Doors won't close

[Brynne]

I am playing a new lot, and there is a door in the kitchen. The kitchen is three-tiles wide, with a counter on the outer two tiles, the middle tile is where the door to the patio  is. Every door I've put in there (all maxis doors) have remained stuck open. Is it because I didn't allow enough room on either side of the door? This lot is a couple of townhouse I built, and both doors in both kitchens do it. I got sloppy and put in one door opening into the house, and in the other townhouse, the door opens out to the patio. Both got stuck and I had to delete them and buy new doors. Three times. I finally just stuck an archway in there, so this house is open to the outside, now.

I just put new doors in, had my sims go outside and they're stuck open again. Here are pics of the layout (ignore the sparking trash compactor in the red kitchen):



Am I not allowing enough room? And like I said, the first time I had one door facing in and it got stuck as well.

[gali]

First - the kitchen is built bad - not enough space to move; I would suffocate in this kitchen....
Instead of the terrace at right - extend the kitche to the end, to get some space.

Second - you always have to put double doors - not single doors. This, to prevent jam (one sim wants to get out, other sim wants to get in). Even then, you will find open doors, if any object is too close to the door, or you didn't replace them a long time.

Third - you bought CHEAP doors, and the simulator doesn't "like" it. You have to buy the pre-last double door.

"Give these people air" (Swartzeniger, in "total recall")....

[J. M. Pescado]

Try moving the fridge. The fridge opening into the door may be causing problems.

[Brynne]

Normally I make spacious rooms, but I was going for more of a galley kitchen look. Come to think of it, I didn't even design that kitchen. I had a small house (don't remember if it's maxis original or not) that had a layout similar to a townhome, so I just made a mirror image of it to make it into two townhomes. I used the cheap doors for that pic which was taken when I was trying to recreate the door thing, but the original doors were on the higher end. Still, I had a hunch it was due to the size. I wouldn't be able to handle something that small. Yes, size does matter.

Thanks, Gali!

edit to add:
Thanks, JM. I thought the fridge may have been in the way; I'd been meaning to move it. Actually, scratch that. It's Demo Day!

[ZephyrZodiac]

Windkeeper has single sliding doors on TSR.  You could try those.

[Brynne]

Thanks, ZZ! I've been looking for something like that!

[ZephyrZodiac]

They're really nice doors, and work on diagonals as well, and since they're only one-tile, I use them for bathrooms and then put another straight door into a different room.

[Brynne]

I'm in trouble. I just looked at Windkeepers stuff and have downloaded almost every door and window she had! She has some really nice things. My downloads folder is getting so big!

[ZephyrZodiac]

Oh Lord - time to prune?  I need to do that, there are some things that were very early creations and don't work well, so they'll have to go.  I'm also on the look out now for things that interfere with gameplay - you know, when you can't click on something because the downloaded object gets in the way!

[Brynne]

I really cleaned out my downloads folder when I switched to this laptop; I lost about half of them! Then I meticulously went through one by one in simpe, looking at poly counts, conflicts, etc. Everything was so neat and tidy! But bald women kept walking by my houses since I lost most of the custom hair...

Seems I'm back to my old ways again. I'm a sucker for good build objects.

[veilchen]

.  I'm also on the look out now for things that interfere with gameplay - you know, when you can't click on something because the downloaded object gets in the way!

May I suggest some nice rugs? Mod the Sims 2 has some nice ones, mesh by echo/windkeeper included, the last time I looked. They also have links there to people who make nice themed rugs. They tend to get in the way really nicely.

ZZ, Val, that's one time I'm grateful I don't join pay-sites. Reading about the TSR stuff could be tempting otherwise. :D

[ZephyrZodiac]

Veilchen, thereare some downloads which actually get in the way of your counters or your coffeemaker etc. and sometimes they are from really good object creators, too.  Some chairs won't allow you to click on dirty plates on the table, or tell your sim to eat.  Sometimes it's hard to part with them, but I'm going to have to slim my folders down a bit!

[reggikko]

Brynne, this has happened to me when I had a ceiling light over a tile next to the door. That will make the door stick in the open position.

Windkeeper is very difficult to resist. She does very nice work. I need to prune my downloads folder again.

ZZ, I hate it when I download a new mesh and it takes up invisible space in the game. What causes that? Is it that the object was cloned from something larger so the game 'thinks' that the object is bigger than what is visible?

[Brynne]

That happens to me with some of my objects. One is a box of tissues I got from MTS2. I'll be damned if I can click on anything else in that bathroom. How can something so small demand such a large clickable area? A lot of my downloaded custom lights do that, too. Takes a lot of maneuvering to get around them. I'm with you, reggikko. I want to know, too.

I think I did have a ceiling light there, now that you mention it. I use Inge's ceiling light hider, so I guess I forgot about it. Moot point, now, anyway, since I rebuilt both kitchens. Oh, well...I know for next time.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I think the objects must be cloned from something larger.  I know with short bookcases sims will still get books from the (non-existent) top! Sometimes if you let the creator know of the problem, they will take the trouble to fix it, but if there are a lot of objects like that in your game, it takes so long to keep going back and posting about the problem!

[J. M. Pescado]

My suggestion is not to use crappy, badly-done objects.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I agree, but how do you know until you put the object in your game?  I'm not talking objects from fly-by-night or well known for crappy objects web-sites, but some objects by highly respected creators which just happen to have a fault they didn't realise.  Normally those people are only too pleased to be told and will correct the problem, it's just finding the time to let them know.....

[Kestran]

I can't see the picture but I can tell that I to get a stuck open door. Stuck open as in Sims can walk in and out though but it wont close. And it is both outside doors and doors inside (for bedrooms and baths). It started when I first got the game and Uni didn't fix it. I have to put the move_objects on cheat to delete the door and put a new one in (open front doors annoy me). And its not downloads. This was happeneing when I didn't have any downloads at all.

Oh and tiny and crammy kitchen is heaven for poor Sims. More room for the rest of the rooms All of my starter houses and even some of my medium houses have very small kitchens, usually no bigger than 3x1 walking space and counters on all sides except the entrance, (can't place a dining table in there even) and my Sims either eat by the counters on bar stools or I place a small dining table in the livingroom, just outside the kitchen. Although most of my medium houses have 2x3 walking space. But only the larger homes and mansions have room for a dining table in the kitchen.

Kestran.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I tend to just have a cooking area in a large family room.  Bigger houses have kitchens, but I usually only put a small breakfast bar in there since sims won't use it anyway except for sitting at to drink coffee or eat a snack!  If there's a posh dining table, that's where they'll serve the food, even if you put it at the bottom of the garden!

[Kestran]

Yeah I know. I wish there was a hack that let the Sims only eat at the fancy dining table at dinner or when they have guests over. I mean if there are other eating areas awailable. Of course if there werent the fancy dining table would of course have to be used all the time

[ZephyrZodiac]

Just annoys me if you have only four chairs at the fancy table because there's only two sims and a kid in the household.  Two visitors after work, and the sim who prepares the meal ends up isolated in the kitchen, or out on the garden furniture!

And why can't the meals have an 8-meal option?  if you have a full-sized family, it means two of them have to get their own dinner!  And you can't make your family up to 8 with a cat and a dog like you could in Unleashed!

[RainbowTigress]

Have you tried TwoJeffs new hack, Serve Everyone, or dizzy2's new Smart Serve hack?  I have tried them both, and they work well together and with JM's mods.  Dizzy has done a lot of updates to his lately, and it is working really well now, even lets kids cook, too.

[ZephyrZodiac]

If it lets them cook for the number of sims there, I'll try it!  But I use Carrigon's pizza oven when I want kids to cook - no risk of fires and serves more than six.

[RainbowTigress]

Children can't autonomously cook, but you can have them fix cereal or make a sandwich for themselves or the whole family.  Dizzy2's hack adjusts for the number of sims awake and present on the lot and how hungry they are, while TwoJeffs' hack makes "Serve meal" stretch the number of servings to however many are on the lot at the time.  Dizzy2's hack will also adjust downward so if you have less than 4 sims, serve will only produce two or three meals instead of six so that the extra meals aren't wasted but cost less than if they were prepared individually.

Dizzy's hack is here http://www.variousimmers.net/vsimforum/showthread.php?t=2002 and here http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=70736.  (There's a pic at the last one.)

TwoJeffs' hack is here http://www.variousimmers.net/vsimforum/showthread.php?t=670.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Thanks for the links!  I'll certainly try them out.