- Small black shadows on lots in Manage Worlds map can be removed by loading into the affected lot and exit to regenerate the thumbnail.
Fixed in Patch 1.110.265/2.01
Please create a new thread if you're still experiencing this issues
@sunddee4 Thank you for the extra information. From what you said, I don't think it's the houses themselves or cc. I've never seen anything like it before. So a few more questions.
Have you tried repairing the game since this started?
Can you see the black lines when you're in live mode on the lot itself playing or is it just on the map?
Does it happen in any other worlds or just Newcrest?
Are you running the game on a laptop or desktop and has anything changed with your hardware (like a new video card)? There have been a number of graphics issues with graphics on laptops.
Have you changed your graphics settings recently? And have you tried changing your graphics settings to see if it would go away?
To be honest, I'm sort of grasping at straws now on what it could be. Since it isn't a bad download or a cc issue, I'm sort of leaning towards a graphics/rendering issue. But if only happens in Newcrest, it's probably not that either. If you've repaired the game, it's probably not a bad file. I've seen a number of posts on graphics/rendering issue on laptops and with some on specific video cards but if you've changed nothing hardwarewise and only installed packs and the patches, I just don't know.
@crinrict bushes is the correct term in the US. Scrambles threw me for a loop too until I looked it up and found that it's a UK term that means the same thing like the bonnet of an automobile is called a hood in the US so I guess your translator uses UK English terminology. <grin>
@CGrant56 @crinrict
- I have repaired the game multiple times
- I couldnt get it to happen that easily in other worlds. I uploaded one of my houses with the black lines in Newcrest into my library again, because I had deleted the original build in my library, as I thought it was corrupted. I placed this build (which had black lines in Newcrest) in Willow Creek and it copied the black lines there as well, see attachment A. But other than that, I just couldnt get it to happen in other worlds with random builds (including Willow Creek, only this build) and I tried Windenburg, Sulani and Oasis Springs. With random builds it still happens in Newcrest. It happens so randomly, because a lot of the time I don't get the black lines. And when I want them the least, they appear :/
- I'm running the game on a game computer. It's my brother's pc and he said he didn't change anything when it comes to the video card or hardware.
- Do you mean changing the graphic settings in the Sims 4? I always play with high settings and didnt change anything about it, except for maybe 2 months ago when my resolution changed when I unknowingly pushed a button? But then I changed it back. Today I tested the game with graphic settings on normal but the problem is still there. I could try to test it on low settings but thats weird cause I'm on a game computer that can handle this game....I had this game since May and everything was fine until October. In those months I only had an issue sometimes with a white or black giant square that covered half of the lot when zooming out in live mode, but that issue has disappeared since then.
Some new developments. I I updated my game and suddenly I get a blue screen when I'm zoomed out in build mode AND in live mode? see attachment B. In one save it was foggy and rainy in live mode. In another save it was sunny and I also see blue in live mode. When I zoom in, I can see the right colors of the lot. I repaired the game, didnt help. Dont know if it's a different problem or has to do with the black lines. Only happened after the latest update, should I make a new report? (Edit: Okay it kinda looks like the black/white screen I mentioned earlier in this post. Never had it in blue or covering the whole screen. About my black lines problem:
1. I placed the build with the black lines in Willow Creek and it happened there too as mentioned before. Also the game recognizes the black lines when placing a build, see attachment C. To explain the situation. First, I placed the build with black lines from my library into Willow Creek and it caused black lines on the lot right next to it. That's "normal"for this problem. Then, I placed the same build again on the same lot and watched what happened in the "placing lot -menu". Apparently the game recognizes the black lines on the lot next to it in the "placing lot-menu" as well? I just noticed this. I don't know if this observation is helpful, but alright.
continuing in my next post cause I can only have 3 attachments per post apparently>>>
2. I did the same thing in Newcrest (placing the same build on the same lot again), and suddenly most of the black lines disappeared, see attachment D (before) and E (after). I thought that maybe placing the build again and again would delete all the black lines,m but unfortunately not. There are still black lines.
3. Like @crinrict said, maybe the problem IS the bushes? That base game house I talked about earlier was build by another user and I didnt place the bushes myself. But with my OWN build, I placed the bushes myself and I think (for 90% sure) I used the moveobjects on cheat to get them in the position I wanted. But isn't that what a lot of users do? But I don't know for sure if its the bushes or the terrain paint cause theyre all in the same place, see the two dark spots by the yellow arrow in attachment A and see my build with trees/terrain paint in attachment F (this is the same house I use but this screenshot was taken in Newcrest).
I really don't know what to do right now and it makes me not enjoy the game as much anymore. Any help, suggestions or questions about testing the game are welcome!
@crinrict @crinrict About the blue house: I don't have a house called Pig Hearth downloaded in my game?
The blue house I have is this one:
https://www.ea.com/nl-nl/games/the-sims/the-sims-4/pc/gallery/9619C6AF144511E98E0EB573E4FD424D?categ...
Creator: simlicy
Lot: Base Game Victorian
The house is basegame with only a holiday celebration pack item I think, but tbh...I have no idea if the house is the problem or something different in my game. There are multiple houses that causes black lines. The house with black lines you can see in a lot of my screenshots is a light blue house that I built myself and not this house from Simlicy. I wish it was a blue house problem so I could paint them all in a different color and the problem was solved lol!
@sunddee4 Thanks for the extra info. Yes, I did mean changing the graphics options in the Sims 4 gameplay options. You did try with different setting so that's probably not it. But from what you said about accidently changing the resolution setting, I wonder if that could of been a trigger somehow. It shouldn't but you never know. Reason I say that is, on my last computer, my vid card died, and even though I replaced it with a better card, I could never get the Sims 4 and a couple of other games to run right again. They just kept doing weird things and I started getting a lot of crashes whenever I tried to play them. In the end, I think that the video card dying probably caused damage to something else but not enough to make the computer die outright. Ended up getting a new computer after months of trying to fix it. But I really don't think it is the cause of your problem.
So I'm back to thinking it may be CC related somehow. From what I can tell from the pictures, the shape seems to be the same wherever it shows up and it looks an outline of something very specific. In your initial post, you said that you'd removed all your CC and mods. Have you still got them out and are you sure you got them all out the first time? I've accidently put a few things in the wrong folder more than once myself and had a devil of a time finding them later on when I wanted to remove them. Also, if you installed the January 16 patch, UICheats is causing problems with build mode after the patch so you'd need to update that if you use it. That patch also caused some weird stuff with certain ingame floors too. From what I can tell from reading those posts, cc and mods seem to be playing a role in who has the problem and who doesn't but sometimes not. Take a look at some of them. Maybe one of them will strike a chord with you and give you an idea to try.
Like I said earlier, CC can cause some really weird things to happen in the game and even after you have removed it, there can still be after effects, especially if it was modded to affect game play somehow and altered how the game works and affects something that gets included in the save itself. Sometimes taking them out doesn't make a difference if it already damaged the save somehow.
At this point though, I really don't know if anything else I can suggest will be helpful to you but if you still have any questions or ideas, I'm around here often and will help you if I can.
@CGrant56 Yeah I'm afraid it is some kind of mod/cc issue. Maybe it broke my game and the problem continued even without cc/mods like you said... though that would really suck. If it's really a cc/mod problem that forever damaged my game, it damaged the whole game cause the problem happens with new saves as well. I hope posting my dxdiag here would give more insight and find a different cause :/ I'll just wait and see. Thanks for replying and your help!
Update: My brother updated his graphics card and the blue screen issue was solved, luckily. Unfortunately, the black lines did still stay in old saves. I started a new save (A ) and placed a house from my library that had black lines in Newcrest and it placed the black lines in the new save as well (in Newcrest). BUT after that, I started another new save (B ) and only placed other houses and there were no black lines? Maybe it was a one time luck? I have to test in other new saves as well to make sure. The difference between A and B is that in A I used a house that maybe was already corrupted in a previous save and thats why the problem continued in save A maybe.... I have no idea, I have to test it first and make multiple new saves to see what happens!
@crinrict My Dxdiag is in the attachment, thank you for your help!
@sunddee4 That could very well be the source of your problem. I've got one lot that I built in an earlier save that crashes my game outright, as in back to desktop, every time I've tried to use it in a later save. Runs for a few minutes and boom, back to desktop. And it has absolutely no cc in it. It does sound that you may have the same issue based on what you said. I hope that is it and solves the problem.
@crinrict I had updated my drivers to the latest version of january in my previous post. Im not sure if it made a difference....I still have to test it some more, because when I tested the game after updating the drivers, I couldnt get the black streaks to appear in a brand new save (see my previous post)....which could be a win. But I have to test it in multiple brand new saves to really make sure of it. The problem sometimes happens randomly so I just want to make sure I dont get surprised by the black lines any longer.
I have been busy lately and couldnt really find the time to play the game and test it thoroughly. I'm gonna update in this thread if I have some more news after testing. As I mentioned in my last post, it could be that the problem has disappeared in new saves, but the older saves or builds where the black lines appeared stay corrupted maybe (and there's nothing I can do about it). We will see!
I didnt play on ultra actually, but on "custom" screen quality with all the buttons on the highest.
Uncompressed sim textures and post processing effects were unchecked. No laptop mode ofcourse.
Now I switched to ultra and uncompressed sim textures + post processing effects are checked, laptop mode is unchecked. I have no idea what all this means though and if it should make a difference?
Is the refresh rate ( standard) and vertical sync (unchecked) important?
In conclusion: I hope to test the game some more soon and will keep you updated!
@crinrict I had updated my drivers to the latest version of january in my previous post. Im not sure if it made a difference....I still have to test it some more, because when I tested the game after updating the drivers, I couldnt get the black streaks to appear in a brand new save (see my previous post)....which could be a win. But I have to test it in multiple brand new saves to really make sure of it. The problem sometimes happens randomly so I just want to make sure I dont get surprised by the black lines any longer.
I have been busy lately and couldnt really find the time to play the game and test it thoroughly. I'm gonna update in this thread if I have some more news after testing. As I mentioned in my last post, it could be that the problem has disappeared in new saves, but the older saves or builds where the black lines appeared stay corrupted maybe (and there's nothing I can do about it). We will see!
I didnt play on ultra actually, but on "custom" screen quality with all the buttons on the highest.
Uncompressed sim textures and post processing effects were unchecked. No laptop mode ofcourse.
Now I switched to ultra and uncompressed sim textures + post processing effects are checked, laptop mode is unchecked. I have no idea what all this means though and if it should make a difference?
Is the refresh rate ( standard) and vertical sync (unchecked) important?
I have a similar problem. After placing a lot from the gallery I noticed black marks on the terrain. I bulldozed the house and the terrain and it looked ok in build view. However in map view the marks are still there. I have repaired and placed new lot but the black is still there. My pc meets all specifications. Any ideas?
Moving this back to bugs but actually found this report: https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/NEEDS-INPUT-Strange-streaks-on-the-building-when-I-used-the/m-p/7968862
Is that the same you're seeing ?
It does look like that but only in map view.
@crinrict It's the same in terms of a black shadow being cast on the world, in this case on their foundation in build mode. But the difference is, just like @maggidesto said, that the black streaks/shadow/stains are only seen in map view and not in build mode or live when you're on the lot itself. Also, I have never used height adjustment tools and never download lots that have used that. The lots in my game that had the black streaks problem had used terrain tools, like using dark sand for the garden.
In the meantime I've tested my game like 5 times and couldn't recreate my problem again: made 5 save files and filled all the lots with builds, then bulldozed or build over them again etc. NO CC. But I'm not really reassured so I'm gonna test some more. I'm afraid the problem doesn't occur as much as before (after updating my graphics card drivers in january), but is still there and will pop up again when I least expect it :/.
@crinrict Maybe this will help you to see the problem for yourself. This builder/youtuber Simlicy has uploaded a base save file for everyone to download. Last week I downloaded it and there were black streaks in Newcrest. I thought it was just my game. but the problem is in her save file. I know this, because I checked her video introducing the save file and the black streaks are there. They can also be seen in Willow Creek but there it's mostly black dots in map view on parts of the map outside of the lot (just like in my game).
Tbh, I have no idea why nobody in her comments has mentioned this problem...anyways, so there are at least three people that have this problem, I guess. Maybe I can message Simlicy about this as well.
Attachments:
Black: shows newcrest in simlicy's file
Black2: I deleted one of the houses on the right so you can see the black streaks better
Video: Simlicy's video on her save file (Newcrest)
Here's the link to the video:
https://youtu.be/nWDVyrOOER0?t=820
Download save file:
https://simlicy.tumblr.com/post/190631765545/simlicy-save-10-download-this-is-the-first
@crinrictThe black marks in some of the pictures that are on the lot are the shadows of trees on the lot before it and only have the top of the tree is showing because map view only shows shadow on lot property line. I can't explain the shadows in the non active part of the lot. This could be a sign of a bad graphics card or bad memory. Its not the monitor because we can all see it. Do me a favor and turn your shadows up to see if it gets better or worse.
