Since my ability to connect to the internet connection is not constant, I need to find a way to start Sims 3 from CD only without ANY internet connection. As far as I know the only method is to have the pre-2012 disc to run the game from and refusing to upgrade to 1.69 upon installation of the game. And tracking down the discs to every EP, SP and world. Even with Steam, I presume you still have to log in initially to Steam’s service in order to launch the game and with no access to the internet I presume that’s the only way There is no way to do this when you upgrade to update version 1.69. . That ties you down to always having to have internet access just incase that Origin throws up an update and requires you to login to it’s client service again. I guess I’m a troglodyte however it’s frustrating when you have to maintain a constant internet connection just to have access to the games you want to play, but I guess that’s the way video games are going we don’t pay to “own” the games any more. We pay for the right to rent the use of the game subject to TOS.

This is why I freakin hate to have third party clients to run games. I despise it. But companies like EA are so terrified of losing fifty cents that they punish the legit customers with horrible DRM's and stupid clients. People say that if you set yourself offline on Origin or Steam or whatever, that you can still play your games, but in my experience, it hasn't really been the case. On Origin, yes I can sometimes play a game but none of my DLC or anything will show up because of their stupid "authentication" nonsense.Steam is less bad, but still bad. Someone more knowledgeable than me about Steam might be able to help more. I avoid all these dumb clients as much as possible. I'm sorry, I don't know another way to play completely offline other than the pre 2012 disc install and 1.67edit - can't spell.

Certainly an Internet connection is required to install the Steam versions of TS3 and its EP/SPs and run them the first time for authentication purposes, but not from that point forward. Steam delivers its own build of Patch 1.67 and therefore a Launcher bypass using a shortcut/alias to TS3w.exe is still sufficient to launch the game after the first run. You will however also need some sort of Internet connection to obtain store content all over again as the game won't let you use store content downloaded under an Origin/disc account on the Steam platform, but that's just another form of one-time pain rather than something ongoing.This may change sometime next year when Steam begins expanding its EA titles and there may be more of a Steam-Origin connection than the none, not possible, don't need it anyway one we have now. It remains to be seen what will be required of us TS3 players on Steam once that happens.Of course, not that this is much help for today, it's also possible that Origin may someday fix its Play Offline feature so that it works closer to what was probably intended.

Read igazor's post here - https://forums.thesims.com/en_us/discussion/745695/why-does-the-sims-3-need-internet-to-startOops...late to the show/ignore.

"Goulsquash;c-17295718" wrote:If the issue is the 1.69 patch itself, would doing a re-install and then manually patching to 1.67 work? Players on Windows who are on a Patch 1.69/Origin controlled install cannot downpatch to 1.67. That would break the game install entirely. There was a very short window back at the end of 2015 when the first variant of 1.69 was released where there was a sneaky way to do this that did work for some players, but it hasn't worked since then due to the tighter control and realigning of the program files with 1.69.As soon as one installs a digital (not disc) version of the base game or any one of the EP/SPs by way of Origin or by using a base game disc manufactured after Sept 2012, one is on Patch 1.69 with no choices being offered.

You can leave all of the store worlds off your list entirely if this makes things any easier. The disc "versions" of the worlds just bring you to the TS3 store anyway. Origin for some of them may act as a purchasing agent just like the retail stores did with the discs, but it doesn't matter how the worlds that are sold for cash as opposed to store points are purchased. It's the TS3 store that provides them for download and installation through the Launcher in every case, not Origin itself and the worlds have nothing to do with Patch 1.69.

Is Pre-2012 CD the only way to play Sims w/o internet?

sparky1922
6 years ago
@ehl451

You just reminded me I need to point out to @Nikkei_Simmer that after supplying the UK ebay address we tend to use Pal versions of the disc game which i am not sure will work in your region so you would need to check :)
NikkeiSimmer
New Vanguard
6 years ago
:D. Yup. NORTH America has been NTSC.for quite some time. :). Yeah si pretty much I’m looking at either Canadian or American retailers.
ZeeGee1
Seasoned Hotshot
6 years ago
@Mikezumi I didn't even think about Australia being different! Mine are UK and US, I think.
Mikezumi
6 years ago
@ZeeGee I am pretty sure that in the past I have bought games in either Australia or US that couldn't be played in both (I spent two-three months of each year in Australia while I was living in the States) but I remember checking when I first started playing TS3 that it wasn't one of them.
ZeeGee1
Seasoned Hotshot
6 years ago
@Mikezumi Thank goodness for that
SuzyCue72
6 years ago
"SPARKY1922;c-17315503" wrote:
@SuzyCue72

I might sound a little paranoid but it's like they never stop interfering with the 3 game almost like they don't want players to be able to play this series without experiencing issues for some ridiculous reason.

No, sadly I don't think you're paranoid, I think you're right. :( :'( They want us all to give up TS3 and start playing TS4 instead, giving TS4 away for free was just another part of that tactic.

"SPARKY1922;c-17315877" wrote:
@ehl451

You just reminded me I need to point out to @Nikkei_Simmer that after supplying the UK ebay address we tend to use Pal versions of the disc game which i am not sure will work in your region so you would need to check :)

As far as I know there is no such thing as a PAL or NTSC version of the TS3 for PC/Mac computers, using monitor as display. TS3 for consoles connected to TVs might very well be different, but I don't know anything about those so I'll have to leave it to somebody else to confirm or dismiss that assumption.

"Karritz;c-17316651" wrote:
The region used to be important but then they got rid of that idea fairly early in the series.

Yep, that's right, only the base game and the first expansion pack, World Adventures, are region coded, after that the only codes are 01 (or 1?) for disc installs, and 17 (or 7?) for the Origin digital download version. Read more about it at Crinrict's blog, and Nichaedemus post in the thread that ehl451 linked to above.
sparky1922
5 years ago
Hi @LadyGreenEyes

What frustrates me a little is the S2 ultimate version of the game plays fine on my non internet W7 hard drive and also on my always connected to the internet windows 10 OS hard drive without any issues whatsoever so i have not had to resort to using my safely tucked away S2 discs up to now although I have never updated S2 in origin and I don't launch the game through Origin either so might make the difference. S3 on the other hand for me will simply not play using the digital version of the game at all without continued bad sim graphics that I have not been able to resolve despite some very good techy help from players on these forums.

If any player wishes to use all their digital store content with their disc game including already purchased EA store worlds just load your pre 2102 base game disc onto a PC that hasn't got another version of the game and redownload all your content and worlds. I own the whole store and it plays fine on my disc game but it will not work for me if I try using digital downloads of store content with my disc version of the game.

@Nikkei_Simmer

I hear what you are saying about costs when I first started with 3 I bought discs to begin with when expansions came out and then later into the game I started buying digital instead so I had around half discs and half digital when I realised i had better get moving and purchase the rest of the series on disc if I wanted to continue playing my game and at that time for me here in the UK I bought 2 pre 2012 base game discs and 2 ITF discs (one for spares) for very reasonable prices new and used discs but when I first noticed this thread I went looking at Ebay and Amazon and could not believe the disc prices and how they had shot up and from looking at the US sites they appear to have even less choice which I actually thought was quite strange at the time as in all the years I have been using ebay the discs were always around even for the S2 series of the game constantly so I am not entirely sure what is going on with stock. In some way I am actually grateful i got my issues with the game when I did as if not I might not have been able to hop over to discs as easily as I did although I got a lot of help from Karritz and other players who had already made the leap so I will always be grateful for their knowledge and assistance when I transferred over to discs although as @Karritz has already pointed out in her post she never experienced issues when using digital store downloads with her disc game and yet my game would simply not allow me to do that lol and in that respect i am quite envious-) I am not a gamer in the strict sense of the word but I justify the spending with this game because I don't spend much money on other games but I hope you manage to find some further discs at the right price :)
karritz
Seasoned Rookie
5 years ago
@SPARKY1922 I think it is possible the reason I had no problem with my store downloads is I only ever had the one base game disk. So it is possible the store content is linked to the base game disk that is registered to the owner of the store content - but that is only my guess.
MagicalArtemis
5 years ago
@Nikkei_Simmer You're a Japanese, right? Can you try Amazon Japan? I got my disc collection there second hand. I got them fairly cheaply and the previous owners didn't seem to care about the online site so I was lucky and got the limited edition freebies when I entered the codes, and I'm talking recent, like the last 2 years. The installation setup is in Japanese but I've set my game to English so I can play in English just fine.

Here is the link and I've filtered it so it only shows the disk and not digital codes. Edit: I'm on mobile and looks like the filter resets, digital code ver are still showing...be careful!

Right now, WA is only 800 yen (got it for 400 yen before), GEN is 700! Sometimes the prices fluctuate so you have to check back once in a while.

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