Forum Discussion
The drm in your situation is very grey in your situation. Usually one code one user. As the disc version only required the disc to prove ownership only one person can use that disc (on one system) at a time and this satisfied the drm. When you started using the digital download version you now use an online activation to play the game that is controlled by the drm SecuROM. SecuROM may not allow two concurrent users at one time (a guess as nobody knows how SecuROM works and no one is talking). Probably if you were to return to all discs the problem would go away. Since Sept. 2012 EA changed the installer so even rebuying the discs may not solve the problem either. Are the discs damaged? If they are not damaged and still do not work it may be your optical drive. Some dvd drive manufactures fail to read TS3 discs or stop reading them after some time. Are the discs readable in another computer? My TS3 disc I use is the one I got in 2009 when the game is released and installs different from what is now called the sims 3 deluxe repack that now requires Origin to install (as stated on the package). The drm for diss depends on the base game and it seems there are at least 2 different discs on the market and you can tell by the wording on the box.
Not good news, I don't have another computer to try now but I will take the Original Sims 3 Disk to a friend and see if it works on their Computer.
The computer could not see the Sims 3, World Adventures, Fast Lane and 70, 80, 90 DVD.
I was thinking my best work around silly as it sounds would be to create a Local SIMS account and install all Games in that account and just let the kids play in different worlds.
But then how do they bring their existing worlds into this single installation.............
How very limiting from EA they should obviously understand that most games are played by families with Kids that share their games and can't afford to purchase individual copies for each Child.
All Apps installed on a single Computer are shared by the local users why do they treat The SIms differently.
Single copy single user...
Do I need then to Install 35Gb of Data 4 Times for the 4 Kids?
Is it a matter of just getting 4 different Codes?
There is no information regarding this issues.
I can't be the only one who has this issue of multiple users in a family who want to share their copy of the game.
Thanks
John