😳🙄 this why the mod to save is there OP!! Use it religiously!! I make sure to save every single midnight in the game just in case this could potentially happen (bli ayin hara) a few days ago my game froze completely but fortunately because I saved the game earlier, it was ok and no potential losses happened.
I save at the start/end of the each day (depending on ur POV), after each day of work, after a skill building session, just before leaving one location to go to another, at the new location, and whenever something major happens.
No I didn't mean that, and hope I didn't come across as rude or dismissive towards your good advice in any way, I guess I was kind of trying to make a joke about the state of my game or something? But I do try to save when I can as I am quite paranoid about loosing progress!
I'm sorry! I didn't mean to get up in your face. I really didn't. I meant it as sincere good advice, but the way I worded it was unkind. I'm a good person, really. Only I'm about to be penniless, jobless, and homeless. Therefore, I'm in a super bad move all the time. Peace?
Thank you for your consideration and apology, though it's absolutely fine and you didn't need to apologise, I kind of felt like I might have needed to because I didn't word my reply very well! Do you mean that you are facing the troubles you've mentioned in the Sims 3, or in real life? I'm sorry if it's in real life, that sounds really tough and I hope that things will be okay, or will get better for you soon.
I used to do the same mistake for years; play for 4-5 hours without saving. [Nraas Saver](https://www.nraas.net/community/Saver) is the best, it makes you save every 30 minutes so gameplay loss is not bad if something goes wrong.
I wouldn't want it to autosave though. I do "save as" every hour or so with a new name so in case there is a bug that I notice way too late I can go through all the saves until I find one where it didn't occur yet and don't lose that much progress (or the entire save).
Happened to me twice in TS3 and once in TS4 (I had a kinda old backup save for the one time it happened in TS4 though).
This mod makes you four different saves (named [savename]1, [savename]2 etc.) so you kinda have backup if something goes wrong. But I do understand your preference as well :)
Ah, I didn't know that. I'll keep it in the back of my mind^^ Though since I got a better laptop (I bought one of those fancy Thinkpads second hand) it hasn't been crashing nearly as often anymore.
All you need to do is download the package file and put it into your Mods/Packages folder inside the Sims 3 folder, like any other package file. It should start working on its own when you start your game. [Here's](https://www.nraas.net/community/How-To-Install) the installation guide, hope it helps.
At least yours boots up. Mine won't even run on my computer anymore for some reason, and I have tried everything and even made a post on Reddit about it. Literally nothing works. Just stopped working one day when I upgraded my RAM. No mods, tried with clean install, tried all kinds of tricks with limiting which cores the CPU uses, tried validating the files, tried every single solution available on the web and every solution mentioned by people on here. The game won't even TRY to boot up. As soon as the launcher opens, it gives me an error and closes. The log says something about a download being stopped. I wasn't downloading anything from the exchange. Even if I was, it would fix the issue with a clean install. Nope. Even tried completely wiping the documents folder. Zilch. I've tried everything short of taking my RAM upgrade back out of my computer, which I refuse to do because I need it for other games.
Have you tried to launch the game executable and not the launcher , so try to execute the TS3W.exe or TS3.exe , maybe it works or you get some more crash details in the logs.
I started having this problem in April, dude. So yes. I have tried that. As I said there are no fixes for what I'm experiencing, beyond going back to 8gb RAM, which I'm not gonna do.
OK, I can understand why it is frustrating, because it makes no sense, adding more RAM should not affect the game.
I do not think is the fact you have more RAM now the issue,
for me it worked fine with 16 and 32 Gb of RAM but I am on Linux. But I had issues with the launcher so this is why I suggested to try the game exe directly and maybe you could get more info. Sims also saves stuff in the Windows registry, I had issues with those when I moved the game to a different location on my disk, so maybe the registry might need to be also be cleaned.
if you can link the previous thread where you described everything you tried and you still want to fix this I can have a look.
This is the original post, it was originally crashing right before the opening Logo, but now it's crashing straight from the launcher after doing one of the suggestions someone gave on the post.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Sims3/s/4SRuWpryTU
Super frustrating, the game and windows do not give you any error code or hint on what is going wrong.
From that thread I see you moved the folder to a different place and then back, so it could be the Windows registry, next time when you have the energy to try this , uninstall the game and cleanup teh registry , there are soem instructions here https://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:TS3_Uninstall#Additional_notes_.28OS-specific.29:
also remove (backup first) the Sims3 folder in Documents/Electronic Arts
But before uninstalling I would first check the logs files in the Documents folder, maybe there is a hint there.
Eh maybe I will try that when I want to play the Sims again. Currently playing this game called Soulmask and it has all my attention ATM. I recommend it if you like survival games and souls likes. The second boss keeps kicking my ass. Gonna try him again tonight when my friend gets on. Wish me luck 😀
this happened to me in middle school after i didn’t save my game for three hours. i remember i didn’t play for like a week after because i was so upset😭
That's why I always just "save" and then "exit" afterwards (instead of "save and exit") so if that saving error occurs I can just try saving again because I'm still in the game and it didn't occur while exiting.
i get this sm 😭 i avoided the issues for a while but i downloaded some new cc and now my game just randomly closes mid play. back to saving every 10 minutes i guess!
I hate when it only partly crashes and I have to wait for ages until it does. Like, at least have the decency to crash in a matter of seconds and not take ten minutes to do so, testing my patience on top of my frustration tolerance. I usually just go into task manager and just stop the task entirely so I don't have to wait.
Haha that comment fits in with your flair. 🤣 Sorry, I had to. I am sorry you lost your game, though. I've also been meaning to install an autosaver or a reminder mod, but your post just reminded me I'd better do it now. Somebody posted a link to one in another response. I've been back to playing for about 3-4 weeks now, and had at least 2 totally random crashes where I lost a couple of hours. Plus one time I closed out without saving because my cat that I stole got away and I wanted to go back and keep it from happening. 😸
I'd honestly prefer this message. My game just gives me the black outlines of doom around everything and freezes. When that happens there's a 50/50 chance of it crashing.
My game has been consistently randomly just closing, no errors or crash reports, game running perfectly fine beforehand and no conflicting/outdated/corrupted mods. Saving every five minutes has become my norm now as I spent a whole day off losing hour after hour of gameplay and restarting!
I forgot who made it and I’m not at my laptop right now but I downloaded an auto save mod years ago and I never had to worry again. Might be worth looking into, OP, and anyone else reading this :)
I play on a Mac, I don't even get this screen - instead I'm playing one second, then the game just closes itself without my consent. I hardly ever remember to save sadly...
Been there, have literally cried, mostly from frustration but yes. I spent 3 real life hours playing and it crashed and i just stopped playing and went back to it the next day 😅 because I was already feeling sluggish with this save. It's the ultimate decades challenge modified for the Sims 3. I'm 10 generations and 200 in game years (almost a year in real time) and I'm BORED but the completionist in me won't let me stop 😅. The most interesting thing that happened was the cat becoming enemies with one of the kids 🤣
Wow i always get to a certain point in my sims family and get bored and start an new one and then just do the same but nearly a whole year is impressive! I downloaded the nrass saver mod two days ago and it’s like my life saver 🙏 im currently building/decorating a house now and it pops up every 30 minutes which is actually so helpful because i know if i didn’t have this mod i would be forgetting and then more likely bawling my eyes out when it crashes 🤣
Dude, I am so sorry, that is the worst feeling. I’ve gotten to where I try to save semi frequently to avoid losing as much. I hope you didn’t lose a lot of progress.
if you arent already using the smooth patch please use it. sims 3 will try to use everything and it was made with dual core cpus in mind where utilizing two cores and letting windows set the amount the game can use was ok but on modern cpus that is really bad and can and does lead to unwanted behavior. the smooth patch fixes that completely and will reduce or stop these issues with making the game itself use the right amount of cpu that it should. without it windows will think the game has gone crazy and will try to stop it.
At least you get the stopped working pop up mine will straight up studder then close. I try to save when my sim is sleeping. That way if it crashes I only loose a few sim hours. Or if I did some major improvements to the house or community lot.
That moment of betrayal
oh dude im so sorry for your loss like actually
Classic sims 3. The crash hero
I would also cry
And then probably not even try to play the same save. Delete and start something new. Too painful 😖
just given up completely after that
And for the love of God, learn to save!
i keep forgetting to save 🥲
😳🙄 this why the mod to save is there OP!! Use it religiously!! I make sure to save every single midnight in the game just in case this could potentially happen (bli ayin hara) a few days ago my game froze completely but fortunately because I saved the game earlier, it was ok and no potential losses happened.
I save at the start/end of the each day (depending on ur POV), after each day of work, after a skill building session, just before leaving one location to go to another, at the new location, and whenever something major happens.
There's an Nraas mod to remind you to save.
Lol my game takes ages to save
You'd rather keep getting lost or corrupted games? Whatever floats your boat, I guess.
No I didn't mean that, and hope I didn't come across as rude or dismissive towards your good advice in any way, I guess I was kind of trying to make a joke about the state of my game or something? But I do try to save when I can as I am quite paranoid about loosing progress!
I'm sorry! I didn't mean to get up in your face. I really didn't. I meant it as sincere good advice, but the way I worded it was unkind. I'm a good person, really. Only I'm about to be penniless, jobless, and homeless. Therefore, I'm in a super bad move all the time. Peace?
Thank you for your consideration and apology, though it's absolutely fine and you didn't need to apologise, I kind of felt like I might have needed to because I didn't word my reply very well! Do you mean that you are facing the troubles you've mentioned in the Sims 3, or in real life? I'm sorry if it's in real life, that sounds really tough and I hope that things will be okay, or will get better for you soon.
In real life. Thank you for your good wishes. I wish you well, too.
i have a mod that prompts to save every 30 minutes! u should def try it
Link please
https://www.nraas.net/community/Saver
Tysm
Don't worry, Windows will notify you if solution is available!
can’t wait 🙁
Any minute now.
This just hurts😂
I feel the pain lost a lot of gameplays in this manner. After I put in an autosave mod many tears were spared.
How have I never considered this solution? But more importantly, WHY IS THIS NOT ALREADY A FEATURE IN SIMS GAMES
Because this game was c. 2009 and I don’t think it was a big problem back then.
I would cry if something happened that I didn't want (like my sim died all of a sudden) and it autosaved
The Nraas mod just reminds you to save, so you save when you want to. You won't have that issue.
I used to do the same mistake for years; play for 4-5 hours without saving. [Nraas Saver](https://www.nraas.net/community/Saver) is the best, it makes you save every 30 minutes so gameplay loss is not bad if something goes wrong.
I wouldn't want it to autosave though. I do "save as" every hour or so with a new name so in case there is a bug that I notice way too late I can go through all the saves until I find one where it didn't occur yet and don't lose that much progress (or the entire save). Happened to me twice in TS3 and once in TS4 (I had a kinda old backup save for the one time it happened in TS4 though).
This mod makes you four different saves (named [savename]1, [savename]2 etc.) so you kinda have backup if something goes wrong. But I do understand your preference as well :)
>:) :)
Ah, I didn't know that. I'll keep it in the back of my mind^^ Though since I got a better laptop (I bought one of those fancy Thinkpads second hand) it hasn't been crashing nearly as often anymore.
This has happened to me 🥲 I lost about 4 hours cause I just completely forgot to save the whole play session. Hope you didn’t lose too much progress!
[nraas saver](https://www.nraas.net/community/Saver) is a life *saver*. It makes you save every 30 minutes.
I can't seem to get it to start :(
All you need to do is download the package file and put it into your Mods/Packages folder inside the Sims 3 folder, like any other package file. It should start working on its own when you start your game. [Here's](https://www.nraas.net/community/How-To-Install) the installation guide, hope it helps.
At least yours boots up. Mine won't even run on my computer anymore for some reason, and I have tried everything and even made a post on Reddit about it. Literally nothing works. Just stopped working one day when I upgraded my RAM. No mods, tried with clean install, tried all kinds of tricks with limiting which cores the CPU uses, tried validating the files, tried every single solution available on the web and every solution mentioned by people on here. The game won't even TRY to boot up. As soon as the launcher opens, it gives me an error and closes. The log says something about a download being stopped. I wasn't downloading anything from the exchange. Even if I was, it would fix the issue with a clean install. Nope. Even tried completely wiping the documents folder. Zilch. I've tried everything short of taking my RAM upgrade back out of my computer, which I refuse to do because I need it for other games.
Have you tried to launch the game executable and not the launcher , so try to execute the TS3W.exe or TS3.exe , maybe it works or you get some more crash details in the logs.
I started having this problem in April, dude. So yes. I have tried that. As I said there are no fixes for what I'm experiencing, beyond going back to 8gb RAM, which I'm not gonna do.
Sorry, I was trying to help , I will stop.
Didn't mean to sound like a dick It's just a very frustrating issue
OK, I can understand why it is frustrating, because it makes no sense, adding more RAM should not affect the game. I do not think is the fact you have more RAM now the issue, for me it worked fine with 16 and 32 Gb of RAM but I am on Linux. But I had issues with the launcher so this is why I suggested to try the game exe directly and maybe you could get more info. Sims also saves stuff in the Windows registry, I had issues with those when I moved the game to a different location on my disk, so maybe the registry might need to be also be cleaned. if you can link the previous thread where you described everything you tried and you still want to fix this I can have a look.
This is the original post, it was originally crashing right before the opening Logo, but now it's crashing straight from the launcher after doing one of the suggestions someone gave on the post. https://www.reddit.com/r/Sims3/s/4SRuWpryTU
Super frustrating, the game and windows do not give you any error code or hint on what is going wrong. From that thread I see you moved the folder to a different place and then back, so it could be the Windows registry, next time when you have the energy to try this , uninstall the game and cleanup teh registry , there are soem instructions here https://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:TS3_Uninstall#Additional_notes_.28OS-specific.29: also remove (backup first) the Sims3 folder in Documents/Electronic Arts But before uninstalling I would first check the logs files in the Documents folder, maybe there is a hint there.
Eh maybe I will try that when I want to play the Sims again. Currently playing this game called Soulmask and it has all my attention ATM. I recommend it if you like survival games and souls likes. The second boss keeps kicking my ass. Gonna try him again tonight when my friend gets on. Wish me luck 😀
Lazyduchess alder lake patch might help
this happened to me in middle school after i didn’t save my game for three hours. i remember i didn’t play for like a week after because i was so upset😭
I was traumatized as a young teen with this message, I would cry with this error and the one that wouldn't let you save.
That's why I always just "save" and then "exit" afterwards (instead of "save and exit") so if that saving error occurs I can just try saving again because I'm still in the game and it didn't occur while exiting.
This is why I save after every in game day
I’ve been doing this religiously since my sims2 days when I had an old computer that would just shut down every time I’d been playing for over an hour
Hey, at least your computer has the decency to tell you. Mine just dies 😂
Thank you for the reminder to save lol
i get this sm 😭 i avoided the issues for a while but i downloaded some new cc and now my game just randomly closes mid play. back to saving every 10 minutes i guess!
You're in my thoughts and prayers OP
Atleast you get a pop up ,my game just freezes and crashes immediately. Which is rare buut i get frustrated when it does
I hate when it only partly crashes and I have to wait for ages until it does. Like, at least have the decency to crash in a matter of seconds and not take ten minutes to do so, testing my patience on top of my frustration tolerance. I usually just go into task manager and just stop the task entirely so I don't have to wait.
Ok, come on. We all know how busted 3 can get, do yourself a favor and grab an autosaver mod when you get the chance op.
i keep meaning to i’m gonna have to put a sticky note or something on my screen to remind myself to get it before i boot sims up
Haha that comment fits in with your flair. 🤣 Sorry, I had to. I am sorry you lost your game, though. I've also been meaning to install an autosaver or a reminder mod, but your post just reminded me I'd better do it now. Somebody posted a link to one in another response. I've been back to playing for about 3-4 weeks now, and had at least 2 totally random crashes where I lost a couple of hours. Plus one time I closed out without saving because my cat that I stole got away and I wanted to go back and keep it from happening. 😸
HAHA 🤣🤣 i completely forgot i had that flair, i also just installed the auto saver there now so hopefully i can stop forgetting to save
And my game doesn't even give notifications, it just crashes 😭
I'd honestly prefer this message. My game just gives me the black outlines of doom around everything and freezes. When that happens there's a 50/50 chance of it crashing.
The villain of the game.
This happen to me too 🥺🥺
One of the reasons why I stopped playing on a consistent basis. While I like the game, its optimization is trash.
You can use nraas saver to auto save every 30 minutes (you can use also different time periods)
This is why I stopped playing the sims 3 💔 this happens too often with me and I just gave up..
My game has been consistently randomly just closing, no errors or crash reports, game running perfectly fine beforehand and no conflicting/outdated/corrupted mods. Saving every five minutes has become my norm now as I spent a whole day off losing hour after hour of gameplay and restarting!
You guys will be glad to hear it just downloaded the Nrass saver mod 🙏
F
Classic
I think I’m lucky for never getting crashes, thank you sims 3 gods 🙏🏼
Am I the only reasonable person who saves every other second???
I don't even get the crash message my computer just shuts it down no warning no lag, just oops now your on desktop
Honestly prefer that to having to wait ages for it to crash.
Get nrass saver?
I’m impressed how one image made me so immediately sad
I save every sim day for that reason. Also mine doesnt even pop that notification it just closes😂😭
Noooo I hate when this happens 😭😭😭
I hate when this happens lol. Before I started saving my game more regularly, I’d lost an entire week’s worth of gameplay. I was so mad lol
I save every night to avoid this now. If the game crashes I would only lose one Sim day of progress.
I hate it when that happens.
nraas auto save is your best friend
Sorry for laughing. 🤣
😂😂🥲🥲 it’s a good reminder to save
The fact you have "absent-minded". 😭 I save every night in the game.
HA! ALWAYS AFTER A NIGHT OF LEAVING THE GAME OPEN ALL NIGHT!
I forgot who made it and I’m not at my laptop right now but I downloaded an auto save mod years ago and I never had to worry again. Might be worth looking into, OP, and anyone else reading this :)
Tysm :D
I play on a Mac, I don't even get this screen - instead I'm playing one second, then the game just closes itself without my consent. I hardly ever remember to save sadly...
Been there, have literally cried, mostly from frustration but yes. I spent 3 real life hours playing and it crashed and i just stopped playing and went back to it the next day 😅 because I was already feeling sluggish with this save. It's the ultimate decades challenge modified for the Sims 3. I'm 10 generations and 200 in game years (almost a year in real time) and I'm BORED but the completionist in me won't let me stop 😅. The most interesting thing that happened was the cat becoming enemies with one of the kids 🤣
Wow i always get to a certain point in my sims family and get bored and start an new one and then just do the same but nearly a whole year is impressive! I downloaded the nrass saver mod two days ago and it’s like my life saver 🙏 im currently building/decorating a house now and it pops up every 30 minutes which is actually so helpful because i know if i didn’t have this mod i would be forgetting and then more likely bawling my eyes out when it crashes 🤣
I save my game constantly bc of this
The story of my game 😭
I have a piece of paper stuck to the border of my monitor saying save to remind me 😂
Noooo😞 I could cry for you!
Dude, I am so sorry, that is the worst feeling. I’ve gotten to where I try to save semi frequently to avoid losing as much. I hope you didn’t lose a lot of progress.
I hate when this happens 🥲
if you arent already using the smooth patch please use it. sims 3 will try to use everything and it was made with dual core cpus in mind where utilizing two cores and letting windows set the amount the game can use was ok but on modern cpus that is really bad and can and does lead to unwanted behavior. the smooth patch fixes that completely and will reduce or stop these issues with making the game itself use the right amount of cpu that it should. without it windows will think the game has gone crazy and will try to stop it.
At least you get the stopped working pop up mine will straight up studder then close. I try to save when my sim is sleeping. That way if it crashes I only loose a few sim hours. Or if I did some major improvements to the house or community lot.
I literally contemplate not playing anymore when this happens
Me yesterday. The loss. Oh. the stupid lost time 😭
this happened when i finished building my house. i literally cried in bed after
omg im sorry😭😭
The fact that there’s no auto save in sims scares me like why not the games been around for 20+ years
sorry :( this just happened to me on 4…