Graphics issue with any reflective/shiny surface

@Bluebellflora 

warning: really long message ahead. get comfy. sorry in advance...

Yeah - I'd been talking with a few different Apple support reps over the last week about the issue, and this last one that I got connected with happened to be a pretty avid gamer. I showed him the graphics issue in a screenshot and he recognized that it was TS4 and asked me to pull it up in the game. When he saw the effect in game he had his roommate load up his game on his Mac (2019 iMac, I believe he said it was the "same as mine" but 2019 so I guess a 21.5 inch?, not positive) - and sure enough the effect was visible on television screens for him. It wasn't covering all/any reflective/shiny surfaces as it was in my own game, however. Instead, it was only on TV screens, like it was when the issue first appeared in my game. Anyways, I was thrilled in general that I happened to be connected with someone who not only knew computers well, but knew Macs well, and knew gaming well, and knew The Sims games well... I really didn't want to let him get away because I knew his knowledge would be super helpful/revealing for this issue. My only hope now is that perhaps he's an EA guru or something and maybe he'll stumble across this post.

Anyways, from the testing I've been doing, I have a little more info to add to the overall issue. Still super confused, but maybe someone else can make sense of this information I've gathered. Heads up, this is going to be a LONG post. The issue is so beyond my comprehension and there are SO many different factors that seem to weigh into it, that I just have to provide all the little info I can in the hopes that some of it will help us find an answer to this problem.

I completed a full uninstall/reinstall of TS4 and Origin. Upon reinstalling, I loaded up the game completely fresh, with none of my mods, cc, saves, tray files, options, etc. Totally new game. No graphics issue. Then I threw my mods folder in there without any of my saves/tray/options. Graphics issue appeared.

Quick reminder: when I tested BEFORE uninstalling/reinstalling, after doing a repair and folder refresh and removing all mods/saves/tray files, the graphic issue remained. The only thing that was different in these two cases was that I totally uninstalled and reinstalled my game and Origin. anyways..

After seeing the graphics issue, I closed the game, took my mods folder back out, and reloaded the game, totally bare game again, no cc, saves, options, mods, tray, etc. No graphic glitch! So then I went about loading in my saves and tray files bit by bit. As far as I could tell, the glitch did not appear. When I got to my mods folder, I went 1 mod at a time until I got all my major mods in there without seeing any glitching. Next I put my CAS folder in there, tested again, still no glitch. Basically, I got down to a few specific subfolders inside of my Buy Mode folder that seemed to contain "troublesome content."

Now here's where it gets a bit confusing. When I was doing my testing, I went in game and looked for the major glitch issue - that is, the effect appearing on any/all reflective, glass, or shiny surfaces. I did not go through each and every object in the game to look to see if the effect appeared on those objects. While testing, if I did not see the graphic effect appear on the windows and appliances that were on the lot I was viewing, I considered that "no glitch" and kept moving through my CC folders. With that said, I later found a couple more pieces of CC that had the effect appear on them, without causing the effect to spread throughout the rest of the game and onto non-CC surfaces. Anyways, more on that in a minute.

So, listed below are the pieces of "problem" CC that I got pointed to by moving my CC into my game one subfolder at a time - these were the items that, when in my game, caused the graphic effect to spread to ALL shiny/reflective surfaces, including EA textures.

- Peacemaker's Caine Living Television

- IllogicalSims Contemporary Living Television

- Luumia's Curved UHD TV

- LittleDica's Modern Kitchen Pack refrigerators, filenames are H&B Portal 4 and H&B Portal 4 Plus

Now, these five items are the same five items that I first noticed the effect on. Actually, the three televisions used to work perfectly fine in my game. It wasn't until trying out the two refrigerators sometime after the Discover University release that I noticed the glitch. I don't know exactly when the televisions started showing the effect, but they were definitely working fine before any DU patches/hotfixes. Anyways, with these five items out of my mods folder, the graphic glitch did not appear on the appliances and windows on the lot I was viewing in-game during testing.

However, I noticed soon afterwards that the graphic glitch DID appear on a few objects alone, without spreading to other objects, textures, etc. The objects that displayed the graphic glitch but did not seem to spread it to other content were:

- Luumia's iSimPad

- LittleDica's Modern Kitchen Pack tablet holder TV

- Peacemaker's Glass Splashback Wall Tiles

- DreamTeamSim's Chalkboard Mural Wall

Please note that these objects previously worked totally fine in my game, and the graphic issue first started appearing on them when it spread to all appliances, shiny surfaces, etc. At that time, the graphic issue spread to not only these two objects but all similar objects in game, including EA ones. But now, for whatever reason, they retained the graphic glitch without causing it to spread to all other surfaces.

Since noticing the effect still appearing on certain objects without "infecting" all other reflective surfaces in my game, I've done some hunting through my build/buy catalogs to really search for anything that could display the effect. That's how I found the above 4 items. There could be more I haven't found. As of right now, the 9 objects listed above are out of my game. Those CC televisions are the only ones I had in my game, so I have not been able to test out whether or not the issue occurs with any other CC televisions. I did not find out from the Apple rep if the tv objects he saw the effect on were CC, EA, or both. Another Mac-user on Discord sent me a photo of the effect visible on their TV screens, plus all over their walls. I'll post that picture on this reply. I've reached out to them to try to find out exactly which objects are affected in their game but I haven't yet heard back. Unfortunately there's no way to reach out/find the Apple rep specifically, though I really wish there was because he seemed to have a much better understanding of the issue than I did. When I asked if there would be a way to reach out to him later, he told me that unfortunately there wasn't. I think this is due to regulations about releasing personal information between client and Apple support reps, though I'm not sure.

All of this said, I have had some PC-users try out the 5 items that I listed above (the refrigerators and televisions) and the effect did not appear at all in their games.

I guess I'll wrap up with a couple of my own unorganized thoughts about this... to me, it seems that at some point, something went wrong with how the game is coded to handle graphics on Mac. From what I can tell, from that point on the effect appeared only on certain pieces of CC, maybe these pieces of CC are particularly difficult to render graphically, who knows. But like I said before, the television screens all worked perfectly fine in my game for months, and the ONLY change I made to my game, computer, or settings around the time of seeing the effect appear on those televisions was the addition of the CC refrigerators by LittleDica. But even upon removing those refrigerators immediately, the effect remained on those TVs. Then suddenly, the effect began appearing on anything reflective/shiny, EA or otherwise. So to me, this error feels somehow progressive? I don't even know if that's possible - I know little-to-nothing about computers and graphics. All I can do is report what I've observed from my gameplay/testing. Right now, my game seems to be back at the point it was at around the time of the DU hotfixes/patches. The glitch isn't all over every surface, but it sometimes appears on a random piece of CC, and if I see it, I remove the CC to be safe. It's as if the game stopped being able to properly process the graphics of certain items after a patch, and then if I left too many of those items in my game, the effect spread and the game was unable to process any reflective/shiny textures at all. Again, not sure if this is possible, but that's what it feels like is happening, from a non-computer-savvy person.

I'm sorry again for the long post and the rambling. This is just such a complex issue and it's really hard to process it myself, let alone write it all out in a clear and concise way. I've been trying to get the word out and encourage any Mac-users who use CC to look for this issue and report it here when they see it, but I also don't want to spam various Discord channels in the hope I'll find another Mac-user willing to test this stuff out with me. But so far, the three other Mac and moderate-heavy CC users that I've come across have seen the issue in some variation in their game. So I know it's not just my computer. I'm hoping I can get them to post here with their specs and also with the items that they're seeing the effect on. The one person said they would but like I said earlier, I haven't heard from them in a couple days. Maybe will try again tonight. Anyways it's time for me to shut up. Thanks so much for anyone who takes the time to read through this. --AJ