Resources for SimsUniversity.world's various Fixes (updated 2014.01.10)

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What is this?
Game Help:World Routing Lagswiki

If you have never read that wiki article before, I suggest to read it first and then come back to this Download. Everything is explained there because I had to repeat the Instructions for many, many, many(!) worlds.



What has been done?
  • There's a disconnected road in Sims University, in front of the Stadium & Annex Rabbithole. This can be used as the visual indicator to check if you have the fixed version, or not.
  • 5 Red chunk boundaries, with 9-10 terrain paints. EA recommends keeping each chunk to a maximum of 8 terrain paints, or weaker machines would experience lags when they need to render it all
  • To fix this, I have
    • merged the 03_Dirt and 05_DustyDirt paints.
    • removed the 07_White paint. The 07_White paint was under the 08_Asphalt layer, as illustrated in the images below, the Asphalt layer does not have any alpha areas for the White to come through, as evidenced by the solid block of white when that layer is visualised. Any alpha areas that allow the terrain paint to blend through each layer would be in black or shades of grey.


      So I thought the 07_White paint was pretty pointless. This is further illustrated by the test I did, as illustrated next, where I moved the 07_White paint layer to be above the 08_Asphalt layer. And you can see that the white paint obscured the white parking stripes. So, really, the white paint has no purpose, apart for causing the chunk boundary to turn Red, because the maximum number has been exceeded.


Before you begin
  1. Make a Backup! Game Help:TS3 Back Upswiki
    • Store this backup away from the user Documents path - like an external USB stick, external HDD, sync it to your cloud, give it to your friend to store. Anything that is outside of the computer system, in case you need it back and you messed up the one in <world path> so bad there's no recovery possible!
  2. Prepare the Porter! Porterize your favorite Households before you do the steps below.
    • Reminder that I don't guarantee that the transplanting procedure would be successful in a fixed world. So if you run legacy games you might want to test this in a different AGS profile

Requirements
  • University Life EP
  • game patched to 1.50 and higher. My game configuration was patched to 1.63 at the time I worked on this fixes.
  • s3pe
  • 7-zip (or any Archive tool that can process .7z files)
  • Twallan's Porter @NRaas (optional)
Links to any 3rd-party tools, and further information provided in Game_Help:World_Routing_Lags/Howwiki, under "Tools needed to Import Resources".

How to install?
  • Please be sure to read and follow the instructions under "Edit in S3PE" in full in Game Help:World Routing Lagswiki. All pertinent information is in the wiki - READ it!
  • Download the .7z file(s) and extract all the contents into a temporary folder onto your Desktop. There are 566 489 files in the SimsUniversityFixes.7z archive.
  • Resources modified:
    1. 0x05CD4BB3 (World - Routing info)
    2. 0x05DA8AF6 (World - Routing info)
    3. 0xAE39399F 0x00000001 (World geometry)
    4. 0x9063660E (World Roads & Walkways)
    5. 0x01661233 MODL scene Object Model (aka Object Geometry)
    6. 0x00B2D882 0x00000001
    7. 0x3D8632D0 World terrain paint
    8. 0x087C4287
    9. TextureDatabase _KEY 0x0166038C
      • Jan 10, 2014: instead of editing the resources that have since been stricken-through, which won't be applicable if only done on my system for those that needed to be removed below, I just removed the references to those resources in this _Key resource instead. But, since I don't have a way to measure the effect of this change in a quantifiable manner, you guys have to feedback on any apparent lag reductions, if any.
    10. Lots with Front of Lot reset:
      1. resources for Stadium_5de5004e441c51f0.lot
      2. resources for ScienceCenter_5de5004dd2655ea0.lot
      3. resources for Administration_5de5004dd0330cb0.lot
      4. resources for ArtBuilding_5de5004de9edfd40.lot
      5. resources for BusinessBuilding_5de5004dd999b670.lot
      6. resources for StudentUnion_5de5004f0a515f60.lot
  • Resources removed:
    1. _IMG-0x00B2D882-0x00000001-0x0010000201000200 (white terrain paint)
    2. _IMG-0x00B2D882-0x00000001-0x0010000203000100 (white terrain paint)
    3. 03_Dirt_EP09 _IMG-0x00B2D882-0x00000000
    4. 06_White_EP09 _IMG-0x00B2D882-0x00000000
  • Go to this path
    Code: 
    \Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 University Life\GameData\Shared\NonPackaged\Worlds
    • If you don't have the DVD version, please visit the Game_Help:World_Routing_Lags/Wherewiki wiki page for the path to other distribution System and/or Operating System, e.g. Origin, Steam, OSX
  • Open the Sims University.world in S3PE (you have done that backup, as instructed, correct?)
  • Then, import all the Resources in S3PE by selecting all files (Ctrl+A).
  • Save and quit S3PE


How to remove or restore the file before updating?
  • Up to the time this download was published, EA has yet to update any of the worlds released, but one can never say never with EA. So, this is here just as a precaution. In the event that a miracle happened and a patch has updated and fixed a world, you need to rollback/undo these changes and restore the original world file, otherwise you might get an error during patching.
  • Go to this path
    Code: 
    \Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 University Life\GameData\Shared\NonPackaged\Worlds
    • If you don't have the DVD version, please visit the Game_Help:World_Routing_Lags/Wherewiki wiki page for the path to other distribution System and/or Operating System, e.g. Origin, Steam, OSX
  • Delete the *.world file. Or if you want to reuse it after patching, rename it with a ".fixed" extension, so the filename becomes "SimsUniversity.world.fixed". But don't use my fixes until I can confirm if it is save to do so. My fixes could have been made redundant by the update, or may conflict with something or other.
  • Rename the "*.orig" copy by removing the .orig extension (or from whatever you have renamed it to).
  • Delete caches before starting game. Game Help:Sims 3 Delete Cache Fileswiki




Feedback
As always, feedback is welcomed.
Please report any other areas that you get stuck Sims at that I might have missed. Unless it is on a Lot, which is not within the scope of these fixes.
If you want to report an issue, please don't forget to state
  1. your gameversion Game Help:TS3_Patching Find Gameversionwiki,
  2. what browser and version (if you have issues with downloading),
  3. if you use a download manager (if you have issues with downloading), and
  4. what archive program you are using (if you have issues with extracting and/or joining)


Notes & Changelog:
As and when I get reports of any issues, or more spots for stuck Sims/Pets, or patch changes (if any).
  • Jan 10, 2014: Fixed the blotchy terrain issue reported by @fxchrfxchr in the world thread.
  • Made while on Patch 1.63.
  • Would most likely be compatible with any patches in the future as well, as EA has never ever modified a .world file in any of the patches.



Additional Credits:
Inge & Peter Jones; the tool makers of s3pe, s3su, package compare
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