Number of sims on community lots

[Sivany]

I'm sure this must have been addressed somewhere, but I've tried several methods of searching for an answer and haven't come up with anything so I'm going to have to ask.

What determins the number of sims that appear on community lots when you visit them? In screenshots (both from the sims 2 website and other users) show large crowds of sims on community lots, however whenever my sims go to a community lot only about 4 or 5 unplayable sims appear at any one time. I assume it's determined by what your computer can handle but when I force the number of sims on a residential lot above 8 visitors everything runs fine so it shouldn't really be a problem. I'd love to have more sims appear on the lots because at the moment it doesn't look very realistic. Is there anyway I can force more sims to appear when I visit community lots?

[KittKitt]

I'm not positive if this is applicable across all EP's, nor if it's actually correct, but I think the "cheat" intProp maxNumOfVisitingSims # (replace '#' with an actual number obviously) can be used to make more sims appear on community lots, as well as having more sims show up for parties.

If I am not correct, hopefully someone more awesome than myself will wander by and give you better information in short order. 

-Kitt

[jsalemi]

Yes, that cheat will let you increase the number of sims on a community lot, though I have found that the number that actually show up is variable. It's worth having that cheat in your userStartup anyway, because the default settings for some video cards are too conservative, so the game defaults the limit to much lower even though the card can handle it.

[Marhis]

According to the code, it seems dependent on the number of community objects presents on the lot. I don't know what exactly they are, but probably objects catalogued as buyable in community lots.

[Invisigoth]

I use that code in my userstartup. My videocard is on the lower end of supported for nightlife, I believe. Way below specs for seasons or for what BV claims to require. Yet via magic and the power of my love for my laptop she manages to play the sims with all EPs almost flawlessly with all graphics settings on high. No reflections, no fish because I'm not trying to push it.  The point is that the game feels that I should have no more than 2 visitors on com lots or at parties. I raised that to 10 and its all working beautifully. 
So, I do see a wide variation in how many sims go to each lot as compared to other comm lots and it varies from visit to visit on the same lot.
An example: I created a community lot that contains 2 bowling alleys, a chess set, 2 videogame machines, a stereo, a pool table, a photobooth, and some shopping.  According to a previous poster the high number of group/comm lot activities this lot should usually run towards the 10 sim limit.  But sometimes I will only get 5 or 6.  I always thought that is was partially dependant on what time the sim arrives, but that could just be coincidence and totally L&P.  If my sim arrives at 5 am it seems that fewer sims arrive on the lot than if the sim arrives at 10 pm.
On a related note, I wonder if the sims that you bring with you count towards that upper limit. When I bring the whole family for a saturday evening outing it sems that fewer other sims arrive. When I bring the teenager out for a night on the town more sims seem to arrive. Does anyone know if this is sadorandom or acurate?
Maybe I should do some testing.  Oh yeah, my point! Ahem.  In conclusion, adding the maxnum code to the user startup works to raise the number of sims able to come to parties and the number allowed to visit comm lots.  I experimented and found a number that worked well on my individual machine before adding it to my userstartup.cheat. obviously picking a number that's too high will have lagging consequences.  There will be variations per lot and possibly per visit.

[Sivany]

Thanks guys I'll give that cheat a try. I already knew about it but I thought it only worked for raising the number you can invite to parties and because whenever I try to put anything in my userstartup.cheat file the game doesn't work I never really used it. If ever I want a big party in a sims home I invite 8 sims then use the phone to invite others round individually (annoying for weddings when you have to use select the visitors and get them to change into formal outfits manually.) I guess I'll have to try and remember to type the cheat in on the neighbourhood screen whenever I'm planning to visit community lots.

Also I'd noticed that thing about the number of sims seeming to be less if you visit a lot in the middle of the night. I thought maybe it was just my imagination because I didn't think the game would be that clever but maybe it is as you've noticed it too!

[Marhis]

Also I'd noticed that thing about the number of sims seeming to be less if you visit a lot in the middle of the night. I thought maybe it was just my imagination because I didn't think the game would be that clever but maybe it is as you've noticed it too!

Yes, for once, the game _is_ that clever  (feel free of being shocked  ).
In addition to the calculations about how many community items are present in the lot, there are also checks on the time of the day, and different limitations to the number and type of visiting sims according to them.