Question - Challenges (legacy and dynasty)

[MrsFlynn]

I don't play generational games, so this may come off as a bit of an odd question. I've had this question for long while. I just haven't asked because it seems somewhat of a "stupid" question, and felt silly for asking. But it's just time to ask....

I've often wondered why I hear/read so many players loosing their dynasty/legacy or other generational gameplay games due to a bug, glitch or crash in the game.

Why not just save the family and house to the library and put them in a new game? Or if it's a severe bug/glitch do a factory reset and go from there?

I've tried to search out the rules on such challenges, and have not found any hard rules that state one is not allowed to reset if needed to recover from a crash, bug, glitch or other technical problems.

If there are actual rules against resetting, please by all means tell me. If it is okay to reset, is a reason for not resetting, because of the loss of game achievements and whatnot? If that's the case, why not maybe (?) write down what achievements are done so in the case of needing to reset, you can pick up from where you left off?

Please, please do tell me if I am missing something here. As I am genuinely trying to understand the why not reset.

MrsFlynn

PS: Also I thought I'd note, that I'm asking this as a general question regarding both Sims 3 and Sims 4 and for all generational Sims games.

[MarianT]

That's a good question. With TS3, it was decided that players working on the Townie DecaDynasty would be allowed to move to 2 different towns in the course of their dynasty to avoid losing their dynasty because of bugs.

I believe that it is okay to pull your save file out of one game and put it in a new version of TS4 -- in fact, you have to, whenever there's a new patch or expansion because an ongoing game is more likely to be damaged.

But as for starting a new file with your ongoing family -- for one thing, you go back to having only $20,000 simoleons. That means if you want to keep your family in its house -- and for both dynasties and legacies that's usually a requirement -- you have to use some sort of cheat to accomplish that, either freerealestate or motherlode. The rules usually don't allow cheats.

You also lose everything in personal inventories and the household inventory. Your sims lose their relationships with other sims in town -- including their parents and other family members. Things could get awkward. For one example, your founder could marry Cassandra Goth, but then if you start over, her great grandson could be romantically interested in her because they're teens together. You could avoid that by moving out (and deleting) families you'd previously married into, but that would require another cheat. Finally, if your adult heirs completed childhood aspirations, they lose the trait(s) they gained from doing that -- not a major drawback, but annoying.

I think the main problem, though, is the money thing. People could keep a dynasty going with a cheat, but then they'd lose their chance to get into the Hall of Fame. I hope this answers your question.

[dodi90]

I never play one myself but yeah uploading you current family to avoid bugs render your "new" household back to the starting simoleon again. While there is non cheaty way to get money (abusing the split and merge household repeteadly for quick 20,000 simoleon cash), I believe there are rules to prohibit this thing unless specified otherwise.

[imayu94]

On a personal level I never really cared for the Hall of Fame, but starting a new save with the same legacy kind of breaks the idea that you've been in that town for a long time.

The greatest downfall to this idea to me is losing relationships with the neighbors. Also, when starting the new games you get the same neighbors as your first generation (at least with residents) and that to me is a bit off.

[Deklitch]

For me in Sims 3 I don't want to go through the process again looking at the same sims - I just find that too depressing.

[Nutella]

I've tried to search out the rules on such challenges, and have not found any hard rules that state one is not allowed to reset if needed to recover from a crash, bug, glitch or other technical problems.

Correct, there is no hard rules preventing reset, however the challenge team must be informed before you do anything.  The problem is if players do not post on the dynasty thread or PM the team, we won't know they fail because of technical issues.  Please let the challenge team know about your technical problems and we will decide what should be done and/or what cheat is allowed for you to recover your dynasty.

As for legacy, it is a PinStar legacy rules and regulation, the challenge team have no control over that at all.