Playing an old game for many people, especially the ones who love the game, means replaying gameplay they already played so yes, it’s logical a current version will be played more. In fact I’m sometimes under the impression new content is Sims 4’s main charm, the way people keep begging for it because the last addition was 3 whole weeks ago. In fact it’s surprising people keep returning to old versions, not a good sign. This also goes for people who stuck to Sims 2, that was mainly because they weren’t happy with Sims 3.
Ragequitting is an entirely different subject. I see people ragequitting Sims 4 as well by the way, the game isn’t exactly bugless. I never ragequit Sims 3 nor 4 because I never had performance issues.