is there a way to download all of my store content in one click?!

adamzaid

so im reinstalling my game on my pc since reinstallling keeps the game "fresh" and keeps my fps at a steady 150-60 but after a while i notice my game starts lagging and and freezing so i reinstall it and somehow its back like its new anyways to the topic installing all there store dlc is very frustrating and takes a while so is there a way to speed this up?

TreyNutz

Unless the native refresh rate of your monitor is 150-160, you should cap your FPS lower. Most LCDs have a native refresh rate of 60, so most people cap their FPS at 60. If you play full screen you can enable vsync to do that. If you play in a window you'll need to use other methods (for Nvidia cards you can use Nvidia Inspector to set the internal frame rate limiter to 60). Capping FPS can help with lag and freezing. For me, it's essential to cap FPS when playing WA tombs, otherwise lag makes the game is unplayable. And generally the game on my computer behaves better when my FPS is capped to 60 (my monitor has a refresh rate of 60). This is the first thing you should try. Your reported FPS (150-60) seems unnecessarily high. However if your monitor's refresh rate is higher (120, for example) then you should cap the FPS at that rate.

Your store content lives in the Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\DCCache folder. Perhaps you could back up that folder and replace it and all your Store content would be installed. I'm not sure if that will work though.

What I have seen recommended is to backup your entire Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 folder and copy that to your Documents\Electronic Arts folder every time you reinstall. The strategy is to start with a fresh Sims 3 folder, install your Store content (and maybe mods, worlds, CC, etc.). Then back up the entire folder before you start playing any games. Thereafter you'll have a 'fresh' Sims 3 folder preserved for future use with all your Store content already installed. I have done this in case I ever decide to essentially do a factory reset of my game.

The only way to speed up downloading your Store content is to not delete it. The Store sims3packs are downloaded to your Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\Downloads folder. (The Launcher installs the content to the DCCache folder.) Once installed there's no need to keep those sims3packs in your Downloads folder. So back them up somewhere next time and you won't have to redownload them. I assume you know you can set your Purchase History to show 64 items at once, and download the entire page in one click. That's kind of a slow process and some people have issues with not everything downloading. You could always choose a smaller page size if that becomes a problem.

There's no good way to install a large amount of Store content at once. The Launcher has limits and I've seen it recommended not to install a lot of content at once. About 100 MB or so at a time might be the advice I've read. It's been a long time since I installed Store content and I used this method the last time I did so. And I made a backup of the folder once I was done, as I described above.

I personally don't think reinstalling would accomplish anything. Have you tried just doing a 'factory reset' ? It's simple to do and would save you some time.

edit: Once I saw this question I knew @igazor would be all over it, so I had to type really really fast! Seriously though, I agree with everything he said.

igazor

Whoa there!

1 - What kind of monitor do you have, I mean what is its refresh rate in Hz? Most monitors and laptop screens, even high end ones, or at least most of those sold here in the US, run at 60 Hz. The frame (fps) rate should never exceed 60 fps on those and we take great pains to work with players to help them cap their frame rates accordingly. Excess fps rates are not a sign of quality, they are the equivalent of digital noise and can lead to performance issues, lag, graphical glitches, screen tears, crashes and can ultimately burn out the card by making it work way harder than it needs to for no reason. This is what the concept of vertical sync is all about.

Now some monitors can run higher. If you really have a monitor that runs at 160 Hz or higher, then of course there is nothing to worry about in this regard as long as things stay capped to its actual refresh rate.

2 - Reinstalling the game doesn't "refresh" anything. The game files that get uninstalled and reinstalled are all in Program Files (x86), those never change through routine usage, only when a new patch comes out which of course is not routine operations anymore for TS3. There is usually no point in reinstalling the entire game unless one is switching computers or has hard drive failures leading to some kind of file corruption. It's only the user controlled files in the TS3 user folder in Documents that change. This is of course where your store and custom content, mods, installed worlds, and saves are. Pulling that out and rebuilding it I can understand, but that's not exactly what we usually mean by reinstalling the entire game.

3 - No sorry, there is no shortcut for redownloading store purchased content if/when that becomes necessary except by not deleting or having backed up the original downloads in the first place. Yes, I agree it's a pain to have to do that from scratch.


Edit: Whoops, looks like @TreyNutz and I hit the same alarm buttons but he was about 2 minutes faster than I was.

Fireheart2010

Sadly I do not believe there is a way to download ALL of your store content with one click.