Livable houseboat?

[Valden21]

Thinking of getting the Island Paradise DLC, but first, a question.

I've heard that many of the problems with that DLC's worldspace center around the houseboats, and that getting rid of them means that those problems are gone. But I actually kind of want my Sims to live in a houseboat. If I do that, will I be facing the same problem?

[orthographe]

im pretty sure its only the npcs houseboats that cause issues and its recommended that you move the families that occupy them before starting a save file. ive lived on one and it worked just fine on my end.

[Valden21]

What about using houseboats in other worldspaces, like in Bridgeport, or Starlight Shores? Can I do that?

[HiFive]

Originally posted by orthographe:

im pretty sure its only the npcs houseboats that cause issues and its recommended that you move the families that occupy them before starting a save file. ive lived on one and it worked just fine on my end.

Yes, I just move the houseboat families to onshore homes before starting a play session with a new family. There is only one family that you have to delete entirely - the Scott family. I haven't tried living on a houseboat yet, but I think you can.

[HiFive]

This person in 2018 was using a houseboat for their family:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/47890/discussions/0/3160848559771483052/

Originally posted by funewchie:

On my file in Isla Paradisio, I have a family on a houseboat, including two mermaids (well, a merman and a mermaid, technically).

The thing that rather irritates me, though, is that the mermaids never use the jetskis in their inventory, even when that would be quicker than them swimming very long distances

A person who has been quite knowledgable on the game posted this in a 2020 thread:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/47890/discussions/0/2972901817705314980/#c2972901817705443155

Originally posted by igazor:

The four most problematic residential lots in Isla Paradiso are Scott (houseboat, the lot this one is on is the worst), Ichtaca (castle), Medina, and Los Amigos. The sims themselves are fine, even the one that's pregnant to start. Usually it's not necessary to delete all of the houseboats . . .

I stopped searching there. Steam gave me 27 pages to look through and I looked at 5 pages of threads.

I'm thinking that if you want to live on a houseboat, it's best to build your own, and I think I've seen threads where people did that in other towns, but I'm not 100% sure on that.

[HiFive]

I think this person on a 2013 thread said you can build houseboats:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/47890/discussions/0/792924952396674927/#c792924952429455881

Originally posted by The Space Ferret:

If you're mainly interested in just building houses though, some expansions may contain additional items for use in house building. Sims 2 was like that. I dunno actually if it's the same with Sims 3. Island Paradise lets you build houseboats. I think Outdoor Living Stuff includes new items for the outdoors.

[Archiekins]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Sims3/comments/zd7io5/ive_placed_a_bridge_in_isla_paradiso_and_i_love_it/ you will need these fixes to actually have it be playable and probably need to install bunch of optimization mods regardless. These fixes helped me with lag and isla paradiso works flawlessly.

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by Valden21:

What about using houseboats in other worldspaces, like in Bridgeport, or Starlight Shores? Can I do that?

Yes, you can build houseboats along the shore, but you'll have to do it via world editor and have a working idea of how ports and houseboats work in terms of building.

[Valden21]

What about the regular boats, like speedboats and the like? Can I dock them to my houseboat? I don't want to be forced to rely on water taxis all the time.

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by Valden21:

What about the regular boats, like speedboats and the like? Can I dock them to my houseboat? I don't want to be forced to rely on water taxis all the time.

You place them at the port that your houseboat is docked at, if the dock has those wooden or metal moorings attached.

So, for instance, your boat is at Dock Blah Blah Blah. At the dock, there will be moorings that act like the public parking space for your car. If there aren't any and there's room, you can place the moorings yourself, but there has to be enough room.

There might be a way to add boats to a houseboat, but I never got that far to know whether this can be done or not. I just know that you can use the dock to place your speed/sailboats.

[infinitecats]

What problems do the houseboats cause? I have been in Isla Paradiso and I've been having a range of issues from horrible lag to being unable to complete opportunities for some reason. Is it possible that moving families out of boats will stop the lag? Or allow me to return someone's stereo??

[Archiekins]

Originally posted by infinitecats:

What problems do the houseboats cause? I have been in Isla Paradiso and I've been having a range of issues from horrible lag to being unable to complete opportunities for some reason. Is it possible that moving families out of boats will stop the lag? Or allow me to return someone's stereo??

boats moving around cause extreme lag due to routing issues, you need to download a bridged version of isla paradiso and install mod that prevents sims from moving their houseboats. Alternatively, you can move out every family living in houseboats

[atomicgirl]

Originally posted by infinitecats:

What problems do the houseboats cause? I have been in Isla Paradiso and I've been having a range of issues from horrible lag to being unable to complete opportunities for some reason. Is it possible that moving families out of boats will stop the lag? Or allow me to return someone's stereo??

The houseboats aren't the only cause of lag. It's the way that some of the houses are built and laid out, so simply moving sims out of houseboats aren't the only solution. For instance, there are a handful of spiral staircases facing the wrong way that trap sims and cause lag. Some of the rooms in houses also have too much furniture or are too narrow, causing sims to get trapped. The two worst ones are the huge castle on the hill and the house named A Modern Folly, owned by a single father.

IIRC, there's also an issue with one of the resorts (the cheap, small one) having to do with spawners. When I tried sorting these issues out, I was able to play the original EA version of Isla Paradiso without major lag.

[Valden21]

Originally posted by infinitecats:

What problems do the houseboats cause? I have been in Isla Paradiso and I've been having a range of issues from horrible lag to being unable to complete opportunities for some reason. Is it possible that moving families out of boats will stop the lag? Or allow me to return someone's stereo??

That's PART of it. Those houseboats also cause TERRIBLE pathing problems for your Sims. Moving the NPC families in those housboats to land-based homes DOES help, but only to a limited extent. The rest of it involves deleting those houseboats altogether, via the Bulldozer option in "Edit Town" mode.

[HiFive]

Originally posted by Valden21:

Originally posted by infinitecats:

What problems do the houseboats cause? I have been in Isla Paradiso and I've been having a range of issues from horrible lag to being unable to complete opportunities for some reason. Is it possible that moving families out of boats will stop the lag? Or allow me to return someone's stereo??

That's PART of it. Those houseboats also cause TERRIBLE pathing problems for your Sims. Moving the NPC families in those housboats to land-based homes DOES help, but only to a limited extent. The rest of it involves deleting those houseboats altogether, via the Bulldozer option in "Edit Town" mode.

I'll have to try that on my next family. The town usually plays well for me if I just move the families and delete the Scott family, but when I played one of the game's older couples I did experience some minor lag.

[vjjnvc89]

I've been fortunate enough to avoid any game breaking bugs or lag associated with the house boats- My family lived on one and I didn't have to delete the others around the town!