EA App Required Now?

I was forced over last weekend. Everything came over okay but yesterday my game crashed. I hadn't saved in a while and lost a lot of gameplay. I used to have to save often when I played the sims 3 so I will just need to get back into the habit of frequently saving. I also noticed it takes a lot longer to load between screens and to save. I think perhaps I've been spoiled by years of the game working pretty well for me.