Sims 2 on Win.10; advice needed please

"ChelleJo;c-16357129" wrote:

"phoebebebe13;c-16356828" wrote:
I figured EA staff would move your post rather than you making 2 posts :)

@ChelleJo the black squares , You just change shadows to med rather than high to get rid of the black box. I did not have to change any files but I'm on windows 8.1. I don't know if the same method works on windows 10

@phoebebebe13 just changing the settings in game did not fix it for me. I tried medium and low. In the files, they all showed as high in the file (sgr file, maybe?) , so I had to change them all to low.

@ChelleJo Interesting . Maybe it's a windows 10 issue? Or a newer windows 10 update? We have had a few who have had windows update issues with TS3 and 4 but not all people have it. Wonder if a windows update could effect some with the black box issue?

@Writin_Reg do you have windows 10 and did changing shadows to med get rid of your box.? Just curious

I just tried it and the shadows did disappear when I put it on medium.

But if that's not working because the shadows option is grayed out, there is a mod that fixes it, too: http://modthesims.info/d/569585

I have been using this mod. Works like a hassle-free charm!

"phoebebebe13;c-16357224" wrote:

"ChelleJo;c-16357129" wrote:

"phoebebebe13;c-16356828" wrote:
I figured EA staff would move your post rather than you making 2 posts :)

@ChelleJo the black squares , You just change shadows to med rather than high to get rid of the black box. I did not have to change any files but I'm on windows 8.1. I don't know if the same method works on windows 10

@phoebebebe13 just changing the settings in game did not fix it for me. I tried medium and low. In the files, they all showed as high in the file (sgr file, maybe?) , so I had to change them all to low.

@ChelleJo Interesting . Maybe it's a windows 10 issue? Or a newer windows 10 update? We have had a few who have had windows update issues with TS3 and 4 but not all people have it. Wonder if a windows update could effect some with the black box issue?

@Writin_Reg do you have windows 10 and did changing shadows to med get rid of your box.? Just curious

@phoebebebe13 It could be. I had an issue with RTSS with one of the windows 10 updates, that I don't think too many others had. But that was some time back, when I still was running AMD GPU.

"ChelleJo;c-16357302" wrote:

"phoebebebe13;c-16357224" wrote:

"ChelleJo;c-16357129" wrote:

"phoebebebe13;c-16356828" wrote:
I figured EA staff would move your post rather than you making 2 posts :)

@ChelleJo the black squares , You just change shadows to med rather than high to get rid of the black box. I did not have to change any files but I'm on windows 8.1. I don't know if the same method works on windows 10

@phoebebebe13 just changing the settings in game did not fix it for me. I tried medium and low. In the files, they all showed as high in the file (sgr file, maybe?) , so I had to change them all to low.

@ChelleJo Interesting . Maybe it's a windows 10 issue? Or a newer windows 10 update? We have had a few who have had windows update issues with TS3 and 4 but not all people have it. Wonder if a windows update could effect some with the black box issue?

@Writin_Reg do you have windows 10 and did changing shadows to med get rid of your box.? Just curious

@phoebebebe13 It could be. I had an issue with RTSS with one of the windows 10 updates, that I don't think too many others had. But that was some time back, when I still was running AMD GPU.

@ChelleJo someone had issue a few weeks ago with a windows 10 update. They had to keep uninstalling it to play TS3 only to have the update come back. Someone else posted they had the same issue. They are the only two people I had seen with this issue so I do wonder if there was something else on their computer that did not mix with the windows 10 update. It's strange when some people have issues and others don't .I blocked windows 10 from updating on my windows 8 computer and I'm glad i did. I don't like windows 8 but I do not like windows 10 forced updates that are hard to remove "IF" they even can be removed. Windows 8 has the option to stop or remove updates

I have it on my Windows 10 machine. I had to do A LOT of tweaks to get it right. I'll summarize what I did for you, and try to find the resources I used. Mind you that I only used my old physical copies, so some of these might not apply to the UC.

Btw, as Sims 2 is a very old game, it runs just as well on integrated graphics. Although if you have a dedicated GPU like GeForce, you might as well use it.

1. Black shadow boxes - Starting with a certain GPU driver update years back, indoor sim shadows began appearing as black boxes. Someone made a mod to fix that after so long, and that person is now my god. http://modthesims.info/d/569585
2. Limited memory access - As Sims 2 is from the days of 32-bit operating systems, it can only access up to 2 GB of RAM, and the other 2 GB is reserved for the OS. This wasn't a problem for me until it started crashing despite me having boatloads of RAM. You'll have to edit your exe files so that your game can access up to 4 GB of RAM. http://digitalperversion.net/gardenofshadows/index.php?topic=21931.0
3. The most time-consuming step: Editing your graphics rules - Sims 2 has a fixed list of GPUs to determine the quality of your game. As such, it can't recognize any modern GPUs, and assumes that your system can't support the game (as if). The problem here is that even if you max your settings, it'll still lower your graphics quality, most notably in the neighborhood view. Also, your game will only allow you to invite 2 people to parties, which you can override by using the IntProp MaxNumOfVisitingSims cheat.
https://www.simsnetwork.com/simpedia/the-sims-2/editions/the-sims-2/specials/graphics-rules-maker-improve-compatibility-with

ALSO IMPORTANT: if you install Sims 2 in your C drive's Program Files (the default location), you need to run Sims 2 in admin mode for it to access some important files correctly. Sims 2 was made before admin mode was a thing, so by default it will be denied permission if it tries to access anything in protected folders like Program Files.

"icmnfrsh;c-16357619" wrote:


ALSO IMPORTANT: if you install Sims 2 in your C drive's Program Files (the default location), you need to run Sims 2 in admin mode for it to access some important files correctly. Sims 2 was made before admin mode was a thing, so by default it will be denied permission if it tries to access anything in protected folders like Program Files.

Lawd...is that the access violation crash I've been having?! Nothing in the log except access violation.

"Mstybl95;c-16357804" wrote:

"icmnfrsh;c-16357619" wrote:


ALSO IMPORTANT: if you install Sims 2 in your C drive's Program Files (the default location), you need to run Sims 2 in admin mode for it to access some important files correctly. Sims 2 was made before admin mode was a thing, so by default it will be denied permission if it tries to access anything in protected folders like Program Files.

Lawd...is that the access violation crash I've been having?! Nothing in the log except access violation.

Probably not. It can still work without this step (at least in my experience) but some things will just be off