I had a crashing problem that did not resolve from following the steps in the game crash help articles in the Sims 3 wiki, so I did a clean uninstall and re-installed. I have the base game, Late Night and University on disk: I also have digital versions of the base game (I couldn't download Create a World without having a registered copy of the base game, and my disks are used so I can't register them), Ambitions, World Adventures, Generations, Pets, and Seasons. Last time I installed the base game with the disk, and this time I did it digitally. I'm noticing some things that strike me as really strange (and no, I am not entirely sure I have beat the crashing problem: I've just returned my mods, and next time I play I'll see if the game plays with them in).

First: both before and now, the game only plays with the University Life disk in the computer, and it runs the University Life intro. With Sims 2, I'm pretty sure whatever you did, you got the intro for your latest expansion. Is this normal behavior?

Second: A few days before my game started crashing, the launcher would display script errors that reference weird urls: ones with "doubleclick" in the name, ones which end in .ru. My research into script errors in the launcher did not come up with anything about what the errors could be expected to reference, but I did read repeatedly that the script errors were benign and un resolvable. But... those references look weird to me. Are those sinister references? Is there anything I can do about them? I had bypassed the launcher before I reinstalled, but now...

Third: my Sims 3 program files look strange now. The only subfolders in the program files are the ones for Late Night and University. Does this mean that my program files for the other expansions and the base game are sitting on Origin's server? If so, I feel utterly defeated, as my experience with playing Sim City 4 is that even playing "off-line" with an Origin server game is unreliable to the point of unusability. (that is, I played Sim City offline, but every so often I couldn't play because the server was down anyway. And other times Origin will crash whatever I happen to be doing, whether it's an EA game or not, in its relentless drive to update. Even though I have told it not to update automatically).

Third and a half: be that as it may, I went looking in the University Life\Game\Bin folder for the file named "TS3W.exe." It's not there. (It was there before I reinstalled) The game is patched to 1.67.+etc., the latest patch, but the executable file there is "TS3EP09.exe." I think that is correct as to the last actual expansion I have, but is it okay that it is different this time?

Fourth: Sometime during the efforts I was making to fix my game before I reinstalled I suddenly started getting advertisements from the store all through the game, Every CAS and build/buy menu is infected with these items that are not in my game, but I could have them for simpoints. There's an option for shop mode (do I remember that right?) in the options menu, and I have turned that off. So what is causing this obnoxious behavior? How can I stop it?

Another thing that started happening during this and wasn't happening before is the game harrassing me about how I should log in online while I am playing the game. Again, I told it not to do that and told it never to ask me again, but I didn't have that before and I'm unsure that I have successfully deterred it. Is there another thing that turns this on while the player isn't looking?

Okay, this is long and boring enough, I hope someone has answers to some of it. I'll continue testing the game meanwhile.

edit: No, I have not resolved the crashing problem. My next steps, I figure, are using Delphy's Dashboard and the Process Monitor to look for bad files.

But also: before reinstallation, I could bypass the launcher by using a shortcut to that TS3W.exe.The TS3EP09.exe file leads, not just to the launcher, but to Origin! It is as bad as I feared. And yes, the launcher still gives me two script errors, which refer to the "doubleclick" and ".ru" urls.

I figure I also ought to re-run my AVG scanner. Though it runs automatically.

I wonder if I have to uninstall all over again? Or possibly just uninstall the base game and reinstall the base game from the disk?

I hope I'm not misunderstanding and this will help somewhat. I have both disc and digital Origin installs. A long time ago I was having similar problems with origin until I registered all the discs along with the digital versions on Origin which made them available to be installed directly using Origin. After everything was installed via Origin I was able to reinstall everything directly from Origin and never had to use a disc again. Now all my games are in the same Origin Games folder under Program Files(x86)>Origin Games and I can easily bypass the Launcher from there.
With regards to your on-line issue. I never play online and I'm not in game atm but isn't there a setting somewhere to check for playing off line?
Another good practice when doing reinstalls is to apply the SuperPatch after putting in the base game and then applying it again after the last install to insure nothing was broken when installing the rest of the game. The game will tell you you're patched but proceed anyway.
I know this hasn't answered all of your questions but hope it helps a little.

First:
UL seems to be the last registered as installed expansion pack as game understands it thus use this particular executable, your installation failed and your patching failed too 'cause valid executable after some path is always ts3e.exe (others are acting just as links). Seems you have already installed *two* version of game - and that confuse the program.

Second:
launcher may be corrupted - I'm not sure if it gets "homepage" from its own resources or particular registry key (never checked tbh) - there may be some malicious software involved or mess in locals attributes (game recognize itself as installed as "ru" version, honestly I even don't know if there's such version, howewher - while exists e.g. polish, czech or slovakian... Russia is a big market so it's quite possible)

Third:
Origins installs in origins subfolder always and you have no choice, disc version installs where you want them to be (I never use "ProgramFiles" and similar locations e.g.)
You don;t need to run Origin framework to run the game and you always may add a game and a launcher to exceptions in firewall and get ride off theirs "internet capabilities" once and for all. Which is exacly what I did.

Fourth:

Probably game don't recognize its own settings file - so it reads defaults which are "all funny stuff to max please" set up.

If you have already Origin version - uninstall *all* (from Origin and disc folder because it seems that you have two independent game installation), clean trash which game will left in registry (with CCleaner or other such kind of software) and do installation as @barbarat wrote above and patch with patcher after installing basegame (it will save you a lot of time anyway). Since that you will have full Origin version and your problems probably shall be gone.

I'm sorry, I really don't understand the advice either of you have given me. But I may have solved some of my problems myself. I still have several steps to go before I know for sure, unfortunately. I have uninstalled and reinstalled using the game disk rather than the digital version, and after opening and closing the game a few times experimentally, the TS3W.exe file has finally spontaneously shown up in the Program Fles (X86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\Game\Bin folder. I haven't had the opportunity yet to test whether it bypasses the buggy launcher yet (there are several threads at EA.com's help forum about this issue, some years old and still going strong, and EA hasn't even bothered to answer them since well before Sims 4 came out). I haven't reinstalled the Store content but I have put in the mod packages I am the most attached to and that configuration doesn't crash. Next I'll put in the store content I like most and see how that goes, then more packages, etc.The configuration I have now is playable, so worst comes to worst I just wasted money on the store content.

Some clarifications:

No, I don't have two installations of the game. I never had two copies of the game on the machine. I had two different versions on the machine at different times. I own two copies of the base game, a second-hand disk and a digital version. I bought the digital version because I could not register the second-hand disks and I needed a registered base game in order to download a copy of Create-A-World. But only one or the other of the base game versions has ever been installed at a time.

My game has never not been patched with the latest patch. I have always run the patcher every time I installed the game (now four times). In fact, I always patched the game twice.

My Origin folder has nothing in it but Origin files. It doesn't even have my Sim Citry files in it. So for me, installing games through Origin did not put the files in the Origin folder.

As I had said before, I had actually cleaned the registry in the first place, so it's a wee bit silly to admonish me about it.

Another clarification: I did indeed turn off shop mode from within the game and yet the advertising showed up in every menu anyway.

Anyway, I'll know after a while if I have solved any or all of my problems-- whether I have stopped my game crashing, whether I will be able to bypass the launcher, whether I will have successfully turned off shop mode and interactive loading this time, etc.

Thanks for your replies, even though I didn't understand them!

so there was a big misunderstanding

Origin installer pass installed games into ./[yourProgramFilesx86]/Origin Games/ into their respective folders, anyway it always do it when I use it and my full sim2 installation (the best element of Sims4 market introduction! ) lies exactly there.

sims 3 executable file is placed in ./[yourinstallationfolder]/Game/Bin and it is *this* updated version



it's only my personal superstition I'm not only one person in this world, who always forgot about the obvious Seems I'm

have you tried to install bought content (sim3pack) just by double click? installer is a part of ts3w.exe (a launcher only calls it) and even if launcher fails to load or work the content should be installed anyway (but you won't be able to uninstall it, except dirty, manual way)

I tried to reproduce this "ignore settings" strange feature but I cannot. Does game reacts properly and save other options? (Like graph/sound settings etc.)

My current state is that the game is now working properly in every way. It's now honoring the options I selected, bypassing the launcher, and not crashing. I have not been able to install the store content I bought, though. I did use Chrome though the store insists on Firefox or IE, so that may be the problem there. But my original questions have all been resolved. I don't know how exactly--I mean I re-installed a few times, but I don't know which variation made the difference.

Glad to hear you got it working lucy. I use Chrome and do not have problems with the store but hopefully using another Browser will help. If you kept copies of the 3packs downloaded from the store somewhere you could just put those back in the Downloads folder and reinstall in the Launcher.

Good to see good news. Happy simming then

It looks like my issue with re-downloading the items is solved by downloading them one at a time.

Oh my, I forgot to ask if you had a lot of content to download and advise that the Launcher can only take so many installs at a time...very sorry for that oversight but glad to hear you are back in business

Yeah, of course I spoke too soon. Somewhere in the pipeline we're getting choked, I don't know if it's at my end or the website (the evidence is contradictory, so I guess both might be true?) and I can't get Riverview and Roaring Heights, though I can get the smaller files.

It could be the website...it's been more troublesome than usual lately...God knows what they're doing over there. Maybe wait a bit and/or restart your computer. The only things I can suggest is to move the 3packs you've installed out of the downloads folder and put them somewhere safe, delete all the .temp files in DCCache and restart the Launcher and see if that works for you. If not, as a last resort try my suggestion for the Super Patch...other than that I can't think of anything else. Good luck