Meshes - Polygon Count

View for: The Sims 4 The Sims 3 The Sims 2

Quality Guideline: Meshes - Polygon Count

Appears in: Body Shop - All, Build Mode, Buy Mode, and Game Mods

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General Guidelines

When meshing, polycounts are an incredibly important thing to keep in mind! If not done properly, it could lead to the game crashing a lot and lagging as well! That's why you don't want to go too high when it comes to the polycount, despite the mesh maybe being an alpha mesh or maxis match.

The standards usually for bodyparts would be for full body Meshes:

TS2: 4,000
TS3: 6,000
TS4: 9,500

Note: Tops and bottoms are usually half of these polycounts, same for the Marvelous design meshes

For Marvelous designer meshes:

TS2: 13k
TS3: 14k
TS4: 14k - This is also directly the Limit of the polycount that it can handle. if you reach the 15k mark, then your item will become shiny and striped.

Note: Marvelous designers, due to the fact that they're so high in Polycount will make your game run slower or even crash if you have too many of these in your game.

The standards for hair meshes Hair meshes (especially 'alpha hair', which is basically realistic hair), tend to be a bit higher. Here is the maximum of what we would allow (The lower is of course the better though!)

TS2: 5k
TS3: 15k
TS4 - 15k

(FOR COMPLEXER HAIR WITH 3D BRAIDS) Try depending on the textures when making complexer hairs, however, if there really isn't any other way, please keep the hairs up to:

TS2: 10k
TS3: 25-30k
TS4 - 25-30k - Keep in mind with TS4, going over the 15k mark could potentially mean your sim will turn all shiny. So be cautious!

For objects: this really depends on the object itself but we'd definitely recommend staying below 10,000 the least. Please do check out the tutorials section for more information on this!

Regarding LODs for Objects: However, for objects there are special cases to when you don't necessarily have to add lower LODs. We STRONGLY recommend doing this still, but if your object is around 500 polys, you MAY use your highest LOD for the medium and low LOD. This is not recommended, but understandable if you ever have to.

The Sims 4 Guidelines, apply in addition to the above General ones.

Body Shop - All

The sims 4 uses "LODs" (levels of detail). You might have seen the word before in either in TSRW, Sims4Studio or a tutorial, but it's important to have it so the polycounts are around an acceptable level. You want to make sure that the medium level is half of the high level's polycount and the same for the low level being half of the medium level's polycount.

The polycount for all LODs should be listed as well! That way, it's easy for the downloader as well as the moderator to see if the mesh isn't too high poly for their game. This is especially helpful for downloaders who have low-end PCs! :)

Buy Mode

The Sims 3 Guidelines, apply in addition to the above General ones.

Body Shop - All

The sims 3 uses "LODs" (levels of detail). You might have seen the word before in either in TSRW or a tutorial, but it's important to have it so the polycounts are around an acceptable level. You want to make sure that the medium level is half of the high level's polycount and the same for the low level being half of the medium level's polycount.

Buy Mode

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Possible Assessments

Approvable	Category	TS4	TS3	TS2	Description
	Body Shop - All				Unfortunately, we can't yet evaluate the polygon count yet since this still needs to be listed. When listing this, try to remember to include: The actual mesh's polycount For all Levels of detail (LODs) You can also check the information section as well if you need more guidance in this :) Hopefully, we'll see the information soon!
	Body Shop - All				Unfortunately, we can't yet evaluate the polygon count yet since this still needs to be listed. When listing this, try to remember to include: The actual mesh's polycount You can also check the information section as well if you need more guidance in this :) Hopefully, we'll see the information soon!
	Body Shop - All				The polycount seems to be a tad too high for the type of CASpart that it is supposed to be. It could take a bit of work to get this back to an acceptable level but it certainly will be worth it in the end as it will prevent downloaders from having lagging issues or game crashes. :) Please check out the tutorial section if you're not entirely sure what the acceptable polycount for your type of mesh would be! It's always fine to ask for feedback in the moderation thread of course.
	Body Shop - All				It seems that the LODs (levels of detail) are almost to the same amount as the highest level mesh. LODs should be at least half of each other. So for example, the medium level is half of the high level's polycount and the same for the low level being half of the medium level's polycount. That way you're sure that it won't affect your downloader's game with lagging and crashes! :)
	Body Shop - All				The polycount for the mesh is somewhat high but not too high! Now, of course, this isn't an issue per-sé, though it might be wise to add a little warning on top of your description in Bold for any downloaders with Low-end PCs. Something like: "The poly count for this item is on the high side, so if you have a weak graphics card, try to use it sparingly." In the future, we'd recommend trying to make any future new mesh uploads a bit more low-poly whenever possible. :)
	Body Shop - All				The polygon count for your item is good - not too high, and you've used the polys well as well as on all Levels of detail! Lovely! <3
	Body Shop - All				The polygon count for your item is great! Quite reasonably low, with every poly used just so. Well done! :)
	Build Mode				The polygon counts must be listed for all new meshes. Make sure that it's listed in such a way that all the level of details (LODs) are mentioned and their respected polycounts.
	Buy Mode				Unfortunately, we can't yet evaluate the polygon count yet since this still needs to be listed. When listing this, try to remember to include: The actual mesh's polycount For all Levels of detail (LODs) You can also check the information section as well if you need more guidance in this :) Hopefully, we'll see the information soon!
	Buy Mode				Unfortunately, we can't yet evaluate the polygon count yet since this still needs to be listed. When listing this, try to remember to include: The actual mesh's polycount You can also check the information section as well if you need more guidance in this :) Hopefully, we'll see the information soon!
	Buy Mode				The polycount seems to be a tad too high for the type of mesh that it is supposed to be. It could take a bit of work to get this back to an acceptable level but it certainly will be worth it in the end as it will prevent downloaders from having lagging issues or game crashes. :) Please check out the tutorial section if you're not entirely sure what the acceptable polycount for your type of mesh would be! It's always fine to ask for feedback in the moderation thread of course.
	Buy Mode				It seems that the LODs (levels of detail) are almost to the same amount as the highest level mesh. This is only fine if your mesh is around 500 polys or below. LODs should be at least half of each other. So for example, the medium level is half of the high level's polycount and the same for the low level being half of the medium level's polycount. That way you're sure that it won't affect your downloader's game with lagging and crashes! :)
	Buy Mode				The polycount for the mesh is somewhat high but not too high! Now, of course, this isn't an issue per-sé, though it might be wise to add a little warning on top of your description in Bold for any downloaders with Low-end PCs. Something like: "The poly count for this item is on the high side, so if you have a weak graphics card, try to use it sparingly." In the future, we'd recommend trying to make any future new mesh uploads a bit more low-poly whenever possible. :)
	Buy Mode				The polygon count for your item is good - not too high, and you've used the polys well as well as on all Levels of detail! Lovely! <3
	Buy Mode				The polygon count for your item is great! Quite reasonably low, with every poly used just so. Well done! :)
	Game Mods				Unfortunately, we can't yet evaluate the polygon count yet since this still needs to be listed. When listing this, try to remember to include: The actual mesh's polycount For all Levels of detail (LODs) You can also check the information section as well if you need more guidance in this :) Hopefully, we'll see the information soon!
	Game Mods				The polygon count for your item is great! Quite reasonably low, with every poly used just so. Well done! :)
	Game Mods				The polycount for the mesh is somewhat high but not too high! Now, of course, this isn't an issue per-sé, though it might be wise to add a little warning on top of your description in Bold for any downloaders with Low-end PCs. Something like: "The poly count for this item is on the high side, so if you have a weak graphics card, try to use it sparingly." In the future, we'd recommend trying to make any future new mesh uploads a bit more low-poly whenever possible. :)

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Examples

Correct polycounts

(LOD stands for Level of details)
LOD0: 847
LOD1: 564
LOD2: 227

Why is this correct? It's corrected in a simple, and nice way! Now, it does use the term LOD (Level of details), which is always good to mention what it is. But that's just a recommendation.

Also correct polycounts

Level of detail 1:
Facecount = 2352
Vertices = 5345

Level of detail 2
Facecount = 1349
Vertices = 3684

Why is this correct?
Sometimes it's tough finding the actual polygon count, so simply sharing the faces and vertices also gives a good understanding of how high poly the mesh is :)

Incorrect way

Polycount: around 15k.

Why is this incorrect
An average usually gives the impression that they're not quite sure whether it's correct or not. So the best thing to do here is to write it out :)

Objects polycounts

LOD0: 540 Polys LOD1: 540 Polys LOD2: 540 Polys

Why is this correct?
For objects, 540 polys is all right to have for all the LODs. It's not recommended of course, but sometimes there is no way around it! And this amount of polys won't likely affect the game as much.

Object polycounts

LOD0: 780 Polys LOD1: 780 Polys LOD2: 780 Polys

Why is this incorrect
Objects can only have the same LODs if they're in the 500 poly mark. Anything higher will probably affect the performance of the game, and therefore we don't accept anything over the 500 mark.

Tutorials - The Sims 2

Body Shop - All

If as a Sims 2 Creator you want to find a very efficient and fast way to find the polycounts then SimPE (as always) is your friend! To find the polygon counts you want to:

Open SimPE (Duh, of course :P)
Open the mesh package
Click on the GMDC
In the plugin view you should be able to see the mesh now. Check out the FaceCounts

NOTE: if you have more groups, then count up the FaceCounts of group 1 and 2 and any additional groups together to get the full polygon counts :)

Tutorials - The Sims 2

Buy Mode

If as a Sims 2 Creator you want to find a very efficient and fast way to find the polycounts then SimPE (as always) is your friend! To find the polygon counts you want to:

Open SimPE (Duh, of course :P)
Open the mesh package
Click on the GMDC
In the plugin view you should be able to see the mesh now. Check out the FaceCounts

NOTE: if you have more groups, then count up the FaceCounts of group 1 and 2 and any additional groups together to get the full polygon counts :)

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