My Sims 3 World Won't Load

[escapedpolarbear]

I have The Sims 3, and I have 4 worlds. 3 of my worlds are fine to load, it takes around 5 minutes for them to load, and then I can play them. However, my fourth world is by far my favourite. I've made loads of progress in it and it's very fun. A couple of weeks ago, I was saving and quitting that world, when an alert came up on my computer saying that an error had occurred. I've had various errors over time playing TS3, but this was a new error that I'd never seen before (I can't remember what the error was, so I'll look it up.) I thought that it was annoying, as what I'd done on that world that dat had probably been erased, but I would just continue playing.

I haven't been able to play that world since. It simply won't load. Just to experiment, I kept it loading without doing anything else. I had it loading for an hour, and the loading music stops and nothing happens. Does anybody know how I can play my world again? I would like to do it without destroying any of my other worlds!

[puzzlezaddict · Accepted solution]

@escapedpolarbear  In your saves folder (Documents\EA\TS3\Saves), you'll find a folder corresponding to each saved game.  You should also see an auto-generated backup for each save, e.g. SunsetValley.sims3 and SunsetValley.sims3.backup.  If you remove the .backup extension from the extra save and rename it (so maybe SunsetValley1.sims3), it will show up in the Main Menu as an option for you to load.  Now would be a good time to copy this file (right-click to see the option) and keep a spare or two somewhere safe, in case something else goes wrong.

When you use "save and quit" to exit your game, sometimes the save function can fail and corrupt your save file.  Then you may not be able to load that world going forward, as you've seen.  For this reason, it's always best to "save as," renaming the file, and then quit without saving.  That way, if the game can't save your progress, it won't overwrite your existing (presumably healthy) save file.  Many of us use "save as" most or all of the time so that we have a number of backup saves to which we can revert if something goes wrong.  I personally keep about half a dozen at any one time, and I delete the older ones when I don't need them anymore.

[jpkarlsen]

@escapedpolarbear

Please post in the Sims 3 forum. This is for Sims 4.

[crinrict]

Hi @escapedpolarbear

moved your post to the Sims 3 forum

are those custom worlds or world that came with packs ?

[escapedpolarbear]

I didn't know that was Sims 4 forum, I'm a beginner here.

[escapedpolarbear]

It's in Sunset Valley

[puzzlezaddict · Accepted solution]

@escapedpolarbear  In your saves folder (Documents\EA\TS3\Saves), you'll find a folder corresponding to each saved game.  You should also see an auto-generated backup for each save, e.g. SunsetValley.sims3 and SunsetValley.sims3.backup.  If you remove the .backup extension from the extra save and rename it (so maybe SunsetValley1.sims3), it will show up in the Main Menu as an option for you to load.  Now would be a good time to copy this file (right-click to see the option) and keep a spare or two somewhere safe, in case something else goes wrong.

When you use "save and quit" to exit your game, sometimes the save function can fail and corrupt your save file.  Then you may not be able to load that world going forward, as you've seen.  For this reason, it's always best to "save as," renaming the file, and then quit without saving.  That way, if the game can't save your progress, it won't overwrite your existing (presumably healthy) save file.  Many of us use "save as" most or all of the time so that we have a number of backup saves to which we can revert if something goes wrong.  I personally keep about half a dozen at any one time, and I delete the older ones when I don't need them anymore.

[escapedpolarbear]

Sorry I didn't reply earlier, I'll try that now!

[escapedpolarbear]

Thank you so so SO much! It worked! I can not thank you enough!