It seems that the twice-voted Most Hated Company In The World, Electronic Arts, has managed to break one of their flagship games once again.
For those of you who have not yet updated your copy of The Sims 4, you might want to hold off for the time being; several users, myself included, have had the game rendered unlaunchable. The game refuses to boot from Desktop, and the icon is greyed out in Origin; you’ll be unable to update the game, purchase DLC and even go for the usual fix. More often when not, when a game breaks in Origin, you can simply select it in your library, right click it and select “Repair game” - this update somehow manages to remove the option to do that…
Worry not, for we have spoken to EA and they promise that there is a way to fix this. It is a lengthy process, and I’ve pasted the directions below. I will add that if you don’t know your way around a computer, follow these directions to the letter. Last thing you want to do is break your PC entirely because The Sims 4 doesn’t work.
Good luck, fellow players. May you return swiftly to putting your Sims in a tiny room with a fireplace and selling the door.
**Directions on how to fix The Sims 4, as given by EA Support**
- First of all, Disable your antivirus and firewall temporarily. Open Windows Firewall by clicking the Start button , clicking Control Panel, clicking Security, and then clicking Windows Firewall. Click Turn Windows Firewall on or off. If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation. Click Off (not recommended), and then click OK.
- Logout from Origin. Close Origin Client from system tray too.
- Manually Uninstall Origin from your system. This involves backing up your Windows registry and and removing your Origin registry keys.
- Clean your registry, clear cache and temp files by following the advice here.
- Download and install Origin from the Origin website.
- Allow Origin through your antivirus.
- Disable the Origin in-game overlay (IGO). To do this, launch the Origin client, then go to the Origin menu, Application Settings, Origin In Game, and then uncheck “Enable Origin In Game.”
- End your Background Tasks: hit Ctrl, Alt, and Delete and select task manager. Go to the “Processes” tab and click on the gray bar in the middle column that says User Name to sort by user name. Do NOT select anything for SYSTEM, LOCAL SERVICE, or NETWORK SERVICE. Click on anything besides EXPLORER and TASKMGR for this User Name or other user names. Click on END PROCESS. Repeat these steps until only explorer.exe and taskmgr.exe are open for this user profile.
- Reset Internet Explorer settings by following these steps.
- Restart your system.
- After that Repair and Install the game: Go to My Games in Origin, right-click the game icon and hit “Repair Install”
If you manage all that you should get your game working again. If that fails, then all I can suggest is that you give up and play a much better game. Personally, I suggest Transistor, or possibly even Red Dead Redemption.
Next on the horizon is the first major expansion for the game, which was announced earlier this wek. The Get to Work expansion adds three of the careers that were mysteriously absent at launch - Doctor, Scientist and Detective - as well as the ability to manage and run your own business chain and bringing Aliens back to the series. It’s due sometime later this year.
Heather Williams reviewed The Sims 4 upon its release last year, and found it to be a thoroughly disappointing entry in the long-running series, suffering from a dearth of content and features which have been a staple of the series from the very start. In particular, she found that the lack of career options, lengthy loading times, the loss of a more open and seamless gameworld, and an inconsistent social system made the game the worst entry so far.
“The Sims 4 feels like a backwards step. It’s prettier, it has new features like emotions and living capabilities, but in the end the hints of greatness that are there pale in comparison to what’s not there,” Heather wrote in her Sims 4 Review. “My honest opinion? Go back to The Sims 3 and wait for the inevitable avalanche of expansions that is bound to come for this latest version. Maybe, just maybe, Maxis will listen to fans; but for the time being, save your money.”
Nic Bunce
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