Look, I'm not usually one to complain (I prefer constructive criticism) but this is getting ridiculous:

First of all, EA add a forum section for Mac users with the subtitle A whole area dedicated to our beloved Mac folk. BELOVED??? Do they even bother to look at this Mac section? Ever since the franchise came out, Mac users have been plagued with all kinds of issues.

I own a late 2009 iMac 27" with 8Gb of memory, an Intel i5 quad core processor running at 2.66 GHz and and ATI Radeon HD 4850 video card. That's no small machine. In fact, it is very powerful.

I have the Sims 3, the latest patch - version 12.0.273.015001 (whatever that means) and I own all the EPs and SPs that exist out there right down to the new Katy Perry Collector's Edition of Showtime. With all the stuff I bought from The Store, my game runs in the hundreds of dollars - not Simoleons, real honnest the goodness American DOLLARS. So naturally, I expect to be one of EA's beloved Mac folk. Right? Not quite:

Unloading loading screen and texture-compositing teddy bears...

First loading screen. Ah! The promise that something wonderful is about to happen:

That's the Game Launcher, this takes an average of 20 seconds to load. Then of course, even though I always select that "Keep me logged in" option, I have to enter my password just about every time regardless. Once I'm logged in, I click on the huge "Play the Sims 3" button.

Second loading screen. That's my "I'm almost there" moment:

If I bypass the movie by hitting the escape key after the logos, I have to wait another 1 minute or so while watching the not so cute little phrases like "Feeding the mechanical bull" to get to the screen where I select which game I want to play. Once I've selected my game, I clck on the huge "Play" button.

Third loading screen. That is my usual What the f... moment:

With all the EPs and SPs I got, THAT takes another 1 minute and 30 seconds on average.

So, just to start the game, it takes me an average of 3 minutes (have another look at my computer specs above and tell me what's wrong with this picture). Heck, the other day, I made a coffee and said to myself that I would enjoy it while playing the game. I had time to drink my coffee before the game loaded

On to CAS. My What the f... moment has passed, but not for long, another one is about to follow:

When I want to create a Sim based on content from The Exchange, I cannot have more than 15 Sims loaded in CAS otherwise, it takes forever for them to appear in the custom section. Instead of just loading thumbnails, they load all of them, the whole shebang. What's more, if I have too many Sims in there, that means their is a lot of clothing and other props. This crashes my game often. That's the other What the f... moment I was taking about. (Again, take a look at my computer specs and give me one good reason why those memory related crashes should happen so frequently). So, when my game crashes, it's back to square one and plenty of time for another coffee (or go to the bathroom and take a serious s**t and perhaps pop a little blue pill).

So I finally manage to make it and start playing my game. That's my mellow moment (remember the little blue pill?)

If I take screenshots, they are nowhere to be found, not in the launcher and not in the folder either (a lot of beloved Mac folks have reported this like a million times but there are still no fix in site. Meanwhile EA has produced a number of EPs and SPs. I tend to think greed is more important to EA than their beloved Mac folks!

Also, with the top notch video card I got in my Mac and 8 Gb of memory, beefed up processor yada yada yada… I would expect to be able to crank all the Screen Settings Options to the max right? NOOOO! Even though my screen resolution is 2560x1440 pixels, I can only play the game at a resolution of 1600x900 and not one of the screen options (ex: Edge Smoothing) can be cranked to the max, otherwise, the game lags and the frames drop like flies.

So, do I need a CRAY supercomputer to play this f*****g game? These days, a game like the Sims 3 should be playable even on a Macbook Air! I have other games like for instance, Drivers: San Fransisco on my machine. That's a very graphic intensive game and I can run it at Mac 2 with my hair on fire. So how come a bunch of little Sims crawling about in a tiny little wolrd need so much memory usage?

That makes me wonder if EA is not using an old Windows 98 era engine to program this game.

Think I'm done? Well, think again…

There's this little tool called CAW (Create-A-World). Not available for EA's beloved Mac folks. Never has been and probably never will be. So if I want to create a world, I would have to shell out another 300 good ol' American DOLLARS (not Simoleons, d-o-l-l-a-r-s) for a copy of Microsoft Windows! Not gonna happen. I love my Mac and I'm not going to spend a penny on some Microsoft bull**** product. Hell, I don't even use Office for Mac!

OK, almost done: While browsing through the Mac section for EA's beloved Mac folks, I have come across so many issues people have while playing The Sims 3 on their Macs. Some of these issues have been around for what seems forever and keep re-appearing in one thread or another all the time. NOT GOOD!

THAT makes me wonder if EA even bothers to look at this little part of the forum for their beloved Mac folks.

I'm going to stop here because right now, I'm in a frickadelle of a mood (I decided to write this post after I lost a whole bunch of my work on building a house in game because of a crash).

Best regards to the beloved Mac folks out there . I feel for you and I know many of you shelled out tons of cash on that game only to be frustrated by issues that could go away if EA were really serious about it.

And if EA is actually looking at this, something I seriously doubt, thumbs way down to you! For EA's investors who care to do their homework and might come across this post, you better have a good talk with your money makers because as it is, EA is going to drive this franchise into the ground - at least for us beloved Mac folks whom, incidentally, collectively form a very sizeable portion of your profits.

Here's a bit of irony: Good thing I saved my text in "TextEdit" before posting this... EA's The Sims 3 website crashed on me while I tried to redo something in this post. That's another issue entirely as this site doesn't play nice with Safari.

I think it's time for a little blue pill now

i'm a fellow mac user and i feel you! i remember when they patched the game awhile back and i couldn't even start TS3 at all for like ... a week maybe a bit more had to go back to my old windows desktop to play atm can't play because the new expansion pack (katy perry limited edition one) keeps crashing on me *sigh*

*clicks the nonexistent "Like" button repeatedly until some little sproingy noise occurs, indicating she's broken the LIke button*

I actually have a brand new MacBook Pro with 8GB of RAM and loading my saved game takes longer than you describe. Saves take forfrakkingever. Quitting (even without saving) even takes faaaauuuurreeeevvvvaaaar.

I get that it's running in a compatibility layer, yes yes, I understand it adds loads of time. but WOW so many performance issues. SO many. So much RAM used. My fans are spinning at full speed all the time to keep the video card cool. Hooo boy.

This rant, man, I am with you all the way.

I was ready to throw a Grade-A hissy all over someone, and then I decked my game out with mods and now I have delicious stability. No more OMG I WORKED ON THAT LOT FOR AN HOUR ARGH! I danced all around the house the first time I managed to design, build, furnish and landscape a lot all in one sitting without a single crash. Hubby thinks I'm crazy.

Anyway.... *presses Like some more*

jooliea wrote:This rant, man, I am with you all the way.

I was ready to throw a Grade-A hissy all over someone, and then I decked my game out with mods and now I have delicious stability. No more OMG I WORKED ON THAT LOT FOR AN HOUR ARGH! I danced all around the house the first time I managed to design, build, furnish and landscape a lot all in one sitting without a single crash. Hubby thinks I'm crazy...

Thank you so much for your support (I thought I was crazy for ranting like that which is unusual for me)! But please, share how you mod your game! I want to dance all around the house too and I'll certainly entertain any suggestion you may have to make this game truly enjoyable.

FYI, the "compatibility layer" you referred to is called Cider. EA would be well advised to do away with this old peace of junk and move on to a real Mac-oriented engine.

Sul Sul!

I totally get where you're coming from and that your computer has better specs than my computer (I've been meaning to upgrade my memory to 8GB from 4 for a while now), but I still had to giggle a little at your comment about three minutes being too long. My Macbook Pro takes 8 minutes to load my larger saved games! I would kill for three minutes!

My poor computer's fans go full out too, which I guess is due to the whole Cider thing. I worry so much about it overheating. Or, like, literally melting.

My game also lags - the Sims themselves don't lag, but the time does, if that makes sense. Everything is moving and working, but the clock will stop for about 20 minutes at a time. Sometimes they take ages to carry out the actions I've told them to do too, which is frustrating.

In terms of mods, Twallan's Overwatch, Register and MasterController can help reduce any lag you might be having - Overwatch purges the game of all the glitchy extra cars and bad routing EA sticks in there, and Register and MasterController let you control generated Sims and clean up your population so that your town isn't struggling under the weight of 300 unnecessary paparazzi.

kirkuk wrote:I totally get where you're coming from and that your computer has better specs than my computer (I've been meaning to upgrade my memory to 8GB from 4 for a while now), but I still had to giggle a little at your comment about three minutes being too long. My Macbook Pro takes 8 minutes to load my larger saved games! I would kill for three minutes!

My poor computer's fans go full out too, which I guess is due to the whole Cider thing. I worry so much about it overheating. Or, like, literally melting.

My game also lags - the Sims themselves don't lag, but the time does, if that makes sense. Everything is moving and working, but the clock will stop for about 20 minutes at a time. Sometimes they take ages to carry out the actions I've told them to do too, which is frustrating.

In terms of mods, Twallan's Overwatch, Register and MasterController can help reduce any lag you might be having - Overwatch purges the game of all the glitchy extra cars and bad routing EA sticks in there, and Register and MasterController let you control generated Sims and clean up your population so that your town isn't struggling under the weight of 300 unnecessary paparazzi.

Hi Kirkuk,

I don't blame you for giggling at my 3 minutes load time. 8 minutes would be unacceptable for me. My gosh that's a long time!

Also, some the issues you mentioned and are exactly some of the issues I was referring to, issues which people have been complaining over and over for ages without any resolution from EA.

As for overheating, I wouldn't worry too much. Apple makes the insides of their computer so that heat displacement is very efficient. As a Mac OS X specialist at work, I've seen a lot of overheating but very little side effects. But I agree with you, when you hear your fan going on at near the speed of light, that is scary But if it keeps up, it wouldn't be a bad idea to pause your game (if you hit CMD+Enter the game goes into window mode and if you click anywhere outside the game window, it should pause it (meaning that it releases memory and processor resources for other tasks such as browsing the Internet, answering your email, etc., thus giving time for your computer to cool off a bit, without having to quit the game and wait another 8 minutes to resume. ( I can't promise anything but I tried that a couple of times before and it seemed to do the trick).

I want to thank you for the suggestion for modding. I will check those out as they seem appropriate. I'll admit that I've always been a scaredy cat when it comes to modding. But, after my rant of discontent above (and I apologize for the less savoury language hinted with "****" in there), I'm more open to the idea than ever. So I'll try them out and let the chips fall where they may!

Best regards and Sul Sul!

Marzupial wrote:
Thank you so much for your support (I thought I was crazy for ranting like that which is unusual for me)! But please, share how you mod your game! I want to dance all around the house too and I'll certainly entertain any suggestion you may have to make this game truly enjoyable.

FYI, the "compatibility layer" you referred to is called Cider. EA would be well advised to do away with this old peace of junk and move on to a real Mac-oriented engine.

Sul Sul!

I started with Twallan's Overwatch - it helped clean up some of the detritus that builds up in the game, like the 3497854 cars that Sims drive to lots and then just abandon there. I also set it to find and reset stationary/unroutable sims.

That was good, but then I got Master Controller, so I could delete all the stupid memories that my sims and all the townies have been building up like crazy. I also set it to never make memories again. I also used Master Controller to help mass-delete some crap from my Sims' inventories - I had a ton of leftover food, SO much food that the fridge didn't even work anymore. Sims would go to get leftovers and then just stand there, befuddled. Trying to get rid of that much food manually was making me want to stab something.

That was great, but then I ALSO got ErrorTrap. Hot d*mn, that's been a freaking godsend. What a beautiful aid to stability it has been. I want to KISS it.

So, having gotten all that and having it work out so great, I also got awsomemod. That seems to actually prevent some of the issues. There are fewer derelict cars in the first place, for example. I have awesomemod replacing EA's story progression too, to see if it's any better/more reasonable/realistic. It also lets me switch households without destroying their inventory or wishes, though I have still had wishes destroyed once.

It's definitely not a perfect game, especially when I create a house with a whole lot of things in it (mo objects, mo problems), but it's SO MUCH MORE STABLE than before. Oh my holy granola so much more stable.

I understand what Cider is, but most people don't 'get' that The Sims is not actually a game written for the Mac. Doing away with an emulation environment and writing the game for Mac OS isn't an easy, cheap or quick task. I highly doubt that they are ever going to get rid of it. It reduces their costs so significantly, and allows them to claim 'simultaneous release for both platforms.' I can't imagine that they would get a big return on their investment if they hired a Mac OS development staff and tried to release EPs for both platforms at the same time. Also, we very likely would not see less bugs even if they wrote it to run natively on our OS, but we would certainly see even slower response times to bugfixes. ...Though I realize, with the amount they already do not fix bugs, that'd be hard to beat.

In a perfect world, what we would get would be something like Microsoft's MacBU. The Mac OS X version of Office is actually far and away a much more superior version of Office. It's like, wipe the tears from your eyes better. The MacBU at Microsoft is (or at least was; I haven't kept up with them, to be honest) a small group of really talented people that set a high bar for Mac development teams within a Windows-dominated environment. I imagine people would throw handfuls of money at EA if they actually had a really sharp Mac development team that produced a high-quality product.

Problem is, they already have people throwing handfuls of money at them regardless of the quality. I'm as guilty of it as anyone else. I buy the stupid EPs and the Stuff packs, and the Store products, blah blah blah. So, I don't see a lot of incentive to change what they're doing.

Besides, it's not like they're making the Windows users much happier, really. I see the rest of the forums complaining just about as much about stability issues. I mean, really, we're using the exact same product the Windows users are - it's just that for us, it runs much slower, and we have that added layer of s**t that can go wrong.

As an aside, I have noticed that even when switched away from the application, even when the game is paused, The SIms 3 does not release any resources whatsoever, and it still causes the fans to run at full speed. The funny thing is, it's not the CPUs that are running that hot - I can only assume it's the video chip that's burning up. And to be honest, I would not be so quick to say that this kind of overheating would not produce some unsavory side effects. It's not a common occurrence, but neither is this particular level of abuse that The Sims subjects your computer to. So, for extra-ordinary circumstances, be prepared for extra-ordinary consequences.

While it's true that the MacBooks are great heat dissipators, the effectiveness is partially defeated by the way that the average person uses a portable computer. In their lap, or in bed, whatever - a nice cushy fabric to trap all that heat in! I highly recommend that if you're using a MacBook to run The Sims, that you make doubly sure to allow good air flow around the computer. When you get up to take a nature break or do something else, set the computer on an elevated stand (I have one of these and it's excellent) to allow some air flow. Also, if you're one of the folks that uses the little plugs in the ports on the side of your computer (I am! So much crap gets sucked in there, and it's gross!), remove them when playing The Sims, or when using any other app that taxes your computer enough for the fans to run that high. Blocking those ports reduces the cooling significantly. Double bonus points if you have a small fan to direct at your computer when it's on its elevated stand! It helps tremendously.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I wouldn't let the possibility of overheating-related damage keep you up at night, but I would also NOT count it out, and I would definitely take extra steps to ensure that you're compensating for the increased heat. A rule of thumb I used when handling these things professionally was, if it's so hot that when you touch it, you reflexively yank your hand away, it's too hot and you need to do something about it immediately. Otherwise, just stay aware of it, and don't have, say, an eight-hour marathon of Sims playing while in bed with your down comforter. (Not that you can play the Sims for 8 hours as-is without it crashing.)

But take heart, it definitely won't literally melt. :)

I use a program called SMCFan Control to control the temperature.

Marzupial, your computer sounds just like mine except I do have a screenshots folder and it does work. How strange.

I recommend, as well, that you try Twallan's mods. He is a great modder, very dedicated and constantly updates his mods. He is also very polite and helpful, as is the site he runs. I have used his mods since the first one he published and they have kept my game relatively stable.

Kirkuk, upgrading your memory will probably not make that much difference to Sims 3. The game itself can only access up to 4GB. If you were running lots of background tasks while playing then it might be helpful but, as an example, I have 12GB and still have the odd crash.

First of all, I wish to thank Jooliea, Kirkook and Figwit for their inputs on mods.

I'm about to test those tools and hopefully, begin to have some real fun with the game. I'm trusting all of you on this!. In the meantime, I'm trying to get my Sim, Col. Samantha Carter, formerly of the very secret Stargate program to do something useful with the Grim Reaper she stole. That's right! Samantha Carter, of all Sims, stole the Grim Reaper last night Now back to business...

I understand what Cider is, but most people don't 'get' that The Sims is not actually a game written for the Mac. Doing away with an emulation environment and writing the game for Mac OS isn't an easy, cheap or quick task. I highly doubt that they are ever going to get rid of it. It reduces their costs so significantly, and allows them to claim 'simultaneous release for both platforms.' I can't imagine that they would get a big return on their investment if they hired a Mac OS development staff and tried to release EPs for both platforms at the same time. Also, we very likely would not see less bugs even if they wrote it to run natively on our OS, but we would certainly see even slower response times to bugfixes. ...Though I realize, with the amount they already do not fix bugs, that'd be hard to beat.

Point well taken Jooliea. However, it is my firm belief that Apple is in the process of shaping the future of computing for us all. I predict that within a few years, computing as we know it will be a thing of the past and we will have them to thank for it. Heck, Apple are even starting to change the way we consume medias as we speak. As more and more people adopt mobile device made by Apple, which by the way is now the forerunner in that field by leaps and bounds, I believe that people will come to appreciate the seemsless experience Apple has to offer. They are bound to find out eventually that Apple does this across their whole spectrum of products. They may start to adopt them en mass. To that end though, only time will tell. One thing is for sure though, Mac is not a cult: Apple makes the best computing products in the World, period.

In my own opinion, EA will eventually have to take this under consideration. They already have staff working on smaller Sims (and other) games for the iPad and the iPhone so they are already becoming familiar with the development of games using OS specific core programming. EA is also a multi-billion dollars industry. I believe they have plenty of resources to resolve issues around Cider, which have been plaguing Mac Sims players worldwide for years now. There is also that the fact that this game runs in 32 bits. With Windows and Apple now offering 64 bits systems, if only EA upgraded their emulator to honour that new standard, we might all benefit from it. That's just a guess as I am not a game developer.

But alas; You are right to say that we go on and buy their product blindly regardless of the many issues on Macs and that EA is not in a hurry to change anything because of that. We really love our Sims don't we? Imagine this: Bringing the whole Sims 3 EPs an SPs and all on the new Retina Display iPad - But I think there's a better chance they'll bring back Elvis!

…And to be honest, I would not be so quick to say that this kind of overheating would not produce some unsavory side effects. It's not a common occurrence, but neither is this particular level of abuse that The Sims subjects your computer to. So, for extra-ordinary circumstances, be prepared for extra-ordinary consequences.

Again, point well taken Jooliea. And oh! What a mistake I made! I faltered in my assessment because I neglected to think about people using laptop in places where heat flow may be hindered. I was wrong and I want to correct my mistake by strongly encouraging people to follow your good advice on this and disregard anything I said on this issue!

Now, Col. Samantha Carter 'Mam, are you ready for a modding experience hum?

Sul Sul everyone!

Marzupial wrote:I'm about to test those tools and hopefully, begin to have some real fun with the game. I'm trusting all of you on this!. :D

I recommend adding one at a time, and not all at once. Just for troubleshooting's sake.

Marzupial wrote:In the meantime, I'm trying to get my Sim, Col. Samantha Carter, formerly of the very secret Stargate program to do something useful with the Grim Reaper she stole. That's right! Samantha Carter, of all Sims, stole the Grim Reaper last night :mrgreen:

This is the greatest thing I have heard all night.

Marzupial wrote:Point well taken Jooliea. However, it is my firm belief that Apple is in the process of shaping the future of computing for us all. I predict that within a few years, computing as we know it will be a thing of the past and we will have them to thank for it. Heck, Apple are even starting to change the way we consume medias as we speak. As more and more people adopt mobile device made by Apple, which by the way is now the forerunner in that field by leaps and bounds, I believe that people will come to appreciate the seemsless experience Apple has to offer. They are bound to find out eventually that Apple does this across their whole spectrum of products. They may start to adopt them en mass. To that end though, only time will tell. One thing is for sure though, Mac is not a cult: Apple makes the best computing products in the World, period.

I am seriously taking away your Kool-Aid, now. O:) You don't happen to work for one of the ARSs or an AAR, do you? The Kool-Aid pours so freely there, my co-workers and I bought a Costo-sized can of it for the AppleCare room to remind us all to relax a bit.

Not that I don't agree that Apple has changed the world many times over, and usually for the better, but while their mobile products set the standard and are the mainstream (though they aren't the current market leader in smartphones anymore), the same cannot be said about their desktop/portable computers. I'm not convinced that Apple's non-mobile computing products will become significant marketshare contenders anytime soon, not so long as Windows remains the OS of choice for the majority of the world. Apple is successful and profitable and is well recognized for their revolutionary ideas and thoughtful execution. But you can make the best thing in the world, and still not come out top dog in the numbers.

Marzupial wrote:In my own opinion, EA will eventually have to take this under consideration.

That's a funny thing - I don't think EA will eventually have to do anything. You would think that other industries would have to take reality into account when forming their corporate strategies, but they don't. The music and motion picture industries continue to screw it up horribly. People have been saying that they will just have to change their business model, their frame of mind and their attitude, but boy have they not done that! The internet has changed the world radically in a visible and measurable way, but companies still do not take it under consideration and change their behavior. So I really don't think EA will eventually have to do anything, if what they're doing now is working even remotely.

Mainly - don't hold your breath. O:)

But I am on board with wishing and hoping that they'd hop on the 64-bit bus (hur hur see what I did there). That's an enormous undertaking, of course. But I think I'd cheer it on even more than I would an app written for Mac OS X. We'd still see the benefits.

I think if there's any reasonable change to be had, it's in creating a compatibility layer with better performance. In fact, I think that may pay bigger dividends across the board, especially in narrowing the gap between the OSes. Windows keeps edging closer and closer to Mac OS X, Apple hardware has jumped full-on into the Intel-based pool, and really, we are slowly meandering towards a point where we are in fact all using more or less the same thing.

Anyway, I think I've gotten all this lint out of my belly button now. Thanks for the good discussion, and I hope your modding goes well!

Also, good luck, Sam.

MANY THANKS ARE IN ORDER HERE:

I want to start by give credit where credit is due: Thank you Love4Evathe5thch and Jooliea for your support when I was in a bad place (the initial rant that started this thread).

And thank you Kirkuk, Jooliea, and Figwit for teaching me the ways of modding!

I went step-by-step on this: first I installed the basic mod package and tested it. Success!

Then I installed Overwatch. When I launched the game and I say that it had been regognized by the game in a popup. It's like EA's game engine was asking "WHAT ARE YOU DOING DAVE?"

I tested it thoroughly and when I feld at ease, I went back to Twallan's site to add Master Controller. More tests. Once I felt everything was fine, I wanted more: ErrorTrap! You were right Jooliea, this is a god send. It's like EA's Engine was saying "MY GOD, IT'S FULL OF STARS!".

For me it was: "MY GOD, I'M SEEING STARS!".

These mods are freaking fantastic. So far, they have given a whole new dimension to my game, not to mention a lot more stability and reliability. I'll stick with those for a while and then go for AwsomeMode (although I couldn't find it last night). I'll experiment (very carefully) with other mods on Twallan's site (which I believe is now called NRaas Industries).

My last thank goes to you Jooliea: I really enjoy our small discussion on the future of Apple and EA. And let me say, you have some solid arguments! You gave me food for thought. That's how we learn! but I'm still firm on my conjecture that Apple will soon make us see a new future for computing. But for now you are right: let's us cling to the hope that EA will crank up their Cider layer to accommodate 64 bits machines. That would be a great start!

What are ARSs and AAR??? I don't know what you're talking about. that's my story and I'm sticking to it

Sul Sul everyone!

I am glad you went to Twallan. He makes this game playable.

Awesome mod is on a site called More Awesome than You (MATY). I used it in the early days but I prefer Twallan's mods now. Be careful if you go to MATY. It is not a friendly site.

Figwit wrote:I am glad you went to Twallan. He makes this game playable.

Awesome mod is on a site called More Awesome than You (MATY). I used it in the early days but I prefer Twallan's mods now. Be careful if you go to MATY. It is not a friendly site.

Thanks Figwit,

But I look some more on Twallan's Site and I think I'll find everything I need there. Also thanks for the warning about MATY!

Sul Sul!

Marzupial wrote:Then I installed Overwatch. When I launched the game and I say that it had been regognized by the game in a popup. It's like EA's game engine was asking "WHAT ARE YOU DOING DAVE?"

Hahahaa, I remember getting that popup too and it scared the bejesus out of me. I should have said something, but awesomemod makes that box go away so I forgot about it.

Marzupial wrote:I went back to Twallan's site to add Master Controller.

Have you had a chance to delete all the memories? I was shocked by how much pep my game got in its step once I mass deleted all the memories. ALL my sims' scrapbooks were full, and I assume most if not all the Townies' memories were at max, too. It was craaaazy.

Marzupial wrote:These mods are freaking fantastic. So far, they have given a whole new dimension to my game, not to mention a lot more stability and reliability. I'll stick with those for a while and then go for AwsomeMode (although I couldn't find it last night). I'll experiment (very carefully) with other mods on Twallan's site (which I believe is now called NRaas Industries).

Figwit wrote:Awesome mod is on a site called More Awesome than You (MATY). I used it in the early days but I prefer Twallan's mods now. Be careful if you go to MATY. It is not a friendly site.

I haven't even scratched the surface yet of what my mods can do. I've just been so happy to play the game without it crashing and corrupting save files all the time, I haven't had time to investigate what nifty stuff goes on.

Figwit is super correct. Don't go to the MATY forums. You can get the mod directly here (warning: that IS a direct link, it will start the download if clicked). You can set up your Awesome config file here. I only got Awesomemod to try out his version of story progression and quickly switch between households.

And then I realized I can... prevent generic-faced Townies, get drag-and-drop inventory transfer (I can grab something from my active sim's inventory and drop it onto an inactive sim and it goes into their inventory, nice for transferring items from your active family to another family you often play), get rid of the unroutable tantrums, enable auto-save, allow me to fulfill wishes I haven't promised (I SO hated getting a wish I could totally fulfill, only I couldn't promise it, and I couldn't fulfill any of the currently promised wishes, so I just lost out on those lifetime points!), allow non-active households to gain lifetime points for fulfilling wishes (means when I switch households, if I promise wishes and they fulfill the wishes off-camera during the course of daily life, they'll get points!), select certain households as 'sacred' and therefore still have control over them even when I am not actively playing them, stop the sims from using totally random, inappropriate chairs (why are you taking your dinner into the bedroom? eat at the table, dumbass!), plant seeds anywhere, keep recipe books from disappearing once read and prevent townies from driving their cars to their friends' houses (and thus abandoning them there).

*deep breath*

As you can tell, awesomemod is a MONSTROUSLY HUGE MOD. It does a lot of things. And in my opinion, the more things it does, the more possible something will break. So, though I like the features, if I were you, I would wait a week or two before installing anything more. So far I have liked the mod and everything it has done, but it is the mod I am most wary of and least likely to heartily recommend. Overwatch/ErrorTrap/Master Controller are totally no brainers, sent by god, etc. Twallan has more mods of course, that do many more things (including replacing EA's story progression), so maybe check those out before hopping on awesomemod.

Marzupial wrote:My last thank goes to you Jooliea: I really enjoy our small discussion on the future of Apple and EA. And let me say, you have some solid arguments! You gave me food for thought. That's how we learn! but I'm still firm on my conjecture that Apple will soon make us see a new future for computing.

Thank you! And to be honest? I think Apple has already taken us to that future. Many of the brilliant technological and stylistic advancements we enjoy (and take for granted) today are thanks to Apple. Remember when phones were all candy-bar shaped, or 'Razr' thin flip phones? I hardly remember that, either! Now everything is iPhone-shaped. I stopped drinking the Kool-Aid a long time ago when I hung up my Torx screwdrivers and retired my certs, but I can't deny that Apple has changed the world of computing and technology in general time and time again. I expect it will keep happening, so long as it's still a place where visionaries are welcome and risk is encouraged. It's definitely a unique company, and I hope it keeps it up even without Steve there to drive that vision.

And don't forget, the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do!

(So don't let my pragmatism and pessimism dissuade you from being one of The Crazy Ones!)

Twallan's mods have made my game playable! Still think I should download Errortrap and see how it goes. My game crashes on average once every hour of playing, I'm sick of saving every 15 minutes.

And my game takes about 5 - 10 minutes to load from the main menu, not including that "polishing the mechanical bull" crap at the start! I wish it only took 3 from start to finish!