Problem With 2 Animals

samkit · Post by **samkit** » Sun Apr 24, 2005 3:09 am

I recently added some new user-created animals to ZTC, but for some reason the Guest Animal and the Scientist Animal crash my game. I've tried the Invisibilty Fix program but that didn't work. Has anyone else had problems with these two animals, or know what might be the problem for me? Only thing I can think of is a problem I saw mentioned on some other post, that sometimes two different user-created animals might have the same id number, which causes a crash. I'm not sure where I'd find the id number (maybe it's 0E246D05 for the scientist? that's the name of the .uca file anyhow), or if it's even possible to change such things.

Post by **Jay** » Sun Apr 24, 2005 3:58 am

Welcome to the Lounge!

I have both of those in my game without problems, but I am using the original ZT. Did you try only the Scientist Animal without the Guest Animal? The reason why I am asking is because the Guest Animal has extra files in it that should not be there. Maybe those extra files confuse CC in some way. The Scientist Animal does not have those extra files. I ran the uca checker just now against the Scientist Animal and it does not show any problems that should cause a crash.

That is the ID for the Scientist Animal. I have thousands of user downloads and none of them are using the same IDs as either of those. (But there are downloads I do not have.) Two things with the same IDs, however, would not cause a crash. Only 1 would show up in the game.

How many ztd files do you have? There is a limit in the 300-400 range. If that limit is hit, the game will crash.

samkit · Post by **samkit** » Mon Apr 25, 2005 4:07 am

I tried just the scientist but that still caused a crash. I have 274 .ztd files at the moment.

Post by **Jay** » Mon Apr 25, 2005 4:19 am

So you take ZT_Scientist_Animal.ztd and put it in either your Updates folder or dlupdate folder. Then you run your game and it crashes. Is that correct? You then take out ZT_Scientist_Animal.ztd, run your game again, and it does not crash. Is that correct?

If the above is correct, did you try downloading it again to see if it became corrupted while downloading (or by running the invisibility program)? Programs such as winzip let you test the integrity of a zip (or ztd) file. But it would still be useful to try downloading again. The size of ZT_Scientist_Animal.ztd should be 539865.

If it still crashes after downloading again, exactly at what place in the game is it crashing?

samkit · Post by **samkit** » Mon Apr 25, 2005 11:51 pm

Yup, it crashes with the file in the Updates folder, doesn't once I take it out.

I've redownloaded the file and tested it. No errors were returned and it stated the same size for the file as you. Now, I do get an error when extracting the file: "Warning - Garbage at the end of the zipfile!" However, I get that alot with user-created animals/objects and haven't had any problems. The file still causes ZTC to crash.

When it crashes: at the main screen, after the yellow loading bar shows that the game is fully loaded. A small pause, then the screen goes black and an error window comes up (that one were you can send an error report).

Post by **Jay** » Tue Apr 26, 2005 2:08 am

Although I have seen that Warning from some sites, I have not seen it at the major sites, including Zoo Admin. When I tested the Scientist download from there two nights ago, I did not have that problem.

Another person was kind enough to try the Scientist Animal in CC and it worked for her.

The location of the crash is where it would be if either a ".ztd" file is corrupted or if the ".ztd" limit was hit. You can eliminate the ".ztd" limit possibility by removing one of the other user created ".ztd" files from the Updates folder and trying the Scientist download again.

You can also test the ZT_Scientist_Animal.ztd file like you tested the ".zip" file. In addition to that, you should be able to look inside ZT_Scientist_Animal.ztd. There are 119 files in ZT_Scientist_Animal.ztd. The first file is animals/0e246d05.uca. The last file is animals/se.pal. Do you have Windows XP? Are you using winzip?

samkit · Post by **samkit** » Tue Apr 26, 2005 10:11 am

I tested the .ztd file, no errors. It has the proper number of files in it. I have Windows XP, not winzip. I use the freeware program EnZip.

I've been editing a different user-created animal, and for whatever reason it crashed my game. Once I removed it from the Updates folder, my game would still crash. I decided to uninstall, use a program from Zoo Admin to remove the registry files, then reinstalled.

Now the guest and scientist animals work, as well as the animal I mentioned above. No idea why it wasn't working before. I've added in some statues, but no animals or buildings yet, so perhaps the problem was incombatibility (gosh, that was hard to spell...) with one of them. I'll only add a few at a time now, and continually test them in Zoo Tycoon, in case they kill off the guest and scientist animals.

Thank you for trying to help me, though.

Looks like(/hopefully) this problem just needed a fresh start.

Post by **Jay** » Tue Apr 26, 2005 7:14 pm

I am glad things are working for you now.

And thanks for giving us an update. That can help others with similar problems in the future.

If you do find what caused the problem originally, please let us know. I am not aware of any incompatibility problems that can cause crashes. All of the ones I know about cause confusing messages or guests getting stuck on benches or in buildings. There are also many things that can cause crashes, but they would cause crashes even if there are no other user downloads with them. The only things I know that can cause a crash at the place you mentioned are corrupted or too many ztd or dll files. But that does not mean there are no others. So it would be useful to know about them.

For your animal editing, were you editing in one of the Zoo Tycoon folders? That can cause a problem. Also, there is a very useful Uca Editing Guide in the APE section here at the Lounge.

Have fun Zoo Tycooning!

Post by **rednotdead** » Wed Apr 27, 2005 12:55 am

there is also a limit on the number of .ztd that your game can handle and so if you have a lot of them then your game will crash. the best solution i have found (because im a download junkie) iis to merge my ztd files into similar stuff ztd so i have a couple called scenery a couple called buildings etc.