#ts3tutorial

Went ahead and updated my tutorial because I've been getting more questions lately than usual and my old tutorial used Maya. I'm glad so many people are trying to learn to convert! I hope this helps answer any questions. I'm also here to answer all questions as always 💗

@nakiri88 @simbianstudios @ghouzlss

I just shared a guide to optimizing worlds and lots in The Sims 3! This guide addresses some of the community's most under-reported issues related to object limits and lot sizes for optimization and performance improvements in open worlds in The Sims 3. I hope you enjoy it, find it useful, and would be incredibly interesting to open a dialogue from this thread so that together, as a community, we can build a guide with best practices for developing optimized worlds for The Sims 3.

Also, if you try any of the ideas offered and are interested in providing feedback, any information is welcome and will contribute to the material we just wrote.

It has a summary for lazy people, so if you don't want to read everything, just read the summary xD

I was about to go back to my business and quietly leave y'all with a word of wisdom but the very next package I opened raised my hackles. So here we go, hold on to your seat.

Disclaimer for younger/sweeter - followers - this has language in it because I'm pissed... I apologize in advance.

49,282 Polycounts. That's 50K for a fucking basket!!!

It's pretty, it's beautiful, and I downloaded it because it's everything you could want out of a basket of lemons... whoever created it did an outstanding job... for a movie production.

NOT PC GAMES.

So let's fix it - and let's hold our creators and converters to a higher standard or send them along to a different platform where they can create without our bitching.

First off, there's 3 or 4 ways you can check polycounts.

1 - TSRW under Mesh tab

2 - S3PE (Pretty sure you have to have an addon to do this - I'll try to find it when I'm done and add the link) Under MLOD, right click and go down to Preview. It'll open up a window and you can view the model and the polycount.

3 - 3D Viewer on your computer

4 - Blender or Milkshape

Now that we have the ability to check our polycount - we're gonna fix this mesh. I'm not going to show you how to package it, there are other tutorials for that part, but this is VITAL to having a healthy game, and honestly, being a creator or converter for this game. I do understand that you have to have the knowledge before you can fix a problem, so here it is - literally handed to you in a basket. I also understand that there are creators/converters who don't post polycounts because they're afraid people won't download it - that is inexcusable. If that's the case then you will eventually be boycotted by the players who know better.

Alright, so step one - you're going to want to get into blender after exporting your mesh. You're going open the modifier properties and add a decimate modifier (the wrench circled in red, and the add modifier drop down menu).

Keep it in Collapse, not un-subdivide. It's gentler on the mesh itself and you'll get a lot farther with it. You're also going to want your UV map to match what you're doing with your mesh, in case you need it for selection (I'll explain that in a minute) and have faces tagged so the selection is easier.

Now that you have that set up, you're gonna want to remove unnecessary vertices. See the shadows on the bottom of the basket? Here's how to fix that - hit tab, press A to select everything, and then go to MESH/MERGE/BY DISTANCE. This removed 16,900 loose vertices that didn't need to be there.

Go back to your modifiers and add an edge split modifier and hit apply.

Boom - no shadows.

Now that that is all done you're going to go in to edit mode (tab) and press L while hovering over what you're wanting to select. This is going to select all of the islands in your UV, and it's the fastest way (that I've found) to quickly select pieces of your mesh.

When you have your whole group selected (you can also figure out at this point what pieces need alternate textures or groups for TSRW later in your packaging process) you're going to hit P-Selection. That's gonna split whatever you have selected into a separate group.

Now, you can do that to however many pieces you see fit, but for this I'm just gonna stick with two - the lemons and the basket itself. You're going to click the blue Ratio box - and type in .5 and hit enter. That will collapse your polycount in half - (you can move that ratio box lower if you wish, but this way is the gentlest way possible and I've gotten better results. So play with it and see for yourself if you wish to. ) - Now repeat the process until your mesh starts to lose quality, I tend to stop there unless I can push it a bit further without making it look bad.

Now repeat that process with all groups.

Given that this particular mesh was such high polycount and an intricate mesh, I could only manage to get it from 49,282 faces (polys) down to 18,860. This is absolutely not okay for TS3 - and I'm using as a lesson rather than using something that I can get down to an okay level - because this is what you're going to run into when getting meshes that start in the tens of thousands of polys. THIS IS NOT MEANT FOR TS3, it's beautiful, yes, but you are putting people's equipment at risk by advertising a mesh for a 13 year old game without disclaiming that it's dangerous for it.

This tutorial will absolutely work for most objects, and I've used this process for a couple of years now with success, but you have to be able to decide what you're willing to put into TS3. We have all of these tutorials for reducing lag in this old as dirt game, but NONE of that matters if you're carrying objects like this - no matter how pretty they are.

If you need it that bad, figure out how to make a version of it that CAN look as good as this with a little less detail (think the spirals in the wicker that is actually meshed rather than just textured), or ask a creator to make something for you.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask. If I have the time, I try to help whoever comes into my inbox. If I can't help, there is a hoard of creators out there that probably can.

So have fun, CHECK YOUR CONTENT, and keep your computer safe.

And creators/converters - do better.

Edit to add - to the creators/converters who do put out their polycounts, or a disclaimer of high poly/photo use only - thank you. I do understand the need for high poly objects for photo-op purposes, and I'm not here to attack anyone's preferred gaming style. I just want people to be safe while they play, as there are those who don't know what they're putting into their games. Let's help ensure that everyone has a chance to play whether they're experienced creators or regular game-players.

Edit to add 2 -

What you need: Only Into The Future Expansion Pack.

UPDATE 10/16/2022 : You don't need the table and to change the lot type, just have the ITF refrigerator in any kind of community lot you want and the waiters will spawn after a few minutes. I tried it recently in Monte Vista and it works. The options for ordering food will only appear when the waiters arrive in the lot.

I don't really know why it never worked in my other saves and worlds if I didn't also put the ITF table and change the lot type, but it seems that only the ITF refrigerator is enough...

-----

Did you know that you can have a functional restaurant in The Sims 3 without having to use the store set? All you need Is Into The Future.

I've seen people go crazy with the store set reporting a different problem each time, so I thought "but why?" Not many people know about this feature of ITF, but now I will explain how it works.

First of all, you don't need to be in the future to have it, but you can create it in any world you want. To do this you have to:

Choose a community lot (of any type).

Have this ITF refrigerator shown in the photo in your restaurant (community lot).

Decorate at will. Table, chairs and other furniture and decorations are at your choice, the only obligatory items is the refrigerator.

Save the lot, get back to live mode with your family and enjoy the functional restaurant! If the lot is located in Oasis Landing, the waiters will be robots, but in a normal world, the waiters will be humans. To order click on the table. Waiters will take a couple of minutes to spawn.

EXTRA: All this is mod and cc free, but if you want to see what you order (with preview images, not just the name of the food) use this mod! (For some reason it will give script error every time you travel, at least it does to me, but don't worry, isn't harmful.)

1. It crash`s sometimes when you try to import the same CC twice. Move the content from Downloadsfolder and try to open CC Magic again. If it`s working now, than you have the issue I described and you must sort out which CC you already have installed. You can use the 50/50 method or go through it one by one. I never had a crash for another reason and I rebuild and imported stuff a million times!

Left to right is 1, 2 & 3. I used a custom eye shadow used on pictures, this one by Gosik, and included a screenshot of the channels.

1.

2.

3.

Oh, well that's simple enough.

You can use any CC in CAW as long as your framework is set up. That's why all of my testing photos come out of CAW, because it's a 1000 times faster to load than the game (especially with all of your CC in there).