Game still unstable (long post)
So I finally got to play for about 2 hours last night, and I still have problems with the game. The clock is still slow (as in ff speed 2 & 3 are almost the same), My Sim kept getting teleported to ot...
Forum Discussion
The most important things that need to be done for your hardware set, if you haven't done this already, are to cap the frame rates and check the fps rates in-game to make sure they are staying capped. Unlike TS4 and other newer games, TS3 has no built-in fps limiter. Uncapped frame rates will run wild with that card otherwise and can lead to graphics glitches, lag, screen tears, crashes, and can ultimately burn out your card by making it work much harder than it should for no reason.
To check: ctrl+shift+C to bring up the cheats console, type fps on (enter). As you play and move the game camera around, the displayed fps rates should never exceed the refresh rate of your monitor. Most are 60 Hz, so 60 fps but some monitors and laptop screens can run higher. To make the displayed rates go away, cheats console again and fps off (enter).
To cap the frame rate, the first tool to try is the Nvidia Control Panel that you would already have to arrange for vsync. Note that you must create a profile for the correct executable, that's TS3.exe for Patch 1.69 but TS3w.exe (with the "w") for 1.67. Also note that the Control Panel method with vsync only works in full-screen mode. Here are the instructions with visuals: http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/comment/15007970#Comment_15007970
If this doesn't lock things in or if you require windowed mode, we move on to other tools to make this work like Nvidia Inspector or RivaTuner Stats Server (RTSS).
The game not picking things up smoothly at higher speeds is an issue most of us face after a while, but it shouldn't be quite as bad as you have described.
The game bouncing while scuba diving is a bug, or at least it often is especially if exploring underwater caves is part of the scenario, that can be solved with mods: https://sims3.crinrict.com/en/2013/06/sim-resets-when-exploring-a-underwater-cave.html
(This subsequent link to Shimrod's mods at The Asylum requires an Asylum account first and one must be logged in to see anything of substance there)
To check: ctrl+shift+C to bring up the cheats console, type fps on (enter). As you play and move the game camera around, the displayed fps rates should never exceed the refresh rate of your monitor. Most are 60 Hz, so 60 fps but some monitors and laptop screens can run higher. To make the displayed rates go away, cheats console again and fps off (enter).
To cap the frame rate, the first tool to try is the Nvidia Control Panel that you would already have to arrange for vsync. Note that you must create a profile for the correct executable, that's TS3.exe for Patch 1.69 but TS3w.exe (with the "w") for 1.67. Also note that the Control Panel method with vsync only works in full-screen mode. Here are the instructions with visuals: http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/comment/15007970#Comment_15007970
If this doesn't lock things in or if you require windowed mode, we move on to other tools to make this work like Nvidia Inspector or RivaTuner Stats Server (RTSS).
The game not picking things up smoothly at higher speeds is an issue most of us face after a while, but it shouldn't be quite as bad as you have described.
The game bouncing while scuba diving is a bug, or at least it often is especially if exploring underwater caves is part of the scenario, that can be solved with mods: https://sims3.crinrict.com/en/2013/06/sim-resets-when-exploring-a-underwater-cave.html
(This subsequent link to Shimrod's mods at The Asylum requires an Asylum account first and one must be logged in to see anything of substance there)
