from the developer + the huge delay in rolling out a fix. Even if it is fixed now, it will have huge ramifications for players for a long time.
nickinbigd
Seasoned Ace
6 minutes ago
I’m still having problems with photos, turning black and paint by reference turning white. On Xbox. Even after the supposed fix. I had saved a bunch of rooms of photos and paintings from old saves to my gallery once the bug was detected originally. Yesterday I spent a lot of time downloading those rooms with those photos and paintings into my current game. And placing them back in the spots where all of the things had turned black or white. Today when I return to the game, they are all black and white again. Should I be working out of a new save entirely. Is there something inherently bugged about my current save. It would be so helpful if EA could give some guidance instead of just closing the chat thread and saying the thing is fixed. Clearly it is not entirely fixed.