Zone Recovery Diagnostic Investigation

Meet Special Investigations Officer 15

Special Investigations Officer 15 has been assigned one mission:

To observe, document, and diagnose The Sims 4 savegame lifecycle before, during, and after save inconsistencies occur.

Officer 15 is a read-only diagnostic tool. He does not modify your save, repair data, or make changes to gameplay.

Instead, Officer 15 continuously observes important game systems and records what is happening in the background. If an inconsistency develops during gameplay, Officer 15 is designed to document what occurred, which systems were involved, and the sequence of events that led to the outcome.

All diagnostic information is written to a single log file named:

VTK_Zone_Recovery.log

 Officer 15 at a Glance

✅ Read-only diagnostic

✅ Does not modify saves

✅ Does not send information anywhere

✅ Creates one local diagnostic log

✅ Log sharing is completely voluntary

✅ Designed to investigate save corruption through evidence

What Officer 15 Creates

When installed, Officer 15 creates a folder named:

VTK_Zone_Recovery_Data

inside your Mods folder.

This folder contains the diagnostic log file:

VTK_Zone_Recovery.log

If you choose to participate in the investigation, you may voluntarily share this log with VTK and the Zone Recovery Investigative Team for analysis.

Our Goal

The objective of this investigation is simple:

Capture the exact moment a healthy save transitions into an inconsistent state.

If that transition occurs while Officer 15 is installed, the diagnostic log may provide valuable evidence showing:

• what systems were active

• what modules were involved

• what changed

• when it changed

• what the outcome was

This investigation is focused on evidence, not theories.

Every shared log helps us better understand what may be causing save corruption.

Who Should Participate?

We are especially interested in players who have experienced problems such as:

• Save corruption

• Error Code 801

• Error Code 802

• Similar save-related errors

• Endless loading screens after traveling

• Lots failing to load

• Lots loading with missing buildings or objects

• Problems switching between households

• Other issues that appear to be related to savegame corruption

The best candidates are players who continue to experience these problems.

Getting Started

1. Install Special Investigations Officer 15.

2. Start The Sims 4.

3. Enable Script Mods.

4. Restart the game.

5. Create a new test save.

Do not use your existing corrupted saves.

Always keep your original saves backed up in case the cause of the corruption is eventually identified and a repair becomes possible.

A short YouTube video demonstration is now available showing an example of how Officer 15 is used during a test session. Pt 1. https://youtu.be/MwyeKN854gI

Running a Test Session

1. Load your test save.

2. Open the cheat console.

3. Enable cheats by entering:

testingcheats on

1. Verify Officer 15 is on duty:

vtk.zone_status

1. Record a baseline snapshot:

vtk.zone_snapshot

1. Play normally.

2. Before traveling, record a lifecycle snapshot:

vtk.lifecycle_snapshot

1. Travel to another lot.

2. Continue playing and repeat the snapshot process whenever appropriate.

3. Before ending your session, capture one final snapshot.

This completes a diagnostic gameplay session.

Build Placement Notice

As described in the Build Placement Notice, please avoid installing builds while conducting diagnostic sessions.

Officer 15 documents changes occurring within the game. Placing a large build requires the game to process thousands of objects, and documenting every change would significantly increase log size and temporarily pause gameplay while the information is recorded.

If build-placement investigations are conducted, they should be performed as separate test sessions.

For easier analysis, it is recommended that each diagnostic log remain under 10 MB, with 5 MB or less being ideal whenever practical.

A Personal Commitment

I cannot promise that a fix is coming.

I cannot promise that Officer 15 will identify every cause of save corruption.

What I can promise is this:

I will continue investigating every piece of evidence collected.

If Officer 15 identifies the cause—or causes—of save corruption, there is a real possibility that the evidence will lead to a reliable fix.

Thank You

Thank you for considering participation in the Zone Recovery Diagnostic Investigation.

Save corruption has affected many Sims 4 players over the years.

With your help, we hope to build a complete timeline of the events that lead to corruption, supported by clear diagnostic evidence rather than speculation.

If the evidence ultimately identifies the underlying cause, those findings will be shared with the Sims 4 development team, along with the months of investigative work that made those conclusions possible.

Guys! You can send your logs to officer15@10thcloudretail.com Please don't spam or send unrelated messages; this mod and investigation is an effort to try and solve a real issue for TS4 players! Thank you!

Together, we can work toward understanding—and hopefully eliminating—this long-standing problem.

(T.O.U.)
Do Not Re-Upload Anywhere
Do Not Decompile/Reverse Engineer
Do Not Claim Ownership