Problems with game grinding to a halt

[eevilcat]

Since installing the more recent awesomemods (dated 21st and 22nd June) I've been experiencing problems with the game grinding to a halt. Graphics are being updated e.g. sleep animations continue to play but the game time appears frozen until it decides to lurch into action again. The hard disk light is on when this happens but other applications like furryfox are running quite happily. It seems to happen around midnight in game time and will freeze like this several times in a row. It looks like the previous version of awesomemod was 13th June and that worked fine.

[Marhis]

It's a known (harmless) issue due to the awesomemod computational peak around 1:00 am game time, wrestling against the stupidity of the random story generator by EA. Pes is looking into it, but in the meantime there will be lag around 1 am.
Have a look in the Awesomeware section, it's been discussed.

[Alex]

Here's the post, quoted for your convenience.

However, I now have some headlining news that I'm suddenly getting extended pauses in the game to the point of unplayability.   This is the first time there has been ANY hesitation in the game.

The extended pauses appear to be triggered by the Story Mode calculations. It seems the algorithms may be slightly computationally expensive, as instead of simply permitting any random shit to happen, an exhaustive scan is performed to make sure that the action is valid. The fact that it hits so hard is PROBABLY why EA threw together the half-assed system. We are looking into ways of reducing this impact.

I'm getting long pauses at 1am.  Nothing that makes the game unplayable, as it passes within a minute or so, just a long hiccup where I can't do anything (though the Sims are still breathing, the plumbob still sparkles, etc.)

Yes, this is the chewing that the game is doing. Apparently, the game's "sophisticated" method of generating actions turns out to be "generate about a million possibilities of totally random, senseless shit, then throw pretty much all of it out and pick about 5". When the code was added to make it pick SENSIBLE shit, which is much more computationally intensive to generate, it thrashes.

[eevilcat]

Ah, that's ok. I tried wading through the mountain of posts about awesomemod but am still playing catch up as installing the game was delayed until after completing my degree. I wonder if it might be possible to shift the lag back to say 2am as sims are usually sleeping by then while they're often still active at 1am.