Troubleshooting Problem with custom houses in neighborhood screen

Problem with custom houses in neighborhood screen

First, my computer specs:

Sony Vaio laptop PCG-GRT100
2.8 gHz Pentium 4 Processor
NVIDIA GeForce4 420 with updated driver 4.3.6.4.
512 MB of RAM
40GB Hard Drive with total 15.3GB free (with TS2 installed)
TS2 DVD-ROM version


Houses that I built myself using TS2 installed resources are all screwed up in the neighborhood screen. There is essentially a "stack" of 2D graphics immediately next to the house/lot, and the house itself is usually in pieces. It looks like a partially finished house with a blob of blurriness next to it. Note - this ONLY happens with custom houses, NOT Maxis-made houses that came with the game that either already existed on a lot or that I moved from the Lots and Houses bin onto a lot.

What I tried already that didn't work:

Closing all background tasks before running the game.
Starting the game in a window format instead of full-screen.
Updating the graphics card driver.
Making the houses smaller.
Moving houses from lot to lots and houses bin and then replacing them on the lot.

The only cheat codes I have used have been motherlode and aging off. I have not downloaded or installed any custom content (walls, floors, objects) from the EA site or any user site. I have not created any custom content using Homecrafter. Everything in/on these houses came with the game when I installed it. I also have not expanded the neighborhood, or used any other neighborhood besides Pleasantview. (I have only had the game for a week.)

I do not have any problems other than this. It crashed once, froze twice, loads slowly sometimes. Graphics look great on family screen when I am actually in the house, and it looks normal in all other modes.

Another problem, (more minor), is that in the families bin, families I have created have no picture. On the select a family screen they appear as just a blank white box, so there is no preview available, OR only one sim from the family will be pictured (usually the last one created on the build a sim screen).

Any ideas on how to fix it? Need more information? Let me know. Post or e-mail me.

Thanks!!

 

If you're referring to the Graphics options, I have them all on the lowest settings. The only thing I have not tried is putting them on the higher settings and see if that helps, but I don't want the game to run slower. Any other suggestions?

 

Okay, so I tried messing around with the graphics settings in the options menu. I tried them all on high, and a bunch of different combinations, nothing made any difference. They also did not slow the game down to a noticeable level.

Any other suggestions/ideas?

 

Okay, so I messed around with it some more. I thought maybe it happened because I was building with the family on the lot. Nope, not the problem. I also found out that the problem also occurs when I alter pre-existing houses on the lots.

I am able to download and install houses from the sims 2 exchange. They show up, they look fine, the graphics are great, I can enter them without the game crashing - no problems there. Unless I try to knock down a couple walls, change the windows, whatever. So even when I'm not building from scratch, just using build mode to alter the property without changing the basic structure of the house, the problem still occurs.

I think I am completely out of ideas. Unless something is wrong with the build mode files themselves, which I would like to be able to find out before uninstalling and reinstalling the game, that way I don't do it if I don't have to. And EA/Maxis is completely useless - they have NO tech support available for the US version of the game as far as I've been able to find out. Of course, most people's problems are that they did not read the system requirements, or didn't understand them. As far as I've been able to tell, I'm the only one who's having this specific problem.

 

What is the EAsy info utility report?

 

Should I post a screenshot so you guys can see what I'm talking about? It's hard to describe it any better than a "stack" of graphics.

 

Sure, a screenshot could help. It sounds to me like the Sims 2 JPEG "renderer" whatever is screwing up. Whenever a new character is created, TS2 poses the character and snaps a picture of the character's face, converts it to JPEG, and puts it into the character's package file. I assume a similar thing, except in 3D, occurs with houses and such. Since downloaded lots already have the renders made on another computer stuck in them, they work fine, but as soon as it is modified, TS2 tries to take a new render, which apparently doesn't work on your computer, and fails.

 

Well, apparently I can't post a screenshot. The freaking camera mode in the neighborhood screen apparently doesn't work. All I got was a black picture. I also can't seem to find any of the pics I took from inside one of my sim's houses.

This whole jpg rendering thing makes sense. But how do I fix it?

Also, what are the chances that the problem stems from the fact that I don't have TS2 installed on the c drive? I have it on d instead because it has more room.

The graphics problem seems to have improved slightly - there's still a stack, but it's much smaller than it was. The houses are still in pieces, but the extra blurry blob is almost gone. How is that even possible??

I really don't get the tech aspects of this game. You know when mine crashes? When I make sure nothing is running in the background but explorer and task manager. Apparently my computer likes a challenge.

 

Ah, the screenshot function not working practically confirms it, since snapshots are also made as JPEG. Anyway, I've always preferred the tried and true PrintScreen method of screenshotting - press the Printscreen key on the keyboard, open up MSPaint, and Paste.

It shouldn't have anything to do with not being installed on C - I have 7 partitions total across my 2 hard drives, with TS2 installed on H: and the savegame info on J:, and it works perfectly fine.

I'm not sure how to fix this... sounds like the video card and TS2 aren't getting along. Try messing around with the level of video acceleration:

1. Open "Display Properties".
2. Under tab "Settings", "Advanced".
3. Under tab "Troubleshoot", fiddle around with the slider and see if it helps.

 

In case anyone's interested, EA tech support finally e-mailed me back. Their answer? "Manually uninstall the game and then reinstall it, it's probably due to an improper installation."

Then they give like 100 steps for manually uninstalling the game. It just doesn't seem worth it to me to uninstall the game. I have a sim family that's almost maxed out on all their skills, and one of the members is about to become mayor.

I'm gonna try this jpg rendering thing, I'll let you know if it works. If it doesn't, and you come across something else I could try, let me know.

 

I got the screen shot

Okay, so the "print screen" key works. Just not the camera mode. Well maybe it does, I lowered the hardware acceleration before getting this shot, but didn't try the camera mode. But now you can at least see what the heck I'm talking about.

You'll notice in the picture that I left the Maxis house in it so you can see the comparison. The house in the background has not been altered in any way, and so it looks fine.

 

Also, you should know that it used to look much worse. The stack of graphics used to be much bigger - took up the entire section of the street on that side of the house, and the graphics change. Sometimes it's the head of the sim who lives there, sometimes part of the house, etc.

 

Okay, I just tried hitting C, and all I get is a solid black box. I'm going to assume that you don't need me to post that pic. I'm also going to assume that this means the problem IS the jpeg rendering. Is reinstalling my only option, or does someone know how to fix it otherwise?

If I backup all the neighborhood files, am I going to lose the character stats when I reinstall?