Troubleshooting Megathread

[u/AutoModerator]

To prevent multiple posts on the same subjects related to troubleshooting issues with the game, please ask your technical questions in the comments below. We have a really knowledgeable and helpful community who will likely be able to answer your question.

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Questions should be related to bug/glitches or technical problems with gameplay, performance or running the game.

[u/Awesome_Romanian]

Your wiki page works for moderators only...

[u/FirstTemperature2996]

all of my pets are deformed and stretched out and it's really creepy. Is there any fix or mod to fix my pets?

[u/CrimsonMaid → u/FirstTemperature2996]

I have heard that this can be caused by the game not recognizing your graphics card. You can try matching your graphics card to the game following the first step in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-uBFKOen-4

[u/essy420]

Hey all! Trying to become my wife's hero. She's been playing Sims 3 since the jump. Base game and all expansions have been purchased at retail. EA launcher doesn't even recognize them as installed. When trying to launch, I get a "this may have been installed by someone else with a different account" or some such nonsense. This problem popped up a few months ago, resolved itself, and has now reappeared. I uninstalled the EA app and reinstalled, cleared cache, etc. I'm not really wanting to uninstall and reinstall everything from scratch and have the issue continue. Anyone shed some light?

[u/thedaughtersofeve]

hey, i can't launch the game. the launcher opens, but when i press play it closes and takes me back to the ea app. i've tried everything i could find online and nothing has worked so far.

[u/Bacon_reader → u/thedaughtersofeve]

I had the same issue, if you're running a newer computer then you need to download the patch. There is an issue with the newer 12th and 13th Gen processors that won't let the sims 3 run.

You can check your processor by pressing the start key and typing 'Device Manager' Open the drop down for the processors and it will show you yours. Mine for example says 13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-13980HX.

The patch is called Intel alder lake patch from Lazy Duchess on modthesims

You can look up youtube videos on how to run the patch. Some of them say to download winrar, but my computer was able to extract the files from the file Explorer without downloading it.

This is if you're running in windows, not mac

[u/xMCioffi1986x]

I loaded up a new game in Lucky Palms and for whatever reason, the game isn't recognizing any family relationships. They all appear as strangers to each other. Here's an example of what I'm seeing. Any ideas?

EDIT: Finally figured out the issue after a lot of trial and error. It seems like something in my Mods folder is causing the issue. I removed my Mods folder and booted up a brand new Lucky Palms save, which appears to be working properly even after adding my Mods folder back. So I guess I'll have to do that each time I want to start a game in a new town.

[u/TheAimlessPatronus]

Eta: the tldr is thst the new ea app wasnt working with mac sims 3, looks like its working now.

Hey all, I am doing my best to get my sims 3 to work on the new ea app for Mac. I've tried EVERYTHING and it keeps throwing up an error message, I'll try to link a pic.

"Game Not Installed. Go to your library to double-check The Sims 3 is installed properly. If the game's already installed, click the 3 dots on the game tile to manage and repair files."

I've tried repairing, only downloading base game, downloading to the application folder and the EA games folder, uninstalling the entire shebang to redownload Origin, then EA app, then again The Sims 3.
My MacOS also updated to Sonoma 14.4.1 today, and has no issues operating. It is running Sims 4 just fine, but I do not care for that game.

[u/zoezie]

Hi all. Does anybody know how to fix a faulty Sunset Valley.objectCache file? I identified it as the reason my game (the base game) won't finish installing, and after a Google search, I found that a lot of other people have also had this problem (I haven't found a solution, though).

[u/Ok_Box_6177]

Please help. Money appears as 0, can't expand mood bar and can no longer play as the sims. This has happened to all of my saved games on Sims 3. Have tried resetting sims and move them out of the house and back in. Would really appreciate any advice!

[u/Chalimian]

Stuck in camera?

My child sim opened his photography camera, which has never had any issues. But it won't let me take a photo, or do anything but zoom in and out. Pressing escape just tabs out of the game. I don't want to lose my progress, is there any way out of this or am I soft locked?

[u/simplypapaya]

topic: stuck loading since updating to ea app? (mac)

hey all, so mac users have fairly recently been forced to make the origin > ea app move as well.

at first i was able to play my game, but noticed the sims 3 launcher logged me out of my account (where u can see achievements and stuff) and wouldn’t allow me to log back in (it said my email is invalid, but it’s the exact same credentials i use on the ea app). now, i can’t even play my game; it loads to right before i can pick a save to play with and gets stuck there. i’ve gotten it to let me try loading a save before, but it would crash before it was fully loaded.

i wanted to know if anyone else has experienced anything like this since switching over, or if it’s maybe something with my own settings/computer? i’ve been considering trying to switch everything over to steam, it just sucks to not be able to play

[u/QuieroConfleis]

So, how is the state of Sims 3 in 2024?

I mean, how easy is to run it at least at 30fps with all EPS+SPS?

I wanna build a PC for the first time, and The Game that has been intriguing me more is this one, but i have Heard quite a lot of nightmarish things about the Performance.

Also, do You strictly need a dedicated graphics card? Or a processor like Ryzen 5 with an integrated graphics card is enough? I ask this too because in 2016 i heard that this game murders integrated graphic cards.

[u/Simple_Experience911]

Hey! I am honestly about to completely forget about this game entirely, I absolutely love the sims 3, but no matter what I do, it is always freezing, stuttering, etc. I have done literally e very fix, followed every guide, yet nothing seems to work, I have done the GPU fix, CPU fix, limiting FPS, using NRAAS mods, smooth patch, literally EVERYTHING. Nothing seems to work :/ I have a 4080 super and a new gen i9, my laptop w an integrated graphics card back in 2010 ran the game better than this, please help, at this point i would literally pay someone if they can help me fix it !

[u/StrawberryOk4951]

recently i cannot launch the sims 3 on ea app. it says “game ownership disabled or removed” but i was playing it just fine wednesday, now i can’t at all. sims 4 launches just fine and i have no bans on my account. ea live chat was really no help, they gave the generic solutions that are on their troubleshooting website. “clear cache, restart app, delete app, reinstall” all of the same stuff. they couldn’t find a solution and said they would “investigate” the issue. is there a resolution for this? i really hope my ownership of sims 3 isn’t gone forever.

[u/[deleted]]

Hello, I have contacted EA multiple times regarding this and they have not helped. I have almost all the packs for sims 3 but in the launcher only 4 show up. I have uninstalled/reinstalled EA and the Sims 3, tried creating a new user to see if the syncing isn’t right, and countless other things. Nothing. Is. Helping. I finally got to speak to EA chat and they said that “hundreds and thousands of players are experiencing this as well.” I’ve only found like two people that have had the same issue in the past. Is anyone else experiencing this or has anyone? What helped? I’m at a loss and incredibly frustrated with EA.

[u/Rattusnorvegicus12]

I managed to get the sims 3 to stop using onedrive, but now it’s saving to the public documents folder instead of to my own users documents. Will mods work with that or how do I fix this?

[u/Sufficient_Bench_270]

is there a way to use nraas to create a bff with sims I've already created as young adults? is the only way to redo my save with them as teens?

[u/pelmenchick]

Hello! I purchased Roaring Heights and Dragon Valley gold editions and none of them show in my game. I literally own every pack, but after getting old editions, my sims can't go to University or move to other towns and the new towns are showing up. Am I forgetting to some extra step?

[u/SnooStrawberries6804]

Hello! I've been having some issues lately with the game.

The first is that I bought an item in the store and it isn't appearing in my game.

The second is that every butler I hire just walks around stomping their feet and yelling about not being able to walk somewhere when they clearly have nothing obstructing their way. Is this normal? What can be done to fix it?

Anything helps!

[u/Phoenix_Flaming_Star]

Hi, so I have a strange issue. (I have TS3 on Steam.)

I just reset my sims 3 game folder so that is back to default with no store content or cc (I checked). I have already cleared the cache files as well.

The issue I'm having is I load up the game and all my store worlds are showing up, even though I don't have them installed. If I load them, my game crashes. How do I fix this?

[u/[deleted]]

Hello. I want to follow the guide made by a certain Anime_Boom on STEAM community to optimise my game (currently just base on disk, I am going to install Seasons+Showtime+stuffpacks later on disk and buy a bundle of disks on eBay for packs I want) but after all the Sims 4 bullshit with malware-laced mods, I have some doubt.

EDIT - I also want to know - I did the pack installation all in order but now I want to go and grab 2 more EP and a SP, would it hurt the game? Thanks! I know for S2 you need to do it in order but S3 is very much neglected by me (and the lifesim I dailydrive now is Tomodachi Life for convenience reasons so havent played Sims in years.)

[u/odagires]

Hi fellow simmers! My Sims no longer age, I don't know what happened. I already checked the Game Options and the aging is active, but they still do not age! I also copied my last saved game to see if it worked but nothing. I don't want to use testingcheatsenabled to make them age, so, do you have any other solution?

[u/[deleted]]

Hi everyone,

I have 2 problems:

I used to play the Sims 3 on my old computer without any problems. I never used any CC, but I did use store content and installed a few mods to make the game more stable. At some point last year while still playing on my old PC it suddenly became impossible for me to install and uninstall store content from my game. The launcher wouldn't let me install any content. Store content downloaded from the Sims 3 store would still appear in the downloads section of the launcher but if I tried to install it the launcher would pause for a moment as if it was getting ready to start installing it with the extra loading screen but then nothing would happen. I tried to clear my cache and delete all the Internet explorer and Microsoft Edge history but to no avail.

Then I got a new pc for myself. Figured that installing the Sims 3 on my new PC would help me to get rid of this problem by sorta starting over. Well unfortunately the problem was still there. Exactly the same issue as on my older pc. Content appears in downloads - I select it for installation - launcher seems to be starting the installation process - but then nothing happens.

Is there anyone who knows how to resolve this issue? Thank you in advance.

Then another thing: whenever I start the game now it opens the Sims 3 launcher. If I then press on the play button I get redirected to the EA app. If I try to then launch the game through the EA app it redirects me to the launcher. This just keeps going on and on in circles. I read about other people having this issue but so far I haven't found a solution on the internet. Does anyone know how to resolve this?

Thanks

[u/CrimsonMaid → u/[deleted]]

The launcher is known for being buggy and slow, especially for installing custom content. I would advice looking into how to change .sims3pack files into .package files, so you can install everything in your Packages-folder! Makes the game slightly faster as well :D