So, I just upgraded my old Alienware potato to a new Aurora (Still Alienware). I've installed TS3 on it, but when I went into an old save game in Starlight Shores—it was winter time—the snow has some new behavior I hadn't seen before. I installed a bunch of lighting mods, which I've since removed, before starting the game on the new PC for the first time. I've taken a screenshot, which I'll attach here, that depicts the issue.


The snow level cuts out at the garage door (and every other outside door, too), but it's pretty deep inside the garage. That's the car inside with snow up to the rims, so to speak. Nothing else on the garage floor is visible when the snow is deep. If it's just a dusting of snow, there's no graphical error. It's probably not even a graphical error, but an issue of compatibility with my new video card...?

Is anyone else having or seeing this problem with a new or upgraded video card? Is it a stray mod that I'm missing that got put into the wrong folder? Do any of Twallan's mods do this? My dxdiag file is attached via link. All of that stuff is gobbledygook to me, so I hope someone can make some sense from this screenshot, and the information I've linked. Just really weird that this started when I got the new PC.

TIA!
Wendy
The Farmer Legacy

From your The Sims 3 user folder, if you open the DeviceConfig.log file do you see the line [Found: 1, Matched: 1] in the graphics card section?
If it has zeroes instead of 1s, some graphical effects will be throttled as if you have a weak GPU - which will happen on every modern PC without manual intervention. What you need to do in this case is edit a few files to resolve it

You may also want to check the graphics options from the main menu to make sure these are set as high as you prefer.
And of course, if the issue remains you can quickly deduce if it's a mod culprit by quickly testing with the Mods folder temporarily removed.

I have a feeling this is going to be the end of my Sims 3... None of those things helped (and I can confirm it's NOT a mod after removing the folder.) I'm guessing I could limit the game to eliminate snow, or at least deep snow, to help this issue since deep snow is the only concern I've found so far. Other than that, I guess it's back to the "potato" to play Sims 3.

RIP new computer. You were fun for a while, but in the end, my Sims win, and you lose. LOL!

Edited: Never mind. I went back and retried the NRAAs stuff and figured out where I went wrong, because every texture was "missing"... turns out, I didn't do everything quite right. The snow is much better, though it's not perfect. I can live with better, though.

Thank you SO much!!