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Mad Poster
#51 Old 1st Jun 2019 at 7:52 AM
Quote: Originally posted by keyqueen
The point I was trying to make in my original post was that in my experience complaints of TS3 being "unplayable" tend to come from members within this subset who lack the technical knowledge to understand why their pc is underpowered to run TS3 and find it easier to blame the game. In that sense the worse thing TS3 can be accused of is being too ambitions for its targeted demographic.



I think there is some truth to this. The average player probably does not have the savy that many of the folks here have. I get computers years apart and so have gotten very few since Sims came out. I tend to get good ones though and I have never had problems with lag other than one overly loaded 64x64 lot packed with harvestables in 3. I overdid that one. (!) I know some folks with good rigs have problems, but my experience has been that my ones can more than handle the game. I have everything for 3 installed other than K Perry and my game plays very well. So I think there is some validity to what you say that some folks just expect too much based on their hardware.
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Forum Resident
#52 Old 1st Jun 2019 at 4:08 PM
Quote: Originally posted by keyqueen
Thanks for the clarification. I also did not mean to imply that you thought all Pirated games or versions would not run well. I wanted to point out that it really is not likely a large factor in why so many people find TS3 "unplayable" and more likely that they simple were trying to play on machines ill fit to handle the game.
It is of course possible that a hand full of people who had difficult with TS3 being "unplayable" were using pirated games, assuming EA did add some protection to it that would cause it to preform poorly if it were to be copied illegally. I know TS4 had some sort of protection involving the screen becoming gradually pixalated as the game was running. I never heard about TS3 having anything like that, though it might have at some point. But the main thing is these protections would have only been an issue for the first few months of the games release before pirates managed to crack them. Which is actually the main purpose of most copyright protection on video games, not to stop piracy all together(not that companies don't want to) but rather to slowdown pirates long enough to give the initial sells rush to roll in. Usually this is around the first six month to first year of a games life time and is when most games make the highest amount of prophet in their lifetime.

Anywho I'm gonna stop revealing my knowledge about video game piracy before people start come to conclusions about me.

I did not know that they never released the games recommend requirements though come to think of it I've never seen them printed any where only the min requirements. I do wonder if they had would it have made a difference for most of the people trying to play TS3 under specs? I know for sure my PC doesn't cut it on that front but I don't try to blame the game because I'm to cheap to upgrade or to impatient to wait to play into I final do one of the two.

I read some people somewhere on the forum saying it feels as though the TS4 team never tested any of the expansions together. Something about aspects of season interfering with features of other expansions. Makes me wonder if TS3 team ever benched marked TS3 running with all expansions. I really don't think they did at this point. If that the case then not even they would truly know what the recommended requirements of the game are. Is it any mystery way a game community that likely has one of the highest percentages of computer illiterate* members of any triple A titles has so much trouble running it?

*I say computer illiterate only because my vocabulary lacks a less rude term. I do not mean to say it in such away as to imply that most simmers barely know how to turn on a compute. Even having knowledge to install a game and run it obviously requires some level of literacy. I simply mean that compared to most other triple a games, due to its very nature The Sims tends to attracted a larger subset of fans who would not normally be into video games and out side of work and less technical entertainment purposes (social media, videos ect.) computers in general. This subset there for comes into the gaming community at large with a generally less developed understanding of how games and computes work on a technical level then the average gamer. That is not to say all or even most simmers are technically challenged just that the sims community tends to have a larger subset of members that are in comparison to other game communities.

The point I was trying to make in my original post was that in my experience complaints of TS3 being "unplayable" tend to come from members within this subset who lack the technical knowledge to understand why their pc is underpowered to run TS3 and find it easier to blame the game. In that sense the worse thing TS3 can be accused of is being too ambitions for its targeted demographic.

Ok I have seriously derailed this thread long enough.


I'm already aware that often times some have no idea when it comes to basic computer knowledge and how that affects gameplay. Been there, done that. However, the reasoning for bringing up a different observation is because I was wondering if a portion of those who complain about poor performance could also possibly be from those who got the games by other means which piqued my curiosity after the topic came up that TS2: UC and TS3 are among popular downloads being pirated. Well, don't worry just because you have knowledge of an illegal activity doesn't necessarily mean you're affiliated with it. But then again, in general some people do at times give themselves away quite easily.

I think if the developers did in fact release recommended system requirements this issue wouldn't be so prominent with what is needed in order to run all of TS3 with the best performance and without any sacrifices of lowering any of the in-game settings. But perhaps that wouldn't still be much help for those who are newbies and refuse to learn and to unrealistically expect the game to just play on anything. All PC games have system requirements for a reason.

The question about whether The Sims Studio ever play tested TS3 with everything for performance data, I don't know but is something I questioned before as well. The gaming experience I have now, I would say I'm still not sure but without any game altering mods such as NRass NoCD or just using NRass MC/Cheats/Integration and NoCD, in-game settings maxed out, all EP's/SP's/All Store Content installed I have minimal to no lag. So far, I have yet to experience error code 12 or crashing to desktop with those particular save games. But my save game I use the most with much more mods I seem to have some kind of issue with whether it's error code 12, crashing to desktop, unknown mod conflicts, lag, stuttering, freezing, etc. Though, I'm pretty sure I need to clean my save file and move some of the Sims to another world, clean up inventory, reduce role Sims, etc. I've been playing in that particular save for awhile, I think I'm somewhere around 98 Sim weeks and want to keep going to see just how far can I go as long as I continue to learn how to manage the save for the best performance possible.

Hmm, I don't think TS3 is too ambitious for its targeted audience. Honestly, I agree with advancing and improving the series overall and yes that means more resources being used in order to pull off more unique, ground-breaking and life-like features to portray the genre best. But even if I couldn't afford new hardware to rebuild my computer and I'm just stuck not being able to play at all or not being able to play with the best performance and visuals...that's okay too. Personally, I don't think it's fair to want to hold back any potential just because I wouldn't be able to play the game. Sometimes the financial situation can get better, worse or remain the same. Either way, it's not the end of the world just because I can't have something I want. Too bad, c'est la vie...move on. But that's not to say there shouldn't be a compromise so that the most could play but not at the expense of ruining the gaming experience nor without any major worthwhile advancements and improvements added to the series as a whole continuing foundation.
Undead Molten Llama
#53 Old 1st Jun 2019 at 4:14 PM
I think what keyqueen said about Simmers not generally being gamers is fairly accurate. I don't consider myself a "gamer," but I am an avid Simmer. (Mostly TS2, but I poke at TS3 in spurts.) But I'm old enough that I've been into computers since personal computers сame into being in the early 80s, so I know a fair bit about them. I'm not an expert by any stretch, and I don't consider myself to be a "computer nerd" -- that'd be my hubby -- but I know enough to understand how they work and what the components do and to be able to upgrade them and to understand what I need to do to make Sims games, at least, run well. Enough to know that a machine that just meets the minimum specs of any game, Sims or otherwise, isn't really going to cut it for that game.

But I think there's another aspect to this, as well. Out there in the world in general, Sims games aren't taken seriously as "real games." The perception seems to be that they're "lightweight," games that only kids play. So, if you walk into a computer store and talk to a resident nerd and discuss purchasing a computer geared for Simming -- especially for an old game like TS2 and, now, TS3 -- they'll smirk and tell you that "any modern machine will run those." (Which, to an extent, is true, sort of, for a vanilla game...but the nerds in a computer store don't know what a fully-tricked-out Sims game needs.) So the people who aren't especially computer savvy will then buy the cheapest thing they can lay their hands on and think that all will be hunky-dory even when they cram in all the EPs and a ton of CC and then play a gigantic world because the nerd in the store said so. And of course it won't be hunky-dory. Because a tricked-out, fully-loaded *TS2* with modern high-res/high-poly CC is a ravenous GPU hog, so you need a decent video card with a good amount of memory, at the very least. When you add TS3's open world you add CPU-hogginess, too, so you need a decent processor as well. Yeah, if you're a true nerd you can tweak things to make lesser hardware do what you need it to do, but many Simmers are not that level of nerd, not unless they're also into other games where that level of nerdiness is more commonplace. So yeah, then the screeching starts. It would've been nice if EA had issued some recommended specs but...Well, it would've been nice if EA had done lots of things.

All that said, TS3 DOES have issues that will cause problems regardless of hardware. Like, the routing in the EA worlds that causes stuck Sims and vehicles and whatnot and that then causes lag. IMO, you DO need some mods and/or fixed EA worlds to address that. So it's not ENTIRELY a "the problem exists between the keyboard and the chair" sort of situation. But I do think it's mostly that, yes. I mean, I run TS3 with all EPs on a machine that's optimized specifically for TS2 -- meaning, it has deliberately-older hardware that was high-end in 2008ish, but a decent and more modern GPU -- and it runs pretty well. The machine has only a Core2Duo processor (because TS2 doesn't know WTF to do with multicores), so that's my bottleneck, but it runs well on high graphics settings so long as I don't cram huge-normous worlds down its throat. But I don't like huge-normous worlds anyway, so I'm good.

I'm mostly found on (and mostly upload to) Tumblr these days because, alas, there are only 24 hours in a day.
Muh Simblr! | An index of my downloads on Tumblr.
Lab Assistant
#54 Old 1st Jun 2019 at 4:19 PM
Quote: Originally posted by keyqueen
[...] the main purpose of most copyright protection on video games, not to stop piracy all together(not that companies don't want to) but rather to slowdown pirates long enough to give the initial sells rush to roll in. Usually this is around the first six month to first year of a games life time and is when most games make the highest amount of prophet in their lifetime.


I don't know why, but I still have the impression that people who have enough money for it still prefer buying their games. I mean, the average PC user (an endangered species nowadays IMO BTW) is still very paranoic about viruses and warez and stuff... My point and opinion is that they would still have some profits secured and some profits lost, much like they already have today, even without copyright protection. But anyway, having one more thing to protect your house from robbers or your game company from crackers never hurts, does it?

Quote: Originally posted by keyqueen
I read some people somewhere on the forum saying it feels as though the TS4 team never tested any of the expansions together. Something about aspects of season interfering with features of other expansions. Makes me wonder if TS3 team ever benched marked TS3 running with all expansions. I really don't think they did at this point.


Well, I have a slightly different opinion on this one.
Lab Assistant
#55 Old 2nd Jun 2019 at 1:27 AM Last edited by keyqueen : 2nd Jun 2019 at 2:52 AM.
Deshong- Just so we are on the same page here, what you are saying it that you wonder how many players who are claiming TS3 is "unplayable" are trying to play pirated copies? The point I was trying (admittedly very poorly) to make is that the proportion of players running pirated copies and having performance issues BECAUSE they are playing a pirated copy is likely statistically insignificant. AKA extremely small compared to those playing on under powered PCs. I am sorry for not being clearer before, I not a very elaborate speaker and have a tendency to bury what I want to say under piles a unnecessary details.

Quote: Originally posted by Deshong
Hmm, I don't think TS3 is too ambitious for its targeted audience. Honestly, I agree with advancing and improving the series overall and yes that means more resources being used in order to pull off more unique, ground-breaking and life-like features to portray the genre best.


Ugg you caught me doing my own pet peeve, when I said TS3 was too ambitions I was being sarcastic but didn't make that clear again, sorry. I too don't believe that a game series should be held back from innovation just for the sake of being playable on low end pcs. Not when PCs are continuously getting more powerful and cheaper every year. Is that not the biggest problem that many TS veterans have with TS4? Honesty imagine myself grabbing someone by the shoulders and trying to shake some sense into them anytime the say "Well at least it runs well." to defend TS4. There is literally no defense for the shier number of features that TS4 is lacking, not even better performance.
I myself only started playing TS3 about this time one year ago due to not having a machine that could even run it until then. So I stuck with TS2 even after I had came to the realization that TS3 fit my play style better now. when I finally did inherent the PC I have now the first thing I did was to grab the disc copy of the base game I had that had been sitting on my self for countless years waiting for the day I could install it and tested it. And true be told I have barley glanced back since. If TS3 hadn't added so much to the series there would have been to point for me to leave 2. So yes I agree with you 100% people shouldn't expect games to hold back progression because they don't want to spend more then 300 on a computer. If your bargain bin system can't run it that doesn't make it unplayable.

iCad- Certainly the game itself is not purely innocent either. And definitely these problems add yet another challenge for the "technically challenged" players. You and I know for instance that a major cause for the build up of save game lag over time is the game spawning ridicules amounts of vehicles, and other garbage in sims inventories, leaving on electronics all over town and of course sims getting stuck in routing errors, all of which that bogs down performance. We also know that Nrass mods can effectively make these problems vanish. However for the "technically challenge" player they often don't understand why every time they create a new game everything seems fine at first but gradually starts to take a nose dive. Many of them, rather then try to find out why their save is not working well any more and look for solutions are more likely to just delete it and start over. Then claim that TS3 can't handle running a save for more then a few weeks.
Also from my personal experience they tend to be less enthusiastic about adding mods to their games (though custom hair and cloths are fine apparently). For example the sims community on YouTube tends to have a large portion of Simmers who are below average gamers. During TS3 lifetimes the general attitude toward mods in the YouTube Sims community was pretty negative, one might say fearful. Many of the LPs I watched frequently bragged about the fact that their games were CC free, commentators spoke of mods in ways that implied they thought players who modded their games were just as good adding a virus to the game etc. All in all I find it unlikely anyone with such a negative outlook on mods would be willing use even one that is designed to help the game run smoother.

Interestingly enough ever since TS4 released YouTube Simmers suddenly don't seem so afraid of mods anymore, wonder why that could be?


TheThirdWizard- It's pretty much impossible to know why people who pirate do so since most people who pirate are not going to exactly come out and admit it. In fact it's impossible to know for instance how many pirated copies of a game are out there compared to legit copies.
I did a semester long research paper for collage a few years age which is were most of my knowledge of piracy comes from. We had to chose a topic on a social issue that interested us and had all semester to research it before compiling it to gather as a paper for our final. Mine covered video game piracy, more about the relationship between game developers and pirates rather then the ethics of it.
Anyway while doing research for my paper I did discuses with several of my classmate and friends around the college who were willing to admit that they had ether pirated in the past or did so rather often. When I asked them each why they chose to pirate games the top answer was that they afford the games they wanted. So if my small sample group is to be believed then there may be some truth to most people will avoid piracy if they can afford to buy the game.
On the other hand the second most conman answer I got was that they pirated as a form of protest against "corrupt corporate game developers". For the people who answered that way, it is like that they would still pirate games rather then give their money to a company they deem unfit.
Mad Poster
#56 Old 2nd Jun 2019 at 6:08 AM
I think it sort of ties into the fact that the Sims series provides various experiences for people

You have people who don't really care about the nitty gritty of the game and want to load up and play something
Some others use it mostly as a wish-fulfillment and story-telling tool
There are some who use the game mostly as a fancy paper doll
Others use it mostly to indulge in their home decor and builder fantasies
(And finally you have people who load up the game purely for WW)

Ultimately, the TS4 caters to these folks far better in being a less fiddly tool to mess around with. It's like a Marriott or a Disneyland, where you get a very glossy and standardized experience across the board (complete with paid add-ons). You don't get the sheer opportunity to transform and individualize your game like the TS2 and TS3 offer, but many of these people weren't looking for that in the first place.
Field Researcher
#57 Old 2nd Jun 2019 at 8:37 PM
I admit, I tried Sims 4. Been goofing around on it now since I downloaded it. I do find it has a learning curve for someone so used to Sims 3 (and coming from Sims 2 in the distant past).

I kind of find the rapid cycling of moods in the game unsettling, that's for sure. It's okay for casual play, I guess. I still rather prefer Sims 3, which is saying something, because about 5-6 years ago, you couldn't get me to TOUCH Sims 3, as I was solely a Sims 2 player.

I do find some things easier in 4 than 3, and vice-versa. It runs great on my rig, but so does Sims 3.

Dead Ringers
Discord: RedBaroness13
Lab Assistant
#58 Old 3rd Jun 2019 at 2:41 AM
@ChickenMadam

Actually, someone made a mod that makes TS4's mood system more meaningful. Unfortunately for me, I still found TS4 too boring to play even with thousands of good mods like this one, but if you are interested, here is the Meaningful Stories mod by roBurky.
Field Researcher
#59 Old 3rd Jun 2019 at 3:47 PM
Quote: Originally posted by TheThirdWizard
@ChickenMadam

Actually, someone made a mod that makes TS4's mood system more meaningful. Unfortunately for me, I still found TS4 too boring to play even with thousands of good mods like this one, but if you are interested, here is the Meaningful Stories mod by roBurky.


(my response got ate? XD anywho)

Thanks, I'll have a look at it! It IS kind of boring, sims 4 - but is that because I'm only playing with what Origin gave me... or... *shrugs* It's something to play if I don't want to wait for 3 to load or I'm shirking my writing duties on my Sims 3 story, you know... procrastinating. XD

The lack of CASt and the loading screens kind of bug me. I think 3's spoiled me with the open world.

Dead Ringers
Discord: RedBaroness13
Lab Assistant
#60 Old 7th Jun 2019 at 12:56 PM
And just short after Sims 4 was free Origin have 50% sales on all Sims 4 EPs and 40% sales on all Sims 4 GPs and SPs. How convenient

And BTW, they also have 50% sales on all Sims 3 EPs (but no sales on SPs or worlds). Though I find it weird they still have pretty much the same price for all The Sims 3 packs as they had when they were released. Obviously, they are still making money on Sums 3, otherwise, they would have make them cheaper. Sims 2 and its EPs and SPs were way cheaper 4 years after Sims 3 and then they dropped them out of Origin so they will not compete with Sims 4.
Forum Resident
#61 Old 16th Jun 2019 at 12:35 AM
I am sorry for posting my own thoughts that break the conversation but it smells bad for the sims 4 or the cracked simmers are numerous than expected? I don't know...

I speak French only. If my statements are harsh, rude for you, that's not intentional. I just think Different due to my Language and my Culture.
But truly, I am open-minded than you think of.
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