I had a question regarding custom content. I like to download new CC here and there, and I have quite a lot in my game. I am playing a legacy family and all the family members have CC skins, hairs, clothing, etc. I want to clean out and remove the CC that I do not use very much so my game can run faster. I think what I will do is uninstall ALL my CC and then reinstall the CC that I want.
So my question is, if I uninstall all my CC and then reinstall it, will all my CC on my sims, house, etc still be there? Or will I have to manually add the CC items back on? Also, the family is also in a custom world, so the world will be uninstalled and reinstalled along with the rest of the CC. Will that mess up my save?
I had a question regarding custom content. I like to download new CC here and there, and I have quite a lot in my game. I am playing a legacy family and all the family members have CC skins, hairs, clothing, etc. I want to clean out and remove the CC that I do not use very much so my game can run faster. I think what I will do is uninstall ALL my CC and then reinstall the CC that I want.
So my question is, if I uninstall all my CC and then reinstall it, will all my CC on my sims, house, etc still be there? Or will I have to manually add the CC items back on? Also, the family is also in a custom world, so the world will be uninstalled and reinstalled along with the rest of the CC. Will that mess up my save?
If you remove CC and worlds then replace some of the CC and worlds with the exact same things, then they will remain in-use in your saved games.
If you miss reinstalling some of your actual in-use CC, you will get a warning upon startup that content in-use is missing and substitutions will be made. But if you quit without saving such a session, then no changes are made and you can then try to restore the missing in-use content. Some of these substitutions will make sense (one shirt or pair of jeans for another), some will be comical (rolls of toilet paper where there used to be a sculpture or some other decor object). For skins that no longer exist, sims will appear to have no skin -- they will be all black with no body texture.
If you miss replacing an underlying installed world that is in-use, then you won't be able to launch saved games that depend on it until that world is reinstalled.
In other words, it's really difficult to do any permanent harm by conducting such a cleanup.
You can't upgrade your laptop video card or processor. You are stuck with the specs you buy when it comes to laptops. They are throw away computers once they stop working. Laptop average life span 3-5 years. Their hardware becomes quickly outdated too. Your laptop is 4 years old and they don't make the hardware your computer has anymore
Your video card is the problem. It's integrated with your processor and not designed to run this game. You can't add a video card to a laptop to meet requirements to run the game. your only option would be to buy a new computer.
We don't advise gaming on laptop unless you must have a laptop. As mentioned above they are a throw away computer. This game requires desktop. Laptop hardware is weaker than desktop hardware. If you buy a good gaming desktop with a good case, good cooling, hardware can be changed or switched out. They are not a throw away computer like a laptop and will last a lot longer
> @igazor said: > LuckyPalms wrote: » > > Hi all, > > I had a question regarding custom content. I like to download new CC here and there, and I have quite a lot in my game. I am playing a legacy family and all the family members have CC skins, hairs, clothing, etc. I want to clean out and remove the CC that I do not use very much so my game can run faster. I think what I will do is uninstall ALL my CC and then reinstall the CC that I want. > > So my question is, if I uninstall all my CC and then reinstall it, will all my CC on my sims, house, etc still be there? Or will I have to manually add the CC items back on? Also, the family is also in a custom world, so the world will be uninstalled and reinstalled along with the rest of the CC. Will that mess up my save? > > > > If you remove CC and worlds then replace some of the CC and worlds with the exact same things, then they will remain in-use in your saved games. > > If you miss reinstalling some of your actual in-use CC, you will get a warning upon startup that content in-use is missing and substitutions will be made. But if you quit without saving such a session, then no changes are made and you can then try to restore the missing in-use content. Some of these substitutions will make sense (one shirt or pair of jeans for another), some will be comical (rolls of toilet paper where there used to be a sculpture or some other decor object). For skins that no longer exist, sims will appear to have no skin -- they will be all black with no body texture. > > If you miss replacing an underlying installed world that is in-use, then you won't be able to launch saved games that depend on them until that world is reinstalled. > > In other words, it's really difficult to do any permanent harm by conducting such a cleanup. :)
Right. Since I don't have enough cred to post this in it's own thread, this is just what I'm looking for!
Okay, so I decided to play my game today... but it took almost TWO HOURS to boot up my savefile! Then when it finally booted, I got stuck in one of those "world freezes but all the sounds keep playing and the plumbob keeps spinning" for almost twenty minutes! What could possibly be slowing down my game so much?
Right. Since I don't have enough cred to post this in it's own thread, this is just what I'm looking for!
Okay, so I decided to play my game today... but it took almost TWO HOURS to boot up my savefile! Then when it finally booted, I got stuck in one of those "world freezes but all the sounds keep playing and the plumbob keeps spinning" for almost twenty minutes! What could possibly be slowing down my game so much?
Hi there. You've had this account for a while, you're just a few points short of full membership and posting rights.
Afraid the issue could be any one or any combination of a hundred things. Is it only this one save that gets stuck on loadup then freezes or do others behave the same? What happens if you start a new test game in a gentle to play world (Sunset Valley, Riverview, Twinbrook)? And what happens if you pull your entire TS3 user game folder out of Documents to your Desktop for safekeeping -- the game will spawn a new one on the next startup that will have no installed content, worlds, mods, CC, or saves but they will all be safe back in the pulled out folder. Does a newly started game work any better on the Clean Folder?
Beyond the issue being game save or user game folder specific, we would need to know more about the computer on which you are trying to play, which EPs you have going, and which world(s) you are playing in. You could run a dxdiag and post it here in multiple responses (it will be far too long to fit into one) or use pastebin.com and provide a link to it. https://help.ea.com/en-us/help/pc/how-to-gather-dxdiag-information
That last part assumes Windows, if you are working with the Mac version of the game please say so as that will require a different conversation.
Well, I am working with a windows 7 computer. This savefile is in Moonlight Falls, but I did have a savefile in twinbrook that was nice and smooth. I haven't done any folder-moving yet, but I'll try that as soon as I can.
@phoebebebe13 oh gosh that's not good, will the laptop still function for other things other than gaming ? and do you have any desktop recommendations? gotta start saving up now!
@cassie465 Gaming on your laptop would not be a good idea . It could shorten the lifespan of your laptop. As far as using it for general use it should be fine. If it does break down , you would have to throw it away. They don't even make your laptop hardware to replace any hardware that may break down.
It's best to ask for help with a computer when your ready to buy. What is available now might not be ready when your ready to buy. Are you only playing TS3? Computers to run this game (TS3) run $500-$700 and up USD. Prices vary in other countries. The cheaper computers will sell you older hardware they don't make anymore. If you go $700 and up you have a better chance of buying the newest hardware out there. My advice would be to buy the newest hardware they make so you would not have to upgrade your computer for a while. if you buy a computer with older hardware just for this game would be fine however at some point the hardware may become to old to upgrade and then even your desktop will become a throw away computer
So in 2009 when The Sims 3 came out I had a crappy laptop with BAD specs but suprisingly the game ran great noww in 2017 when I run The Sims 3 (or The Sims 4) it has major lag issues every 5 seconds is normal then slow then fast then normal etc. I now have a modern Windows 10 64bit PC with an Intel Core i7 and NVIDIA Geforce GTX 1070 and it is weird i tried a bunch of methods it either does nothing or helps only a little maybe it's because on TS3 and TS4 I have all DLC installed because DLC takes up some extra RAM but I have like 15.9 GB of RAM and even on the lowest settings the game runs like 🐸🐸🐸🐸 I am really confused and if anyone would like to help that would be great! (Also on a side note TS2 runs bad as well but maybe it's because the game is over 10 years old)
So in 2009 when The Sims 3 came out I had a plum laptop with BAD specs but suprisingly the game ran great noww in 2017 when I run The Sims 3 (or The Sims 4) it has major lag issues every 5 seconds is normal then slow then fast then normal etc. I now have a modern Windows 10 64bit PC with an Intel Core i7 and NVIDIA Geforce GTX 1070 and it is weird i tried a bunch of methods it either does nothing or helps only a little maybe it's because on TS3 and TS4 I have all DLC installed because DLC takes up some extra RAM but I have like 15.9 GB of RAM and even on the lowest settings the game runs like plum I am really confused and if anyone would like to help that would be great! (Also on a side note TS2 runs bad as well but maybe it's because the game is over 10 years old)
There is almost no comparison between TS3, the base game as it was released in 2009 to run on Win XP and Vista (the later ones weren't out yet), and the final product with eleven EPs and countless patches. The EPs don't add "some" resource usage, the heavier ones increase the load on the game and its requirements tremendously -- these would be Pets, Seasons, IP, and ITF. Some like Generations and Ambitions are actually very gentle, the others would be in between. The load and requirements also change with the operating system. Win 7, 8.x, and now 10 are far more resource heavy than their predecessors.
So far all we know is that you have an i7 with 16 GB of RAM and a GTX 1070 for a card. That's actually more than enough for TS3 and all EPs, but the game needs some help now. For one thing, it has no built-in frame rate limiter like more modern games do, even TS4. Have you taken the steps in the Nivida Control Panel to cap the fps rate to the refresh rate of your monitor? Usually that's 60 Hz, so 60 fps but some monitors can run higher. And have you checked the fps rates you are actually getting in game with the fps on cheat code? Wildly fluctuating fps rates in the hundreds or thousands on the newer more powerful cards will cause graphics glitches, lag, screen tears, crashes, and can ultimately burn out your card as it works far harder than it ever needs to for no helpful reason. If the Nvidia Control Panel is not going to lock things in as it should, or if you require playing in windowed mode as vert sync only works in full screen, then the next tool to use to cap the fps would be Nvidia Inspector.
If you would like a more complete assessment, please provide a full dxdiag report and post it here in multiple responses (it will be far too long to fit into one) or use pastebin.com and provide a link to it. There could be something else off-kilter there that needs to be adjusted or compensated for. Or (is this a laptop?) you might have dual graphics cards and the game could be reaching for the "wrong" one to use. https://help.ea.com/en-us/help/pc/how-to-gather-dxdiag-information
And please tell us which worlds you are playing in. Isla Paradiso is a nightmare to play for almost anyone unless one fixes up the world first due to design flaws, Bridgeport has issues as well.
Modern computers should run TS2 fine, although I do believe steps are required to get the newer graphics cards recognized and tamed. Many have better results with the more recently remastered TS2 Ultimate Collection (UC) available for owners of the game for free by requesting it from an EA Customer Support agent. Can't really speak to TS4 except to say yes, its EPs also considerably add to the load that version of the game must carry and they are not always going to work well together for all players right now.
"Plum" is the forum's potentially naughty word filter.
I have a Desktop PC an Alienware Aurora R5 to be exact. I have (from what I know of) one graphics card and I tweaked the settings alot. Dxdiag I'm new so you have to type it in manually rcKq87nr
I have a Desktop PC an Alienware Aurora R5 to be exact. I have (from what I know of) one graphics card and I tweaked the settings alot. Dxdiag I'm new so you have to type it in manually rcKq87nr
Your dxdiag looks fine to me, except for the part where your sims games are crashing all over the place. But you already knew that. Here is the full link for the other tech responders here to see in case I've missed something. https://pastebin.com/rcKq87nr
TS3 should run fine, or at least as fine as it's ever going to, on that hardware set, it's really overkill for all of these games. Let's focus on the fps issue if we could? This is not optional for TS3 and runaway fps rates will kill both the game and your expensive graphics card.
In-game, shift+ctrl+C to bring up the cheats console and type fps on (enter). As you play and move the game camera around, the displayed rate that shows up in a little circle should never exceed the frame rate of your monitor, which is indeed 60 Hz like most, so 60 fps. To make the fps rate display go away, cheats console again and fps off (enter). And again, please not in Isla Paradiso or Bridgeport as those wouldn't be valid tests due to world design issues.
Here are illustrated instructions on how to use the Nvidia Control Panel to arrange for vsync and fps capping, if needed. Note that you will have to create a profile for the correct executable, you are on Patch 1.67 so that's TS3w.exe (with the "w"). http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/comment/15007970#Comment_15007970
And again, if the Control Panel method doesn't lock things in or if you require windowed mode as opposed to full screen, then we move on to Nvidia Inspector.
For more precise help with TS2 UC, it would be better if you post on the TS2 section where the players actually are.
I'm not a new member, but I hope it's okay if I post here. I got a new laptop and I installed the sims 3 on my C drive which is an SSD. But whenever I start the game, a sims 3 folder where saves and stuff would go gets generated in my documents which I moved to the D drive. So all the files for the game are in a different drive from where the game is installed. I hope this makes sense. It's really confusing. Is this supposed to happen?
I'm not a new member, but I hope it's okay if I post here. I got a new laptop and I installed the sims 3 on my C drive which is an SSD. But whenever I start the game, a sims 3 folder where saves and stuff would go gets generated in my documents which I moved to the D drive. So all the files for the game are in a different drive from where the game is installed. I hope this makes sense. It's really confusing. Is this supposed to happen?
It's more a matter of what do you want to happen rather than what is supposed to.
From quickly looking at another thread on the TS4 section, it looks to me like your C drive is a 512 GB SSD. Unless you have other extensive plans for it, that should be plenty to support the program installs and the user game files in Documents for both games. But for some reason you have chosen to redirect Documents entirely to your D drive?
If so, that would be why your user game folder is on D. It spawns in Documents and that's where Documents is. And that's fine if both drives are internal, but if D is a regular HDD and not an SSD then you aren't getting the real benefit of even having an SSD (TS3 benefits from this much more than TS4 does).
So...why is Documents redirected to D and where do you want it to be? Or, if I am oversimplifying what you were trying to accomplish, please explain a bit more if you could.
I redirected documents to D because I wanted the sims 4 on that drive. But I want the sims 3 on my SSD since that's why I bought a laptop with that. Is it not possible to have the games on different drives? I thought I could do that, but I don't know anything about computers
I redirected documents to D because I wanted the sims 4 on that drive. But I want the sims 3 on my SSD since that's why I bought a laptop with that. Is it not possible to have the games on different drives? I thought I could do that, but I don't know anything about computers
Yes, you can install the game programs on whichever drive you want, but you can't manage different choices for the Documents user game folders just by redirecting the entire Documents folder at the Windows level.
I would recommend having all of this on C and not having the Documents folder redirected in its entirety, just for simplicity's sake, if you can work with that. If D is a standard HDD, you can still use it for general file storage just by moving things over there manually.
I am using an older Mac running Snow Leopard (10.6.8) and I am running the Sims 3 directly from the discs without Origin (can't use Origin because operating system is too old).
So my question is... is there still a way for me to purchase and download store content and add it to my game without updating and without Origin? Also will I still be able to add mods to my game? Is there a way for me to just grab the files somehow and place them in the appropriate folders on my Mac?
I bought the game originally through Origin, and when Origin stopped working on my operating system, I bought the entire game (base + expansions) again in disc format so that I could still play it directly on my computer. So basically, I've bought the entire game twice :P
Let me know if you have any help or insight. Thanks so much!!
I am using an older Mac running Snow Leopard (10.6.8) and I am running the Sims 3 directly from the discs without Origin (can't use Origin because operating system is too old).
So my question is... is there still a way for me to purchase and download store content and add it to my game without updating and without Origin? Also will I still be able to add mods to my game? Is there a way for me to just grab the files somehow and place them in the appropriate folders on my Mac?
I bought the game originally through Origin, and when Origin stopped working on my operating system, I bought the entire game (base + expansions) again in disc format so that I could still play it directly on my computer. So basically, I've bought the entire game twice :P
Let me know if you have any help or insight. Thanks so much!!
Hi there.
Not sure why you needed to repurchase the disks. Origin is not required to run an already installed game on the Mac OS like it is with the current Windows version. But perhaps you had to reinstall at some point, then of course not having Origin working would be painful.
Yes, you can still purchase and add TS3 Store content if you are not using Origin. The Origin client is not required at all. Your game does have to be patched up to a reasonable level though for the store content adds to work. Current for the Mac version of the game is 1.67, I believe at anything lower than 1.63 there could be issues.
Store Points, if you need them, can only be purchased by way of Origin now, didn't used to be this way, but you can do that on the Origin.com website. The program is not needed for that either. If your Origin.com and TS3 store logins are the same, then the points will show up in your store account sometime very soon after the purchase is made.
Mods on the Mac version of the game work the same way as they do in Windows. You need a Mods folder with two required subfolders and a file called Resource.cfg inside. We call this the Framework. It can be downloaded together with a couple of simple test mods, unzipped, and placed into your TS3 user game folder in Documents. Your setup should look exactly like the illustrations when finished, except of course with the Mac OS Finder around the edges instead of Windows 7 as shown. http://modthesims.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:Installing_Sims_3_Package_Files/Setup_and_Files
Once you have it in place and tested, mods and other package based content get added by placing them (unzipped) into the Mods\Packages folder, and clearing your cache files. Again, exactly the same as with Windows.
I formatted my Mac last Summer, so that's why I needed the discs to reinstall my game :/
Fantastic news that I can still use store content!! So you are saying that I should be able to update my game without a hitch then? In that case I'll go ahead, update and enjoy. I've been afraid to update because I thought that updating would cause the game to require Origin, therefore making my game unusable again.
I still have my TS3 Store account from before, and still have have some SimPoints. Thanks for the great news!! :D
I formatted my Mac last Summer, so that's why I needed the discs to reinstall my game
Fantastic news that I can still use store content!! So you are saying that I should be able to update my game without a hitch then? In that case I'll go ahead, update and enjoy. I've been afraid to update because I thought that updating would cause the game to require Origin, therefore making my game unusable again.
I still have my TS3 Store account from before, and still have have some SimPoints. Thanks for the great news!!
The must use Origin to manage and start the game thing comes with Patch 1.69. There is no 1.69 for the Mac version (and not relevant here but it doesn't apply to Steam players on Windows either). The best way to patch up to 1.67 is to download and use EA's SuperPatcher. The download is huge, but it's painless to run and typically much more reliable than patching through the Launcher. https://help.ea.com/en-us/help/the-sims/the-sims-3/the-sims-3-super-patcher (make sure to get the correct version)
And, by the way, you aren't missing much. There is no difference at all in the game files between 1.67/69, only in the way the game must start up.
Comments
I had a question regarding custom content. I like to download new CC here and there, and I have quite a lot in my game. I am playing a legacy family and all the family members have CC skins, hairs, clothing, etc. I want to clean out and remove the CC that I do not use very much so my game can run faster. I think what I will do is uninstall ALL my CC and then reinstall the CC that I want.
So my question is, if I uninstall all my CC and then reinstall it, will all my CC on my sims, house, etc still be there? Or will I have to manually add the CC items back on? Also, the family is also in a custom world, so the world will be uninstalled and reinstalled along with the rest of the CC. Will that mess up my save?
If you miss reinstalling some of your actual in-use CC, you will get a warning upon startup that content in-use is missing and substitutions will be made. But if you quit without saving such a session, then no changes are made and you can then try to restore the missing in-use content. Some of these substitutions will make sense (one shirt or pair of jeans for another), some will be comical (rolls of toilet paper where there used to be a sculpture or some other decor object). For skins that no longer exist, sims will appear to have no skin -- they will be all black with no body texture.
If you miss replacing an underlying installed world that is in-use, then you won't be able to launch saved games that depend on it until that world is reinstalled.
In other words, it's really difficult to do any permanent harm by conducting such a cleanup.
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@cassie465
You can't upgrade your laptop video card or processor. You are stuck with the specs you buy when it comes to laptops. They are throw away computers once they stop working. Laptop average life span 3-5 years. Their hardware becomes quickly outdated too. Your laptop is 4 years old and they don't make the hardware your computer has anymore
Your video card is the problem. It's integrated with your processor and not designed to run this game. You can't add a video card to a laptop to meet requirements to run the game. your only option would be to buy a new computer.
We don't advise gaming on laptop unless you must have a laptop. As mentioned above they are a throw away computer. This game requires desktop. Laptop hardware is weaker than desktop hardware. If you buy a good gaming desktop with a good case, good cooling, hardware can be changed or switched out. They are not a throw away computer like a laptop and will last a lot longer
> LuckyPalms wrote: »
>
> Hi all,
>
> I had a question regarding custom content. I like to download new CC here and there, and I have quite a lot in my game. I am playing a legacy family and all the family members have CC skins, hairs, clothing, etc. I want to clean out and remove the CC that I do not use very much so my game can run faster. I think what I will do is uninstall ALL my CC and then reinstall the CC that I want.
>
> So my question is, if I uninstall all my CC and then reinstall it, will all my CC on my sims, house, etc still be there? Or will I have to manually add the CC items back on? Also, the family is also in a custom world, so the world will be uninstalled and reinstalled along with the rest of the CC. Will that mess up my save?
>
>
>
> If you remove CC and worlds then replace some of the CC and worlds with the exact same things, then they will remain in-use in your saved games.
>
> If you miss reinstalling some of your actual in-use CC, you will get a warning upon startup that content in-use is missing and substitutions will be made. But if you quit without saving such a session, then no changes are made and you can then try to restore the missing in-use content. Some of these substitutions will make sense (one shirt or pair of jeans for another), some will be comical (rolls of toilet paper where there used to be a sculpture or some other decor object). For skins that no longer exist, sims will appear to have no skin -- they will be all black with no body texture.
>
> If you miss replacing an underlying installed world that is in-use, then you won't be able to launch saved games that depend on them until that world is reinstalled.
>
> In other words, it's really difficult to do any permanent harm by conducting such a cleanup. :)
Thank you very much, igazor!
Okay, so I decided to play my game today... but it took almost TWO HOURS to boot up my savefile! Then when it finally booted, I got stuck in one of those "world freezes but all the sounds keep playing and the plumbob keeps spinning" for almost twenty minutes! What could possibly be slowing down my game so much?
Afraid the issue could be any one or any combination of a hundred things. Is it only this one save that gets stuck on loadup then freezes or do others behave the same? What happens if you start a new test game in a gentle to play world (Sunset Valley, Riverview, Twinbrook)? And what happens if you pull your entire TS3 user game folder out of Documents to your Desktop for safekeeping -- the game will spawn a new one on the next startup that will have no installed content, worlds, mods, CC, or saves but they will all be safe back in the pulled out folder. Does a newly started game work any better on the Clean Folder?
Beyond the issue being game save or user game folder specific, we would need to know more about the computer on which you are trying to play, which EPs you have going, and which world(s) you are playing in. You could run a dxdiag and post it here in multiple responses (it will be far too long to fit into one) or use pastebin.com and provide a link to it.
https://help.ea.com/en-us/help/pc/how-to-gather-dxdiag-information
That last part assumes Windows, if you are working with the Mac version of the game please say so as that will require a different conversation.
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
It's best to ask for help with a computer when your ready to buy. What is available now might not be ready when your ready to buy. Are you only playing TS3? Computers to run this game (TS3) run $500-$700 and up USD. Prices vary in other countries. The cheaper computers will sell you older hardware they don't make anymore. If you go $700 and up you have a better chance of buying the newest hardware out there. My advice would be to buy the newest hardware they make so you would not have to upgrade your computer for a while. if you buy a computer with older hardware just for this game would be fine however at some point the hardware may become to old to upgrade and then even your desktop will become a throw away computer
So far all we know is that you have an i7 with 16 GB of RAM and a GTX 1070 for a card. That's actually more than enough for TS3 and all EPs, but the game needs some help now. For one thing, it has no built-in frame rate limiter like more modern games do, even TS4. Have you taken the steps in the Nivida Control Panel to cap the fps rate to the refresh rate of your monitor? Usually that's 60 Hz, so 60 fps but some monitors can run higher. And have you checked the fps rates you are actually getting in game with the fps on cheat code? Wildly fluctuating fps rates in the hundreds or thousands on the newer more powerful cards will cause graphics glitches, lag, screen tears, crashes, and can ultimately burn out your card as it works far harder than it ever needs to for no helpful reason. If the Nvidia Control Panel is not going to lock things in as it should, or if you require playing in windowed mode as vert sync only works in full screen, then the next tool to use to cap the fps would be Nvidia Inspector.
If you would like a more complete assessment, please provide a full dxdiag report and post it here in multiple responses (it will be far too long to fit into one) or use pastebin.com and provide a link to it. There could be something else off-kilter there that needs to be adjusted or compensated for. Or (is this a laptop?) you might have dual graphics cards and the game could be reaching for the "wrong" one to use.
https://help.ea.com/en-us/help/pc/how-to-gather-dxdiag-information
And please tell us which worlds you are playing in. Isla Paradiso is a nightmare to play for almost anyone unless one fixes up the world first due to design flaws, Bridgeport has issues as well.
Modern computers should run TS2 fine, although I do believe steps are required to get the newer graphics cards recognized and tamed. Many have better results with the more recently remastered TS2 Ultimate Collection (UC) available for owners of the game for free by requesting it from an EA Customer Support agent. Can't really speak to TS4 except to say yes, its EPs also considerably add to the load that version of the game must carry and they are not always going to work well together for all players right now.
"Plum" is the forum's potentially naughty word filter.
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
https://pastebin.com/rcKq87nr
TS3 should run fine, or at least as fine as it's ever going to, on that hardware set, it's really overkill for all of these games. Let's focus on the fps issue if we could? This is not optional for TS3 and runaway fps rates will kill both the game and your expensive graphics card.
In-game, shift+ctrl+C to bring up the cheats console and type fps on (enter). As you play and move the game camera around, the displayed rate that shows up in a little circle should never exceed the frame rate of your monitor, which is indeed 60 Hz like most, so 60 fps. To make the fps rate display go away, cheats console again and fps off (enter). And again, please not in Isla Paradiso or Bridgeport as those wouldn't be valid tests due to world design issues.
Here are illustrated instructions on how to use the Nvidia Control Panel to arrange for vsync and fps capping, if needed. Note that you will have to create a profile for the correct executable, you are on Patch 1.67 so that's TS3w.exe (with the "w").
http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/comment/15007970#Comment_15007970
And again, if the Control Panel method doesn't lock things in or if you require windowed mode as opposed to full screen, then we move on to Nvidia Inspector.
For more precise help with TS2 UC, it would be better if you post on the TS2 section where the players actually are.
NRaas has moved!
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Am I too lost?
From quickly looking at another thread on the TS4 section, it looks to me like your C drive is a 512 GB SSD. Unless you have other extensive plans for it, that should be plenty to support the program installs and the user game files in Documents for both games. But for some reason you have chosen to redirect Documents entirely to your D drive?
If so, that would be why your user game folder is on D. It spawns in Documents and that's where Documents is. And that's fine if both drives are internal, but if D is a regular HDD and not an SSD then you aren't getting the real benefit of even having an SSD (TS3 benefits from this much more than TS4 does).
So...why is Documents redirected to D and where do you want it to be? Or, if I am oversimplifying what you were trying to accomplish, please explain a bit more if you could.
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Am I too lost?
In order to have the TS4 user game folder on D but the TS3 user game folder on C, you would have to deploy what are called Junction Points, also known as Symbolic Links. It's a bit advanced and may require a third party program to manage properly.
https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/16226/complete-guide-to-symbolic-links-symlinks-on-windows-or-linux
I would recommend having all of this on C and not having the Documents folder redirected in its entirety, just for simplicity's sake, if you can work with that. If D is a standard HDD, you can still use it for general file storage just by moving things over there manually.
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So my question is... is there still a way for me to purchase and download store content and add it to my game without updating and without Origin? Also will I still be able to add mods to my game? Is there a way for me to just grab the files somehow and place them in the appropriate folders on my Mac?
I bought the game originally through Origin, and when Origin stopped working on my operating system, I bought the entire game (base + expansions) again in disc format so that I could still play it directly on my computer. So basically, I've bought the entire game twice :P
Let me know if you have any help or insight. Thanks so much!!
Not sure why you needed to repurchase the disks. Origin is not required to run an already installed game on the Mac OS like it is with the current Windows version. But perhaps you had to reinstall at some point, then of course not having Origin working would be painful.
Yes, you can still purchase and add TS3 Store content if you are not using Origin. The Origin client is not required at all. Your game does have to be patched up to a reasonable level though for the store content adds to work. Current for the Mac version of the game is 1.67, I believe at anything lower than 1.63 there could be issues.
Store Points, if you need them, can only be purchased by way of Origin now, didn't used to be this way, but you can do that on the Origin.com website. The program is not needed for that either. If your Origin.com and TS3 store logins are the same, then the points will show up in your store account sometime very soon after the purchase is made.
Mods on the Mac version of the game work the same way as they do in Windows. You need a Mods folder with two required subfolders and a file called Resource.cfg inside. We call this the Framework. It can be downloaded together with a couple of simple test mods, unzipped, and placed into your TS3 user game folder in Documents. Your setup should look exactly like the illustrations when finished, except of course with the Mac OS Finder around the edges instead of Windows 7 as shown.
http://modthesims.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:Installing_Sims_3_Package_Files/Setup_and_Files
Once you have it in place and tested, mods and other package based content get added by placing them (unzipped) into the Mods\Packages folder, and clearing your cache files. Again, exactly the same as with Windows.
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Fantastic news that I can still use store content!! So you are saying that I should be able to update my game without a hitch then? In that case I'll go ahead, update and enjoy. I've been afraid to update because I thought that updating would cause the game to require Origin, therefore making my game unusable again.
I still have my TS3 Store account from before, and still have have some SimPoints. Thanks for the great news!! :D
https://help.ea.com/en-us/help/the-sims/the-sims-3/the-sims-3-super-patcher
(make sure to get the correct version)
And, by the way, you aren't missing much. There is no difference at all in the game files between 1.67/69, only in the way the game must start up.
You're welcome!
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Thanks so much! I'll give SuperPatcher a try when I get a chance :)
That is a very large file and my Mac is only running 4GB RAM right now. Hopefully it'll be fine though..