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Chessack's avatar
7 years ago

Disobedient Sims are driving me crazy

I have experienced this to some extent before, but the last few days playing Sims 4, my Sims are driving me up the wall with disobedience. Before anyone asks, yes, I leave autonomy on. And I know this leads to them having minds of their own. To some extent I like it.

But... when I give them a direct order to do something that has a defined duration, such as taking a shower, cooking a meal, eating a meal -- I expect them to follow through with that activity until it completes. And up until a week or two ago, they did that the majority of the time.

Now, however, especially over the last few days, it seems like I can't get them to do almost anything other than a skill activity (like making an end table at the workbench) without them canceling it the second I switch to another active Sim. I will have a Sim with yellow hygiene, and tell her to "take a shower" and she will walk over to the shower. Figuring that's done, I will click on another Sim and tell him to "ponder chess moves." Once he seats himself at the table (having all needs in the green and thus no urgent needs), I will switch back to the first Sim. She's not in the shower but now petting the cat. I figure wow, that was quick, but check needs and she did not take the shower! Argh! So I order it again -- I have taken to clicking the Take Shower command FIVE TIMES to fill up her queue and ensure the activity. Then I switch back to the 2nd Sim and he's reading a book -- not pondering chess moves! ARGH!

And today, even my active Sims are being disobedient. I had to tell my Gen 3 Legacy heir to eat a meal like 4 times to get her to finish it. She kept taking a bite, putting it down, and trying to do something else (usually -- go to the card table, the pool, or the computer...). It took her like 3 in-game hours to just finish eating.

It's become so ridiculous that for the first time in probably 11 years of Simming, I am thinking seriously about just turning autonomy off and leaving it off. I don't really want to do that -- because I enjoy seeing what they get up to when I am not controlling them. As long as, when I issue a direct order, they follow it (which has been true, generally, in the past). But if they're going to disobey direct orders... I may have to rethink my strategy.

Anyone else having fits with this? Or do you all just play with autonomy off?

28 Replies

  • "comicsforlife;c-16679534" wrote:
    are you using mods


    I am not using mods. I have never used mods. EVER. Not in Sims 2, Sims 3, or Sims 4. I use only what Maxis/EA puts out... for 2 and 3, via disk. For this game, via the lovely Origin store that we all love so much.

  • "wormstache999;c-16680270" wrote:

    And just because I know the question will pop up - Yes, I tried it multiple times with no mods, new installation, different packs, different patches. It's always the same.


    Yup this. I've repaired the game. As for fresh installs... I went to visit my mother a couple weeks ago and fresh-installed it on a laptop... slightly older but still way above spec (24 GB Ram, nVidia 980M vid card, etc.). SAME THING happened.
  • "SimChessack;c-16680781" wrote:
    "wormstache999;c-16680270" wrote:

    And just because I know the question will pop up - Yes, I tried it multiple times with no mods, new installation, different packs, different patches. It's always the same.


    Yup this. I've repaired the game. As for fresh installs... I went to visit my mother a couple weeks ago and fresh-installed it on a laptop... slightly older but still way above spec (24 GB Ram, nVidia 980M vid card, etc.). SAME THING happened.


    My testing just confirms this is indeed an engine issue and has nothing to do with specs. They really should discontinue the sims 4 because the game can't even handle its own simulation and more packs make it worse and more obvious.
  • Yes, you would think the Sims being able to go through their action queue correctly, and also correctly prioritizing completion of player-given orders over their own desires/whims would be basic functioning of a Sims game. I mean, I can see when the Sim is very angry or very sad, maybe not completing actions due to mood. But when "Happy," which they are most of the time... this should not be an issue.
  • It still baffles me how something that worked so well in prior editions is such a bloody mess in this one. On the assumption that the actual techie types are at least as smart as we are, it seems that either someone in management was incredibly stupid in choosing the game engine or that EA is deliberately giving us the 'green weenie'.
  • I doubt it was designed on purpose to do this -- to have Sims refuse direct orders of the players. It's just so baked into the incompetently programmed engine now that they probably can't even fix it without massive overhauling.
  • Honestly, this is one of my pet peeves with this game. I get SOOOOO annoyed with these sims sometimes.

    Here is my favorite example because it happens to me a lot.

    My sims wakes up in the morning. Hunger in the red, shower and toilet in the yellow. Naturally my sim wants to fill the hunger need first so the autonomy kicks in to grab a serving. I cancel because I want them to pee, shower and then eat because we all know they may pee themselves before they can finish the meal. My sim goes all the way downstairs to the fridge opens and closes and then walks all the way back upstairs to pee and shower. WHY DO THEY DO THAT OMG!?!?!?!!?
  • "keekee53;c-16693258" wrote:

    My sims wakes up in the morning. Hunger in the red, shower and toilet in the yellow. Naturally my sim wants to fill the hunger need first so the autonomy kicks in to grab a serving. I cancel because I want them to pee, shower and then eat because we all know they may pee themselves before they can finish the meal. My sim goes all the way downstairs to the fridge opens and closes and then walks all the way back upstairs to pee and shower. WHY DO THEY DO THAT OMG!?!?!?!!?


    Yes the refusal to immediately cancel the action you just x-ed out is incredibly frustrating. I saw a toddler trying to go up the stairs the other day and he was down stairs in the hallway. I hit cancel and switched his action to playing on the tablet, downstairs in his room. He crawled all the way upstairs, then turned around and came all the way downstairs. Then he self-canceled the tablet action (apparently) and tried to go back upstairs again. This went on until I finally made the Sim he was trying to go upstairs to see come downstairs so he would finally cut it the heck out.

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