My Game Won't Save!! :( And unable to connect to Orgin

[livelove07]

 I haven't had many issues recently playings the Sims, but just the other day while I was building on a third floor and had everything built and set up, I went to save my game and waited forever until a message told me the game was unable to save and that windows was checking for a solution to the problem. I tried saving the game while in play as well, and it just stayed in the 'saving' process but never saved and I had to shut my computer down and restart it. I just don't get what's going on with all this.
I have Supernatural, Pets, Seasons, Katy Perry Sweet stuff, Generations, and a bunch of other stuff packs but like I said before, I never experienced any problems before trying to create a third floor in my house.

Also, not sure if it is related or not, but I keep getting the message 'unable to connect to Origin" i have no way of checking to see if my orgin is up to date, as it doesn't say anything anywhere when I open my account. I also am trying to update in the Sims launcher, but it won't allow me since I am "unable to connect to Orgin"... gah. SOOO frustrating! I'm not sure what to do! Anyone??? Please help!

[Joria]

Also, not sure if it is related or not, but I keep getting the message 'unable to connect to Origin" i have no way of checking to see if my orgin is up to date, as it doesn't say anything anywhere when I open my account. I also am trying to update in the Sims launcher, but it won't allow me since I am "unable to connect to Orgin"... gah. SOOO frustrating! I'm not sure what to do! Anyone??? Please help!

I feel your pain since this is the very issue that caused me to completely uninstall/reinstall everything.  That didn't fix it by the way.

My understanding is there are several problems it could be.  One is your game is on a Quarantine list in your anti-virus.  You have to go into your anti-virus software, mine is Norton which is notorious for doing this, and make sure you "allow" the game to by pass firewalls etc.  This fixes it for some, did nothing for me.  Some have suggested completely turning off your firewall and anti-virus.  I even tried that and it didn't work.

In some cases it could be because your changed your email address.  This wasn't the case for me but here is a link Mrs. Flynn found for me:

http://answers.ea.com/t5/The-Sims-3/Can-t-connect-with-Origin/td-p/121764

She wrote:

"What happens is that you already have a file called ChallengeData.package

When you change the email address that is connected to your account, a
second ChallengeData.package file gets generated causing confusion because
both files seem to get paged at the same time.

So, you must remove the older ChallengeData.package.

1. Go to your game files

2. Click on Downloads

3. You will see two folders with a long number as folder names.

- One folder will have a ChallengeData.package in it by itself.

-The other folder will have 2 files: ChallengeData.package and
PassportData.package

-The folder with 2 files in it contains your older ChallengeData.package
file. Cut that file and paste it to a new folder on your desktop and name
it something like backup for launcher.

4.Select ALL files in your downloads folder that begin with
dynamicchallenge and the .bin file with your current email address ex:
[email protected] Cut and paste these to the new folder on your
desktop. If you see a file with your old email address in your downloads
folder. Delete that file.

Restart your launcher."

I DID find this but correcting it did not help.  Still, it should be done in any case as it can solve a variety of issues.

She also wrote:

"Connection Issues with Origin
https://help.ea.com/article/connection-issues-with-origin

-- This talks about firewalls, Server outages, etc. But it also talks
about which ports on your router that need to be open. You may need to
look up your routers maker's website to see how to check/open ports."

We have not tried this yet.  Too much chaos with remodeling going on at my house but it's basically the last resort and we will try it soon.

My "work around" for the problem is the MINUTE the play button shows up on the launcher I click it.  I still get the "can't connect message" but after clicking ok, and waiting a bit, my game starts.  So I do get to play.  By the way, it happens whether or not I'm playing from disk or directly from Origin.  Once I get into the main menu of the game, I go to the options thing, (three dots in blue field found on lower left corner), and select "Open Launcher".  This will open a second launcher and minimize the "game" you had just gotten into.  You can then install or uninstall things from your launcher or buy items from the store, or whatever you would use the launcher for.  When done just close out the second launcher and play your game if you want to.  It's a royal pain to do this but till hubby can do the router ports thing it's the best I've got. 

Here's a link to Crinrict's blog.  This gal has done a lot of work and answered a ton of questions.  It takes a long time to find what you want but if there is an answer she will probably have it.  She's on the EA official forum.

http://sims3.crinrict.com/en/welcome

We even tried live chat with the Origin help line.  Don't bother!  After 8 hours and making things even worse than we started, we finally just, once again, uninstalled and reinstalled everything and are back where we started.  It was a nightmare dealing with people who actually knew less than we did.  Ever see the Capitol One bank card commercial with "Peggy", the barbarian in Siberia?  Well, you definitely get a "Peggy".  Their final solution was call EA.  Yeah, right.