Sims randomly lost body meshes/textures in CAS, Body Shop and live mode. New user folder didn't help.

I'm dealing with a very strange Sims 2 issue and I'm out of ideas.

The problem started during a normal CAS session. I was scrolling through female bottoms and noticed one base game skirt thumbnail failed to load. When I clicked it, the Sim's body started breaking apart. After restarting the game, the issue persisted.

Symptoms:

• Sims lose body parts (legs, torso, arms, chest, etc.)
• Some Sims become transparent
• Faces may appear as dark voids/masks with missing facial features
• Clothing still displays correctly
• Skin/body underneath is broken
• Body Shop shows the same issue
• Existing Sims in live mode show the same issue
• CAS is affected immediately on launch

What I've already tested:

• Removed Downloads completely
• Generated a completely fresh Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2 folder
• Tested with a brand new neighborhood
• Tested with existing neighborhoods
• Cleared caches
• Ran HoodChecker
• Tested both Sims2RPC.exe and Sims2EP9.exe
• Opened game package files in SimPE (including Textures.package) and they appear readable
• Problem remains in CAS, Body Shop, and live mode

Additional observations:

• Through RPC, faces are sometimes completely missing.
• Through Sims2EP9.exe, I can sometimes see facial structure (eyes, mouth, nose outlines), but the body is still broken.
• Graphics log reports Texture memory: 0MB.
• The game detects Intel UHD 630 only, while the laptop also has an NVIDIA Quadro P600 installed.
• The issue appeared suddenly in the middle of a play session. No new CC, mods, drivers, or game updates were installed beforehand.

At this point I'm trying to determine whether this is:

1. A graphics/rendering issue
2. A corrupted game installation file
3. A body mesh/skin resource issue
4. Something else entirely

Chat GPT and Gemini both failed to help. Has anyone seen Sims behave like this before?