Lighting and Shadows issue - lots are covered in shadows

[Bijou]

All of the lots in my game, regardless of where they are located or whether they are empty or populated, are covered in shadows, almost like overcast on a cloudy day (but in broad game daylight) or something huge hovering above. The rooftops of all lots in the area (and any high ground such as hills) will briefly flash as if the game is attempting to render normal daylight but can't fully.  Normal shadows, such as from trees and buildings, work fine, but I am having entire lots darkened out by shadows that have no discernible source.  Examples:

Empty lot in Build/Buy Mode:





Same area in live mode:



Another set of lots in shadow (all should be visible in full daylight like the house on the far left)



I have the base game only and am updated to patch 1.8.  This problem didn't start until I updated to that patch, and I never had the issue prior to that.  If I turn the Lighting and Shadows setting to LOW, the problem seems to go away for a while, but prior to patch 1.8 I was able to have that setting on HIGH with no problems whatsoever (my card is an GeForce 8800GTS).  I have the latest AwesomeMod installed and a few other non-core mods (no lighting mods), plus a great deal of custom content.  I have Google searched this issue extensively and posted on the TS3 forum with no solution found.

As far as actions I have taken so far, I have:

• updated my Nvidia drivers to the latest (196.21)
• taken out ALL of my cc, mods, & hacks
• adjusted the Lighting & Shadows setting to low (it had been on high with NO PROBLEMS before the patch - setting it to low seems to get rid of the issue, but it shouldn't have to be on low)
• tested it in live mode and build/buy mode in different hoods and with different saves
• tested it in all saved games in Sunset Valley and Riverview (the problem persists in both)
• tested several combinations of graphics settings in-game in fullscreen and windowed mode

I'm at my wits end here.  I've been having a Flagrant System Error with AwesomeMod in one neighborhood...could that be related?  I'm hoping to find a solution to this without having to reinstall (which is the only option I haven't tried as it's my last resort).

Has anyone else experienced this, or does anyone know of a fix?

[Simsample]

Have you tested it with a clean Sims 3 folder in Documents\ Electronic Arts? That will tell you if something there is causing the issue. Also test without the framework, if you haven't already.

[Bijou]

Have you tested it with a clean Sims 3 folder in Documents\ Electronic Arts? That will tell you if something there is causing the issue. Also test without the framework, if you haven't already.

Yes, I tried testing it with bare-naked folders (save for the original game files), including removing the .dll file and the resource.cfg file, deleting cache files, and replacing the censor blur Shaders file with the original).  I also tested it on another XP account on the same computer (the items in Program files were the same, but files in My Documents had never been tampered with).

I'll be bald before this is all over.    Thank you for the suggestion, though.

[Simsample]

Sounds like reinstall is the next step then, I'm afraid- it's possible that the patch installer screwed up somewhere.

[Bijou]

Oof, I'm afraid that's what it's come down to.  I wanted to exhaust all options before a reinstall, but it's looking eminent.