Sorry to bother you again Hero, wondering if there was any positive news for the Sims 3 and Sim City for us poor sods who upgraded to Big Sur?.... would love to buy these games for my daughter but too scared to after reading reviews on the App store. Also, support wise, am I better off buying on the App store or directly through the Aspyr Store? I've included info on my system, not that I understand any of what it means!
@FieryFiFi To my knowledge, SimCity still doesn't run in Big Sur. I do know someone who was troubleshooting this issue a while back, but I don't think she ever found a way to make the game work. Aspyr is aware of the issue and may or may not release an update, but you can certainly post on its forums asking about it. You're far from the only one hoping to play.
One completely different option is to install an older OS on an external hard drive and boot into that when you want to play. I'm not sure how old your older Mac is, but if it can install High Sierra, that would be a good option. Booting into an external is as simple as plugging it in, restarting while holding down the option key, and choosing the drive. Installing an OS on an external drive is only a bit more complicated; the best instructions are the same as before:
https://bluebellflora.com/running-32-bit-apps-after-macos-mojave/
Sims 3 works fine in Big Sur, at least on hardware like yours, but it still has the same issues it had at release. We're all hoping there will be a patch at some point, but EA hasn't released any information either way.
By the way, it's a good idea to remove the first screenshot, the one with your specs in it, because it also lists your Mac's serial number.
Specs removed, cheers! You see, I have no tech clue hehe! Ok thanks so much again, just that last question I had, regarding support, am I best to download Sim City from App store or Aspyr website directly? From what I can see, I can only download Sims 3 from Origin??
@FieryFiFi Right, sorry, I forgot to answer that one. Aspyr is good about supporting its products whether you bought through the App Store or the Aspyr site. If you want to support Aspyr more fully, skipping the App Store means Aspyr would get a larger cut, but other than that, the outcome should be the same.
The 64-bit version of Sims 3 is only available through Origin.
