Help! White X surrounded by a red circle...FIXED!

[rylangere]

When I try to open my game, I get a message box with the Sims 2 listed at the top and a white X surrounded by a red circle.  I've never had this happen before!  I have been downloading custom content and decided to start my game to play around with the new hairs I've downloaded when I got that error.  I have The Sims 2, University, Nightlife, and Seasons installed.  I opened my game yesterday without any issues.  Has anyone else come across this?  Any help would be much appreciated =)

I decided to just unintall everything and reinstall it thinking this would be easier than combing through my list of downloads.  Boy was I wrong.  I reinstalled The Sims 2 and tried opening it and got an error saying it is not compatible with Windows.  I have Windows Vista and I have never gotten this error.  I've had this computer for just less than a year.  I updated with the patch and I can now get to the Sims 2 loading screen and then it all goes blue, like it gets stuck when loading.  I have no idea what's going on, but I'm thisclose to throwing in the towel.  Thanks for letting me vent.  If anyone has experienced anything like this and could offer any insight, I would appreciate it. Thank you! 

[amc462000]

this is a stupid question probably, but - you do have your disk in the disk drive?

[ancienthighway]

Sounds like a mesh that doesn't like your game.  Try moving those new downloads out and starting up the game again.  If the game starts up, you get the long tedious task of checking out all the new meshes.

[rylangere]

Lol no question is stupid, amc!  Yes, my disk is in.  That was the first thing I actually checked!  I wouldn't put it past myself to forget that...    I was afraid I'd have to sort through my downloads... At least I haven't gone too crazy yet so it shouldn't be too daunting of a task.  I just hope that fixes it!  Thanks for the help!  I'll let ya know how it goes.

[SimGirl20]

Hi I have seen the dreaded red circle as well when I let my boyfriends cousin borrow and install my game on her laptop, the game installed fine for about 2 months and then she was wondering why it wouldnt come up one day so I went over and checked it out and found that some files had been deleted from the registry folder and configuration folders within the sims2 folder so I figure her son had something to do with that since he is 9 and so we un-installed and re-installed and it still wouldn't work and still won't work after we had done a system restore..I hope this hasn't happened to you?

[Amorine]

When I try to open my game, I get a message box with the Sims 2 listed at the top and a white X surrounded by a red circle.  I've never had this happen before!  I have been downloading custom content and decided to start my game to play around with the new hairs I've downloaded when I got that error.  I have The Sims 2, University, Nightlife, and Seasons installed.  I opened my game yesterday without any issues.  Has anyone else come across this?  Any help would be much appreciated =)

It's too late to be of help now, since you've already reinstalled your game, but if this happens again, you should try deleting the Groups:cache file in the my documents\Sims 2 folder (or whatever it's called on Vista, I'm still running XP).  You can also safely delete the accessories;cache file.  This has only happened to me once and deleting these files worked.  Apparently, the Groups cache file is easily corrupted.  Some people have to delete it every time they play. 

Another thing you can try, if you ever get the game to reinstall and have problems in future, is to rename the my documents\Sims 2 folder, even to something as simple as Sims 2-1, and load the game.  It will generate a whole new Sims 2 folder, and you can copy your original files into the new one, adding downloads a few at a time til you find any problem files. 

Sorry I can't help with your reinstalling problems

[rylangere]

SimGirl20, that's exactly what happened to me.  I now get the error stating that the program isn't compatible.  It makes absolutely no sense considering I've done nothing differently!  Thanks for your suggestion, Amorine.  If I ever get the game to work properly again and have the same issue, I'll definitely try that first.  I guess I figured it would just be best to start completely over.  I should never listen to myself!  Haha    Perhaps someday I'll get to play!  If I don't get it figured out in a day or so, I'm going to have my friend's boyfriend look at it.  He's super good at computers so hopefully he will be able to help!  Thanks, everyone =)

[SimGirl20]

That is very unfortunate that you still can't get your game to work Rylangere, I deleted her cache files in her Sims2 Folder Amorine but like I said that wasn't the problem, some of her registry files had been deleted/corrupted and I'm sure other things stemmed from those problems making the game not work but I'm not sure what I didn't look too much into it but I did compare my files with hers and ruled out some of her core files had gone missing so with that said it would probably be best but perhaps not if you have already tried but either cleaning your harddrive by clicking on Start:All Programs:Accessories:System Tools:Disk Clean-up and then just choosing what drives need to be optimized maybe even both your C & E Drives to get rid of any corrupted files that may still be lingering, then go into My Document:The Sims2 and delete your folders or thumbnails called Content Registry, Groups. Cache, Cigen.package, & Finally Accessories.Cache and maybe even safe to delete your thumbnails folder NOT the folder just the contents inside it so your game can regenerate new ones hope this helped, please let us know how it goes?

[rylangere]

Hmm I think I just found part of the problem... When I opened my Sims 2 folder, these are the only folders that were in there- Logs, Storytelling, Teleport, & Groups.cache.  When reinstalling the game, shouldn't all of the folders be there?     I wish I knew more about all of this so I knew what I was doing!   

[amc462000]

It sounds like a bad reinstall. Reinstall once more, making sure any running programs like antivirus are not running also. Nothing should be running while installing the game. Reinstall, patching after each EP. Since you don't have any downloads to worry about, starting it up after your last EP is installed should go fairly quickly. Let us know how this works.

[rylangere]

I just reinstalled The Sims 2 and when I tried to install the patch, there was an error readin, "Error during installation update."  =*(  Apparently, I'm not supposed to play     Thanks everyone for all the suggestions =)

[amc462000]

ok. after uninstalling everything again, go into your C drive, open up Program Files and see if there is a folder called EA Games. If there is, open it up. If there are folders in there with the names of your expansions and Sims 2 on them, delete them all. Then try reinstalling again, with nothing running in the background.

[rylangere]

Ahhhh!!! That worked, amc!!!!!!    I've only reinstalled the original game disk and the patch and my game opened without any issues!  Thank you so much!     I had no idea those folders would still be on my PC.    I'm not sure whether or not I want to install any other EP's or download any CC!  I'm sure I will, but I'm scared!  Thanks again everyone! =)

[amc462000]

you are welcome. I am glad that it worked. :}

[SimGirl20]

Thats Great rylangere!! I'm so glad its working for you again -high five-