Two Sims 3 Folders

[BrittaRose]

Hello, so a few months ago something went wrong with my computer. All of my documents, pictures, videos folders etc. were empty and instead the files saved in another part of the computer. I sorted out the folder mix ups kind of (though I don't know what caused it) but I don't know what to do with Sims 3. It seems to have split between two Electronic Arts folders (one in documents, another in program filesx86). There is a Sims 3 folder with all my saves, cc, sims, downloads etc. and another which has all the expansions and is the one that plays.

I tried copying over the content in each of the folders to the ones corresponding in the one that plays but aside from the cc which I seem to only be able to install one at a time via the folder nothing else is appearing in game. I've never re-installed and had to deal with moving old saves and other files so I don't know what I'm doing really. I'm sure there's an easy fix but I don't want to do something stupid that destroys the game as well so I've been a bit hesitant messing with it.

I'm a windows user and the game is up to date. I have world adventures, ambitions, generations, town life, pets, seasons, university, and into the future installed.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[KhaineGB]

It's supposed to do that.

\Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 (and variations thereof) are where your core game files are installed.

\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 is where all your user content goes (saves, CC, screenshots, etc).

By copying between the two, you've made a mess. I advise backing up your CC and saves folder, uninstalling the game, deleting any spare folders and then reinstalling it.

[BrittaRose]

Ah okay. Feel rather stupid now haha. Don't know why it stopped working in the first place now then. After all my other folders messed up was when I went onto it and realised it wasn't loading my things at all.

I might see why that happened. Could it be because of my libraries messing up?

I've made it so I can see my documents in the library but the default location is still wrong. Don't know what happened and what's wrong and right location wise. Guess I need to figure that out first. When I downloaded something and installed it after everything disappeared it appeared in the program files I think so I assumed that everything should've been in there.

I'm not the best with this sort of thing! Thanks for replying so quickly!

[KhaineGB]

Windows just very much likes to do whatever it wants.

What I would honestly recommend, if you're comfortable with it, would be to back up your saves and anything else you need, then completely reinstall windows. That should fix any errors, plus reinstalling windows every year or two really helps with performance (at least from what I've observed).