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Field Researcher
Original Poster
#1 Old 22nd May 2019 at 2:30 PM
Default For 7 days, The Sims 4 is free on origin.
SOURCE. Yes, this is real.
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Field Researcher
#2 Old 22nd May 2019 at 4:10 PM
The question is how long do they get to keep it? Since they have turned over the game to a mobile producer, and have said recently they would be rolling out things more like mobile does, it didn't take long did it? Free to Play anyone? I'm waiting to see the cost of recolors now that they have said they would be changing up things to be more like how mobile handles it's DLC.
Instructor
#3 Old 23rd May 2019 at 3:32 AM
So even though I said I would never buy TS4, I downloaded it for free through Origin (it's FREE LOL). It took maybe 8-10 minutes to download, no problem. I went to play it, and I couldn't see anything, I just got a bouncing message that says something like "interface couldn't load." I can hear it loading and playing intro music, so it seems to be a display issue. My Sims 3 works just fine on the same computer. I have a GeForce GTX 1050 graphics card. I'm using 3.7 GB of 8.0 GB memory on an Acer computer with Windows 10 64 bit. Anyone else have this issue? What part of my system is incompatible with TS4 but works fine with TS3?

goderguy
Mad Poster
#4 Old 23rd May 2019 at 7:45 AM
Can You Run It is not always right, but I would check there.
Instructor
#5 Old 23rd May 2019 at 3:58 PM
Everything I check says my computer and graphics card specs are fine, and if I can run TS3, I can run TS4. Hmmm...

goderguy
Forum Resident
#6 Old 23rd May 2019 at 5:17 PM
Perhaps a bad download? You can try repairing the game or if worst comes to worst, uninstall the reinstall the game.
Scholar
#7 Old 23rd May 2019 at 5:49 PM
@goderguy Update your graphics drivers man.

So be it. Move. ~Jason Bourne
Simblr
Top Secret Researcher
#8 Old 23rd May 2019 at 6:57 PM
Is everyone and their brother downloading just this minute? I've been stuck on 'preparing' for 15 minutes. LOL
Test Subject
#9 Old 23rd May 2019 at 8:06 PM
but why? lol just make a game people actually want to play so you dont have to give it away for free
Top Secret Researcher
#10 Old 23rd May 2019 at 9:39 PM
If anyone else is stuck on it 'preparing' for over an hour, sign out and back in again; that seems to have worked.
Instructor
#11 Old 23rd May 2019 at 9:55 PM
Quote: Originally posted by spammmm
but why? lol just make a game people actually want to play so you dont have to give it away for free


It's good marketing.

Sims 4 bombed on release, a lot of people abandoned it because of it.

I'd bet now they feel confident enough they can sell copies with the amount of content on offer, so they're offering the base game for free to try and win back old lost customers or attract new ones. Sales tend to fall off dramatically over time so they're probably making money on this endeavour despite the base game being free.
Lab Assistant
#12 Old 23rd May 2019 at 9:59 PM
keep it
Top Secret Researcher
#13 Old 24th May 2019 at 12:21 AM
Hard Pass.
Lab Assistant
#14 Old 25th May 2019 at 1:10 PM
Free is free so I claimed a copy the other day, and installed and tried it earlier today. I was prepared to be reluctantly amused temporarily at least, even though I already knew it's of no interest to me long term. I was wrong. It looked even worse in-game than in Let's Plays on YT, and I LOATHE the controls. I can't stand dealing with it even for a short time. Life is too short to be hate-playing anything.
Lab Assistant
#15 Old 25th May 2019 at 3:38 PM
downloaded it because err.. Free. Its very okay since i cannot play sims 3 on this potato of a lap top... However i won't be buying any expansions or stuff packs unless they are also pretty much free so...
Mad Poster
#16 Old 25th May 2019 at 4:58 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Woolysmurf
Free is free so I claimed a copy the other day, and installed and tried it earlier today. I was prepared to be reluctantly amused temporarily at least, even though I already knew it's of no interest to me long term. I was wrong. It looked even worse in-game than in Let's Plays on YT, and I LOATHE the controls. I can't stand dealing with it even for a short time. Life is too short to be hate-playing anything.

@Woolysmurf Camera Controls? You can change those back to TS3, which are close to TS2/

P.S. Sorry for my bad english.
Lab Assistant
#17 Old 25th May 2019 at 5:22 PM
Quote: Originally posted by SneakyWingPhoenix
@Woolysmurf Camera Controls? You can change those back to TS3, which are close to TS2/

Not specifically, just the controls in general. As with all the sims games I'm sure you can tweak most things, but it's not worth it when you hate the game overall, and I really, truly do. I don't have time to play TS2 and TS3 as much as I'd like so don't feel the need to jump through hoops for this pile of dung.

Might be good to know for someone else though, so thanks for pointing that out.
Mad Poster
#18 Old 25th May 2019 at 7:25 PM
Quote: Originally posted by DeservedCriticism
It's good marketing.

Sims 4 bombed on release, a lot of people abandoned it because of it.

I'd bet now they feel confident enough they can sell copies with the amount of content on offer, so they're offering the base game for free to try and win back old lost customers or attract new ones. Sales tend to fall off dramatically over time so they're probably making money on this endeavour despite the base game being free.


Likely this, the basegame is worth relatively little at this point- rather the goal is to attract people to the series who are otherwise turned away by the entry cost of the base game, and then hope that some of them will become fans and purchase the add-ons.
Mad Poster
#19 Old 25th May 2019 at 9:15 PM
@Woolysmurf What are you referring to exactly?

P.S. Sorry for my bad english.
Mad Poster
#20 Old 25th May 2019 at 9:28 PM Last edited by SneakyWingPhoenix : 26th May 2019 at 12:33 AM.
Quote: Originally posted by DeservedCriticism
It's good marketing.

Sims 4 bombed on release, a lot of people abandoned it because of it.

I'd bet now they feel confident enough they can sell copies with the amount of content on offer, so they're offering the base game for free to try and win back old lost customers or attract new ones. Sales tend to fall off dramatically over time so they're probably making money on this endeavour despite the base game being free.

And the base might be gone from the FREE bin after their favorite milestone number has reached. Would be relief if people did not rush to buy content packs until they had at least played the base game alone for a YEAR. Like pretty much the time period you had to wait for the first EP to be released. Then it's up to then to decide to purchase anything, leaving them time to think of how much time they poured playing the game.Then perhaps they would decline on the decision... but I doubt that's likely to happen. Fate of mine is gone as I previously mention numerious of times. The franchise does not have to endure all this horrific torture. It would be preferabal If it died naturally... painlessly but without it being dragging. If an expansion can solve your issues with the BG, you're probably wrong and naive :D

P.S. Sorry for my bad english.
Instructor
#21 Old 25th May 2019 at 10:29 PM
When I last checked News in game the number of online players got to over 210,000 and that's about double I saw last at the same time before the offer so lots of people took a free copy. There's a countdown to the termination of the offer at the top of the Origin page. There's far more in the game than there was at the Base game in 2014.
Mad Poster
#22 Old 25th May 2019 at 11:41 PM
Quote: Originally posted by daisylee
Can You Run It is not always right, but I would check there.

Can You Run It is never right. All it does is scan your hardware and check it toward official requirements. But any dedicated gamer knows official requirements often lie and there are a lot of variables, including how optimized the game is and what mods you use, that determine your experience. Any experienced PC user knows that simply because another person has the same hardware, doesn't mean they'll have the same experience. It's a your millage may vary ordeal.

In reality there is only one way to know if it'll run on your machine.

Because the earth is standing still, and the truth becomes a lie
A choice profound is bittersweet, no one hears Cassandra Goth cry

Mad Poster
#23 Old 26th May 2019 at 12:35 AM
Isn't TS4 intented to be toaster-friendly? Whether your machine lives up to spec shouldn't be much of a concern for a modern PC, no?

P.S. Sorry for my bad english.
Instructor
#24 Old 26th May 2019 at 6:31 AM
What'd be hilarious is if they took these numbers and then were like "SIMS 4 OFFICIALLY SOLD MORE COPIES THAN SIMS 1!!!" or something like that. And then you know the community would willingly turn their brains off and eat it up like "WOW this is officially the best Sims game EVER!!!! look how popular it is!!"
Scholar
#25 Old 26th May 2019 at 1:47 PM
I love TS2 and have been playing it for almost 10 years. recently I started playing TS3, a game I told myself I never would play. And now I have been downloading/installing the TS4 because it was free...

Ok, it was just the base game and it seemed to run well on my win 10 laptop. It does bugs me thou that I have to log in on Origin every single time I want to play. Very uncool indeed. I downloaded aprox. 13.4GiB of data, an operation that did take hours over a Wi-Fi network, and can not play local on my computer. But it does look good. I did see the review from LGR about the base game and as I understand it it's back to TS2. No open world (and a very limited world) a lot of loading screens etc.PP. Oh well, I will give it a try. It was FREE after all...
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