at some point in your life you will be boiling fruit, water, sugar, and lemon juice in a pot to make a syrup or jam. the instructions will tell you to simmer for a certain amt of time. your timer will go off and you will look at the pot and go, "hm, this doesn't look thick enough. maybe i'll let it go for another 10 minutes." this is the devil speaking. it's only so liquid right now because it is at boiling point. it will thicken when it cools down. learn from the follies of my youth and do not let this happen to you
at some point in your life you will be making a sauce or a stew in which you need to add cornstarch to thicken it. and you will prepare a slurry of starch in cold water and think "this looks like way too little starch to thicken this amount of liquid." this is the devil speaking. cornstarch instantly polymerizes at 95°C and if you add too much it will turn into an impossibly thick goop.
at some point in your life you will be making some sort of cream based dessert that requires gelatin to thicken it. and you will soak some gelatin sheets in water and think "this is too few gelatin sheets for this amount of cream." this is the devil speaking. it will thicken in the fridge and if you add too much you will end up with milk jelly
at some point in your life you will be baking cookies. you will take the sheet out after twelve minutes as the recipe instructs and the cookies will still be glistening and soft. "these don't seem cooked enough," you will think to yourself, "i should place them back into the oven until their edges are nice and golden." this is the devil talking. this is how you get dry, overdone cookies. the cookies will continue to bake on the warm sheet for several more minutes and then harden up after sitting on a rack for a while. trust the process. trust the process.
at some point in your life you will be adding a small pasta to a soup and you will think "that is not enough small pasta." this is the devil talking. the pasta will absorb the stock and expand. this is how you end up with a soup that is a solid mass of soggy ditalini.
At some point in your life you will be adding garlic to a dish and you will think "that is not enough garlic." These are angels speaking. They are correct. Add more garlic.
Can absolutely confirm this is on Win10 as well, Settings > Time & Language > Language. Scroll down to Related Settings/Spelling, Typing & Keyboard Settings > How AI Has Helped You/Typing Insights.
I just wound up turning off everything, they can fuck off wholesale.
I think a lot of people who are complaining about the lack of content in Paralives are forgetting just how fucking bare bones the sims 4 was at launch.
today i have some recolours of some items from @jinxxsims 's conversions of @bostyny 's fusion set in 23 aelia colours. the oval dutch oven (in orange) is the master mesh, all other meshes are repoed to it
Have you ever wondered why Bodyshop makes your PC work so hard?
BODYSHOP HAS NO FPS LIMIT
With limited frame rate, Bodyshop only puts a strain on PC when it loads CAS content. If your GPU fans go significantly faster the entire time you have Bodyshop open, then FPS is very likely way too high.
It's similar case for TS2 game - but FPS also depends on your system / PC /Laptop and the way you run TS2.
➤ To check FPS in the game, use a shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + S to bring up FPS HUD. FPS is displayed right in the upper left corner.
Tip: if FPS is changing too fast, take a few screenshots so you can read FPS from those
➤ If you set a limit to 60 FPS, that tells CPU/GPU to produce 60 game frames per second. This is the sensible number for TS2. Without FPS limit, your hardware is trying to put out frames as fast as it possibly can, heating up and using unnecessary amounts of energy.
The Sims 2 engine was not designed to run any higher than 100 FPS
➤ When you play The Sims 2 with TS2 RPC & borderless window, Windows Desktop Manager usually handles frame rates. Same for windowed TS2 Legacy edition. This is thanks to Vsync*, which forces desktop's default refresh rate on game window.
*In case of high-refresh gaming monitors / laptops, FPS limit imposed by Vsync may not be low enough for TS2.
*I showed a screenshot of my hood, but I recommend checking FPS in lot view, because in hood view, 'heavy' particle effects like clouds can dramatically slow down FPS even on a modern gaming GPU.
➤ On older gear, FPS may never go beyond ~70 even without the limit, but CPU / GPU still try hard to reach the unachievable frame rate.
Varying FPS numbers may be an indicator that the game is running uncapped, OR that the default frame rate is set too high for your system to handle.
➤ On modern gaming GPU, you'll have no problem telling the game runs uncapped - FPS in lot view usually oscillates between ~200 - 600.
➤ A few ways to set FPS limit:
Playing a game in windowed mode often solves high FPS issue. Unless you have a monitor with high refresh rate. But the general recommendation for old, uncapped DX9 games is: do not trust WDM, do not rely on Vsync, set a hard FPS limit.
If you use DXVK, you can set FPS cap in the DXVK config file, both for the game, and for Bodyshop (you pick the same 32-bit d3d9 version). *I've explained how I tweaked my DXVK's FPS in this post here.
If you don't use DXVK, and Windows Desktop Manager doesn't affect your game's FPS for some reason, or if you insist on playing fullscreen, you can set FPS limit for TS2 with driver-level GPU settings: Nvidia 3D program profile* / AMD adrenalin. Same applies to Bodyshop.
*Nvidia's global FPS cap may not work in fullscreen mode, often it's required to set FPS limit for TS2 exe specifically.
➤ In case of laptops using "Mux-less" or "Optimus" technology, the integrated Intel/AMD graphics card may be forcing FPS adjusted to screen refresh rate, ignoring Nvidia 3D profile's FPS limiter settings.
If so, you may need to use DXVK with FPS limit, or an external tool like Riva Tuner Statistics Server. RivaTuner apparently can make FPS feel smoother ;) It can be used along DXVK, too (but in that case you set limit with RTSS only, ofc).
TS2 game actually has the option to adjust screen refresh rate, it's in the middle of the graphic options tab. I was told that in the Legacy Edition, the Refresh Rate box is blank and permanently locked, meaning you cannot fix FPS inside the game menu.
I have Mr Dj's repack, and this box was always greyed out for me because I always used FPS cap. When I uncapped FPS, the refresh box became active, game allows me to switch between 59 and 60 mhz refresh options, but these do nothing. FPS stays at 80 for a while, then it goes uncapped.
Some say the Refresh Rate setting is broken in Legacy version, but ,more likely, it got disabled cuz it doesn't work anyway on modern systems.
when i was a kid i was so mad all the time bc i thought someday i'd have to be somebody's wife i didn't know it was optional. is everybody reminding the young girls in their lives that it's optional.
Tutorial: How to Install TS3 with DXVK, Sims3SettingsSetter (S3SS), and ReShade in 2026
This is a long-overdue update of my previous, now obsolete tutorial on how to use DXVK and ReShade (d3d9). If you do not use ReShade, you can still follow this guide up until where it is to be installed.
At the time of writing (April 2026), this guide is compatible with and corresponds to Step 1 to 3 of The Sims 3 Performance & Bug Fix Guide 2026, featuring an extra step on how to install ReShade.
If you followed any other guide (including my own) on how to install DXVK and/or ReShade, it is strongly recommended that you start from scratch, meaning you should uninstall DXVK AND Reshade completely. Believe me when I say this: it will save you a lot of time, frustration, and make your life so much easier.
For the purpose of this tutorial, I am on Steam version 1.67.2.024037 on Windows 11, but it should work for discs 1.67 and EA App 1.69 versions, too. This guide does not cover GShade.
Without further ado, let's begin!
Backup your files, even the entire folder (EA Games\The Sims 3\Game\Bin or steamapps\common\The Sims 3\Game\Bin) if you want to be extra safe; you will thank yourself later. If you do not wish to backup the entire folder, at the very least backup the following:
Keep them somewhere secure, for your peace of mind (and sanity).
Firstly, to fully uninstall DXVK, you should remove the following files:
d3d9.dll (if you hover your cursor over the file, it will read: Company: DXVK)
dxvk.conf
TS3.dxvk-cache (or TS3W.dxvk-cache)
Secondly, remove remnant files of previously installed ReShade (you did create a backup, right?):
d3d9.dll (located at the Bin folder, if you hover your cursor over the file, it will read: Company: crosire)
ReShade.ini
ReShade.log
⚠️There are a couple more steps. Please follow the instructions here.
Get the latest version here on GitHub:
Click on the version that has the 'Latest' tag next to it (2.7.1 as of now), scroll down to 'Assets', and click on dxvk-x.x.x.tar.gz to download DXVK.
Open dxvk-x.x.x.tar.gz, click on x32, and locate d3d9.dll from within.
Download a copy of dxvk.conf from this page by clicking on the tiny icon on the right.
Drag both d3d9.dll AND dxvk.conf to the Bin folder (EA Games\The Sims 3\Game\Bin or steamapps\common\The Sims 3\Game\Bin); that is where TS3.exe and TS3W.exe are located.
Open dxvk.conf with Notepad or Notepad++, 'Ctrl + A' to select all, and hit delete. Yes, delete everything inside. Once you've emptied the file, enter the following:
Copy your Options.ini from your backup folder (you did make a backup, right?) into your Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 folder.
Because we have 'tricked' the game into recognising our modern GPU as a GTX 580, we must edit one single line within the Options.ini to keep our preferred in-game settings intact.
Hit 'Ctrl + G', type in '150' to go to that line, and replace it with:
lastdevice = 0;10de;1080;65535
'Ctrl + S' to save.
⚠️Thanks to DXVK, from now on whenever there's a GPU driver update, we no longer need to keep the 'lastdevice' line up-to-date to prevent your in-game settings from being reset. You can leave it alone forever, once and for all. The last digit of '65535' is a placeholder value for driver versions and remains constant as long as you are using DXVK.
Launch the game to confirm that DXVK is working. By default, the debug HUD should show up in the top left corner of your screen. What's more, your graphics settings should not have reset.
If you're still not convinced that DXVK is working, go to your Bin folder and look for a file called: TS3_d3d9.log or TS3W_d3d9.log and inspect its content:
If you see these correctly documented in your log file, DXVK is working as intended.
⚠️ NB: This newer version of DXVK no longer generates a cache file by default, meaning that there will not be a TS3.dxvk-cache or TS3W.dxvk-cache any more.
Get the latest version here on GitHub:
Click on the version that has the 'Latest' tag next to it (1.5.0 as of now), scroll down to 'Assets', and click on Sims3SettingsSetter.asi to download S3SS.
An ASI Loader is required for S3SS to function properly, and now so we need to install it.
However, if you use any of the listed LazyDuchess mods:
Mono Patcher Library;
Pixel Shader Modding Framework;
Shadow Extender (TS3);
or Split Level Light Fix,
you should already have an ASI loader (in the form of wininet.dll) located inside your Bin folder, and you can use that instead.
As you can see in the screenshot below, LD's Shader Framework came shipped with an ASI loader, as the other 3 mods do.
If you do not use any of the mods listed above, or that you wish to get a newer version of ASI loader for the game, you can get it from here (Ultimate ASI Loader by ThirteenAG):
To install, drag Sims3SettingsSetter.asi AND wininet.dll to your Bin folder.
And that is S3SS and its prerequisite successfully installed, now we should launch the game (again) and check if it's working.
Once the game has launched, hit 'Insert' key to toggle on S3SS interface.
⚠️ If nothing happens after pressing ' Insert', remove a folder called 'S3SS' (located at: Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3) and reinstall from Step 2 again.
From S3SS interface, select 'Patches' on the top.
Here I recommend enabling all performances patches, but choose only one flavour for the Smooth Patch: Original or Precise.
Next, click on 'Other/QoL' tab, tick the box next to 'Enable Memory Warning', and increase the warning threshold to 3.8 GB.
Navigate downwards to 'Borderless Window' and choose 'Fullscreen' in the drop-down menu. This will allow you to play in borderless windowed mode.
⚠️ Please note that I do not play TS3 in exclusive fullscreen mode, nor do I recommend doing so; therefore, I cannot provide support for that.
Lastly, don't forget to click on 'File' on the top left corner to save any changes you've made.
Exit the game, it's time to install ReShade.
Download the latest version (with full add-on support) from the official site; it is 6.7.3 at the time of writing.
If you do not download the version with full add-on support, DoF (depth of field) shaders will not work properly upon internet detection.
Select TS3.exe (EA App) or TS3W.exe (disc, Steam), and then choose Vulkan as rendering API, click 'Next'.
If you would prefer not to install any shaders/effects (i.e, you want to keep using your existing ones), click 'Skip'.
On the following page, you'll get to choose to install add-ons. Hit 'Skip', unless you know what you are doing.
Click 'Finish' to complete installation.
At this stage, a new, vanilla ReShade.ini file will be placed in the Bin folder; you may now replace it with the one from your backup folder to recover all preferred settings (such as hotkeys for taking screenshots, directory for shaders etc.). Same thing goes for your reshade-presets and reshade-shaders folder.
Launch the game (for the final time) to check that ReShade has been properly installed.
To toggle S3SS interface, press 'Insert' (or whatever hotkey you've set it to).
⚠️ NB: under ReShade's 'Settings' tab you may need to change 'Input processing' to either 'Pass on all input' or 'Block input when cursor is on overlay' to tweak S3SS settings whilst ReShade's GUI is visible. Otherwise, you'll need to toggle ReShade's menu off first.
That is the end of this tutorial.
Congratulations, you have successfully installed DXVK, S3SS, and ReShade! You may now open dxvk.conf and remove line dxvk.HUD from it.
Whew, what a long tutorial. If you've made it this far, great job. 🎉
Hope you've found this helpful; comment down below, or send me an ask/DM if you've any questions. I'll try my best to troubleshoot with you. Happy simming! ⭐
Credits:
doitsujin for DXVK
ThirteenAG for Ultimate-ASI-Loader
@sims3fiend, just-harry, @lazyduchess, and swiffyjk for Sims3SettingsSetter
crosire for ReShade
@nectar-cellar @desiree-uk and @kevinvoncrastenburg for their help.
These questions were asked by @divagirl76 in a reply to my post about load times, and I thought it should be it's own separate post:
Do you recommend merging the mesh with the recolours into one file OR merge recolours only and leave the mesh separate?
Answer: I will answer this with examples 😊
a) Let's say I download a set which has a bunch of individual objects each with their own recolours. For each item, I merge the item together with it's recolours. In times gone by I'd just merge the entire set into 1-2 big files, and sometimes I still do, but these days I like to have more control over it and still be able to delete a CC object from within the game if I decide I don't want it anymore, and be sure the object + recolours all disappear at once. I sacrifice a little bit of load time speed for this, but I'm okay with it.
b) Let's say I download a big CC set like Honeywell's Bespoke windows and doors set. This set has some key master objects, then a bunch of recolours and repo meshes. Here's what I'd do with it or how I'd merge it.
First, I look through the set in a test game and see if there's any meshes I don't particularly want or need. I make a note of them in a notepad file, then outside of the game, delete anything I don't want.
Once I'm happy, leave the master meshes out on their own, then I merge:
All recolours together
All repo meshes together.
c) Let's say I download CAS stuff - I handle this slightly differently. With CAS stuff, all of the meshes (whether hair or clothing) I
Only remove special characters
Do not merge
I put all of these into a folder called
CAS_Meshes_Hair or CAS_Meshes_Clothing
Why? Because otherwise I accidentally end up with 20 copies of the same hair mesh, lol. If I stick to this system, I get a prompt if the file is already in there. Handy! Then the recolours, I vet first and then merge.
2. Do the file names (or length of file names with or without spaces or weird characters) BEFORE merging matter? I know you will rename them when you do merge, so if they don't matter, I can save myself alot of time now and just bundle the recolours (or mesh and recolours) and rename them when I do merge.
Answer: nope, you can leave them as they are and then just give your merged package a nice neat name 😊
3. Do you merge recolours by creator?
Answer: Yes 😊 Let's say it's a Maxis mesh. I'll name it something like
DECO_CivicIdolPoster_xmathyxRCs_merged
If it's recolours of a cc set, I'll go something like SET_Bespoke_ShastaRCs_merged
4. Is there a limit to how many recolour files you should merge?
I've never run into any issues with it, but there's possibly some issues with merging a lot of large textures together - @picknmixsims might be able to weigh in here, as we were helping @lamare-sims with a broken merged file just yesterday, and William worked out that it was unhappy about texture files I think? In general, I would say I don't worry too much about it.
5. Is there some cc you shouldn't merge?
Yes, anything that when you merge it, you go in game and try to look at it, it's invisible 😄 This doesn't happen to me much anymore, but it can happen. In particular I remember trying to merge some old couches from HolySimoly that would throw a tanty every time, lol.
You also cannot* merge:
Hood Deco
Fences
Columns
*You can merge these I think, definitely fences, but you need to go into SimPE afterwards and tweak some stuff. See this tutorial by @hugelunatic
6. Can you merge repository meshes or should they be kept separate?
Answer: As in my answer to your first question, you sure can. I just like to keep the master objects out on their own or things can start to complain. I also like to leave master meshes out in case I decide I want to make recolours 👀
General tips:
The thing with merging is that it can be tedious and time consuming, so attack it in small chunks. Like "this week I will merge all my painting recolours".
It's ultimately up to you where and how much you want to merge your content together. Some people will do huge merges and throw a bunch of content in together (looking at you, Lamare lol), others prefer to do smaller merges. These days I tend to prefer smaller merges, which as I mentioned above does sacrifice some load time speed, but gives me better control of my catalogue in game.
I also recommend everyone check out the latest update to object relocator by PickNMix, and for CAS stuff the Outfit Organizer, as we can now merge files with these and it's SUPER streamlined and simple. I merged a crap tonne of windows together with their diagonal meshes earlier this week and it was 10x faster with Object Relocator than it would have been otherwise.
While you're learning to merge, test in game regularly, keep an un-merged backup, or just keep a link to what you downloaded in case you need to try the merge again.
DO NOT PIRATE ANYTHING. NOT SHOWS/MOVIES. NOT GAMES OR SAFER GAMES. AND CERTAINLY NOT BOOKS. AND DO NOT DOWNLOAD YOUTUBE VIDEOS. AND NEVER EVER EVER WATCH MUSICALS WITHOUT GOING TO THEM AND DONT USE ADBLOCKERS/OTHER ADBLOCKER TO AVOID ADS AND VIRUSES PIRATING IS VERY HARMFUL TO THE CORPORATIONS WHO WORKS VERY HARD TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF PEOPLE AND THEIR MONEY. ANYONE WHO PIRATES IS BAD. BAD PIRATING. EVIL. OH AND THIS
If ever you struggled with how to hide the necessary pool tile for the sea/pond water mod? I have, and so has my friend @ladyvondolladay. She had an idea, and I made it a reality.
I present to you — the terrain rug. A two poly sheet with terrain paint textures that you can slap over your pool tile and hide it completely. Thank you @picknmixsims for sharing the shader info I needed to make the texture actually blend in this perfectly!
There are recolors to match all 30 maxis terrains, swatch folder is included. I chose to only do full strength, as the combinations quickly get out of hand otherwise. If you are interested in making your own recolors to match custom terrains or common blends you use, I'll include an explanation of how I did it under the cut.
You'll find it in deco/rugs, it costs nothing. 2 poly, textures are 256x256.
Download on simfileshare
Credits: Calibrat who helped me with the names of terrains in English for swatch purposes. LadyVonDolladay for the original idea. @pforestsims who suggested the problem with getting texture to match might be shader related.
The textures were made by taking a screenshot of the terrain painted ground from straight above and at a level of zoom where 1 tile in game measured about 256x256 pixels. By matching the mesh size to the image size I grab, the scale of the pattern remains the same. I included a texture reference image to hopefully make it a little easier to understand what I mean.
I haven't tried with floor tile textures, but I think it would work somewhat well for them too though the mesh is just a smidge bigger than exactly 1 tile.
The previous masterpost got flagged as mature, which is whatever but now I have an excuse to create new example screenshots
So these are CC-free collections of EAxis Build/Buy that I decided could fit into each featured theme. They speed up decorating for me immensely and make it easier to jump into trying out a less familiar theme/aesthetic by narrowing down & structuring your options.
Alien | Grunge
Gothic | Pink
Carnival | Wild West
Little Guys | Aquaria
80s/90s Pastel | MiniMod Pop
As a Sims 2 player one of the most eerie things about playing the original game isn't necessarily the creepy/more liminal aesthetic or the repetitively endless gameplay, but the fact that almost all the pre-made Sims from the original game are inexorably doomed by the narrative.
There's something odd about Pleasantview specifically, where the majority of the returning Sim families live (save for Tara Kat, who seems... relatively fine). Like, the concept of the game is that twenty-five years have passed, and all of the returning characters are pre-baked into character arcs that communicate an unavoidable truth: You, the player, failed.
Bella Goth will disappear. Her brother (though in the original Sims we aren't aware that Michael Bachelor is her brother) will die, possibly murdered. Mortimer will be lost and alone. Cassandra will be stuck in an unloving engagement. The Newbie's daughter will be impoverished, a single mother whose husband died young, with two boys and another on the way. Daniel Pleasant will grow up to be a cheater. Jennifer Pleasant will never be an athlete like she wanted (her brother will). And though poor Johnny Burb never mentions Tucker anymore, you know that old dog died years ago. The Roomies, the Mashugas, the Hicks, the Charmings - all leave town... or worse, die out.
I think about Jeff Pleasant's bio in the first game: "Jeff and his family are new to the neighborhood. Can you help Jeff provide for his family and fulfill his lifelong goal of being the first man to walk on Mars?" And how it contrasts to Daniel's in the second: "Since his father Jeff died without achieving his dream of going to Mars, Daniel has felt an overwhelming guilt."
And sure, you can save the families of Pleasantview. You can choose for Mary-Sue to not go to work that day, or maybe Daniel never pursues Kaylynn Langerak again. You can give Cassandra a happy marriage, tame Don Lothario's womanizer ways. You can financially save Brandi Broke. You can get John Burb another dog. You can get Jennifer the career she always wanted. You can defy the scripted in-game prompts and say "No. I don't want to play like this." You can break the cycle, every time you play.
And yet, at the end of the day, no matter what you do... uninstalling the game and reinstalling it, maybe just deleting that Neighborhood folder, they are reset back to exactly where they were again. They're doomed to repeat it forever.
The game makes it clear that there are some things you aren't meant to change. A genie lamp or a Resurrect-O-Nomitron can bring back sims like Michael Bachelor, but you will pay for it in your neighborhood deteriorating to corruption. And no matter what you do, no force in the universe can bring Bella Goth back. The one in Strangetown isn't even really her, after all. And maybe she isn't. They say they deleted her in development, replaced her with a clone. Maybe that's what Bella Goth in Strangetown is. A clone. Maybe we were wrong, after all. Maybe she was never abducted by aliens. Maybe Don Lothario killed her. Maybe Dina Caliente killed her. Maybe Mortimer did. But you can't bring her back, no matter what you do. Recreate the original Bella, pixel by pixel, extract her data, make your zombie Bella. Build your own monster. Create a sim. But she will never recognize her family. Never see them as her own.
And she was never meant to.
Liz is playing the sims 2 @lizplaythings - Tumblr Blog | Tumgag
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