Re: the load game option is gone form the homescreen

Try closing the game fully, move the saves folder out of the EA folder to your desktop. Then start the game.
The game will create a new saves folder.
Close the game again, and put one of the save files in the new save folder (make sure it's not slot_00000001.save, because that's the auto-save).
Check if that save file will show up in game.