[CURRENT ISSUE] Sims 4 already running
Overview
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This is a common error that is usually caused when Sims 4 cannot access the user folder in Documents > Electronic Arts. It can also be triggered by outdat...
Forum Discussion
@fairyr0re What antivirus do you use? Some of them have extra settings that need to be adjusted. And when you reset your user folder, did you ever try to play without adding anything to the new folder? If not, please do so now and let me know whether it works.
You can also try playing in a new admin Windows account, as a test. Make it a local account, as in, don't sign into Microsoft, and don't sync with any other services you normally use. You'll be able to sign into your existing EA account and won't need to reinstall Sims 4, but your saves and other content won't be available. That can be addressed later; for now, just let me know whether the game loads properly.
@Da_Anxiety_45 You can try the suggestions above as well. But it's definitely not an issue that anyone at EA is working on; I don't know why that support rep would say it was. This is always a system issue, with something blocking Sims 4's access to the user folder, so with the exception of adjusting to a new operating system or something similarly global, this is not the responsibility of EA to fix.
@madison00ulo I've merged your post with another thread on the same issue. Please try the suggestions in this article:
https://sims4.crinrict.com/eng/crin-error/game-already-running/
and then the other suggestions above.
Hi , i seen that you were able to help others with this issue i am having. my game worked perfectly fine two days ago, once i tried to open it yesterday it said my game was already running when it wasnt , earlier that day i installed new mods, once the error began to occur , i deleted the new ones that i added , all my other mods are already up to date. i tried eeverything , deleted the app entirely , added it to my exceptions for the virus rasnsomware in my settings. I cannot add it to my desktop because i have no space on there , the game is within my external hard drive , i also tried playing on another desktop account but that didnt work either . I ran the dxdiag and of course i dont understand it. can you please help me ?
@Nyythajointt Thanks for the dxdiag, which shows the immediate problem: your C drive is almost completely out of space. Given how small the drive is, you really can't have anything on there except for Windows and a few small apps: browsers, game launchers (but not the games), Spotify, that sort of thing. Everything else needs to be on your external drive. If you need help moving files or apps, let me know what they are and what's giving you trouble about the process.
Once you've cleared as much space as possible, let me know whether you're still getting the same Sims 4 error, and we can go from there. Please also list the current free space on C, which you can see by opening a File Explorer window and clicking This PC in the left panel.
i would definitely like some help moving everything , most of my c drive space got full once my windows 11 updated after i first got it , i had about 6GB of free space at the time and was still able to play . right now i have 2.83 GB free space left .
most of the apps that are installed are the windows app , i have just deleted instagram and will be deleting textnow
@Nyythajointt What's the Sims 4 updater in your first screenshot? I don't recognize it.
For your internal drive, it looks like Sims 4 itself is taking up almost all the space not occupied by Windows, so your best bet is to uninstall it and reinstall on the external drive. That alone should take care of the storage issue. Please create a folder on the external where you'll install Sims 4, for example D:\Games, rather than trying to install straight onto D.
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