NAM Shows Double

[BrokeDiamond 2]

Lately, I installed NAM and started the game to find that everything related to NAM was shown twice in the menus - two options for rails, stations, canals, etc.

Since I've heard of similar problems with other mods, I'm assuming that the solution is to use DATPacker to pack SimCity_1.dat and the NAM files into one .dat and then rewrite the original SimCity_1.dat, but when I looked at the NAM files there were too many and I didn't know which one to choose.

Can anyone help me out? Am I doing this the right way, and if so, which files should I DATPack? Thanks.

Note: SimCity_1.dat has been rewritten previously - once for the IH $$$ Missing Jobs modd and once more for CAM. I still have the original SimCity_1.dat, thankfully.

[Ganaram Inukshuk 906]

DATpacking the NAM is actually the last thing you want to do; In fact, DAT-1 has most (if not all) of the original unmodded network settings and RULs, so combining that with the NAM's own RULs may result in even more dysfunction; In fact, the original RULs may load instead of the NAM's RULs, meaning bye-bye NAM.

The proper solution is simple: You may have two NAMs installed. Find it and delete it.

NOTE: It's also not recommended to DATpack the NAM so that NAM updates can go about without problem; The installer is set to overwrite previous NAM files with new ones; If they're somewhere else (or DATpacked), it will just install another NAM. Boom, two NAMs, one old and one new.

I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that's what you did...

  Edited May 27, 2012 by Ganaram DI  

[BrokeDiamond 2]

Unless NAM automatically installed itself somewhere, I don't have two NAMs. I've checked both the Plugins folder under My Documents and the one in Program Files.

Are there any other mods, that when used with NAM, might cause this to occur?

[Ganaram Inukshuk 906]

Are there any other mods, that when used with NAM, might cause this to occur?

No other mod out there can cause this problem except another NAM; In fact, the NAM Team is the only group allowed to distribute these kinds of things.

Another cause for this: doubled NAM plugins. Search for files that have the name "NetworkAddonMod_" in its filename. There has to be a second everything...

[BrokeDiamond 2]

I haven't edited NAM in any way yet (whew!). The only other file with NetworkAddonMod in the name I could find was part of CAM, and altered pathfinding and commuting speeds. I don't think that should be doing it though...

EDIT: If there was a second one, where should I be looking?

EDITEDIT: Would deleting all of NAM and reinstalling fix it?

  Edited May 27, 2012 by BrokeDiamond  

[Ganaram Inukshuk 906]

EDITEDIT: Would deleting all of NAM and reinstalling fix it?

If all else fails, it's worth a shot.

[CaptCity 4,915]

,,,

Note: SimCity_1.dat has been rewritten previously - once for the IH $$$ Missing Jobs modd and once more for CAM. I still have the original SimCity_1.dat, thankfully.

If you're sure there's not another instance of NAM in either Plugin folder, could you have perhaps inadvertently DatPacked NAM files with the SimCity_1 file? In such a case, installing NAM will give two installations. Just a thought....

[BrokeDiamond 2]

If NAM has been completely uninstalled, the game runs as normal, but if I install NAM again, it shows double. Cleanitol isn't detecting anything. Hmm...

EDIT: Even with the normal SimCity_1.dat, NAM still is doubled.

  Edited May 27, 2012 by BrokeDiamond  

[CaptCity 4,915]

You could try a "for sure" test...

Place the original SimCity_1 file back into the game's installation folder. Then rename the Plugins folder and run the game (it will create a new, empty one) in an empty city (don't need to save it), and let us know what happens with the menus.

[BrokeDiamond 2]

You could try a "for sure" test...

Place the original SimCity_1 file back into the game's installation folder. Then rename the Plugins folder and run the game (it will create a new, empty one) in an empty city (don't need to save it), and let us know what happens with the menus.

With an empty Plugins folder and original SimCity_1.dat, the game menus now act normally with no doubling. In case I forgot to mention it, the only items being doubled in the first place were all NAM-related.

This little test caused another bug - the background, rather than being blue squares, is now completely black. Let's ignore it for now until we get NAM working.

EDIT: With the original SimCity_1.dat and only NAM installed, the doubling problem still persists and the background is still black.

  Edited May 27, 2012 by BrokeDiamond  

[Wiimeiser 452]

It's not the original, but

will fix the black background

[Indiana Joe 1,752]

Well your background is black because you must have deleted the plugins folder in the Program Files folder. There's the essential Background Texture files in that one that you never want to delete. Check in your Recycle Bin for that old plugins folder; check if it has the Background Texture files in it and put those back in. If they're gone, you'll have to reinstall your game to get them back. (EDIT: or just download some new ones as wiimeiser suggested as I was typing this)

That's actually what I'd recommend at this point for your original problem. Just do a complete wipe and reinstall. You can copy your regions and plugins before you do; the only issues should be with the NAM and SC4 files.

  Edited May 28, 2012 by Indiana Joe  

[CaptCity 4,915]

With an empty Plugins folder and original SimCity_1.dat, the game menus now act normally with no doubling. In case I forgot to mention it, the only items being doubled in the first place were all NAM-related.

When you say "no doubling", do you mean there's still single NAM items in the menus or no NAM items?

Did you also rename the Plugins folder in My Documents? From reading your post, it sounds like you may be referring to the Program Files plugins folder and not the My Documents plugins. That's where NAM is installed by default if the installer was used.

This little test caused another bug - the background, rather than being blue squares, is now completely black. Let's ignore it for now until we get NAM working.

Yes, that will happen because the game creates an empty Plugins folder without the background images. It's not a big deal. They should still be in the original folder you renamed. The background will return when you rename the original Plugins folder back to "Plugins". If you did happen to delete them, you can copy them from the installation CD.

EDIT: With the original SimCity_1.dat and only NAM installed, the doubling problem still persists and the background is still black.

Just out of curiosity, what is the size of the SimCity_1 file that you're using for the "original" one?

[BrokeDiamond 2]

With an empty Plugins folder and original SimCity_1.dat, the game menus now act normally with no doubling. In case I forgot to mention it, the only items being doubled in the first place were all NAM-related.

When you say "no doubling", do you mean there's still single NAM items in the menus or no NAM items?

Did you also rename the Plugins folder in My Documents? From reading your post, it sounds like you may be referring to the Program Files plugins folder and not the My Documents plugins. That's where NAM is installed by default if the installer was used.

This little test caused another bug - the background, rather than being blue squares, is now completely black. Let's ignore it for now until we get NAM working.

Yes, that will happen because the game creates an empty Plugins folder without the background images. It's not a big deal. They should still be in the original folder you renamed. The background will return when you rename the original Plugins folder back to "Plugins". If you did happen to delete them, you can copy them from the installation CD.

EDIT: With the original SimCity_1.dat and only NAM installed, the doubling problem still persists and the background is still black.

Just out of curiosity, what is the size of the SimCity_1 file that you're using for the "original" one?

By "no doubling" I mean that there are no NAM options, but whatever is left acts normally.

The SimCity_1.dat file is 141,208 KB.

EDIT: NAM options are a double-or-nothing kinda deal.

EDITEDIT: All of my work is being done in the My Documents folder. I've left the Program Files one alone unless one of the plugin installers modified it without me knowing.

  Edited May 29, 2012 by BrokeDiamond  

[CaptCity 4,915]

Thought perhaps you were using the Program Files folder because that is where the background images are located, and you said they disappeared when you re-named the Plugins folder in the above post. If that's not the one you re-named, and the images are there, then something unusual is going on. Perhaps a game reinstall is the next step.

I'm not aware of any installers placing files in the Program Files folder, for sure NAM doesn't - at least not by default.

[BrokeDiamond 2]

Thought perhaps you were using the Program Files folder because that is where the background images are located, and you said they disappeared when you re-named the Plugins folder in the above post. If that's not the one you re-named, and the images are there, then something unusual is going on. Perhaps a game reinstall is the next step.

I'm not aware of any installers placing files in the Program Files folder, for sure NAM doesn't - at least not by default.

I've checked the Program Files one, and there are background images there...it's almost as if the Program Files folder and the My Documents folder are completely separate...

EDIT: Sooo I deleted everything, reinstalled the game and ONLY NAM (no updates, others mods, etc. except for EP1 which came already installed - I don't think the Night Ligths update is in yet) and I still get the same problem.

My only conclusion is that I somehow got a virus which has the sole purpose of screwing with me every time I play SC4.

  Edited May 29, 2012 by BrokeDiamond  

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

I would certainly do a virus scan. However, I am not aware of any edition of the game that comes with EP1 pre-installed without the update for the BAT. What is the version (build) number of your game after you do your install? And if the result is 1,1,638, where did you get this copy of the game? It is probably illegal.

[jdenm8 362]

I've checked the Program Files one, and there are background images there...it's almost as if the Program Files folder and the My Documents folder are completely separate...

They are completely separate and have nothing in relation to each other aside from that theyre both called "Plugins" and the game looks in them for plugins. You only need to put mods in one of those folders for the game to register it.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Bear in mind that the one in Program Files loads first. It should contain only the sky textures. If these are not showing up, they've been overridden by the user area Plugins.

An experiment: Rename your user area Plugins folder to Plugins.old and start the game. If you now have sky textures, the problem is in the user Plugins.old folder (the game creates an empty Plugins folder). If not, then you need a reinstall.

[BrokeDiamond 2]

By "reinstall" I really meant "delete, then copy and paste from old backup drive I have laying around", which explains the odd mod scenario.

Anyhoo, I randomly solved the problem! Before, the Sim City 4 folder in My Documents was completely identical to the one in Program Files - Apps, Regions, everything. This time, I only installed the game into Program Files, then ran the game and let it create the My Documents folder itself. The game began to work normally, which is odd, since the setup has been like this for a long time and only recently gave me issues.

Even though the problem has been solved, can anyone tell me what the glitch was so I can avoid it in the future? Thanks.

[CaptCity 4,915]

...Before, the Sim City 4 folder in My Documents was completely identical to the one in Program Files - Apps, Regions, everything. This time, I only installed the game into Program Files, then ran the game and let it create the My Documents folder itself. The game began to work normally, which is odd, since the setup has been like this for a long time and only recently gave me issues.

Even though the problem has been solved, can anyone tell me what the glitch was so I can avoid it in the future? Thanks.

Well, that explains some of the things above. I guess I would ask why things would be set up this way. You really don't need all the installation files in the My Documents location. As for why the issue started recently, I would offer a possible reason... Have you changed or made a new shortcut icon? Just out of curiosity, I copied all the installation files into the My Documents location and ran the game using the two different icons. Running the game through the icon in the Program Files location resulted in a normal set up, but running the game through the icon in My Documents resulted in double icons. Perhaps the game is loading everything twice.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Aha! Thanks Cap.

Just a note: This game is actually set up so that you can have multiple users with separate accounts on the same machine. The material that goes to the system residency (Program Files) is all that really needs to be present at the beginning.

As each user starts the game from his own account (you can pass the shortcut around if need be), the game constructs the user files and copies in the default regions then takes you to Timbuktu to run the tutorial. At this point, you can quit the game and copy any material you had in previous games into the user structure.

The Program Files material must remain out of bounds for all users. Windows has a mechanism to permit multiple user access to the Program Files on a read-execute only basis. I don't know the MAC mechanism. On Linux, it is simply a matter of setting permissions and/or copying the .wine directory or setting a shortcut (link) to it in some common place.

User directories will differ from system to system, and this should not matter after installation if it is correct.

  Edited May 31, 2012 by A Nonny Moose  

[BrokeDiamond 2]

Thanks! This really helped a lot!

[Thredz 1]

Lately, I installed NAM and started the game to find that everything related to NAM was shown twice in the menus - two options for rails, stations, canals, etc.

Since I've heard of similar problems with other mods, I'm assuming that the solution is to use DATPacker to pack SimCity_1.dat and the NAM files into one .dat and then rewrite the original SimCity_1.dat, but when I looked at the NAM files there were too many and I didn't know which one to choose.

Can anyone help me out? Am I doing this the right way, and if so, which files should I DATPack? Thanks.

Note: SimCity_1.dat has been rewritten previously - once for the IH $$$ Missing Jobs modd and once more for CAM. I still have the original SimCity_1.dat, thankfully.

The probleme is your double NetworkAddonMod in plugins folder, you have a NAM DatPacked, and the folder NAM recently installed non datpacked, so it show it 2 times. You have to erase the datpacked file from compressed folder and restarting a new DatPackaging on the NetworkAddonMod folder. I Had this probleme with NAM and ZNam folder and DatPacked also in plugins compressed folder. So game read it 2 times whitout probleme.So next time you don't need to reinstall the entire game...

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

There are some things that should not be datpacked.  NAM is certainly one of them.  Use of datpacker has to be done with some thought and not just shotgunned.  Anything that is subject to frequent update should never be datpacked, but if you want to reduce (slightly) the overhead in some folders many can be reduced considerably using Files2DAT from the STEX.  You don't get much space saving, but the game likes DAT files better than unpacked stuff.  I've been slowly getting all my plugins over to DAT format.

 

Oh, and by the way, NAM files are all DAT files, so nothing need be done with them.