Hi, i'm having some trouble. Whenever I tried to start the game the blue screen with the plumbob would appear, but it'd never continue past that. I uninstalled all my CC, the base game, and expansion packs. i reinstalled the base game with the CC to make sure this wasn't caused by a bugged file, and it worked fine. Then i continued to install all of my expansion packs, and I ended up having the same problem I started out with. I removed a couple that I could live without, but to no avail. I've seen coding fixes but none of them apply to my type of computer. Here's my MacBook info:
You don't have Intel Iris graphics. This fix is not for you. Three messages copied and pasted in the same thread and multiple others on here is only going to annoy people.
After replacing my trusty old 2011 13" MacBook Pro base model with a fully loaded 2015 Retina 13" MacBook Pro, I had the CAS crash issues many commenters have described here. I did the OP's TextEdit step by step and it worked beautifully, solved the original issue and the graphics are clearer than they've ever been!
One big problem (and one little one): The options menu no longer works! I can change the resolution no problem but any other changes such as muting sounds, enabling story progression and aging, and changing lifespan will not apply. When I reopen the options menu after trying to apply these changes, it has reset itself back. This means my sims are no longer aging which takes a lot of the fun out of the gameplay.
The small issue is that the map view shows blocky white terrain now. All the other graphics are amazing, except for this.
Hello. This is easily solved as well. You should have the option to press Command + Enter to go to "Windowed" mode. While there you can change your resolution and save it and then repeat the key commands and go back to full screen. Ta-da. I have to do that on my iMac to change resolution as well.
Second Star to the Right and Straight on 'til Morning.
I completed all the steps, but am still having the problem. So I have to do all the steps and then uninstall the game and reinstall it completely?
Will the changes I just made still be there after a reinstallation?
So, I have a brand new Retina Macbook Pro (early 2015) with the new Iris Intel Graphic card. When I first tried to play the game unsurprisingly crashed while on CAS. After that I was able to play normally but then the graphics started to glitch one by one and after half an hour the whole down panel was so messed up (green and red panels) that I had to remember by memory where play, buy, build etc. tabs where(thank god I've played a lot in the past!) After few failed attempts I followed Bluebellfloras tips and it seemed to fix the messed up graphics, and I was able to play normally, or at least I thought so... While on the city view the city is completely grey, with only the house, library etc icons showing. That didn't really bother me and other than that the game worked just fine! I was even able to play with the highest graphic settings and the game run very smooth and didn't show any signs of glitching or crashing. I even built a whole house and didn't see the green panels anywhere.
Well then it became interesting... Previously before the code fixing my game worked great on CAS before I tried to make a child to a couple. I created the couple and the game was fine, but when I clicked to make a child (to the couple) the whole game crashed a I had to force shut the poor computer. Later on I was able to get around it in CAS with simply making a sim and then later adding that as a child. Then later in that same game I wanted that couple to make more kids, so I clicked the bed and you know, made them woohoo. Everything was great until I heard the little music that tells that the woman got pregnant and instantly the game crashed. And now, after the code fixing everything ran great as I said, graphics were high, game didn't show any signs of crashing within an hour or so of playing. Then I made the couple woohoo again, and nothing happened, they did their thing, music came and game didn't crash, yes! Then a day later, when the woman "becomes" pregnant and changes into pregnancy clothes the preggo woman turned green and red and a second later the game crashed again with me having to force shut the computer again.
Could any of you have a solution for this? This is a really interesting glitch since it has only to do with creating kids into the game, other than that it works normally (except the neighborhood view mentioned above).
The funny thing is that I could also play with my PC that I have previously played on, except the disk lot doesn't work after the Windows 10 update and Origin won't work because I have no way around it and the internet fixes won't work. I really wanted to play the sims since I'm sick but I guess the universe is really against it...
Okay now I tried to play again... This time it didn't crash while woohoo or"becoming" pregnant, but the game crashed totally out of nowhere about a day after the sim got pregnant. Argh I hate this game!
My game seems to be working okay without crashing on my new 2016 mac, but the quality of the graphics are awful and pixeled, the pets in create mode look like they've been sliced in pieces and put together, while the sim looks like a minecraft character.... I've contacted several people on the 'chat now' help option and now waiting for one of their top specialists to contact me via email to help me with this problem as apparently they're 'never dealt with this issue' so I'm just waiting now...shame because I was looking forward to play on fast speed and amazing graphics for which macs are knows for .... it wont let me post the link of the images but it should be on my origin... if anyone here knows and could help maybe..?
My game seems to be working okay without crashing on my new 2016 mac, but the quality of the graphics are awful and pixeled, the pets in create mode look like they've been sliced in pieces and put together, while the sim looks like a minecraft character.... I've contacted several people on the 'chat now' help option and now waiting for one of their top specialists to contact me via email to help me with this problem as apparently they're 'never dealt with this issue' so I'm just waiting now...shame because I was looking forward to play on fast speed and amazing graphics for which macs are knows for .... it wont let me post the link of the images but it should be on my origin... if anyone here knows and could help maybe..?
The others here will be able to speak from more recent experience than I have with TS3 for Mac. But as I understand it, the challenge has always been getting the game to function at all, in just about any kind of way, with the Intel Iris/Iris Pro chips.
High or even medium quality graphics (especially with the Pets EP, the hardest hitting of them all) on a system that can devote not one iota more than 2 GB of RAM to a game due to the way it was designed, and running it on what is still integrated graphics as Iris Pro would be, is likely expecting a bit too much I'm afraid.
so there isn't anything that can be done to fix it?:(( I guess I'll keep my hopes until I get a reply from their specialists, or maybe they'll do something to fix it... (
so there isn't anything that can be done to fix it?:(( I guess I'll keep my hopes until I get a reply from their specialists, or maybe they'll do something to fix it... (
Not knowing what model Mac you have or if you have enough drive space to support this, but you might consider Bootcamp and running TS3 on the Windows side. That's the way I've been playing for years, not because I don't have a dedicated graphics card but to get rid of the draconian 2 GB RAM restriction that was ruining my long-running games the way I wanted to play them.
But in your case the limitations of Iris Pro being an integrated graphics chip would still follow you over to the Windows side.
now waiting for one of their top specialists to contact me via email to help me with this problem as apparently they're 'never dealt with this issue' so I'm just waiting now...shame because I was looking forward to play on fast speed and amazing graphics for which macs are knows for
This really annoys me. EA are fully aware of this issue as your Mac's integrated Intel graphics and/or AMD Radeon GPU are not supported so essentially the game is not compatible on your Mac. It's a known issue and has been since 2013. Unfortunately customer support are lying to you, plain and simple. That's why your graphics look so awful and until EA release a patch to fix the issue (which I highly doubt but apparently they are looking into it), you're stuck with a horrific looking game. Sorry.
now waiting for one of their top specialists to contact me via email to help me with this problem as apparently they're 'never dealt with this issue' so I'm just waiting now...shame because I was looking forward to play on fast speed and amazing graphics for which macs are knows for
This really annoys me. EA are fully aware of this issue as your Mac's integrated Intel graphics and/or AMD Radeon GPU are not supported so essentially the game is not compatible on your Mac. It's a known issue and has been since 2013. Unfortunately customer support are lying to you, plain and simple. That's why your graphics look so awful and until EA release a patch to fix the issue (which I highly doubt but apparently they are looking into it), you're stuck with a horrific looking game. Sorry.
Just a curiously question. I have not gone in and ever changed my sgr files. Both my laptop card 770m and My GTX 960 desktop are not supported. I get the notice from the game not support. The notice goes away and my games run no problem. I would think you would have no issue with getting the AMD card to run the game even if not supported.
including @igazor in this too. Has EA added any new intel cards to the sgr files? Wonder if It may be a liability issue since integrated graphics are not designed for gaming and should really not run 3d games. I know that the original minimum specs were an intel card GMA 3. I had one. My game stopped running completely after the fast lane patch so EA would not have to worry about about complaints if someone's card got damaged. The game would not even turn on. EA also got a lot of complaints on TS3 for having no fps limiter. A few people destroyed/over heated their video cards not checking the fps and locking it. This is why the sims 4 has a built in fps limiter. TS4 is also optimized for Mac.
This may not be the correct answer from a 100% technical standpoint. But from what I understand, there is a big difference between the game not recognizing a video card/chip by name or Device ID number and not knowing which profile to apply (which is what most of the more recent sgr file hocus pocus on both Win and Mac is about), and not recognizing a video card/chip to the extent that the game just doesn't know how to use it in combination with their particular CPU, thus leading to outright startup failures and crashes. In the first instance, the game can still be played and for many it will use their card just fine. In the second instance, the game is just saying bye bye, see ya later.
There were changes made to the stock sgr files along the way with patches and EPs, but I can't speak to any about the GMA 3 chip specifically.
This may not be the correct answer from a 100% technical standpoint. But from what I understand, there is a big difference between the game not recognizing a video card/chip by name or Device ID number and not knowing which profile to apply (which is what most of the more recent sgr file hocus pocus on both Win and Mac is about) and not recognizing a video card/chip to the extent that the game just doesn't know how to use it in combination with their particular CPU, thus leading to outright startup failures and crashes. In the first instance, the game can still be played and for many it will use their card just fine. In the second instance, the game is just saying bye bye, see ya later.
There were changes made to the stock sgr files along the way with patches and EPs, but I can't speak to any about the GMA 3 chip specifically.
The GMA 3 chip is now very old. It was on the minimum requirements. I could play the base game and WA on that computer with the WA patch. Once I added fast lane and that patch The game would not even start. Now checking sims 4 they have this on the minimum requirements Intel GMA X4500 or better. The sims 4 won't run on this either.
I believe I have seen a laptop with the AMD 380 laptop card be able to run the game . They don't really put higher end AMD cards in laptop anymore and higher end laptops all have Nvidia. I was just curious why the Mac with the AMD 300 laptos cards would not run if you told the game to use that card. Like I do on my laptop and desktop even though my cards are newer than the game. I could understand intel having more issues since it's integrated.
Yes, I realize how old that chip is. Apparently something happened with the game's development through patches along the way that caused it to become totally obsolete, by the game's standards anyway, whereas around the time of WA's release it was probably just barely able to hang on to the instructions it was given to carry out. There are probably a few other older chips, now we're talking released in 2006 or earlier, that happened to along the way. I'm always amazed when someone shows up with an 11 year old computer of any kind or one with components from that time, even with a dedicated card, that can still run TS3 in any form but as you know we do see them.
There are issues on the Mac side with the CPU needing to know what to with the information that the GPU is processing, other than providing fuzzy full screen rainbows for the player to look at before the crash. @BluebellFlora and the others here have a better handle on which generations of CPUs are more problematic than others in these combos, I'm sorry to say all that Haswell, Broadwell, etc. evolution makes my eyes glaze over until someone tells me what I'm actually using. Also remember the game is really running inside of a Cider provided Win XP wrapper, not on OS X natively like other sims games are on Macs, and not on a modern version of Windows, so things are annoyingly different and more difficult to troubleshoot. My understanding is that if the user Bootcamps and attempts to use the same AMD or even Iris Pro GPU on the Windows side without all that Cider overhead, it works just the same as it would on a PC running whatever version of Windows they have installed. In that case, they may need to edit sgr files to grant formal card recognition but just like anyone else they may not need to in order to get the card to function.
Every once in a while we have a breakthrough or an Origin provided update like we did around last year at this time that makes a particular combination or other suddenly work better on the Mac side. But there is no simple, this will fix everything type solution. As we all keep saying, TS3 for Mac is a mess. It's even a mess when it works as intended because of the 2 GB RAM restriction, though of course many do manage to have fun playing while staying under that if their hardware can support it.
I got Sims 2 UC free from EA back a couple of years ago when they were giving it away. I had to edit the graphics card so that I could even play the game. (I run Windows via Parallels). I got the updated Aspyr port of Sims 2 SC and need to copy the graphics file from that to copy into the Windows version.
Second Star to the Right and Straight on 'til Morning.
@Tremayne4260 - But Parallels is a bit different, no? Since the hardware resources are shared between both operating systems at the same time, doesn't Parallels require the the game's recognition and use of the Parallels Display Adapter?
@igazor believe it or not my GMA 3 ran the base and WA just fine. No traveling issues etc. You should be impressed It was either Fastlane or the patch for it that made the game unplayable. Then my disc drive broke so I gave up at that point rather than uninstalling fastlane and back patching at the time. The computer still runs though and it is an all in one computer.
I guess that is what I was asking if one were to bootcamp windows would those cards work more like PC
also I forgot when I mentioned a liability issue with EA adding intel to the sgr files for TS3. With TS4 on PC you get warning cant run this video card and the game will not start. I don't know if they could add that to TS3 and maybe why they may never add intel to TS3
I guess that is what I was asking if one were to bootcamp windows would those cards work more like PC
On the AMD cards there would be a need for Bootcamp specific drivers (included w/Bootcamp), usage of Crimson and its siblings is probably out of the question, but other than that should be exactly the same unless someone else here knows otherwise. I'll let you know when my new iMac arrives and I Bootcamp it five minutes later so I can continue playing, but that likely won't be for at least a couple of years given current financial constraints.
Just a curiously question. I have not gone in and ever changed my sgr files. Both my laptop card 770m and My GTX 960 desktop are not supported. I get the notice from the game not support. The notice goes away and my games run no problem. I would think you would have no issue with getting the AMD card to run the game even if not supported.
Because of Cider Mac users don't necessarily get that error message and the game is unplayable. It got lost in translation somewhere that the game should default to low settings and load anyway. It just crashes.
Mac users get the unrecognised card error in Sims 4 too but the game will load because it is native to macOS, not the Cider crap EA used for Sims 3
Sim3 for Mac has not had any update of any sort since the 1.67 patch in January 2014
When using a VM such as Parallels or VMware the drivers used are not native drivers for the hardware, they are VM drivers, which is why the graphics and performance is never as good. It will never perform as well as Boot Camp which will give you a like for like experience on a Windows PC.
Don't underestimate what @igazor has stated about the 2Gb RAM limit and Cider using Windows XP for the Sims 3 on Mac. That the game can even run at all on some Macs is nothing short of a miracle
Macs with AMD 300 series GPUs should run the game, if the necessary information is added to the .sgr files. @phoebebebe13 any idea what we should be adding for the AMD Radeon Pro 400 series GPUs in the 2016 15" MacBook Pros?
Just a curiously question. I have not gone in and ever changed my sgr files. Both my laptop card 770m and My GTX 960 desktop are not supported. I get the notice from the game not support. The notice goes away and my games run no problem. I would think you would have no issue with getting the AMD card to run the game even if not supported.
Because of Cider Mac users don't necessarily get that error message and the game is unplayable. It got lost in translation somewhere that the game should default to low settings and load anyway. It just crashes.
EA should definitely fix that for you. I could understand if they don't want to add intel but your AMD cards should have no issue running the game even if the card is newer than the game.
Just curious Do you get a warning on Mac for the sims 4? On PC the sims 4 will get can't run this card and the game won't start. Sometimes it's because a video driver needs updating. If it's lower end it just won't start. We also have issue with the new AMD 400 series. I just helped someone with a new AMD 480 on desktop. The game wont accept the card in full screen and it will only work in windowed mode.
I think EA needs to get on the ball and fix both games so they accept new cards
@BluebellFlora Im not sure with the 400 series on sims 3. As I mentioned above the 400's are even having issues on sims 4. @ChelleJo and @igazor do use or have used AMD so they might know or know some work around on the sgr files
Comments
MacBook Pro
13 inch, mid 2012
Processor 2.5 GHz Intel Core i5
Memory 4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
Graphics Intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB
You don't have Intel Iris graphics. This fix is not for you. Three messages copied and pasted in the same thread and multiple others on here is only going to annoy people.
One big problem (and one little one): The options menu no longer works! I can change the resolution no problem but any other changes such as muting sounds, enabling story progression and aging, and changing lifespan will not apply. When I reopen the options menu after trying to apply these changes, it has reset itself back. This means my sims are no longer aging which takes a lot of the fun out of the gameplay.
The small issue is that the map view shows blocky white terrain now. All the other graphics are amazing, except for this.
Will the changes I just made still be there after a reinstallation?
Well then it became interesting... Previously before the code fixing my game worked great on CAS before I tried to make a child to a couple. I created the couple and the game was fine, but when I clicked to make a child (to the couple) the whole game crashed a I had to force shut the poor computer. Later on I was able to get around it in CAS with simply making a sim and then later adding that as a child. Then later in that same game I wanted that couple to make more kids, so I clicked the bed and you know, made them woohoo. Everything was great until I heard the little music that tells that the woman got pregnant and instantly the game crashed. And now, after the code fixing everything ran great as I said, graphics were high, game didn't show any signs of crashing within an hour or so of playing. Then I made the couple woohoo again, and nothing happened, they did their thing, music came and game didn't crash, yes! Then a day later, when the woman "becomes" pregnant and changes into pregnancy clothes the preggo woman turned green and red and a second later the game crashed again with me having to force shut the computer again.
Could any of you have a solution for this? This is a really interesting glitch since it has only to do with creating kids into the game, other than that it works normally (except the neighborhood view mentioned above).
The funny thing is that I could also play with my PC that I have previously played on, except the disk lot doesn't work after the Windows 10 update and Origin won't work because I have no way around it and the internet fixes won't work. I really wanted to play the sims since I'm sick but I guess the universe is really against it...
High or even medium quality graphics (especially with the Pets EP, the hardest hitting of them all) on a system that can devote not one iota more than 2 GB of RAM to a game due to the way it was designed, and running it on what is still integrated graphics as Iris Pro would be, is likely expecting a bit too much I'm afraid.
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
But in your case the limitations of Iris Pro being an integrated graphics chip would still follow you over to the Windows side.
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
This really annoys me. EA are fully aware of this issue as your Mac's integrated Intel graphics and/or AMD Radeon GPU are not supported so essentially the game is not compatible on your Mac. It's a known issue and has been since 2013. Unfortunately customer support are lying to you, plain and simple. That's why your graphics look so awful and until EA release a patch to fix the issue (which I highly doubt but apparently they are looking into it), you're stuck with a horrific looking game. Sorry.
Just a curiously question. I have not gone in and ever changed my sgr files. Both my laptop card 770m and My GTX 960 desktop are not supported. I get the notice from the game not support. The notice goes away and my games run no problem. I would think you would have no issue with getting the AMD card to run the game even if not supported.
including @igazor in this too. Has EA added any new intel cards to the sgr files? Wonder if It may be a liability issue since integrated graphics are not designed for gaming and should really not run 3d games. I know that the original minimum specs were an intel card GMA 3. I had one. My game stopped running completely after the fast lane patch so EA would not have to worry about about complaints if someone's card got damaged. The game would not even turn on. EA also got a lot of complaints on TS3 for having no fps limiter. A few people destroyed/over heated their video cards not checking the fps and locking it. This is why the sims 4 has a built in fps limiter. TS4 is also optimized for Mac.
There were changes made to the stock sgr files along the way with patches and EPs, but I can't speak to any about the GMA 3 chip specifically.
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
The GMA 3 chip is now very old. It was on the minimum requirements. I could play the base game and WA on that computer with the WA patch. Once I added fast lane and that patch The game would not even start. Now checking sims 4 they have this on the minimum requirements Intel GMA X4500 or better. The sims 4 won't run on this either.
I believe I have seen a laptop with the AMD 380 laptop card be able to run the game . They don't really put higher end AMD cards in laptop anymore and higher end laptops all have Nvidia. I was just curious why the Mac with the AMD 300 laptos cards would not run if you told the game to use that card. Like I do on my laptop and desktop even though my cards are newer than the game. I could understand intel having more issues since it's integrated.
There are issues on the Mac side with the CPU needing to know what to with the information that the GPU is processing, other than providing fuzzy full screen rainbows for the player to look at before the crash. @BluebellFlora and the others here have a better handle on which generations of CPUs are more problematic than others in these combos, I'm sorry to say all that Haswell, Broadwell, etc. evolution makes my eyes glaze over until someone tells me what I'm actually using. Also remember the game is really running inside of a Cider provided Win XP wrapper, not on OS X natively like other sims games are on Macs, and not on a modern version of Windows, so things are annoyingly different and more difficult to troubleshoot. My understanding is that if the user Bootcamps and attempts to use the same AMD or even Iris Pro GPU on the Windows side without all that Cider overhead, it works just the same as it would on a PC running whatever version of Windows they have installed. In that case, they may need to edit sgr files to grant formal card recognition but just like anyone else they may not need to in order to get the card to function.
Every once in a while we have a breakthrough or an Origin provided update like we did around last year at this time that makes a particular combination or other suddenly work better on the Mac side. But there is no simple, this will fix everything type solution. As we all keep saying, TS3 for Mac is a mess. It's even a mess when it works as intended because of the 2 GB RAM restriction, though of course many do manage to have fun playing while staying under that if their hardware can support it.
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
I guess that is what I was asking if one were to bootcamp windows would those cards work more like PC
also I forgot when I mentioned a liability issue with EA adding intel to the sgr files for TS3. With TS4 on PC you get warning cant run this video card and the game will not start. I don't know if they could add that to TS3 and maybe why they may never add intel to TS3
NRaas has moved!
Our new site is at http://nraas.net
Because of Cider Mac users don't necessarily get that error message and the game is unplayable. It got lost in translation somewhere that the game should default to low settings and load anyway. It just crashes.
EA should definitely fix that for you. I could understand if they don't want to add intel but your AMD cards should have no issue running the game even if the card is newer than the game.
Just curious Do you get a warning on Mac for the sims 4? On PC the sims 4 will get can't run this card and the game won't start. Sometimes it's because a video driver needs updating. If it's lower end it just won't start. We also have issue with the new AMD 400 series. I just helped someone with a new AMD 480 on desktop. The game wont accept the card in full screen and it will only work in windowed mode.
I think EA needs to get on the ball and fix both games so they accept new cards
@BluebellFlora Im not sure with the 400 series on sims 3. As I mentioned above the 400's are even having issues on sims 4. @ChelleJo and @igazor do use or have used AMD so they might know or know some work around on the sgr files
Yes because the game is native, not wrapped in a 100 year old alien OS