Problem with outdoor lights

[MissDoh]

Maybe it is just now that I notice this but I turn to you to help me.

Lately I sent a lot of Sims to community lots.  My problem is that no matter what I do, the outdoors lite always turn off by themselves at 2:00 am, I have to manually turn them on.  This happens both on community lots and regular house lots.  I did clic on an outdoor light while on a regular lot and select the right option since at the beginning they did not turn on when 7pm came. I am completely lost has to what I am doing wrong.

So, is normal that the outdoors light are turned off automatically at 2:00 am? I never paid attention to that.

If it is not normal, how can I fix this?

[syberspunk]

Doesn't the commlightson hack make all community lights stay on all night? I don't remember exactly. But I use dizzy's smart lights which I think is supposed to include that fix as well. *shrugs* I also haven't paid attention lately, as I haven't really gone to any comm lots recently at night.

Ste

[Sleepycat]

MissDoh, in my game if I set the lights to "always on" (not auto) then they stay on all the time (but for community lots only for while i was there of course)

[MissDoh]

Thanks Sleepycat I could definitely do that.  I won't use a hack for that since there are ingame option to do so, thanks for the suggestion though Syberpunk.

I still have no idea if it is normal or not in the 1st place.

It is not a huge problem of course but I still want to know if it is like that in everybody's game or just mine.

[jrd]

Neither commlightson (what does this do again?) nor smart lights does anything about the 2 am cutoff.

[radiophonic]

It certainly is a tad annoying that the lights go off at 2AM on community lots. Makes no sense really.

I have definite light issues. Especially when modifying and building lots. I want to see what the darn lighting looks like. With existing lots it's not a problem, you turn off the sunshine and start adding lights. With binned lots, they're just off...sometimes.

Are there any lighting "on" hacks out there?

I suppose that's not the topic of your thread. I just had to rage for a moment.

[cwykes]

Gunmod's lighting hack improves the lighting generally - there's something about times of day
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=101456&highlight=gunmod+lights
doesn't work with smart lights 2

[jrd]

DOES work with smart lights 2, actually.

The lightning hack tends to make rooms too dark though, especially while building.

[Sleepycat]

I used GunMods lighting for awhile but ended up giving it up, it was just way to dark at night and made building a bitch 


MissDoh, yes the 2am "lights out" deal is how the game is but if you change the lights to always on then they won't turn off untill
1,you turn them off 
2, you switch them back to auto.

sorry I should have gone into more detail before 

Both "auto" and "always on" can be done by room or even by each light, so you can set some lights to always be on and some to be auto, if you want 

Sims don't care if the lights are on when they are sleeping either (I think leaving them on helps keep the room score up) Right now most of my lots are set to always on for all lights and a few have the bedroom lights set to auto. I like seeing the bedroom lights go out when they go to bed, lets me know at a glance that those sims are sleeping 

[jrd]

Lights have absolutely no effect on environment score. Your Sims are perfectly happy in full brightness or full darkness.

[radiophonic]

Lights have absolutely no effect on environment score. Your Sims are perfectly happy in full brightness or full darkness.

I'll have to dissagree with that. Put a sim in a pitch black room, watch the environment score. Turn the lights on, watch the score.
They may not care if it's dark or light but it does make a difference to the environment score.

Gunmod's lighting hack improves the lighting generally - there's something about times of day
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=101456&highlight=gunmod+lights
doesn't work with smart lights 2

While this is an excellent mod, it is no longer being developed and support if very, very minimal.

MissDoh, yes the 2am "lights out" deal is how the game is but if you change the lights to always on then they won't turn off untill
1,you turn them off 
2, you switch them back to auto.

Sleepy, she's referring to community lots. Those settings will not save when you exit the lot.

[MissDoh]

Lights have absolutely no effect on environment score. Your Sims are perfectly happy in full brightness or full darkness.

Well in my game lights do have an effect on the room score.  The environment score do raise when the lights are turn or when I add new ones.  Example:  I notice in a bathroom there was no light, I put the game on pause, add a light, unpause and the room score goes up.
Also when they move closer to light you can see the environment score raise slighty.

[jrd]

Hmm. Must be a tiny effect then... or I am just suffering from lack-of-sleep-amnesia .

[MissDoh]

Radiophonic I think that I can set them to always on while I edit a community lot.  I will have to check.  Anyway, the setting you put in a Sim house will be used on community lots as for outdoors light, well that is what I notice so far.

[jrd]

I can't edit lights build mode. Fortunately though if you've set lights to 'all on' during play and then edit the lot, all lights will be lit in build mode.

[radiophonic]

Radiophonic I think that I can set them to always on while I edit a community lot.  I will have to check.  Anyway, the setting you put in a Sim house will be used on community lots as for outdoors light, well that is what I notice so far.

I'd be interested in knowing how this is accomplished since exiting the community lot does not save any lot information.

[MissDoh]

Radiophonic I think that I can set them to always on while I edit a community lot.  I will have to check.  Anyway, the setting you put in a Sim house will be used on community lots as for outdoors light, well that is what I notice so far.

I'd be interested in knowing how this is accomplished since exiting the community lot does not save any lot information.

When I edit a community lot to change/add/remove stuff on it well I need to save it afterward in order for the changes to take place.  I was not talking while a Sim is visiting it but when I edit the lot to modify it.

EDIT:  Well I just remember we cannot set the lights on the community lot when we edit it to add/remove things, only when Sims are there we can and like you said this cannot be saved, so the setting must be done in a Sim house to take place.

[Gwill]

Is there really no hack that changes autolights to stay on from 7PM to 7AM?
I'm also annoyed at how I either have to let my sims roam around in the dark outside, or leave the lights on all day, wasting electricity.

[MissDoh]

It is nice to see I am not the only one annoyed by this.  I just can't remember if it was always like this or if it is a problem that started to appear in Nightlife.

I am glad to see I am not alone with the 2am lights strikes!

Now is there anything we can do on community lots that will leave the light on from 7pm to 7am.  Turning on the outdoors light at "on" does not seem to solve this problem..

Is there a hack somewhere that will work on COMMUNITY lots to solve this problem?  At my regular sim house I don't mind since they are mostly inside so I don't mind if the lights turns off at 2am.  Only outdoors light do that.

[radiophonic]

Is there a hack somewhere that will work on COMMUNITY lots to solve this problem?  At my regular sim house I don't mind since they are mostly inside so I don't mind if the lights turns off at 2am.  Only outdoors light do that.

It seems that the only solution is commlightson and whatever "pool light problem" it brings.