Long Loads: How to Shorten Them?

[LlamaMama]

Does the number of items and patterns downloaded increase the load time of a particular saved game file? Or does that affect the game loading prior to the Main Menu?

With a generational legacy game, the loading of that save file (newly-named each save) appears to take longer, the more generations I've gotten to.

I'd like to have quicker loads, but don't want to delete a bunch of stuff if that's not going to make a significant impact. Is there some trick, like maybe saving and evicting the household and their house and then re-placing them on the lot that will compress the file size?

Btw, I start the game by bypassing the launcher.

[Metropolis Man]

I feel right with you on this one. My Dynasty file takes absolutely forever to save back to the desktop — probably a full minute. And it takes a long time to open as well. Nothing can be done about it I'm guessing. There's just more information that needs to be processed as you get deeper and deeper into generations. Think about everything going on in the neighborhood too — more and more and more Sims are added. All of that needs to be somehow saved.

[LlamaMama]

I thought I'd read that the file size compresses or cleans up by moving them out and back, but I'm afraid of interrupting opportunity chains, relationships, etc.

[Pam]

I thought I'd read that the file size compresses or cleans up by moving them out and back, but I'm afraid of interrupting opportunity chains, relationships, etc.

I don't know how true that is, but I wouldn't risk it on my Dynasty file.

[samoht04]

I think it all depends on how big or long you have had a game, I can tell you that the Characters take forever.

[Saltypaws]

I agree, my large game files and especially my dynasty, takes a long time to load and takes a while when I save it.  It took so long the other day to save, I almost paniced. lol

[Pam]

Just another bit of information for everyone...  the larger your game file, the more chance you're going to have the Error 12, 13, or 16 crashes, too.  I've started having them in my Dynasty file now.  I always start getting those errors in files that I've been playing for a long time.  They happen when you try to save and there's nothing to be done about it.  You just have to quit without saving and reload your game.  It's incredibly frustrating, let me tell you!  Be sure to save often so that when it does happen, you won't lose as much of your play time. 

It also seems like the game will crash to desktop more often as the files get bigger.  I've had to replay the last bits of my Dynasty game two, three, or even sometimes four times because of crashes or because the save didn't take. 

Even though we can't prevent these issues, better to know ahead of time that they are likely to happen and try to take precautions with extra saves! 

[Saltypaws]

I had that happen last night.  Had played for quite some time and really had not saved it for a while.  I decided to save and left the room, when I came back, it was back to desktop and I lost a couple of sim days, which is not too bad, so just will have to remember to save more often and shut the computer down after a few hours of playing.  I had only been playing for 8 hours yesterday, gee, wonder why it shut down, lol.

I decided to play another game for a while and it did not take that game long to load at all.

[Schipperke]

Does the number of items and patterns downloaded increase the load time of a particular saved game file? I'd like to have quicker loads, but don't want to delete a bunch of stuff if that's not going to make a significant impact.

Yes, my Dynasty takes longer and longer to load.  Going back to LlamaMama's post, would it help to delete some of the unnecessary stuff?  Does anyone know?

[Metropolis Man]

Yes, my Dynasty takes longer and longer to load.  Going back to LlamaMama's post, would it help to delete some of the unnecessary stuff?  Does anyone know?

I certainly would think so. The more objects on a lot, the more memory and resources it takes to draw all of those and it would certainly affect save/load times.

[LlamaMama]

I'd like to remind people that every time you delete a bunch of stuff, or install a stuff pack or expansion, be sure you clean up your hard drive and defrag. I highly recommend Auslogics BoostSpeed software for superior Windows maintenance and optimization.

[Leto85]

I'd like to remind people that every time you delete a bunch of stuff, or install a stuff pack or expansion, be sure you clean up your hard drive and defrag. I highly recommend Auslogics BoostSpeed software for superior Windows maintenance and optimization.

Exactly what I use: Auslogic BoostSpeed. Registry Cleanup, disk cleanup, disk defragmentation, it al leads to a perfect working system, softwarematically speaking of course.

[Naga]

I have played the same game file since I got The Sims 3, I have never had any error, and my game only crashed if it was because of a PC overheat.

Don't hate me just yet. There's a drawback.
...
My game takes literally (and proved) 10 minutes to load from the main menu to the game, and 10-15 minutes to "save and quit".

[Beddy_Boop]

I'd like to remind people that every time you delete a bunch of stuff, or install a stuff pack or expansion, be sure you clean up your hard drive and defrag. I highly recommend Auslogics BoostSpeed software for superior Windows maintenance and optimization.

Is this free? Will you ever have to pay for it? It usually takes about 5-10 minutes for the main menu to the in-game to load.

[Pam]

Is this free? Will you ever have to pay for it? It usually takes about 5-10 minutes for the main menu to the in-game to load.

You can get a 14 day free trial, but after that it's around US$50.00 to purchase it.  I'm giving serious thought to buying it.  From what I read on their site, it does a lot more than I'm able to do on my own.  It might be worth it.