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Issues a player who likes to play large saves can face in the sims 3?
Iceey
Posts: 148 Member
Hi there everyone!
So I've been playing the sims franchise since I was a kid, but the sims 3 (excluding 4 which frankly idk if I have a week total in gameplay hours) is the game I am more unfamiliar with in terms of corruption, errors etc. The last time I had the game was more than 2 years ago and I may have known some stuff, but not anymore.
My main game for those 2+ years has been the sims 2 and I do have a 2yo neighbourhood with 200+ self-created sims with rotational play and so far I haven't faced any corruption signs or relationship issues (except a cousin-sibling duo cuz when you've played about 40 diff families you forget some relationships...), and so far am in gen4.
So I would like to be able to do the same in the sims 3, but I've been reading up on ts3. Turns out the game doesn't recognise 2nd cousins. I guess that might not be too much of an issue, becsuse I'm sure most of the sims who would have 2nd cousins would be dead by that point and if not there's always story progression castes. The one that worries me though is this error which I've seen people talking of in threads, where a save becomes too large and u get some sort of error and you can't play anymore.
Considring I am the kind of player who will make 2 starter sims and expand their family for many gens and at the same time play all those sims, I am sure there's many problems I could run into if I try to do the same thing I did in the sims 2, but that's just my style of gameplay.
So, what problems could I face and is there any ways to prevent/fix the issues that might show up in a save with a family with multiple generations. I would like to know since I am the kind of person where if something that ruins my game happens, I'll probably not play the game for about 4 months at least. Thanks in advance!
So I've been playing the sims franchise since I was a kid, but the sims 3 (excluding 4 which frankly idk if I have a week total in gameplay hours) is the game I am more unfamiliar with in terms of corruption, errors etc. The last time I had the game was more than 2 years ago and I may have known some stuff, but not anymore.
My main game for those 2+ years has been the sims 2 and I do have a 2yo neighbourhood with 200+ self-created sims with rotational play and so far I haven't faced any corruption signs or relationship issues (except a cousin-sibling duo cuz when you've played about 40 diff families you forget some relationships...), and so far am in gen4.
So I would like to be able to do the same in the sims 3, but I've been reading up on ts3. Turns out the game doesn't recognise 2nd cousins. I guess that might not be too much of an issue, becsuse I'm sure most of the sims who would have 2nd cousins would be dead by that point and if not there's always story progression castes. The one that worries me though is this error which I've seen people talking of in threads, where a save becomes too large and u get some sort of error and you can't play anymore.
Considring I am the kind of player who will make 2 starter sims and expand their family for many gens and at the same time play all those sims, I am sure there's many problems I could run into if I try to do the same thing I did in the sims 2, but that's just my style of gameplay.
So, what problems could I face and is there any ways to prevent/fix the issues that might show up in a save with a family with multiple generations. I would like to know since I am the kind of person where if something that ruins my game happens, I'll probably not play the game for about 4 months at least. Thanks in advance!
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Sorry to jump on just this point, I'm a bit pressed for time right now and will respond more later if I can.
But I think you have 2nd cousins confused with 1st cousins once (or 2nd cousins twice) removed. It's once or twice removed bits that put sims (and people) in different generations from each other, usually. But siblings have a common parent, 1st cousins have a common grandparent. 2nd cousins have a common great grandparent, even if that great grandparent is no longer alive. They are more likely to be of the same generation. In other words when two first cousins each have children, on their own with each their own partner I mean, their offspring are 2nd cousins. And in turn the offspring of each of the 2nd cousins will be 3rd cousins -- we're getting kind of far apart on the family tree now, and in the real world we wouldn't necessarily consider offspring that far apart to be all that closely related. I don't know any of my 3rd cousins because I don't really know much about my great great grandparents and what their various offspring have done with their lives as they all lived in a country whose name I can barely pronounce, although I am sure I have plenty of them. Others may be able to trace their family trees back and around that far more easily.
First cousins once removed means one's grandparent is the other's uncle/aunt or great grandparent. These are often a generation apart but sometimes not depending on how far apart the siblings were and how early/late they started having kids compared to each other. The game does not see these as closely related either.
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I have ran the game in windowed mode, it's the same excluding the screen tearing.
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I checked some threads out and there seems to be a lot of this issue and literally no fix.
People on those threads just suggested the usual stuff,
Video card recognition- Done that.
FPS limiter- also done, and I did test ingame via the fps on cheat. Max 59, min 40ish, when I move cam 10-20.
Older stuff is slower- this laptop ain't old or bad for sure
Less expansions- that would kind of be like throwing the money I spent away tbh.
Then one said lot detail at 8, sound outrageous, tried and failed.
One said lot detail below 3- that's what I have and I have lag or whatever u call this.
Vsync- didn't fix my screen tearing, tried windowed, screen tearing disappears but preformance is the same no matter what. Got windowed borderless gaming from another source since the main one doesn't work, this one does the job.
Tested w no cc- did that, still the same.
Texture memory-done.
Disable ingame stuff that makes u lag-done.
Get the featured items folder not to generate anymore files and deleted those-done
Delete chaces regularely (lately)-done.
So when rotating or doing anything sometimes it will take like 10 secs to for example rotate when I press the rotate arrow, same for the other camera related stuff. Now ig this camera lag is also making my sims lag literally. They walk backwards, cancel most actions and ye. Am I wrong in thinking my pc should be able to run the sims 3 when it can decently run AAA games. I get that the sims 3 is 32 bit and riddled with limitations and issues, but I've ran it before, and clearly many people are able to run it these days, so why can't I. It's quite frustrating because before even getting the laptop I was excited knowing it can run sims 3 and now I'm about to just give up on the game and hope a similar sims game or a remaster or smth happens someday so I can enjoy the game too.
Game runs decent in town view, decent when I don't move the camera at all, but no one can play that way, great at build mode also if I don't move the camera.
I am really running out of options here.
There are a few other useful tests, if you haven't tried them already. First, move your entire Sims 3 user data folder out of Documents\Electronic Arts and onto your desktop, launch the game to create a clean folder (don't put anything at all into it), start a new save in Sunset Valley, and have a look around. Don't change any of the graphics options either.
If that doesn't or didn't make a difference, please try playing while your laptop isn't connected to the internet. If you use Origin, and please let me know whether you do, you can put it in offline mode first, then disable wifi and/or pull the ethernet cable. Please use another clean folder.
If that doesn't help either, please try playing in a clean boot:
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-clean-boot-windows-10
Let us know how all of this goes. It would also be useful to see a dxdiag. Hit Windows key-R and enter "dxdiag" without quotes into the run box. Once it's done, click "Save all information," save the dxdiag to your desktop, upload it to a free filesharing site (pastebin.com works fine), and link it here.
Name: Sims3
Version:
Build: Release
=== Rating info ===
GPU: 5 GPU Memory: 4 CPU: 3 RAM: 4 CPU Speed: 2096 Threading: 3
Adjusted CPU: 2395 RAM: 6061 Adjusted RAM: 5549 Cores: 8
=== Machine info ===
OS version: Windows 8 6.2.9200
OS prod type: 0
OS major ver: 6
OS minor ver: 2
OS SP major ver: 0
OS SP minor ver: 0
OS is 64Bit: 1
CPU: AuthenticAMD
Brand: AMD Ryzen 5 3550H with Radeon Vega Mobile Gfx
Family: 15
Model: 8
Cores: 8
HT: 0
x64: 0
Memory: 6061MB
Free memory: 2944MB
User: el
Computer: LAPTOP-4SLD818H
=== Graphics device info ===
Number: 0
Name (driver): NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050
Name (database): GeForce GTX 1050 [Found: 1, Matched: 1]
Vendor: NVIDIA
Chipset: Vendor: 10de, Device: 1c91, Board: 86d4103c, Chipset: 00a1
Driver: nvldumd.dll, Version: 26.21.14.4587, GUID: D7B71E3E-5FD1-11CF-6762-DAA61BC2D735
Driver version: 4587
Monitor: \\.\DISPLAY1
Texture memory: 6016MB
Vertex program: 3.0
Pixel program: 3.0
Hardware TnL: 1
As for the rest, I'll try right now and edit this comment. Thanks for responding! I should mention I play in 1.67, no origin.
The thing is, at the time you launch the game, you have just under 3 GB to work with. That should theoretically be okay for TS3, but in reality once the game starts calling for 2 GB or more, at some point Windows will likely start "paging out" (using virtual memory) to preserve the running of any active programs and that stands to have a decidedly negative impact on game performance.
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This!
What made me think that it isn't ram apart from the task manager is because the game preformance I wouldn't consider bad. As I said if I didn't move my camera, my sims would do everything perfectly.
Anyway thanks for the help! I really hope I won't have to come back for a long time.
https://pastebin.com/2NdZLvNG
Other than that, your dxdiag lists a number of crashes from HP's software that checks your internet connection and your system info. Neither of these programs should be crashing at all, and although the reports might be nothing, if some process involved is running and crashing in the background, it could cause choppiness or other issues, not to mention eating more RAM than it has any right to take.
I know the dxdiag is old, but it would be useful to see a new one if you run into any more trouble at all. And if you do, please test with no internet connection, and then in a clean boot if that doesn't help.
Since this laptop was probably sitting on a shelf for a while before you bought it, it's possible it didn't get all the necessary Windows updates. You're also running a year-old version of Windows 10. The newest version should be out soon, so if you don't want to update to that one right away, now's a good time to update to 1909 (from November).
If you want to cover all your bases, start by running a couple of basic checks on your Windows system files. Here's how:
If you get the message that sfc found corrupt files and was unable to repair some of them, please let me know, and stop here. Otherwise, hit Windows key-i, choose Update & Security, and click the button to check for updates. If there are a number pending, it might take a few tries, with restarts in between, to get them all to run.
If you want to update to 1909, do it next. The best way is through the website. Open Edge (yes, Edge), go here:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
and click the button at the top of the page to update to 1909. When the Windows update is done, please manually check for any other updates through Update & Security as well.
On this fairly long list of yours, the best and most important method of troubleshooting and solving problems with the game is missing, it's the one that's called Factory Reset, that's when you rename or move out your old user folder and let the game generate a new and clean user folder without any harmful things in it.
I noticed two things worth mentioning in your DxDiag report:
The big difference between Memory and Available OS memory is a bit odd, I don't think I've seen that before, it's usually much smaller. Have you been able to find out why that is?
It seems that you have a dual graphics setup, which is probably why it didn't work to turn on vsync in the Nvidia Control Panel, it never does, at least I've never seen it work.
And ye I just found out yesterday why it didn't work, while checking out older threads, and some user had suggested to another user to also turn on vsync for the intel card, but mine is a AMD based system with Vega integrated graphics and this is my first AMD CPU based system so idk how I would mess with the vsync and such for the integrated card.
I was able to play the game comfortably in a smaller world for now, and getting 2×8GB sticks whenever the place I take my pc to for upgrades opens so I hope if RAM is an issue it won't be then. Not really getting the RAM for the game, although I know it will be better for my laptop, but I will also eventually have to do programming and work with virtual machines in this laptop so.
You can change the memory allocation for the chip in BIOS, if you want; this is completely fine to do and shouldn't break anything. In your position, I'd assign 512 MB and leave it at that. But if you don't have anything else open while you play Sims 3, then 6 GB RAM for Windows and the game is enough, and you technically don't need to do anything. Just don't open other apps while playing, because even a couple of browser windows can take a significant amount of memory.
By the way, your Nvidia driver is new enough that I think the Control Panel should have a global fps limiter built in. This works in fullscreen and windowed modes. Right-click on the desktop, select the Nvidia Control Panel, then Manage 3D settings, then under the Global tab, scroll down to Max Frame Rate, set it to On, choose 60, and click Apply.
Imma do what you said and update here. Thanks for the help guys!
Thanks for everything guys! I think my issues here are solved!
It's always fun to find out you fixed a problem you didn't even know someone had. Glad to hear the game is running well now.
And yes, definitely get that extra 8 GB memory when you can. Even though it's not essential, it will make your life so much easier, or at least the part of your life that involves staring at your screen.
A huge thanks for all your suggetions and help once more!
There's probably a sneaky way to get into a more advanced BIOS interface on your laptop vs. the simplified one you are seeing but that doesn't seem necessary anymore.
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