Trouble

The Sims 2 Troubleshooting:

Where do I put the .package file?

Files like MTS-Corner-Bath-n-Shower-unit-pro.package needs to be placed in C:\Documents and Settings\****\My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Downloads

This is where all user made content should be placed. You can use subfolders in the downloads directory but not for cloths.

Why Can’t I see the custom Items in my game?

If you have Sims Expansion pack 3 Night Life installed you need to turn on (enable) custom content on the in game settings.

I still can’t See the Item, Why?

EA never said normal user would never be able to created Sims 2 items. Well there are a lot of smart people out there.

But the problem is there are no guaranties that what one person marks dose not conflict with another.

You can use a tool like SimPE to check for conflicts and there are other tools.

Why is my Sims 2 Game getting lag?

Remember with a game like the Sims2 the more stuff you download and put in to the game the longer the game will take to load always delete unused or unwanted content form the game.

If you find that its only certain houses that cause this to happen try and delete one item at a time from that house and see if the game gets smother after each deletion, This is a way of finding out if a particular item is causing this.

Start by deleting only user made object in the home Beds first.

Why is my water green?

It is believed that green water is a NVIDIA driver related issue, Test this by using a bath that came with the Sims 2, if the edge is correct then there is a problem with the code for the item that has the green water.

I know that the first corner bath I made had this problem but only some people had it turn green. The ones that had correct water where running NVIDIA drivers 77.77 and older, however the original game content was correct this told me that the problem was a conflict with the .package code and the NVIDIA drivers. So I found an alternative to fix this problem by using different water in my package.

My in game catalogue icons have wrong colours and some blue stuff on them how do I fix it?

This sometime happens; especial if you have updated a object. Delete the files DesignModeThumbnails and ObjectThumbnails

from C:\Documents and Settings\****\My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Thumbnails. When the game run’s they will be rebuilt.

NOTE on Polygons:

Polygons are referred to as polys Items that have a high Poly Count can cause your game to take longer to load,

They may also cause your game to run slow, (usually when you have them in you home and more than one high count polygon Item.)

What is a Poly?

At any time have you done a dot to dot where you join the lines, to make a picture? The dots are vertexes and every vertex that is joined with 3 lines makes polygons, the joined lines have a faces that the texture is then place on. This is how a mesh is made.

Meshing is a 3D dot to dot.

Why do some objects have High Polygons?

Objects that have a lot of detailed work have high Polygons, Rounded objects are higher than most.

I try hard to keep polygons low by removing unneeded part for objects and use Pictures to give my objects the detail they need.

So what is to High?

Poly counts affect every one differently; People that have high end Computers may not be affected by large poly items, where as people with low end Computers can be.

Some objects that come with the Sims 2 have more than 5000 polygons like the cars that come to take your Sims out and I’ve seen items in the game that have 4000 polygons. Most objects your Sims uses are low poly object like TV’s and vase's that are under 100 polys.

It’s up to you to decide how much is too much.

What Can I do to use high poly Objects?

Putting more Ram into your computer can help you should have 1gig of ram at lest,

Windows XP needs 512 to run smooth; So what ever more you put in your computer, your computer can use for games and other programs.

Graphics play a big roll in the smoothness of you games also; So a larger graphics card would help, (One with a good name behind it.) I recommend 256 ram on a graphics card and one with good clock speeds like a Geforce FX 5700 or higher.

Why dose the Sims crash or not load?

Some objects that are made by users have errors in the package file that can conflict with the Sims 2, This confliction can cause a number of things to happen from the game not loading, crashing whilst playing the game, freezing when playing and objects in the Sims not being correct.

If you have any of these problems you should uninstall then remove the EA folder from MY Documents the reinstall the game run it with out putting back any backed up content and see if its ok, If it is Ok put back the \EA Games\The Sims 2\Downloads that you took out, then run the game. If the problem comes back then you have something in the downloads folder that is causing your problem.

About Modeling:

Why do some small items have more polys than big ones?

This was an answer to a question placed to me, it’s on models sizes and how they affect the PC. I feel that some might find the answer interesting. This is far form a simple question. And the answer for this is dew to many factors.

Smaller Curvier things like ducks have sharper turns in the mesh so they have more vertexes to make the curves.

Also some of the more detailed small objects have bumps for thing like raised wings that make the over all poly size bigger.

Rounded object have even more polys.

This is why my Ducks and Chickens have such large poly counts as they have bumps and lumps making it look as though they have wings and other details that when the texture is mapped to make’s it look real.

The duck is 824 and each duckling is just a small duck so it’s like putting many ducks down this is why the swan never had cygnets with it.

The package for the Duck has both packed in to it, with and without ducklings, the duck 824 polys and if you place the ducklings 4,120.

The dog has the most of the animals as it has more work in the facial area mouth eyelid etc…

I wonder how big the animal EP pets will be in polys? If the Sims body has more than 4000 polys and the head and face that is separate has more than that??

The horse is simple. Having straighter lines making the back and head curves, the side of the horse is pretty straight and not rounded so it is in fact is a much simpler thing to make. The textures are from a real horse to give a more 3d muscle tone look to the sides. (The dog has this trick on the sides to, actually I used the horse texture to do it.)

Plants have total different meshing techniques, with invisible textures so the leaf is a flat square having a texture of a leaf on it.

The outer part of that leaf texture is made invisible in the game. Making plants easer to make smaller... (This technique can not be done on object like animals and only on flat objects.) Flat objects have low polys anyway but this can make them smaller.

This trick though has it own game problems, when the graphics card renders the mesh it is fast, but the instructions given to the card to make invisible part are much harder for the card to process and take just as long as a poly render. This can cause a game to slow down to, if you have a poorly made graphics card.

I'll use the hedge as an example; the Maxis hedge has 1,184 polys, and so placing one down is like placing one 4,000 poly object. Placing the hedge down till the pc runs slow might take 5 now doing it with the one 4,000 poly object would take 5 also... So it’s not all about polys but how your graphics card renders them from the instructions in the package its self.

It would be different for each object and how they are made, both how many polys and how much of an area of the object needs to be textured with an invisible texture.

That said, what's in a package and the instructions play a big part in the overall performance.

So why use this invisible texture?

If the hedge where to be made by each leaf and each leaf had 7 polys you would need about 6000 leaves to get the same look so the final mesh would be 42,000 polys and that’s just the leaves.

When I make a plant I use multi tricks to do them (The same tricks as Maxis) ensuring that they do not cause the game any major problems. I have studied the maxis objects, trees and plants and do as they do. Some areas I have done better getting the same result. Like my Conifer Pine Box Shrub of 30 polys to that of Maxis 1,184 shrub mine renders much faster and look just as good.

Bed are very small in polys as they often have many straight lines and fewer curves, there are a few beds that have more like the Iron bed at 7,144 polys.

This bit about an item not really having many polys as it covers more tiles is false!... I’ve seen some people state that there object has 14,000 or so poly but covers 15 tiles so it has 933 polys per tile.... No this is not the case as the object is not rendered by the tiles it is in face rendered in the graphics card by drawing the dots, lines, faces then wrapping the texture on it...This is how 3D games work.. Old 2D games rendered a flat picture on the screen in areas like Sims 1 so for games like this it might be true.

Only Items that have green tiles light when place down might be rendered in sections by Sims 2, this still doesn’t mean they are better than the large objects place on one tile both will affect the computer in the same way. Only the in game interaction would be change.

I’m always learning... and I hope you understand that not all objects can be made small, I cut and edit over and over till the object is as small as can be, and still can be made out as a duck, dog, cat or whatever.

I use poly reducers, allot of manual editing and textures to create more detail to get the final result without destroying what the creation is.

Not all Sims 2 items are small believe in me when I say that I’ve pull meshes out of the game to be shocked by the crazy sizes…

This is why I believe the next EP has new requirements even Maxis has changed the way they mesh and texture. Now they will be using larger textures and more.

I hope this help you to understand the work more.

Thanks go out to:

MTS2 (Mod The Sims 2) and Delphy,

EA and Maxis for the Beautiful Sims 2 Games,

The SimPe People, whom without any of this stuff would not be,

JWoods for his tutorials,

Dr Pixel for his MilkShape for Object Meshes tutorial,

WDS BriAnna for her cloths tutorial,

Corel Software for there awesome Paint Shop Program,

Big TKS, to those whom Summit meshing tutorials for other to learn from.

The people who download my work, and for there responses that keep me doing more.