Would you be interested in a Sims 3 64 bit update

My game runs fine most of the time so I don't know. If it ever happens ... I won't hold my breath ... I will wait to see what others have to say about it. It's a case of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" for me.

If it'll help with lag issue! I have my game on SSD with all add-ons and store, minimum CC and mods but original large worlds are still lagging for me. If the lag will be solved by this I'll be playing TS3 non-stop. It's my favorite in the series.

@logion - My sense is that 64-bit will help prevent resource overload crashes and Error 12s for ongoing games that were just on the edge of being overloaded, thus allowing them to be saved and continued forward. But it's really just going to kick the problem of what the game engine can handle a bit further down the road. If the ongoing game has or is becoming corrupt, if the world has too many places where sims are unroutable, if the resident population is too high, the world is too large or overstuffed with busy lots, if game file maintenance procedures are not followed, then only giving the game more RAM to work with is not going to cure performance issues more than temporarily. The goal will still be to find ways both with and without mods like those from NRaas to get the game to use fewer resources, not more, as we play our longer running game saves forward. I'm already imagining situations where the game is using let's say 6 GB (or more) to keep the open world simulation going and things progressing; at some point it's still probably all going to fall apart as the game engine as it's currently designed isn't going to be able to keep up with the increases in demand on it.

But that's all just theory and we don't have to be so theoretical about it for much longer. The 64-bit version of TS3 for Mac has been worked on for over a year now and is slated to be released by EA tomorrow, Oct. 28. From all indications we are getting from those involved with the project, it really will be 64-bit and not as some of us suspected just a way to trick the Mac version of the game to work in any capacity on the current macOS which the current 32-bit Mac version cannot. Those of us with Macs are very much looking forward to trying this new version out to see how quickly we can break it...er, I mean how much further we can take gameplay on it.

Thus I am not voting here yet, not until some of us get to try this new version out and kick it around the block a few times. :)

"Cinebar;c-17704864" wrote:
I didn't have any idea EA was going to do this for MAC users. That's odd in a way after the game has been over for almost seven years. What's up with that?

The original (older) Mac version of the game will not run on the current macOS because Apple dropped 32-bit backwards compatibility with the release of Catalina a year ago. So those on Catalina or higher cannot currently play the game at all unless they have a way to boot up Mojave or run Windows through Bootcamp on their Macs. That's the difference -- the game having built-in limitations or perhaps not running as well as it might vs. forget it, it's just not going to install or run at all on the players' native or main-use operating system.

Another theory is that since Mac users represent only a minority of TS3 players, perhaps this project is a way to test how well 64-bit is going to work out and be received by a still very large sample set before seriously considering working on the Windows version. Or even if that was not really the original intent, it might very well be how things work out. Again, all just theories. :)

@Cinebar - Except that they are still selling TS3, and unfortunately to many who aren't noticing the system requirements and trying to run it on Catalina anyway only to find that it can't be done. And then there's the existing expansions and TS3 Store, revenue sources that kind of rely on players' games to work at least to some extent. But they could of course just as easily have decided to retire the Mac version and be done with it.

But yes, somewhere among all of the possible explanations for why EA might be doing this, both the reasonable ones and those that might be a bit off the wall, and players having fun trying to figure out what their true intentions are (taking over the world is one, right?), there is the fact that very few of us expected such a thing to happen at this late date in any form. So that does indeed make it qualify as odd. :)

It must still be doing very well for them to take the time after this long, it must still be a huge cash cow. That's actually amazing TS3 is still a huge revenue source for Maxis since they actually have TS4, The Sims Mobile and FreePlay. Would have been nicer if a 64 bit version for MAC and PC would have been done a long time ago. Some of us would have never tried TS4 if that were possible back in 2014.

"igazor;c-17704812" wrote:
@logion - My sense is that 64-bit will help prevent resource overload crashes and Error 12s for ongoing games that were just on the edge of being overloaded, thus allowing them to be saved and continued forward. But it's really just going to kick the problem of what the game engine can handle a bit further down the road. If the ongoing game has or is becoming corrupt, if the world has too many places where sims are unroutable, if the resident population is too high, the world is too large or overstuffed with busy lots, if game file maintenance procedures are not followed, then only giving the game more RAM to work with is not going to cure performance issues more than temporarily. The goal will still be to find ways both with and without mods like those from NRaas to get the game to use fewer resources, not more, as we play our longer running game saves forward. I'm already imagining situations where the game is using let's say 6 GB (or more) to keep the open world simulation going and things progressing; at some point it's still probably all going to fall apart as the game engine as it's currently designed isn't going to be able to keep up with the increases in demand on it.

But that's all just theory and we don't have to be so theoretical about it for much longer. The 64-bit version of TS3 for Mac has been worked on for over a year now and is slated to be released by EA tomorrow, Oct. 28. From all indications we are getting from those involved with the project, it really will be 64-bit and not as some of us suspected just a way to trick the Mac version of the game to work in any capacity on the current macOS which the current 32-bit Mac version cannot. Those of us with Macs are very much looking forward to trying this new version out to see how quickly we can break it...er, I mean how much further we can take gameplay on it.

Thus I am not voting here yet, not until some of us get to try this new version out and kick it around the block a few times. :)

Thank you, I guess we will see how much better the 64-bit version on MAC will perform.

I think that EA should remaster the sims3 (or even the sims2) so that they work better on modern computers, like what they did with Command & Conquer, but maybe this was the cheaper solution. And maybe the sims3 and the sims2 are difficult to remaster with all their packs.

I hope that we will see the sims3 running better on Windows some day.

I am so much looking forward to it! The game plays well in this laptop (Windows 10) with all packs and store worlds and some store content too. Also NRaas mods and a few simmer created worlds, so I am happy with it, but I love this game and I just want to see how it would perform on my Mac on 64 bit. I look forward to tomorrow.
Best news since sliced bread was invented... we need a bit of good news.

"cody6268;c-17712190" wrote:
I think it would run a lot better. I have a refurbished Dell Optiplex 7010 as an interim desktop. With a 3rd gen i7 and 16GB of RAM, it should run TS3 very well. But, it doesn't since we can only use 2 GB of RAM.

That hasn't been true on Windows since Patch 1.17 was released in 2010, thus making TS3 Large Address Aware (LAA). Only the now older 32-bit Mac version kept the 2 GB cap.

The game on Windows will reach for up to just short of 4 GB, if and when it "thinks" it needs it and if the physical RAM is available. Resource overload and Error12s happen when usage approaches ~3.5 GB, this varies for different players, with 3.7 GB being absolute most the game can work with. A strong enough dedicated graphics card helps to offload a lot of the memory usage and is at least expected to improve game performance dramatically over integrated graphics.

Going 64-bit doesn't make the game call for more RAM earlier unless the game's programming is changed/remastered to take advantage of the increased capacity. On the new Mac version, I haven't played a world that is complex enough yet to require more than the 1.5 GB or so that it's currently asking for but stress testing will soon change that once I get finished adding all my content into it.

The Sims 3 is Old And not better than the wsims 4 who has 64 Bits Support (Formerly has 32 bits support but has dropped)