@laijahd There are two separate locations for Sims 4 content, and they need to be handled differently. The game's program files, those that Origin installs, can just be installed to the external drive, and if Sims 4 runs, you've handled that fine.
But that doesn't cover custom content, which is stored in the Documents directory. If you simply move the Sims 4 folder out of Documents\Electronic Arts. or move the Mods folder inside it, the game won't read the folder in its new location and will instead spawn a new instance of that folder, one with new content. The solution here is to create a symbolic link within the Documents directory pointing to the location of the Sims 4 folder on your external. Please see this guide for details:
From your description, I don't think you need to wipe your computer and start from scratch. However, when creating the symlink, please be very careful to get the commands exactly right—one small typo can ruin the whole process.
I think I’ve done something wrong , my document folder is no longer documents it’s basically a shortcut to my external drive , I have no saved data except cc on sims should I still NOT restart because the cc still isn’t working.
@laijahd Please undo the process and start over. You're not supposed to redirect the Documents directory, just the Sims 4 folder (or the Electronic Arts folder) inside. Having Documents on an external drive will make Windows extremely unhappy should the drive ever be disconnected.
Do I still do the full process in this guide AFTER I've installed the sims 4 on my external hard drive? When I cut The Sims 4 folder from my document and pasted it on to the external hard drive it disappeared. I'm assuming it combined with the already existing folder on the external hard drive?
@MarMarDinah15 Your Sims 4 user files may well have gone into the folder for the game's program files, and I would sort that out before doing anything else. At the very least, grab the saves and Tray folders so you've preserved your saves and saved households and builds.
You can create the symbolic link before or after you've moved the game's program files, or without moving them to the external at all. But one critical detail is that you need to have the program files and the user files in separate folders. You can't just dump everything into D:\The Sims 4 and hope it works. Create another folder on your external, call it whatever you want, and direct the game to look for the user folder there, for example D:\Game Data\The Sims 4.
I’m just wondering if you know how to fix my issue, my sims game works perfectly fine, no issues there, however when trying to add my cc I’m struggling as it doesn’t appear in game, I’m also using the EA app since origin doesn’t work on my device anymore, I also have an external hard drive ; I have no idea how to get my cc in game, since when I try to add it to the mods folder nothing happens / it doesn’t appear in my game
ive moved my game onto an external disk and none of my saves or mods moved over, so I tried doing what the link said to do, but my cmd says ''Cannot create a file when that file already exists'' however said file isn't visible, at least for me. any idea what I could do to fix this? other than that, my game works just fine
@Majale2006 That error means exactly what it says: that wherever you're trying to create the symlink itself (the link, not the destination), there's already a file or folder with the same name. It'll be easier to help you if you simply post the command you used.
Please also list the default location of Documents on your computer. Write "command" in the Windows search field, open Command Prompt, and enter this command:
reg query "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders" /v "Personal"
Then post the result.
the command ive previously used was MKLINK /J “%UserProfile%\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 4” “D:\The Sims 4”
Ive tried the "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders" /v "Personal" command, yet command prop says The system cannot find the path specified.
is there anything else I could try?
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