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Simon Hampel

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The Sims 2 resolution problems – solved !

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I recently bought a copy of The Sims 2 but when I installed it, I found it was stuck at a resolution of 800×600, and I couldn’t get it to run any higher. My laptop has a native resolution of 1024×768, so it would be much better to run the game at that level.

The EA Games support site didn’t have much useful information on it, I tried the command line options that allow you override the defaults, but it didn’t make a difference.

I tried another search in Google last night and found a suggestion on a discussion forum.

Find the file:

C:/Program Files/EA GAMES/The Sims 2/TSData/Res/Config/Graphics Rules.sgr

… and make a copy of it under a different name as a backup (something like Graphics Rules.sgr.bak)

Now edit the original file and find the section:

“option ScreenModeResolution”

You will see settings for Low, Medium, and High. Copy the medium settings and paste them over the low settings to allow the game to start at 1024×768 resolution or better.

Save and exit and then start the game to see if it works.

The game looks much better now at full resolution on my laptop !

Comments

  1. Anyone WHO can help me?
    I’m running Windows 7 gtx 970 strix. I have alle the games and extentionpacks, not the ultimate bundle. have have changed the screen size, but no matter what, there is a Black box under my sims inside. I have tried to change the shadow graphic from high to low and off. But the box is still there. Anyone who knows how to fix this?

    Reply

  2. So glad I found this. Was only getting 800×600 in Win10 on my 1080p display. Did the update to all the files in all the expansion packs. The next time I opened the game I was able to access all the resolutions all the way up to 1920×1080.

    My wife will be very happy about this!

    Reply

  3. still useful in 2016! thank you so much for this guide, win10 really screwed me out of a lot of playtime.

    to anyone else still looking, as another commenter said, it’s important that you rewrite ALL graphicrules.sgr files not just in the base sims 2 game, but any and all expansion packs you have as well, otherwise you won’t get any option to change the resolution.

    Reply

    • May 2017
      Win 10, X64
      Nvidia GTX 1060 6 GB Card

      As one of the previous repliers has stated, you really do need to do this in EVERY SINGLE game expansion you may have and save the original.

      I had to alter security of the file before it would allow me to save, despite I was in Admin mode.

      But, glad it still works!!

      Reply

  4. Oh my god! Thank you all so much <3.
    I just installed it and was struggling with it before, because I only added the coding to 'Fun with pets'
    The one who said it should be added to all of the expansion packs saved my life ;)

    But seriously, thanks!

    Reply

  8. Thanks so much! I tried this previously with a port of my original Sims 2 UC version via a Windows 10 upgrade, and none of the steps worked. I ended up following another site’s suggestion to uninstall and reinstall TS2 UC via Origin, and followed the Registry edit steps to add the Store content compatibility so that my original saves were usable, then followed these steps to adjust that one last thing that was driving me CRAZY – the low resolution issue. I’m not sure which fix finally did it, but after editing the Graphics file in ALL of the EPs and base game from Ultimate Collection, my game is back in beautiful, full-size resolution!

    Thanks again to you and the other Posters here for the brilliant suggestions! :-D

    Reply

  9. Oh my god. I love you so much for posting this! My old laptop is too burned out to load TS2 anymore, but now I can play it on my new laptop thanks to you!

    Reply

  10. DEFINITIVE ANSWER: You must do what the original poster said, then replace ALL “Graphics Rules.sgr” files in ALL your Sims 2 EP folders with the one you edited!

    If it still doesn’t work, set all “forceLowResolution”/”ForceLowSettings” to “false”
    (to find all of them quickly, press Ctrl+B and write “ForceLow”)

    PD: This Works for ALL resolutions, you just change the numbers to the ones you want.

    Reply

  11. Save it as “all files”.

    It will save as .sgr then.

    Quite possibly you will not be able to save it on the game folder – it happened to me.

    If that happens to you too, save it as “all.files” on your regular “documents” folder.

    Then delete the .sgr on your TS2 folder, copy the .sgr you just altered from your documents folder and paste it into the TS2 folder.

    Worked for me! ;)

    Reply

  12. For Windows users:

    Some computers give you the option of using an integrated (built-in) graphics chip or a discrete (separately installed) graphics card. Integrated graphics tends to be more inferior than discrete graphics. Selecting the integrated graphics often causes the water to look “blocky” and not have any reflections (if reflections are selected) in Neighborhood View. If this is so, change the graphics option to discrete in Control Panel. My laptop has an NVIDIA discrete graphics card, so I selected NVIDIA Control Panel in Control Panel and ensured my latest expansion pack (Mansion & Garden, EP9) would use discrete graphics. This option may or may not be available depending on your graphics setup.

    When I did this, the game defaulted to offering only a screen size of 800×600. To permit for other resolution options, additional modifications to a game graphic file is required.

    First, determine your latest expansion pack (the expansion required to run your game). Then search for “Graphics Rules” for your latest expansion pack in the Program Files folder. My latest expansion pack is EP9 (Mansion & Gardens), so its default location is: C:\Program Files (x86)\EA GAMES\The Sims 2 Mansion and Garden Stuff\TSData\Res\Config. Next, copy that file as a backup: Either copy and save it to a different location (like your desktop) or copy and rename it to something else like “Graphics Rules.bak”. Then open the file, Graphics Rules. Usually, you are unable to open it because the file is not associated with any of your programs. To enable this, right click on the file and select “Open with” from the menu. If Notepad is listed, select it; otherwise, select “Choose default program” and choose Notepad under Recommended Programs or Other Programs. If for some reason Notepad is still not listed, you may browse for it at C:\Windows or C:\Windows\System32.

    After opening Graphics Rules, search for the following:

    option ScreenModeResolution
    setting $Low
    uintProp maxResWidth 800
    uintProp maxResHeight 600
    uintProp defaultResWidth 800
    uintProp defaultResHeight 600

    setting $MediumButDefaultLow
    uintProp maxResWidth 1280
    uintProp maxResHeight 1024
    uintProp defaultResWidth 800
    uintProp defaultResHeight 600

    setting $Medium
    uintProp maxResWidth 1280
    uintProp maxResHeight 1024
    uintProp defaultResWidth 1024
    uintProp defaultResHeight 768

    setting $High
    uintProp maxResWidth 1600
    uintProp maxResHeight 1200
    uintProp defaultResWidth 1024
    uintProp defaultResHeight 768
    end

    Your values may be different than mine. Copy all the resolution settings for the setting $High to the $Low, $MediumButDefaultLow, and $Medium, so it looks similar to the following:

    option ScreenModeResolution
    setting $Low
    uintProp maxResWidth 1600
    uintProp maxResHeight 1200
    uintProp defaultResWidth 1024
    uintProp defaultResHeight 768

    setting $MediumButDefaultLow
    uintProp maxResWidth 1600
    uintProp maxResHeight 1200
    uintProp defaultResWidth 1024
    uintProp defaultResHeight 768

    setting $Medium
    uintProp maxResWidth 1600
    uintProp maxResHeight 1200
    uintProp defaultResWidth 1024
    uintProp defaultResHeight 768

    setting $High
    uintProp maxResWidth 1600
    uintProp maxResHeight 1200
    uintProp defaultResWidth 1024
    uintProp defaultResHeight 768
    end

    Close the file and save it. Then run your game and the highest resolution your computer offers should be available (mine was 1600×900). If you run into problems, start over by replacing the Graphics Rules file with your backup copy and attempt to do the same thing but using the $Medium settings, instead (in this case, don’t change the $High values).

    Hope this helps.

    Reply

    • Hey. I’m wanting to change it so it has a 1920×1080 res for my monitor.

      Could you tell me how you got your Graphic Rules file back into a .sgr file? I open it in Notepad, do the necessary edits and then goto save it and it saves it as a .txt file even though it has the .sgr extension. Quite confused!

      Any advice?

      Thanks :)

      Reply

      • James, to change the .sgr file back to an .sgr when you have changed it in notepad,once you have opened the document, select save as. You will then save the notepad doc as all files (not as a txt doc)and then label it Graphics Rules.sgr.

        The picture will look a little different, but you should be able to slide the saved file back into the sims folder you accessed it from and launch the game. You will then have the option in the game to select the resolution size you want and it won’t just have the 800 size res. Hope this helps.

        Sept.

        Reply

      • I just finally figured it out, hehe.
        OK first if you have windows 8 ( i do) you would do this:
        You would open THIS PC or just your library and look at the top and there would be a tab that says ”View” click that and on the very right there will be an icon called ”Options”. Click the arrow under it and it shows something that says ”Change folder and search options”. Click it, and you will see the properties.
        Now click the ”view” tab and look for ”Hide extensions and known file types”. Now uncheck the box. Press ”OK” and you go back to config where the Graphics Rules are. You can now rename it to an .sgr file.

        For Windows 7 and whatever (I dont remember how to use windows 7 and XP, Vista :P)
        go to windows explorer/library folder and go tools> folder options and in there go to the ”view” tab and deselect the box where it says : ”hide extensions for known file types”
        then you will now be able to rename it Graphics Rules.sgr and it will change.

        Wala like Magic its an SGR file. P.S it may still have the icon for the .txt file but dont panic its an sgr file.

        I hope this helped and I am really stupid when it comes to tweaking with core files and coding etc. and files. IT MAKES MY BRAIN HURT but I hope I did something good (i hope :D)

        Reply

    • Hi
      I have changed the file “Graphics Rules” to exactly what you have said, but i keep getting a pop up notification.
      It says, “Failed to find any DirectX 9.0c compatible graphics adapters in this system! Please make sure you have a Directx 9.0c compatible graphics adapter and have installed the latest drivers provided by the manufacturer. The application will now terminate.”
      Could Anyone please Help me?

      Reply

  13. Editing this file worked great for me :) I just pasted the highest setting into the other spaces and next time I started the game it gave me all graphic options which is great because my native is 1600×900 so 800×600 looked terrible, Thanks.

    Reply

  19. EVERYONE; this is what you need to do:

    This should work for all computers:

    Find the file and the ‘Graphic Rules’ file. Click open with…and choose Notepad, find the ScreenResolution thing and edit all the medium size to the small. Then click save (or save as… to your documents then copy and paste it into the config file if your access is denied) then do this for ALL THE EXPANSIONS. When saving as make sure you put .sgr onto the end to take it out of a text document.

    Hope this helps, when you go onto the game you’ll have to go into the settings to change the screen res.

    Reply

  21. Cheers, mate.
    Still useful in 2012!!!

    BTW. “make sure you are editing the graphics file in the folder for the newest expansion pack you have installed.”
    This did it for me. Now running in 1920×1080 in Win 7 64bit.

    Thanks again.

    Reply

    • Hey man. Wanting to do the exact same thing with my 21.5″ screen which has a 1920×1080 res.

      Could you tell me how you made your Graphic Rules file back into a .sgr file? I open it in Notepad, do the necessary edits and then goto save it and it saves it as a .txt file even though it has the .sgr extension. Quite confused!

      Any advice?

      Thanks :)

      Reply

  22. It worked! Thank you so much. To others… make sure you make these changes to all expansion pack folders. It WILL work if you make changes to all folders.

    Reply

  23. I know what to do with the files and have the .sgr files. Whenever I try to edit the file it tells me access denied (Im the friggin’ administrator). Attempts to move said file, change it and put it back in the folder have not worked – the game resets it to its original state. What can I do? Please either post here or email me at reborn_raptor@yahoo.com

    Reply

  24. I’ve tried everything on this list and still stuck in low res. I think I’m doing it wrong. I tried changing all of the
    “forcelowsettings” to false, but again, I think I did it wrong as I changed ALL of them.
    If someone could please email me a txt file of the higher resolution settings, it would be much appreciated.
    My email is fistsizedmachine@aim.com
    Thank you in advance.

    Reply

  25. Hey!! Great thinking. But wait: I was wondering, if your genious can think of a way to fix MY Sims 2 DOUBLE DELUXE with the nightlife and celebration stuff. I used to play it before on an old computer, and got a new laptop. So I installed it on my new laptop, and it loads and installs fine, but when I click to go into a neighborhood, it says: Application has crashed. Application will now terminate. I have uninstalled and reinstalled three times, disk defraged, and disk cleaned, but it still doesn’t work! I need help!! I removed my downloads folder, knowign that nothing was in it, but I still don’t know!! And I don’t want to download anything or buy anything, just somehting easy to get it working again!! Help me!!!!!!!!

    Reply

  26. Hey Im glad I found SOMETHING online that can help me get on the right track on fixing this…

    My screen is 1440×900..when I went into Sims 2 University, everything was all messed up and flashing. It was crazy lol..so I followed your steps, &I got the text open (thank you veni) but now I dont know what exactly to do.

    It’s just a bunch of coding to me “/..could someone help me out if I sent them a copy of my coding???

    Please :(..I’d hate to have wasted money &not be able to play it!!

    I would appreciate it SOOO MUUUCCH! Honestly…
    My email is Natty30stm@yahoo.com if anyone would be willing to help me!!

    Natty

    Reply

  27. Hey guys,

    I wanna play The Sims 2 in 1400×1050 but I can only
    choose 800×600 or 1024×768. Pretty weird, I always
    play games in 1400×1050 and it’s the current size of my computer.
    Somebody help me please!

    MAIL ME! msn -> estherxoxo@live.com

    Reply

  29. My goodness! this fix works 100%! I edited my sims2 seasons “graphicsrules.sgr” because it’s my latest expansion pack. the fix gave me all available resolutions to choose from.

    Reply

  37. If you still can’t get this to work, just copy the resolution you want to use and paste it over ALL of the resolution settings under “option ScreenModeResolution”. Do not change the variable names, only change the resolution numbers.

    For example, you could set every single one to 800×600.

    No matter what the config decides to do, it will be forced to use the resolution you have selected regardless of whether the previous variables have been set to true or false.

    I have to say, this is one of the most annoying and unreliable methods I have seen for a game to chose a resolution.

    Reply

  39. ok so i made a backup of the graphic rules file but how exactly do you “edit the original file”?
    there is no option that says “edit” in the right click menu, nor is there anywhere else on the page!
    please help!

    Reply

  40. Thanks guys, the fix worked.

    Another thing people may want to consider if this fix is not working for them, make sure you are editing the graphics file in the folder for the newest expansion pack you have installed.

    Reply

  41. I am just wondering, after I have noticed this factor the next question seems to be, what if you want to set it at a much higher resolution for example, 2560×1024 can you use the same technique? Or is that something that is still out there to find? Thanks for offering the solution and I wish you the best.

    Reply

  43. And all of this would be SO wonderful if I could get Vista to cooperate with me on it…

    All the same, kudos on the work of genius! Hopefully I can put it to some use, as the resolution keeps me from playing the game for more than five minutes without wanting to break it.

    Reply

  44. hay, i have a problem with the sims 2… i can only one half of the game!! when i start it, i can see nothing but a half monitor black – half in the game… plzz help me :)

    Reply

  46. Hi all,

    I have follow the Vinny and the original post. However I am not quite sure which “setb forceLowResolution” should I change to false. I am using nvidia 6100 but I dont have something like Vinny mention

    “# the 6200 Turbo Cache peformed very poorly in CATLAB runs for EP2
    if (match(”${cardName}”, “*6200*”) or match(”${cardName}”, “*6100*”))
    setb forceLowSettings true
    setb forceLowResolution false”

    Reply

  47. I keep getting a blue box in the middle of the screen that says the montior resolution should be set at 1280×1024. I don’t care what the resolution is, I just want the blue box to disappear. Any help???

    Reply

  48. Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,

    The Sims 2 website did not have this valuable solution to a problem which has bugged me for a whole year, i was searching for this solution , Finally i can view both (wants abd skills) screens together,

    Reply

  49. hey! i have done that b4 and all was fine i managed 2 change it but i un-installed the game and reinstalled (don’t ask why because i was ummm “fixing” the game to my liking and all went horribly wrong) so i have to do it again but this time it wont work for me even with changing further settings like vinny says but i did this without looking it up but my game continues to run even with this tampering?

    Reply

  50. So how would I fix this for a NVidia 6150? I tried editing the file like the original poster but it just tells me that vista has disabled it to be changed.

    Reply

  51. whenever I run the sims 2 it always comes up with the message about DirectX 9.0c.
    Ive downloaded all the stuff im surposed to like it says but it STILL doesnt work!!!!
    how on earth do u run the sims 2?????
    help me please!!!

    Reply

  55. Thank you so much to Vinny and the original poster. The website did not have this valuable solution to a problem which has bugged me since installing my NVidia GeForce 6200.

    You guys rock!

    Reply

  56. i used your solution but i had to edit it futher i had to change some more coding and variables from true to false.

    if (match(“${cardName}”, “*GeForce2*Integrated*”) or match(“${cardName}”, “*GeForce?2*Integrated*”) or match(“${cardName}”, “*GeForce4*Integrated*”) or match(“${cardName}”, “*GeForce?4*Integrated*”) or match(“${cardName}”, “*GeForce2 Quadro2 Pro*”))
    boolProp causticsEnabled false
    boolProp enumerateMultisampleLevels false

    setb forceLowSettings true
    setb forceLowResolution true
    endif

    # the 6200 Turbo Cache peformed very poorly in CATLAB runs for EP2
    if (match(“${cardName}”, “*6200*”) or match(“${cardName}”, “*6100*”))
    setb forceLowSettings true
    setb forceLowResolution false

    i had to do this because i have a nvidia 6200 and had to stop it from forceing the resolution to low

    Reply

  57. Hi there,

    Oh,thank you so much!I got the link from Angel F of Mod the Sims,I also went on a hunt as I got seasons for my b-day, and so dissapointed when it wouldn’t go to higher res.Thank you for the solution, you made my day!!

    Pixi

    Reply

      • Did you get anywhere with this?

        Could you tell me how you made your Graphic Rules file back into a .sgr file? I open it in Notepad, do the necessary edits and then go to save it and it saves it as a .txt file even though it has the .sgr extension. Quite confused!

        Any advice?

        Thanks :)

        Reply

        • Open the file in Notepad as you said, but instead SAVE AS with file name: Graphics Rules.sgr but change save as TYPE to all files.

          That’s what I did to change the file back to an SGR file, but my game still plays in the 800×600 :(

          Need help, I changed all my expansion packs as well !

          Reply

  61. Um…I tried and I still cannot get the game to give me more options on screen resolution! The only one listed is 800×600. My monitor is 1280×1024! Help if you can.

    Reply

  62. I am still having trouble with the resolution changes. I followed the directions as you advised and still there is no option on the controls of the game for the higher resolution. There is only one choice and that is the 800×600. The file I changed made a shortcut and they all read the same file name with the Graphics Rules.sgr. Now there are 4 file with the same name. 2 orginal and 2 with today’s date. My 2nd comment is that it has taken about 1 hour to load the game and it is really slow. I have a pentium 4 processor and this should not be happening. I never had any problems with the Sims original game and expansions. Help!

    Reply

  64. Wow no comments for the entire 2005 year and then it picks up for 2006.

    I wonder why it’s suddenly more popular again. My 12 year old daughter has gotten right into it over the last 8 months. She even reads the Sims2 fiction on the site. At least she’s reading.

    Sim or anyone: does the greater resolution cause a performance hit? I’m running it on a P3 and it takes a long time to load depending on which expansion packs are loaded. Should I accidentally alt+tab then it crashes the machine.

    chiki: remember to rename the file back to Graphics Rules.sgr when you finish.

    Paul

    Reply

  66. Thank you for the brilliant solution. You’re a genious!

    PS: to chiki:
    You have to rename Graphics Rules.sgr to Graphics Rules.txt then you can open it in your notepad and do the edit.

    Reply

  67. Hello,

    I want to thank very very much for you solution. I myself have been trying for more than a week searching for an answer to this question. Ea games doesn’t offer much help on their sites. I also made a call to Sims in the Netherlands, but they neither could help.
    So once again I admire your skill in handling software problems.

    bye,
    Rob (ex desperate father of a Sims 2 fan daughter!)

    Reply

    • Right click on the file and open. You’ll get a pop up saying Windows can’t open the file. Use the select a program option and click OK, find Notepad and use it open the file

      Reply

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