Difference between revisions of "Game Help:TS3 Load Issues"

Revision as of 09:10, 6 October 2011

Warning:

These pages are still under construction, information will change without notice and may be inaccurate at this point of time. Most of the pages are skeleton-pages mainly containing placeholders that need to be flesh-out and will be expanded upon as we work on them.

Issue & Symptoms

Causes

Solution

Long loading times

Lag lag lag, due to incompatible/outdated/broken content (not just mods), things like Sims 2 stuff in Sims 3. Test with Game Help:Sims 3 Game Problem to confirm and then see

1. Game Help:Package File Lag
2. Game_Help:GCCTSU3_VerifyCompatibility

Crashing

1. Immediately on loading screen: incompatible/outdated core mods. Test with Game Help:Sims 3 Game Problem to confirm and then see Game_Help:GCCTSU3_VerifyCompatibility
2. With black screen: update drivers. See Game_Help:Graphics_Cards.
3. OK in CAS, Buy/Build mode but crash in Live mode: Do DEP, see Game Help:Crash workarounds -> DEP -> Change DEP settings.
4. If using Launcher to start game, then Game Help:TS3 Bypassing the Launcher

A Serious Error has occured error

1. First, ensure that Documents/Electronics Arts/The Sims 3/ folder is not opened in Windows Explorer (on Windows) or Finder (on Macs) while you're loading the game.
2. With the game running, if you ALT+Tab (Option+Tab on Macs) out to Desktop, navigate to the Documents/Electronics Arts/The Sims 3/ folder, double-click on the CurrentGame.sims3 folder and you get an error, you need to delete this folder. This means that the game cannot open this folder either. Quit the game and delete this corrupt folder.
3. If the above "CurrentGame.sims3" folder is not empty, empty it out.
   • Copy the "CurrentGame.sims3" folder to your "Saves" folder and renamed it "BuggedSaveGame.sims3" or something
   • Then back in the original "CurrentGame.sims3" folder, select all files and delete.
   • You can then test if the "BuggedSaveGame.sims3" Save can be loaded from the Select a Game screen.
   • If you can, then do a SaveAs and name it under a different Save.
   • If not, you can just delete this "BuggedSaveGame.sims3" folder or continue on to the next suggestions.
4. You can try to restore from a Backup save.
5. If no Saves to restore from, you can try this:
   • Create a New game based on the world this is happening in.
   • Save it (with a different name that the "Serious Error" one), and Quit Sims 3.
   • Copy the meta.data file from this newly created save to the "Serious Error" one or the "BuggedSaveGame.sims3" one, and replace it.
   • Game Help:Sims 3 Delete Cache Files, exception logs, version.tag, etc that would be regenerated on each game load.
   • Load the game to test with the "Serious Error" or "BuggedSaveGame.sims3" save.

The Sims 3 Base Game is incompatible error

If you have Expansion (or Stuff) packs, you have to let the Launcher quit and restart itself again in order to patch both the base game and the last-released expansion/stuff pack that you have installed. Yes, contrary to Sims 2 patching methods, patches from version 1.6 onwards, need to run separate updates for each game. If Launcher does not Quit and restart, you might need to do the fix for EADM glitch below, or logoff the machine and logon again.

See the Game Help:Patch Table for the patch versions in each release that must match, at the very least for base game and the last-installed pack, as per EA's claims. But patching all the games to the same level now, may also mean less hassle next go round.

This guide shows how to find your GameVersion.

If you're doing a manual patch, you need to download separate .exe files for each game and run them one after another (order does not matter).

There was an error during startup error

Most likely cause is outdated Origins (aka EADM), see Game Help:TS3 EADM Issues. If Origins is current, then if this happens after patching or installing a new pack, the process may have been

• interrupted or
• is not completed successfully for some reason or
• completes but is corrupt, then,

you need to Game Help:TS3 Uninstall and this time patch manually (it is safer and has higher success rate) Game Help:TS3 Patching.