Sims 4 not starting in 2024 Please help im desperate

@exileBailey 

Based on what you've said about messing with the game files, I think your best bet is to uninstall and then reinstall the game using the EA App.  I'm no expert on the App but what it sounds like is the App is failing to start the game because it's not finding something it expects or needs to find.  A reinstall through the App should fix that.  Before uninstalling the game, you should move the "The Sims 4" folder somewhere else on your computer out of the Electronic Arts folder just to make sure that the uninstall/reinstall doesn't wipe out your saves.

Hope this helps.

Thank you for your reply. I failed to mention that I use steam to launch the game. I've tried uninstalling it and only reinstalling it via the EA app but it will download the base game and once it gets to the first DLC I have it runs into an error every time and stops the download.

@exileBailey 

Ok, I'm no expert on steam and how it works with the App, but I think if you bought the game and your DLC through steam, then you have to install it through steam.  Just using the App alone won't work in that case.  Others here will know more about it and may be able to help you a little better than I can.  But still, the key thing is to get the game reinstalled so it's all a new installation.  That'll fix any corrupted game files, etc.  Then you can start troubleshooting your mods and CC if you still have problems after getting the game to run vanilla.

And what computer are you running the game on?  Windows PC or Mac?

Hope this helps.

@exileBailey  For the initialization and already running errors, please try the suggestions in the first post of this thread:

https://answers.ea.com/t5/Technical-Issues-PC/CURRENT-ISSUE-Sims-4-already-running/m-p/13276380

The two errors have a lot of overlap, to the point where the standard troubleshooting suggestions are essentially the same.

AS CGrant56 mentioned, you do need to install Sims 4 from Steam to have access to your Steam-owned packs, and you need to uninstall the EA App version first.

I'm on windows PC. I'll re-install it again through steam. I have actually tried this before and it gives me the "already running" error. But I'll try it again just in case. Now, this may have been a bad idea, but in a desperate attempt to make things work, I deleted all Sims 4 related files in my computer, then reinstalled the game. I thought that it would make fresh files and fix whatever was wrong. It made new files but it put them in program files(x86)>steam>steamapps>common instead of documents>electronic arts. Ever since then it changed from the "initialization error at startup" to "already running error". I will try your suggestion again thought just in case. 

Thank you for your reply, I will try these methods and let you know if it helped. 

I thought this may be useful information, but I tried the option where you have to move the game files to desk top temporarily and try to run the game. As I mentioned in a previous post, my files aren't where I think they should be. Instead of in Documents>electronic arts, they are in the area shown in the picture attached, I don't know if that has any significance. Anyways, I tried moving the files to my desktop and I got this message. I have no programs running in the background. I tried pausing syncing and it didn't change anything. I just thought I ought to put this out there in case it tells us anything about the underlying issue. 

@exileBailey  The folder in your screenshot contains the game's program files and should not be moved.  Once you've launched Sims 4 for the first time, you should also see a folder called "The Sims 4" in Documents > Electronic Arts.  This folder contains the user files, a completely separate set of data.  Sometimes one or more files in this folder can prevent the game from launching.

If you don't see the Sims 4 user folder, that can have a few causes.  One is the game never having launched in the first place, as in, it doesn't get far enough to create that folder.  Another is that the folder is being moved to cloud storage by OneDrive.  Yet another is you're looking in the wrong location.  For the last one, please search in Windows for Command Prompt, open it, and enter this command:

reg query "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders" /v "Personal"

This will report the location of the Documents directory as Windows sees it, and therefore the likely location of the Sims 4 user folder if it exists.  Please list this location for me, for reference: it'll make describing troubleshooting steps easier, and I'd also like to know whether Documents is in a location that might be causing problems for the game.  To be clear, there are multiple folders called "Documents" on your computer, but only one location per user that is the designated location for the Documents directory.

You can also search your computer for GameVersion.txt : there should be exactly one of these in each Sims 4 user folder.  Open a File Explorer window, click This PC in the left panel, and enter the search term in the upper-right corner.  Let me know what you find.

So I tried to do the command prompt thing and I think I might be typing it wrong, I sent a screenshot, could you tell me where I'm going wrong? Also I searched for the "GameVersion.txt" in "this pc" and It said there was nothing that matched this.

@exileBailey  It looks like you never at any point entered the entire command.  This site breaks it up into multiple lines, but it's all part of the same command.

reg query "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders" /v "Personal"

Just to be thorough, please also download Everything, from VoidTools, which is a free (and totally safe) search tool for Windows.  Use it to search for GameVersion again, and if you don't find anything, look for Slot_ and let me know what you see.