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Crash to Desktop Help Please

Hello so I've got The Sims 3 + Expansions installed and I've also used the "The Sims 3 Performance & Bug Fix Guide 2020" on Steam to adjust my settings to make the game more playable and less laggy. I've added my graphics card to graphics rules along with changing other settings in the specific files listed in the tutorial. Things are really good but I'm having one particular issue that I can't seem to figure out how to fix it. Sometimes when zooming out to neighborhood or if you hit the space bar to toggle between active sims in the household and the camera rushes from one side of the neighborhood to the other...the game will completely crash to the desktop. I do have a lot of Nraas mods installed including overwatch and errortrap. I do see some script error files and xcpt files in Documents>Electronic Arts>The Sims 3 folder. Is there anyway I can read these to find out what might potentially be the issue for the crashing to desktop? Also all my drivers etc. are completely updated.
What other information do you need?

Thanks for reading,
Summer
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Comments

  • puzzlezaddictpuzzlezaddict Posts: 1,877 Member
    The xcpt files in your user data folder are mostly useless. They can show whether the game ran out of memory, or your computer did, but beyond that, they're not much help. There are other ways to try to figure out what's happening though. The best place to start is with a dxdiag: hit Windows key-R, enter "dxdiag" without quotes, wait for the scan to finish, and save the text file to your desktop. Then upload it to the filesharing site of your choice (the free version of pastebin.com works fine) and link it here.

    It could be that there's something wrong with your computer, but it could also be a bad custom content item, or even just the game running out of resources. When snapping the camera from one location to another, it's entirely possible that the data from the first location isn't released from video memory before the data from the second location loads. Since Sims 3 is programmed to only use 800 MB of VRAM, it could run out of resources and crash. This kind of thing can happen without any other complicating factors, but bad custom content, or a corrupt driver, or any number of other problems could cause or exacerbate the problem.

    By the way, there are a number of guides out there that tell players to increase what is referred to as the game's memory limit, from 2 to 4 GB. If you changed this value, you probably actually changed the value of the script heap. Look closely at the number and you'll see it's 20 GB, not 2. It's better not to change this value at all.
  • Summerbear5Summerbear5 Posts: 643 Member
    The best place to start is with a dxdiag: hit Windows key-R, enter "dxdiag" without quotes, wait for the scan to finish, and save the text file to your desktop. Then upload it to the filesharing site of your choice (the free version of pastebin.com works fine) and link it here.

    https://pastebin.com/eUGAhD1g
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  • igazorigazor Posts: 19,330 Member
    Three questions here, if I may. First is might it happen to be snowing when this happens or does it do so regardless of the weather? (Some of us had a similar issue with cross-town camera movements in one or two worlds years ago related to winter weather and a problem with the NRaas GoHere mod, but we thought that had long since been fixed with an updated version).

    The second is maybe I'm missing where you said this, but have you verified your frame rates and what kind of fps readings are you getting in-game with the fps on cheat code?

    The third isn't really a question, but yes it might help if we could read those Script Error logs. Any chance you could bring them over to us at NRaas?

    The dxdiag looks fine to me, unless @puzzlezaddict sees/recognizes anything helpful in the other (non-Sim related) crashes that are being reported on. Your hardware probably couldn't be any stronger that it currently is.
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  • Summerbear5Summerbear5 Posts: 643 Member
    igazor wrote: »
    Three questions here, if I may. First is might it happen to be snowing when this happens or does it do so regardless of the weather? (Some of us had a similar issue with cross-town camera movements in one or two worlds years ago related to winter weather and a problem with the NRaas GoHere mod, but we thought that had long since been fixed with an updated version).

    The second is maybe I'm missing where you said this, but have you verified your frame rates and what kind of fps readings are you getting in-game with the fps on cheat code?
    .

    I'm playing in Lucky Palms and have all weather turned off, even rain because it didn't seem realistic to me to be raining and snowing in the desert lol. I also don't have the NRaas GoHere mod.

    Secondly I used the Nvidia inspector to force my frame rates to 60
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  • igazorigazor Posts: 19,330 Member
    Secondly I used the Nvidia inspector to force my frame rates to 60
    A wise move, but what I meant was have you checked the actual fps rates you are getting in-game to ensure that the fps is staying locked in as specified?
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    NRaas has moved!
    Our new site is at http://nraas.net
  • Summerbear5Summerbear5 Posts: 643 Member
    Thank you @igazor it actually wasn't on. I had it turned on but either an update or a new expansion install might have turned it off. Not sure but regardless it's on now and I'm going to play test it. Thanks =)
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  • Summerbear5Summerbear5 Posts: 643 Member
    @igazor It's still doing it. :(

    How can I read the script error logs?
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  • igazorigazor Posts: 19,330 Member
    edited August 2020
    Have you verified by using the fps on cheat code in-game that the frame rates are now staying locked in at or below the refresh rate of your monitor, which is indeed 60? This is very important for many reasons and that's why I keep asking about it.

    To read script logs, double-click or force them to open in a text reader like Notepad. Understanding what they are saying would be a different matter, which is why I suggested bringing them to us at NRaas. That is a service we provide over there. You could zip them together, upload them to a third party host, and provide a link here, but if I don't recognize the script errors myself then I wouldn't be providing much help. Our developer assists with these and he does not have a presence on this forum.
    o550pjoa47rpxo63g.jpg
    NRaas has moved!
    Our new site is at http://nraas.net
  • Summerbear5Summerbear5 Posts: 643 Member
    Thank you, I'll head over there next time I get a chance. I can confirm that the fps is locked at 60 fps or below now.
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