Batuu and University Crash

[Thanatos606]

Product: The Sims 4
Platform:PC
How often does the bug occur?: Every time (100%)
What expansions, game packs, and stuff packs do you have installed? Every expansion (Except Eco Lifestyle), every Game Pack, and 'Bowling, Luxury, Toddler' stuff packs. 
When did it happen?: It first started yesterday. 
What happens when the bug occurs?: Computer crashes entirely, requiring a forced reboot. 
Have you installed any customization with the game, e.g. Custom Content or Mods? I did before, but I've removed them, uninstalled the game, reinstalled the game, and the issue persists. 
Did this issue appear after a specific patch or change you made to your system?: No.

Got back into playing this game right after the Star Wars stuff came out but started over. Everything was fine, but after sending a sim to University the game would begin crashing often. I figured my mods might be the cause so I removed them, deleted the game, reinstalled it, and made a new save. On that new save (Again, zero mods now) the game crashes within five seconds of me travelling to Batuu. After browsing for answers, I've already tried renaming my Sims 4 folder in the documents section to something else to force the game to make a new folder, but the game still crashes within seconds of me going to Batuu. I can't even manage to be there long enough to do so much as interact with anyone before it crashes. 

[puzzlezaddict]

@Thanatos606  Do you have a lastcrash.txt in your new Sims 4 folder?  If so, please either copy and paste it into a reply—use the spoiler tag—or create a .rar file and attach it.

Edit:  Is the sim you're sending to Batuu currently enrolled in university?  Please let me know either way.

There aren't any Sims 4 errors listed in your dxdiag, probably because the desktop window manager is crashing so often.  For that, please run a couple of basic checks on your Windows system files.  Here's how:

• Hit Windows key-X
• Choose either “PowerShell (Administrator)” or “Command prompt (Administrator),” whichever option is offered
• Inside the window that appears, copy and paste “DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth” without quotes into the window, and enter
• The system will start validating soon. If it throws an error, please list it here
• After it reaches 100%, hit Windows key-X again
• Again, choose “PowerShell (Administrator)” or “Command prompt (Administrator)”
• Inside the window, copy and paste “sfc /scannow” without quotes into the window, and enter
• Post the message you receive here

Restart your computer before testing Sims 4 again.  If you get another crash, please look for related entries in the Reliability Monitor.  Hit Windows key-R and enter "perfmon /rel" without quotes.  You'll see a list of errors and updates, with a column for each day.  (Today is all the way on the right.)

For any errors that mention Origin or Sims 4 from after you run DISM and sfc, click "View technical details," then copy the information and paste it into a text document.  (Notepad is fine.)  You can attach the file to a post as you did with your dxdiag.  Sometimes the Reliability Monitor doesn't update right away, so if you don't see any related errors, be sure to check back an hour or two.  The timestamp on the initial chart can also be off by up to an hour, so that's not an entirely reliable metric, but the one within the technical details should be accurate.

[Thanatos606]

There's no lastcrash.txt in the new folder. At least not that I could find. 

The Sim I'm sending is not in University. I've tried making an entirely new character, moving them into a home, and sending them to Batuu and the game crashes within seconds or arriving.

Everything seems worse now. Now I can barely play the game before it crashes. Earlier, the game would run fine until I sent a sim to Batuu or would crash randomly at University, now I can barely load into a home before the game crashes. I can sit in the main menu or CAS for a long as I want and it's fine, but when I go into Live Mode it crashes within seconds. 

I've attached a document that contains both the message I received from powershell, and the information from the Reliability Monitor. 

[puzzlezaddict]

@Thanatos606  CAS and the Main Menu are less demanding than live play, and they're also not writing data to your user folder, so it's easy to imagine various reasons why you'd only get a crash in live play.  A useful test is to try to play while your computer is completely offline, as in, disable wifi and/or disconnect the ethernet cable.  You can sign into Origin first and put it in offline mode before disconnecting.

It's a good idea to disable Origin in-game as well, although usually it causes crashes earlier in the process.  Whether it helps or not, it won't hurt.  In Origin, hover over your username, select Application Settings, then the Origin in-game header, and disable the option at the top.

Please also test in a clean Sims 4 folder, even if you've already been doing so.  With each new test, let the game create a new folder, and you can delete it afterwards.

If you get another crash, please check the Reliability Monitor again, and let me know whether there are any new errors related to Sims 4 or Origin, or any other errors that happen around the same time.

[Thanatos606]

I gave playing offline a shot (And made another clean folder first as suggested), and the game still crashed after about two minutes of being in Live Play. Didn't even go to Batuu, so now it just seems like Sims 4 itself isn't working anymore. I tried checking the reliability monitor, but the only new message there is about how "Windows was not properly shut down" due to me needing to force reboot it since the game hardcrashes my PC. 

I've turned off Origin In-Game, tried offline, and ensured that my PC is fully updated and everything else. Not sure what happened. Started playing on the 11th and there were no issues until I sent a Sim to University, then it began crashing. Then when I started over (Assuming mods to be the issue) it crashes constantly. 

[puzzlezaddict]

@Thanatos606  The game hard crashes your PC?  That's a little different.  Please first search for any crash dumps on your computer.  Open a File Explorer window, click This PC in the left panel, and search for *.mdmp (with the asterisk).  For any files you find, click "Open File Location," right-click on the file and select Copy, then right-click on your desktop and select Paste.  Repeat the process for *.dmp as well.  Please upload any files from the last two days or so to a third-party filehosting site and link them here.  If you have multiple files, you can zip them together first.

If you don't find any files, that's fine; the next step would be hardware monitoring while you play.  Download hwinfo (the free version) from here:

https://www.hwinfo.com/download/

You don't need to install anything if you don't want to; just choose the Portable version, unzip it, and launch it from Downloads or wherever you want.  (If you would like to install, be sure to click the green button, not the orange one.)  Restart your computer, and don't open any other apps.  Launch hwinfo, choose "sensors only," and click the icon that's a sheet of paper with a + sign to start logging.  Save the file to your desktop for easy access later.

Wait five minutes, then launch Sims 4 and play until it crashes.  Click the same button to end logging.  Then upload the log to a third-party free filehosting site and link it here.  Please leave it in .csv format, or if you use OneDrive to share, please compress it in .zip format instead.

[Thanatos606]

Before I do all of that, quick question. You said activate the sensor, play until it crashes, then click the button to end logging. Wouldn't the logging end when my PC crashes and I have to restart? Or will the logging thing include that as well?

[puzzlezaddict]

@Thanatos606  Oh right, sorry, I was going to post that you should play until it crashes or for 20 minutes, which is the minimum we like to see if the game doesn't crash, but then I deleted that part because it doesn't sound like you'd get that far.  I just forgot to delete the other part.

And yes, hwinfo will close when your computer crashes, but it does write data in real time, so the log should be intact when you reboot.

[Thanatos606]

Ok, gonna try that then. Also, side question. I've also just realized that I can't even start The Sims unless I'm logged into Origin. Is it supposed to be like that? Or is my game just severely broken even more than expected. I don't remember it being like that before. 

[puzzlezaddict]

@Thanatos606  Sims 4 requires Origin to be open before it launches; that's the DRM for the game.  Maybe you used to have Origin set to remember your password and open with Windows?  Sims 3 also didn't have an Origin requirement for the first few years, and it still doesn't if people use discs or Steam.