[OPEN] [GALLERY] Download Numbers Lower After Maintenance (June 2023) [ Edited ]

[MapleSimmer]

Product: The Sims 4
Platform:PC
Which language are you playing the game in? English
How often does the bug occur? Often (50% - 99%)
What is your current game version number? PC: 1.98.127.1030
What expansions, game packs, and stuff packs do you have installed? All packs. I don't have Book Nook and Modern Menswear Kits
Steps: How can we find the bug ourselves? Compare your item download count from before the gallery maintenance to after the gallery maintenance
What happens when the bug occurs? In some cases, the amount of downloads showing is lower than it was before
What do you expect to see? I expect the number to be the same, or possibly higher but not lower.
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? Yes
Please describe the patch or change you made. This happened after the May 30 to Jun 1 gallery maintenance

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When we were told that our downloads would be there after the maintenance, I thought that meant that the download count would stay the same but that doesn't appear to be the case. 

Here was my top most popular before the maintenance (I took this screenshot a few hours before the gallery went down):

Vs what it is now after the maintenance

You can see the count is lower on most.

Thanks and regards,
Jennifer

PS I moved my mods folder out of my game before Tuesday's update and haven't put it back in yet. 

Edit By Crinrict: Adjusted Title

[SleepycatDSL]

I don't have any before & after screenshots but I also noticed that some of the download counts for my sims & houses are less then they had been.  

Friends & Followers are also messed up.

[mrsr99tso]

Product: The Sims 4
Platform:PC
Which language are you playing the game in? English
How often does the bug occur? Every time (100%)
What is your current game version number? 1.98.127.1030
What expansions, game packs, and stuff packs do you have installed? All of them including all of the kits as well
Steps: How can we find the bug ourselves? Search the gallery
What happens when the bug occurs? Every time I search the gallery or look at my downloads the counts are off. I had a Maxis Fav with o14050 downloads. I wrote it down 5 minutes before the gallery went down. When it came back up, it said 11,335. Another example is one that had 1667 now has 1575
What do you expect to see? All of my downloads returned or an explanation of why the numbers are off.
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? Yes
Please describe the patch or change you made. It happened after the gallery maintenance and patch on 5/30/23

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There are several other simmers having the same issue with some losing thousands of downloads.

[InaMac]

I have this issue too. My maxis fav family before & after pics

[Verbasca]

I noticed the same! One of my most downloaded items has now around 1200 and it had over 2000! I never made screenshots, did't expect to need them.

[617sim]

My dowload count and followers also decreased.

[EA_Cade]

Hey all,

I believe this is by design, as the Gallery calculates number of downloads by unique EA accounts rather than total downloads.

This is to eliminate bad actors from spamming the download button on their own creations, and to give a more accurate count.

[JonaO703]

@EA_Cade    Thanks for the reply on this.  I completely understand the desire to prevent bad actors from inflating their download numbers.  I still think this might warrant further investigation because there should be a way to determine if a user is downloading their own creations vs. other users downloading those creations multiple times.

Let's say I download User X's lot but delete it at some point.  If I DL that lot again at any point, then User X's total DL number should still increase.

I've previously DLed a number of my own builds because they lost their "shared" status in my Library.  (Currently none of my creations have the shared status cloud icon which I think is different bug?  EIDIT: I created a separate bug report for this.)  Hopefully that doesn't make me a bad actor.  I wasn't trying to inflate my numbers.  I just wanted to see which creations in my Library had already been shared and the only way to do that was to DL those creations that had lost their link (EDIT: this no longer seems to be a valid workaround).  I was actually kind of annoyed that DLing my own creations counted toward the total.

My main point is that if other users are downloading creations more than once, I think that should still count toward the total DL number.

[Citysim9997]

Well, I understand the much less traffic, after all, they have completely nuked the search engine. 

I have empty apartments I can no longer furnish anymore. try searching for 1020 Alto Apartments, or 19CulpepperHouse, or any apartments, no results, even I simple word like Apartment brings you nothing but residental lots, so if you got empty bulldozed apartments you are now on your own to furnish them yourself. 

One good thing about the lack of interest of the gallery, gallery performance is a lot faster, with less time-outs, etc.

I wonder what they deciding on screwing up next.

[JonaO703]

@Citysim9997   Hi!  I think this thread is more about the DL counts being changed; reduced by the update, not about how many people are using the Gallery and actually downloading.

I do understand your frustration with the search issues though.  There is a thread for that at this link.

https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/OPEN-GALLERY-Item-Name-search-results-are-not-accurate/m-p/126...

I see that you commented there already so this is more for others who might be reading also.  Hopefully more folks will add their "me too" there.

As for the apartment searches, you might try selecting the Rooms category.  I ran searches for several of the San Myshuno and Evergreen Harbor lots, as well as just a search for Apartment, and found numerous creations.

I hope this helps!