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markkadorkka's avatar
markkadorkka
Rising Newcomer
2 months ago

Game won't start

Hello, I have been playing The Sims for six years on this same laptop. I haven't had any issues besides old/broken mods so far and I have been able to fix them myself very easily. The laptop is Acer Nitro Geforce something, and it was one of the best of the year when I bought it. Runs smooth and great with full graphics, so I don't think that's the problem (or who knows?). It's still in great condition, except that it is a bit noisy, lol.

So the game won't start. It started acting funny this week, i.e. a few days ago. Loading times went through the roof, the game started to work slowly, lagging, etc. Then it started crashing on random intervals. I deleted the mods I had downloaded recently and eventually quite a lod of mods. Tried old save files. Read the crash reports which were mostly incomprehensible. Cleaned caches, repaired the installation, etc. etc. Finally I thought the game worked and played a resurrected save file for two hours, no problems except huge loading times. Then the game totally freezed suddenly, and I couldn't do anything. I had to close the program with ctrl+alt+delete. After that the game hasn't even begun loading. Not in the EA app or by clicking the TS4.exe file. It tries to start, the screen blinks etc. but then it goes back to the EA app. Also, my desktop is acting weird. I can draw random black squares on it by clicking my mouse. I don't know if this is related to the game or if I've just missed this feature over the last few months?

I use Avast, I already checked that the game files are among the exceptions, also from Windows Defender. I checked that all the .exe files are correctly connected from all folders and the desktop and EA app, since I know there are several options. Of course I could've missed something. I have checked that I have the latest Intel, Nvidia drivers, everything. I made a game refresh and started the game from scratch by making a backup of my old Sims folder and downloading the game and add-ons all over again. IT STILL WON'T LOAD. I don't know what to do anymore. Now it at least sometimes pops up a notice saying that "could not start, alustusvirhe during launch" (sorry I don't know a proper translation for that Finnish term, I play the game in Finnish). Format error or something? Do I really need to try to fix my hard drive or what?

Please help :(

corrupted save
crashing
custom content (cc)
launching

3 Replies

  • AJW2707's avatar
    AJW2707
    Rising Newcomer
    2 months ago

    I can't help, other than to say that mine is doing the exact same thing :/

  • markkadorkka's avatar
    markkadorkka
    Rising Newcomer
    2 months ago

    Oh, no! Since when? I noticed that quite a few people are having these same issues right now. I don't know if it's usual for people to be having this many crashing issues, or is this really some sort of an EA epidemic? I hope they get it fixed soon 😩 I'm at such an interesting phase in my game now, I would've bawled my eyes out if the save file had been corrupt.

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    2 months ago

    markkadorkka​  It looks like the translation of the error you're seeing is "initialization error," which these days at least is usually, but not always, related to an antivirus.  So I would double-check that all your Avast settings are allowing the game executables: TS4_x64, TS4_DX9_x64, and TS4_Launcher_x64.  Here's a good guide for Avast:

    https://crinrict.com/blog/2020/10/add-exceptions-to-anti-virus-programs.html#avast

    Aside from that, please try playing in a clean user folder.  Move the entire Sims 4 folder out of Documents > Electronic Arts and onto your desktop.  When you launch the game, a clean folder will spawn with no content.  (Your saves and other content will be intact in the folder you've moved but temporarily unread by the game.)  Don't add anything to the new folder yet; just start a new save and see how it runs, that is if you can get that far.

    If that doesn't or didn't help, please provide a dxdiag.  Click Windows key-R, enter dxdiag in the run box, wait for the scan to finish, click "Save all information," and save the file to your desktop.  From there, you can attach it to a reply using the paper clip (Attachment) icon included with the other formatting buttons.

    Separately, do you have any other games installed on this computer, and if so, how do they run?  It's difficult to know for sure from your description, and the initialization error is always software-related, but it sounds like it's possible your laptop has a hardware issue.  Another game that's at least somewhat demanding would be a good test.  If you don't own anything else, the 3DMark demo is free on Steam and is a good test.

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