SimPE: Sim genetic troubles

[strangetomato]

I went back into SimPE over my lunch break and saw that none of my changes to genetics had been saved, because I forgot to commit them. Now I feel really silly. So, I went ahead and made some changes, and now I have a new problem. I was following Madame's list of genetic codes, but somehow I've ended up with black hair from Johnny and Ophelia. And missing eyebrows.

Weird, isn't it? I'm not sure where I went wrong. Why would the eyebrows be missing?

I'll have to look at this again later this evening. I hope I just copied the wrong code somewhere. Black hair and the palest skin have the same code, so maybe something went wrong with Johnny's recessive skintone. I put it under skintone, not skintone range (what's does the second refer to anyway?), if that makes a difference. Now I'm worried that I should have used some other sims for my experimenting. I hope I haven't messed up anything that I can't fix.

If you have any insight, I'm all ears.

Comments

[cindyanne1.livejournal.com]

To me, that kid looks like a 000001 code all the way... 001 hair, 001 skin, and 001 eyes (brown). It's like he's a blank.

I've had the no eyebrow and the 001 "reset" happen when I mess around with Insim to make Servos look human. They will also always have 001 skin and eyes, and no eyebrows, although since hair color is a turn on, Maxis does give them a hair color. Everything else defaults to the 001.

Which, incidentally, is why the Grim Reaper and the Social Bunny's kids always have black hair, brown eyes, and 001 skin too. It's default "blank" genetics.

*is rambling again*

But yes, somewhere in SimPE the coding was messed up to where the game couldn't read it and so it chucked out those default blank genetics. It should be an easy enough fix; just go in and make sure there are enough 00's and whatnot in all the genetic strings and that they're in the right places. Is there any way you can take a printscreen of your SimPE where you changed the genetics and we can all look to see if we can find the problem?

I'm sorry this is happening to you. It's such a pain! Hopefully it can be fixed easily!!

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

The eyes aren't brown, but that sounds right. I probably just did something wrong.

The one thing I can say is that the sims were empty for skintone, and only showed their colour code in the skintone range slot. I added the alien code to Johnny's dominant skintone slot and skintone 1 to his recessive slot. Was that the right thing to do?

I'll just go back and go over it with a fine tooth comb and see if I can fix it. If not, I'll be back to poat a screencap and beg for help.

Thanks for your input! It's very helpful.

[ikichi.livejournal.com]

I birthed a grimpreg last night and after 3 tries, none of the kids had brown eyes (alien, blue, green- I'm pretty sure I had set the alien mother to have green eyes as a recessive).

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

I've never tried a Grim baby before. Do they just use one of the face templates for them?

[katsuko]

If I'm remembering right, in most cases (except Nervous :p) a Grimbaby is pretty much an opposite sex clone of the parent sim. I need to redownload InSim and test a bit (I love the Blender, I really do, but I still need my Grimpreg option, dammit!)

[cindyanne1.livejournal.com]

Yep I think ikichi is right... the eyes on a Grim preg don't go to default brown (it's been so long since I had one, lol!) but the hair and skin are always 001/001 (from GRIM, that is... it can still mix with the parent sim and be different in the child.)

It's been my experience Grim always uses default face template 001 too. Which is why the kids are known for being so cute, since that's considered (by some, lol) to be the best looking Maxis template.

And I had read that Grim was a female in the game too. I don't think that's true. He stands up to pee. :P You know how he hangs out in the house after your last sim dies? Well, he'll use the toilet sometimes and yep... he stands. *giggle*

[ikichi.livejournal.com]

I dunno... I think it's a bit like the in-game pollinator and plantsim. I think the new one (Kat, Lola Curious' daughter) looks a bit different than the other two I had (different moms)- I think her face is rounder. I've heard that his kids are always cute, and so far that's been true for me, so I guess there is a specific face for him.

[cindyanne1.livejournal.com]

Wait I just noticed the eyes are Lyran green, yes? So that part is okay... it just must be the skintones and hair colors where the game had a problem reading (which is all you changed, right? I'm slow on the uptake sometimes, lol!)

Yep I think it's just a matter of the game not being able to read the code because it was missing a number or something and should be an easy fix. *fingers crossed*

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

I didn't make any changes to eyes, so maybe that's why they're fine. I added recessive red hair to Johnny and Ophelia, and recessive skintone 1 to Johnny. That's all.

Well, I assume (and hope) that changing it back or correcting it would just fix the issue. *crosses fingers*

[madame-ugly.livejournal.com]

Did you try taking the kid to the mirror and doing a makeover? Maybe the kid just needs reset (I've had issues in game where a sim reset to a default face template and I had to take them to the mirror to get the correct face back--I've also had hair go missing leaving sims with gaping skull holes, also fixed with a trip to the mirror).

I'm willing to double check the code list and make sure the typo's not on my end (I still have my test family in my pleasantview bin--that could also give me a go with the new simPE).

The way I understand it, you shouldn't have to fiddle with the skintone range. It's kind of like the setting on the toaster, telling how dark/light to make the toast. So if the range is, say, 1 then you'll only get the lightest skin. If the range is 3 then you can get 1,2,or3 (but never 4). Does that make sense?

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

I didn't try the mirror, but I will if it happens again.

It could be a typo. If you don't mind double checking, I'd appreciate it. I can always take a look at some of the other sims from the game to check there too.

Okay, so leaving the skintone range as-is, to give Johnny a recessive skintone 1, I just add that code to his recessive skintone slot? Johnny didn't even have the alien skin in his dominant skintone slot, so I added it there too. Is that where I went wrong, I wonder?

[madame-ugly.livejournal.com]

Yes, to make Johnny have a recessive skin, just change the recessive skin tone line. He didn't have the green as his dom? That seems weird (but not really since the strangetown genetics are know for being mega funky like that). The way I understand it, the DOM is what your sim currently looks like, so maybe in changing that you confused the game and it spat out the default kid (like cindyanne was describing).

I won't be able to check my codes until much later, so if you're in a hurry you might want to just make your own test family (one sim each going 1/1, 2/2, etc) and then look at them in simPE. Then look at one of the Curious born in game aliens for the alien dna (since pre-made aliens might not be accurate given the issues with strangetown DNA).

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Johnny had the alien skin code in both of his skintone range slots, but both of the skintone slots were empty. This is true of almost everyone in Strangetown, from what I've seen.

I'm in no rush, and I probably will make that test family when I get home.

Thanks for your help with this!

[madame-ugly.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how much help I am (I feel bad that you used MY instructions and now you have weirdo babies).

I'll take screen shots of each of my test sims (and a born in game alien) when I get home.

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Bah... I'm sure it's not your fault. SOMEONE forgot to hit commit the first time 'round, so she's probably capable of messing up the code too. *whistles innocently*

Thanks. It will be nice to get to the bottom of all of this.

[aledstrange.livejournal.com]

sorry I peak in, but yes, most of the town sim do have missing strings on their dominant skin tone range. I understand its better to fill those up, normally i just copy the skin tone on to that blank space (i do not understand much about ranges so, to avoid any stupid mess up on my part in just use the same codes in both skin related spaces)
and its very easy to get confuse or make silly mistakes when copy/pasting codes, but you can aways go back to it a fix them back. Also do as madam_ugly recommends and try the mirror :)

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the input. Since you seem to have done this a lot, I feel relieved that you say it will be fine if I just go back and correct it.

Ahh... I can feel the worries drifting away already.

Thanks!

[simgarooop.livejournal.com]

Don't worry about messing your sims up.

Worst case scenario, you could ask someone to check the regular Strangetown sims with SimPe and just give you the original settings for Ripp, Johnny and Ophelia. The best part of playing with the Maxis Sims is that there's always a way to restore things to the way they were (unless your computer blows up :P).

I have a merged neighborhood that was created with a Strangetown template with the character's DNA fixed (from MATY), so let me check Johnny's data with SimPe:

Johnny,
Dominant Genes:
Eye: 51c4a750-c9f4-4cfe-801c-898efc360cb7
Facial Features: brow,mouth,eyes,ears,
Hair: 00000004-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Skintone: 6baf064a-85ad-4e37-8d81-a987e9f8da46
Skintone Range: 00000001-0000-0000-0000-000000000000

Recesive Genes:
Eye: 12d4f3e1-fdbe-4fe7-ace3-46dd9ff52b51
Facial Features: Empty
Hair: 00000003-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Skintone: 00000001-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
Skintone Range: 6baf064a-85ad-4e37-8d81-a987e9f8da46

I hope this works ^^

(If you need Ripp or Ophelia's data, let me know)

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Wow. Thank you. That is so helpful. How did the correct genetics looks for Ophelia? Did she have a recessive red (Willow is supposedly red, according to the genetics in the game, but that's probably wrong)? Is that information listed anywhere, I wonder? I don't want you to go to any trouble to get that from your game, if I can look it up.

I don't agree with the inclusion of recessive alien eyes here (since dominant traits don't hang on as recessives in the game or in real life), so I'll leave those out and make it green too, or make them recessive light blue to tie into his Uncle Vidcund (who he obviously takes after somewhat).

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Wait... according to madame_ugly, blond hair is 3 (or 00000003-0000-0000-0000-000000000000, which I take to be the same thing), but this Johnny has 4 listed, which she has listed as meaning red.

In your merged neighbourhood, does Johnny show with red hair?

[aledstrange.livejournal.com]

yes 003 is blond, oo4 is red (001 for black, 002 for brown, 005 for white)

Sometimes I think the DNA of most of those 'parents' is just random, dunno, some seam very off looking at their children.
Ophelia does not have any recessive red hair genes that I know of, tho her mothers does as you say, tho I have no idea where that hair comes from either, because for what I remember none of her parents had red hair and actually Olive shows brown hair in simpe, not black as she should be .... It just a huge mess!!

I made a huge list with all of this sim dnas (alive and death ones) .. I must have it somewhere, I just need time to look it up coz' I can't find it nowhere now *blushes*

[simgarooop.livejournal.com]

Oh, don't worry. I'm currently playing with SimPe for my prosperity neighborhood and it takes no time to check their DNA.

Ophelia appears with blond hair, s4 skin and green eyes as both dominant and recesive genes (and skintone range). According to that file I had about the dead Maxis characters, Ophelia has little in common with her parents: Willow has red hair, s4 skin and brown eyes, while Creon has black hair, s3 skin and light blue eyes :P.

Ripp has dominant blue eyes, brown hair and s1 skin (and the skintone range is 2). And also has recesive blond hair, grey eyes and s2 skin (with 1 as his skintone range).

Yeah, that's something that confused me when I was getting this DATA from SimPe. Johnny does show up with blond hair, though.

Although, now that I remember... when I restored my Strangetown, I also gave Buck the brown hair as dominant gene (because it made sense to me, don't ask :P) and he still showed up as a blond. And his kids still inheritted the blond genes.

For example, Lyla Broke has recesive blond and grey eyes, both from Buck. And Chip has the dominant dark blue eyes and recesive blond hair from his dad.

For more info about the Strangetown characters odd DNA issues:
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,1423.0.html

And this link has actually a fix for Strangetown. YOu download that file and place it in your N002 folder. I've just discovered it :P

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,7086.0.html

Hope this helps ^^

[simgarooop.livejournal.com]

Although that fix only works if you install it before you play the Strangetown neighborhood for the very first time!

(But it's a good link to have bookmarked in case you ever want to re-start Strangetown)