[FIXED] Romantic interest for everyone in group conversations (flirtatious joke) [ Edited ]

[CinnamonToastBun]

Product: The Sims 4
Platform:PC
Which language are you playing the game in? English
How often does the bug occur? Occasionally (10% - 49%)
What is your current game version number? n/a
What expansions, game packs, and stuff packs do you have installed? Everything except Spooky Stuff, Romantic Gardens, Jungle Adventure, and My First Pet Stuff
Steps: How can we find the bug ourselves? Have a sim flirt/use romantic interactions with their significant other while in a group conversation.
What happens when the bug occurs? Everyone in the group gets the pink romantic interest bar as if you flirted with all of them individually.
What do you expect to see? Only the Sim who was targeted gets the romantic attraction bar. Everyone else will be indifferent.
Have you installed any customization with the game, e.g. Custom Content or Mods? Not now. I've removed them.
Did this issue appear after a specific patch or change you made to your system? Neutral/Not Sure 

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Basically the problem seems to be that if you use a group conversation, everyone in the group will react to something you're doing to one person specifically... which makes sense for things like jokes and insults, but is really disruptive and annoying if you use a romantic interaction because suddenly everyone has become your "romantic interest". If you try cutting off the romantic-ness by using the "Ask to Just Be Friends" option, the target will get super offended and throw a tantrum... even if you barely know them. And even still, they show up in the phone book under "Romantic Interest" with a little blurb in the description that implies your sim was ever interested in them to begin with.

I originally had this bug occur in a completely vanilla game about a week ago, and then I installed MCCC and had the same thing happen. I then tested it in a brand new mod-free save, and noticed that it was still happening but really hard to trigger intentionally, it seems to be completely random when it will occur. Still, the general issue happened-- if I used romantic interactions between my two married Sims while another person was involved in the conversation, the other person will react as though you're using it on them. If you are friends or higher with them, they tend to get the romantic interest bar, random strangers who are not in a flirty mood will just have the "Awkward Conversation" thing. Strangely, when I had the bug happen in a conversation with four sims (two couples), the uninvolved couple didn't seem to experience jealousy/anger despite somehow having another person flirt with their spouse.

Aside from MCCC, which I installed after I encountered the bug to begin with, I don't use any mods or cc. I have tested without and the issue still occurs, but is very difficult to just force. 90% of the time, if you flirt with another sim while a group conversation is going on, it won't affect anyone but the target sim. It's just that the 10% is really bad and there's no way to completely nuke the romantic interest bar altogether or move them out of that section of your phonebook.

[crinrict · Accepted solution]

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Flirting with another Sim in a group conversation no longer increases the entire group’s Romance with you. That was awkward.

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Fixed in 1.52.100

EDIT: Please use this thread if you have issues again: https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/NEEDS-INPUT-Group-Conversation-leads-to-inappropriate-love/td-...

[crinrict]

This is an older issue that's supposed to be fixed.

You say for you it's very rare. Do you have any idea what triggers it to still happen ? Any specific interaction ? Or do you think it just has to do with the existing relationship level ?

The third party will gettin uncomfortable is by design I think but I haven't seen them get a romantic relationship myself in a long while.

The old thread on the issue is here (for reference, please don't post there): https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/FIXED-Teenage-romance-with-adult-bug/td-p/3902463

[simvasion]

I think once I saw this happen in my game when sims were having a group conversation and I picked Make a Flirtatious Joke from the romance category while in a playful mood. I directed it to their significant other, but all sims in the group conversation suddenly got pink romance bars.

Since then, I am really wary of that action and break group if using it.

[crinrict]

Was that after the bug got fixed ? Do you remember ?

[simvasion]

I can't remember when it happened. I didn't even know it was a bug that got fixed. I just hoped it was a one-off thing so I quit without saving and redid that moment without the group conversation.

[CinnamonToastBun]

I think it was the flirtatious joke that did it, too. I'm having a hard time trying to replicate the exact issue though. I don't know if it makes a difference but every time it's happened to me, I'd been playing that same household for a long period of time. In the new tester household I made specifically for trying to get it to happen, I noticed that everyone in the group will react to things you're doing to one specific sim as if you're doing it to them but the actual romance bar popping up isn't happening. For instance, if I got the tester sim to romance her husband, everyone will be embarrassed/"awkward conversation", and a few will become flirty. I'll have to play with that household for longer... maybe my individual saves just got corrupted somehow?

It's kinda frustrating because it's hard to force it to happen, but the times it has happened have been really annoying. You can't even choose who your sim is talking to in group conversations and a lot of the time, they just start talking with anyone and everyone in the room. I think the actual issue might tie into another issue where flirty sims in general are extremely aggressive, because I think all the sims who ended up with the romance bars were in flirty moods when it happened.

I haven't owned the game that long, so it's not like the older households would have had the same issue that Crin mentioned that got fixed. I'm going to keep trying to get it to happen in a fresh save, and if I don't, then maybe it's an issue with my save games. Overall, not the end of the world, just an irritating bug that I've encountered.

[crinrict]

I'll try the joke but I believe everything apart from the actually developing a romantic relationship is by design.

They can become flirty because of this and the conversation is awkward also (I mean it would kinda be in RL too, right).

[SimGuruIcarus]

Hi @CinnamonToastBun

Would you be willing to send your save files?  If so, instructions are here:

https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/INFORMATION-How-to-Send-User-Files-to-The-Sims-4-Team/m-p/6065...

That would help us a lot!.

Thank you very much!

[crinrict]

Tagging @CinnamonToastBun for saves

[CinnamonToastBun]

Oops, I spent an embarrassing amount of time trying to figure out how to get a save file for you guys! Sorry about that. Anyway, the first save where this happened is the one labeled OG, the most egregious example is in the Waters family. Epiphany Waters has an inappropriate relationship with Bella Goth and Eliza Pancakes as a result of doing some type of romantic interaction with her husband around them. The husband is romantically involved with Bella but this was intentional, he is having an affair. I did not make him do a romantic interaction with Bella when the glitch happened, it was definitely with his wife. Also, Don Lothario is Epiphany's ex boyfriend, so the romance bar is intentional with him. It's just Bella Goth and Eliza Pancakes who are the problem. I tried to make Epiphany hate Bella so that the romance bar would go away, but it didn't work.

The second game with the glitch is Big City Living, the household is Nash-Kibo. This is the one after I installed MCCC. Hadassah Nash had an inappropriate relationship form after using a romance interaction with her boyfriend at the time, she managed to get a romance bar with her half sister Lacey Kibo and Lacey's wife Saya Yamamoto. I continued playing the game for a long time after it occurred and tried to use MCCC to eradicate the pink romance bars but it didn't work. It's been a really long time in-game and Lacey and Saya both died, their spirits were sent to the Netherworld because I didn't think to strengthen their connection. So they aren't in Hadassah's friends list anymore. It should also be noted that even though I put MCCC in, I don't have incest features enabled and never did, so I'm not sure how she was able to even get that kind of relationship with her half-sister, unless it's by design that the game doesn't view them as actually related.

The OG save has other examples of the glitch happening in other households. It happened at least one other time in Johnny Zest's household in Brindleton Bay, but I haven't touched that house in so long I couldn't tell you who was involved or how it happened... I just remember that after playing for a good amount of time, his wife had suddenly developed romance bars with people I hadn't directed her to interact with at all.

Also, when you open the game it says that there was custom content CAS stuff. I had briefly put in some CAS items but it was after the glitch already occurred, and I took them out after only a short time of playing. They were not in the game when it happened either of the times when the two biggest examples happened.

Here's the dropbox link:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/jzsn535fqkl1ogh/saves.zip?dl=0