I just use the rabbit hole rugs and build a shell I like. I furnish it if I feel like it. But not everyone likes building so I hope you find a way to make that work, I am pretty sure it was in Nrass debug mod like Simsample mentioned that let's you fix the names on the rabbitholes.

I tried rabbit hole rugs once (and they also made my crash for some reason) but there are so many nice shells in the game - mainly the UNI buildings - that I like to use. And aren't the shells a less of a load to the game, than actual buildings? At least I think they are. Anyway, I agree that it's good that there are options to both kind of players.

I love to build! But I also like some of the rabbithole shells, so I like to approach everything on a case by case basis.

Another question for the knowledgeable- do the Showtime Live Venue shell objects (Los Sueños, Brotherhood of Fine Fellows Hall) have any sort of scripting/opportunities attached to them? Same with the Hoi Polloi Event Center.

I want to remove some to make way for other lots, but I want to make sure my sims can reach the top of the Showtime careers without them and aren't missing out on any sort of specific opportunities.

Well, when it comes to the Brotherhood of Fine Fellows Shell, I haven't ever got any opportunities from it. I've also used its shell for my own clubs just fine. Same goes for the Los Sueños shell. Not sure about Hoi Polloi, though.

Question for builders. I have been trying for a while now to get a short wall for the roof of the gym I'm working on working. The kind you have on a flat roof and need CFE to make.

I've got the making them part down. But the problem comes when I try to connect them to anything else. When I try to connect them to the rest of the building, the ends always distort even with CFE off. I can't get them to stay at their respective heights, the short wall always goes up about halfway to "connect" with the higher wall. If I don't have to connect it to anything, like the very top of a building, it works fine. It's only when I have to connect it to something else that's higher.

I hope it's just something obvious that I'm missing. I've seen it work with the University gym, so I know it can be done.

I think the only way to deal with this is having the higher wall made up of a wall the same height as the short one you're connecting it to, with another level of walls on top of that to make it taller.

Like if you're connecting a garage to a house on a foundation, you need to make the base of the garage a wall that's as high as the foundation, and then a wall on top of that to make a total wall height of 1 wall + foundation height, which will match with the house on the foundation.

Hope that makes sense

That does make sense actually! I'm going to try that when I open up the game next.

This was my thoughts as well- it seems like the private venue shells are just decorative, but the Large Venue shells are combo rabbithole/shells.

In this case, the big question is whether or not there are specific opportunities/gigs attached to the Hoi Polloi shell, or if I can just replicate its functions using just the Binder Clips Center + a more space-saving theater rabbithole.

If there are any opportunities etc. attached to that shell, would those show up in the shell specific game files? With S3PE perhaps? Just a thought.

Do I need an expensive gaming PC to run The Sims 3 smoothly? I'm planning on getting a desktop soon, and I'm really not sure what kind of budget I should be setting for myself.

A top of the line gaming computer just for TS3 would be pointless in my opinion so the answer is no in my opinion. If you only care about playing TS3 to its fullest potential without the computer being an issue, then I would suggest searching for older hardware released in 2012. However, that's not something you may find pre-built unless someone reputable was selling their old gaming computer if you are not into building your own.

My first gaming desktop I built played TS3 well. Unfortunately, the motherboard died after about 6 years and because it's old I would have to go online to find a possible new replacement or an used one. Anyway, the computer specifications are:

Win 7 64-Bit (You may want to go with 64-Bit just in case later down the line TS3 for PC does get a 64-Bit version.)

8 GB RAM (For now, TS3 doesn't need any more than this and has room for some multi-tasking, however, the developers say for the best performance you should close any other programs before running TS3. Depending on the computer, it may vary whether there will be any issues or not. If a 64-Bit version ever does come out then you can always upgrade later as long as the motherboard supports larger RAM capacity. I think some support up to 32 GB or more of RAM.)

Intel Core i7 3770K @ 3.5 GHz (The minimal requirements state at least 2.4 GHz but if you want faster processing, routing, liveliness of simulation then the higher the GHz, the better. Or so that has been my experience coming from different computers and each one better than the last. If I had to guess recommended requirements then it would be 3.2 GHz or higher. Getting a CPU that's already overclocked may be a better option.)

Geforce GTX 660 2 GB VRAM (This seemed more than efficient and I was quite happy with my build. Though because it's old ShadowPlay, a free recorder which comes with an updated driver, doesn't perform so well with TS3 and stutters and lags a bit. The more VRAM, the better to help with graphic intensive games. Now TS3 is not GPU intensive but mostly CPU intensive, however, some custom content just goes overboard with 4K, high poly counts, etc so be careful with that. While the GPU might handle it, TS3 game engine has a limit to what it can handle. Be responsible about what you put in your game if you choose to use mods/cc.)

Edit: 1 TB HDD (The size of the HDD and/or SSD will depend on your storage needs. Before this system I came from 500 GB HDD gaming laptop and was near its limit with space to spare for other computer operations. So I decided to double that to have more storage because I store a lot of TS3 and it takes up a lot of space like screenshots, videos before I move it to the external HDD plus multiple TS3 game folders since I like to switch.)

Edit: Full HD 1920 x 1080 @ 60 FPS monitor (Higher resolutions than this will make the U.I. smaller but the image clearer. If you get a monitor or already have one with higher resolutions then you can always try it out in TS3 options menu to see if you can accept that. Or change it back to whatever you are comfortable with. Also note: Higher resolutions may cause poor game performance depending on the computer configuration. So you may want to test it out to find the right settings for you. Currently, on the computer below the resolution I'm playing at is 2560 x 1440 @ 144 FPS. The higher the frames per second on a monitor, the more smoother a game's movement will look. 60 FPS is really good though and in case you may want to get or already have a monitor with a higher FPS, TS3 seems to pick up on that when you want to change it in the options menu. It will be greyed out in windowed mode though and the fps cannot be set unless through external programs.)

Edit: Personally, I always find it extremely easy to test out a new computer with TS3 as is. No game altering mods at all is ideal because you can purely test your computer's capability with TS3 so you know the as is performance compared to when you start adding mods/cc. Then you can always better manage your game performance because you know how it's supposed to play and means some mods/cc is dragging your performance down. Of course, it is up to you whether you value quality performance vs poor performance.

Edit: There are also YouTube videos/knowledgeable persons that are helpful when it comes to finding the right balance in performance. (Ambient Occlusion is not supported in TS3 and I would not recommend trying to force something a game does not support through external programs.)

Tested: Graphics settings and how they affect performance
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DW2m14vzFM8

Here are a couple of websites I found useful when building my first desktop. Even if you are not building, this information is still useful to know once you get all the information about what's inside a pre-built computer.
https://modthesims.info/wiki.php?ti...em_Requirements

This is great for comparing CPU's, GPU's, etc to find out which is better in performance. Also, great for other kinds of information specific to what you may want to know.
https://www.passmark.com/

For example: Comparing two CPU's or two GPU's to find out which is better suited to what you want your gameplay experience to be but also according to your budget. But again, TS3 is a game released in 2009 and continued through 2013. I suggested hardware from 2012 because The Sims Studio seems to have updated the new GPU's to the list for the game to recognize but not for 2013 and onwards, naturally. Though personally, I highly doubt the game recognizing your GPU matters in that sense and seems to be just there to have preset in-game options already set for you, but what does matter is the game is using the GPU by default and not an onboard integrated card from the CPU. As long as the connection, VGA or DVI or HDMI cable is in the right place concerning a desktop, the GPU should automatically become the default graphics device when plugged into where it is supposed to be...in the back of the video card, not the motherboard. Of course, it says this on the instructions of how to set up your new gaming desktop or so it does when I got my pre-built gaming desktop. The one I built I didn't know that, lol, but a quick search on the internet easily rectified my error. Now I know. Also, TS3 still does not recognize the RTX 2070 and I have zero issues and I don't ever plan to force it to recognize it either as I personally find it pointless as I can play just fine like I did on the other older systems that did recognize the GPU. So yeah, that's my experience and conclusion to that.
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compar...7-9700K/2vs3335
https://www.videocardbenchmark.net/...2070/2152vs4001

Here in this topic I link below you will see screenshots and videos from this specific computer mentioned above. This is for you to get an idea as a starting point. Anything better than this, should play TS3 just fine with all EP's/SP's/Store Content/Some mods...be careful of mods because a lot of it, just puts too much on the game engine. And the game engine is only a 32-Bit program already running mostly CPU intensive simulation. Plus, there's also a reason why high poly counts just ruin the games performance when it's just overkill.

Some screenshots were from an older computer and because the resolution is less, you should be able to tell. Plus it took me how many years to finally use the better resolution options, lol.

https://forums.thesims.com/en_us/di...0/my-s3-game/p3

Edit: There's also these videos which better represents how TS3 plays as is on the computer specs above.

https://youtu.be/RecjZIs6N-E

https://youtu.be/eGZxSsm5sUc


========

Here's the computer specifications that I play now and it's performance. Though Isla Paradiso is known to have issues so that's why there's freezing which I do fix in-game based on a Simmer's, BlueSpaarkle's guide, how to fix IP lag.

Win 10 64-Bit
16 GB RAM
Intel Core i7-9700K @ 3.6 GHz
NVidia Geforce RTX 2070 8GB VRAM
1 TB NVMe SSD
1 TB HDD

This build is overkill for TS3 and so I did not get it specifically for that game. It's for Cyberpunk 2077, Control and other real-time ray tracing games, etc. But I can confirm in my experience that TS3 plays just fine with this newer hardware thankfully. Not sure what's the big deal with some saying TS3 runs horrible on newer hardware...my guess its incompatible computer configurations.

https://youtu.be/HUKUSsNOQ3c

Edit: Here's another video, better recorded and in a different neighborhood.

https://youtu.be/BtfrhN8rGpA

One more thing. If you go for a pre-built gaming computer beware that not all of them are the same, as in, performance. It's always best to do a lot of research before purchasing. Look at a lot of reviews, know everything that is inside the computer and whether it's good for what you want or not. You cannot always trust the salesperson to tell you the truth so I suggest to do your homework. Okay actually one more thing, everything in the computer matters, not just the GPU and CPU if you really want the best performance out of a gaming computer. The motherboard matters, the RAM and speed matters, the fans/cooling/airflow system matters, the SSD/HDD and speed matters, etc.

Sometimes I wonder about those who claim to have gaming computers but says TS3 runs poorly. Possibly could be bottlenecking. There are non gaming computers that run TS3 just fine, provided it has its limits, of course. So yes, I have come to the conclusion that TS3 is not the problem and runs extremely well with no mods for a mostly CPU intensive 32-bit program. By the way, the Isla Paradiso video has no mods except NRass NoCD. Just pure official TS3. Now that is how you know you got a good purchase. TS3 does not need mods to run and if it does...I wonder about that too.

Suddenly there is a red glowing sparkle bit on various items in my sim's house. It was on a computer for a couple sim days and then on a living room chair (or maybe on the floor under it). I don't recall this ever happening before. The sparkle goes away eventually. Anybody know what it is?

@lucy: Pretty sure those are booby traps from Generations and/or Supernatural, set by children/teens/fairies. Pranks can be set up for sims in general or specific sims, and will not set off for the prankster.

Question: Has anyone thrown a gift-giving party on a community lot? My host family won't interact with the gift rug, other than to call guests to open presents. Surely that's not working as intended?

@zoe22 Just chiming back in to say that that suggestion for my question about short walls worked great! Thanks so much for that. I thought I was about to lose my sanity trying to figure that one out lol.

Is there a way to make movement on various lots, such as houses, easier or less time consuming? It shouldn't take my sim an hour to come down for breakfast starting from when he gets out of bed.

This is why I prefer smaller houses! Also, I prefer 2 story houses because the path from one place to another can be shorter than in 1 story houses. 3 stories seems to lose the advantage. I always make the stairways doublewidth, or if I'm using spiral staircases I prefer to have 2 of them in opposite corners of the house. Hallways are usually 3 spaces wide and also short! Bedrooms do not have to be bigger than 4X5 spaces unless they have other uses. EA likes to make houses with a lot of diagonal walls and weird crannies- if I use one of their houses I usually redo the interior walls to make straightforward spaces. I'm pretty sure that diagonal walls subtract navigable space on both sides.

There's a lot of furniture placement combinations that are technically "legal," like the coffee table right in front of the couch, and they don't exactly necessarily cause route fail, but they might cause a sim to go out of their way to get places. So I like to leave open walking room on the way to everything a sim has to go to repeatedly. Also I usually do the public parts of a house-kitchen, living room, eating area- as a great room, open-plan sort of thing, though I tend to place the stairs and half-bath in a way to break up the floor and guide traffic. Keeping the furnishings rather simple might help, so you don't have a kitchen the size of a hotel's with twenty countertops all bedecked with small appliances between the stove and the refrigerator. I have also come to the conclusion that dishwashers are worse than sinks for routing and getting the work done.

NRaas Relativity can also be used to make time (the sim clock) go a bit slower, so sims won't take as long to get places

Is there is a way/mods to micromanage autonomy of Zombies?

I wanted to make some playable zombies but do not like that they autonomously turn other sims into zombies. I disabled the lunar cycle because of this. I play the world similar TS2, going through every household time to time with NRAAS master controller instead of playing a single family, which I prefer more control over what happens in the town.

Not sure if this can happen with Nraas SP, so I didn't make this a WCIF question.

In some of the larger, more complex lots I have built for story telling I've found that using ladders speeds things up considerably. They are easier to place than stairs, take up less space, and are certainly a quicker way of getting from one floor to another. One of my castles has four storeys above ground and four dungeon levels below. Three of the towers have ladders going from the topmost level right down to the lowest. I click where I want my sim to go, he heads for the nearest ladder and... zip, he's down in an instant.

Is there any way to age up Sims with aging off without having to remember to enable testing cheats all the time?

I keep aging off on a per town basis with NRaas. I just like playing a family as long as I want without having to worry about an actual age counter. However, I can't seem to be able to age them up with the birthday cake when I'm ready to. It always says "No one on your lot is able to age up" or something similar. Is it blocked from functioning if aging is turned off?

I’d bet NRAAS master controller can do that somehow. But worst case scenario could take the sim into CAS with it and change their age?

(Debug mode) Testingcheatsenabled true - (click on sim) age up
along instant Nraas master controller -> Sim -> Immediate > age up

I don't use aging off as I prefer shorter lifespans but I use these two when aging up sims, but I don't know if they work with aging off. Perhaps it's my specs, but testingcheats one tends to crash when aging up several sims at the same time.

Agreed. Sometimes I cheat one of my sims to friendship with the adult just so I can take care of their baby for them (using Master Controller to instantly age them up if all else fails). The store child care items (baby plat mat, baby swing, playpen, walkers, etc.) have high advertising. If you scatter them around lots, it seems NPC sims will use them fairly regularly. If you don't want to spend money in the item mall, Around the Sims has some really cute versions (like turning the playpen into a little ball pit).

Not a stupid Sim thing per say but a stupid launcher thing... first it says "it's recommended to play with just a few packs at a time". So I make an adjustment. But then it says "save files may not work correctly if you don't use the right packs." Like... it just told me to remove packs? Apparently it wants me to play with JUST two or fewer packs... what's the deal here EA? You made all these packs... but then you say "oh actually, only play base game please. Because the other packs we had you shelve out money for is too intensive. So don't." I dunno... it just bugs me that it's "recommended" to just play with a few packs at a time.

Also... for some reason Bridgeport... that came with Late Night if I'm not mistaken, is disabled even if you have Late Night activated. You need additional packs for it to show up. For some reason...
Apparently you need High Loft stuff for it to show up. Odd.

Oh and can I say how annoying it's to have to download additional store neighborhoods via that old Sims 3 site?