Phone problems in Sims 2???

The Game Room
1

A friend sent me a panicky e-mail. I don’t have time to find this for her, so I ask my faithful fellow Dopers- thank you for any help!

Here she is:
You have to find out why I can’t use the phone. I get incoming calls but I can’t get them to call out. I also can’t send the teens off to college or anything. I have something installed called CEP and I don’t know what it is or how to get rid of it. I think it does something to the global settings of the phone. Find out about this, if I need, it and how the Hell to get rid of it. Also, which Insiminator allows you to Shift click onto things like the fridge to restock it.
It would be awesome to be able to play this game again, but all my sims starve to death cause they can’t call for food or go to the store.

2

There was another e-mail I forgot to include- she also can’t leave her lot. I have tried to find patches on both problems now & have not been able to. Any ideas here? I also tried sending her the Sims 2 & Seasons patches but the files are too big & The Sims 2 EA site where they are hosted is down for maintenance! Oy!

Her message-
Find some Sims patches that fix the phone bug and the transportation bug where you can’t leave the lot even if you buy your own car. I’m playing seasons but I can’t find an actual patch.

3

First, it’s not CEP. All that does is make it possible to have multiple recolors of some objects, like the potty chair.

Second, she has one or more hack conflicts. There’s no reason to panic. She needs to do the 50/50 method. Take out all her hacks and put them in a folder on her desktop. (Not in the Documents folder, the game will still find them there.)

Now, try the game. It should work just fine. (If it doesn’t, it’s time to back up all her data and reinstall the game.)

Assuming her game works without hacks, she should add half the hacks back in. Test the game. If her problems are still there, the problem is in the hacks she added back in. Take out half of them and test again.

If the problems are gone, then the problem is in the hacks she removed. Swap out the hacks, and test again.

THIRD - This is the most important part. Fewer and fewer people are playing Sims 2. She needs to join a dedicated Sims 2 forum. There are still a few good ones around, and that’s where she can get the help she needs.

If she’s shy, she doesn’t even have to post. Most forums can be searched, and she’ll almost always find the answer to her problems that way. The 50/50 method gets discussed all the time. Hack conflicts get discussed all the time.

I’m going to suggest Neighborhood 99, because that’s a very nice forum with plenty of helpful people. She will have to register, however. If she’s just not willing to do that, she can read the forums at Mod the Sims without registering.

Oops, needed to add FOURTH - Rumor has it the official Sims 2 site is gone for good. If she ever has to reinstall her game, or put it on a new computer, she can get the official patches here. It’s not a bad idea to download them now and save them.

This is another reason she should check out fan forums. Electronic Arts isn’t going to support the game anymore.

4

Thanks- she definitely narrowed the problem to the InSimenator 2.8. She needs to try 2.9. This is her assessment of the situation -

What is the problem with my InSimenator? For some reason, it messes up the phones in the house. If I click on the phone to do any function with it, the directive either disappears so they never do it or I get an error message that keeps making me reset to infinity. I am also not able to leave the lot even if I buy a car. All I can do is sit & listen to the radio. Another thing I noticed is that the various expansion added directives disappear such as using a computer to go to college or asking a Sim on a date. I’m using the OBJ InSimenator and I’m not sure why but I’m also able to modify the wants & needs by dragging them & shift clicking onto a Sim lets me bring up different options. So I’m not sure what’s
happening but it’s really screwing up my game.

Should I just abandon InSimenator and opt for The Sims Blender now?

5

Sims Blender is safer, because it’s still being supported by it’s creator. The Insiminator people are long gone, sadly.

Just upgrading to the latest Insiminator could fix her problems, though. Most people are able to use it without any problems - it works just fine for me.

6

Well, she fixed her phone somehow. Here’s here latest set of difficulties-

When getting a teen to lay on the bed with another teen and clicking the other person, it gives an error message so she has to click on reset and it bumps them out of the bed.

Her teens aren’t able to have relationships. They try to kiss people and it just says Family Kiss. She’s using Inteenimater and Closer Family.

When using the Teen Wohoo thing it messes with adults having babies. When their bellies go to pop out it gives her the error message and when she clicks reset, it just pops the message back up again. She ends up having to delete them. And this mod or Inteen No Age of Consent takes away menu options like for College and Buisness and Nightlife.

Thanks for any help you all can give!