The Sims 3 - Empty Start up screen. [SOLVED]

Hello everyone,
I recently registered to this site even though I've been browsing it quite a bit before. I really need help with my game.
I bought my laptop 2 months before and it came with Windows 8. I tried installing the game but when I played it, it would just get stuck at the EA logo. So I browsed the internet and came upon this ultimate fix. I did everything that the guide said including having at least one of several expansion packs, updated the game to the latest version and copy paste the mentioned files in the '...Sims 3/Game/Bin' folder. I launched the game and I could get past the EA logo. The game loaded after the cinematics but when I came across the Main Menu. There was nothing there to select. Nothing happens when I click on a new game, there's no Town and even the options in '...' are empty.

I would be glad if anyone could help me. I couldn't find any solution online. Any ideas would be much appreciated.

And here's a screenshot:

cat2006house wrote:Hello,

Have you tried the following?
1. Open "Start" and type "regedit" in the search box. After that, press [ENTER].

2. When the Registry Editor has opened, navigate to this path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > Sofware > Sims > The Sims 3 (Be sure that you're navigating to exactly this path!)
If it's not in that path, it may be here: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SOFTWARE > Wow6432Node > Sims > The Sims 3 (Be sure that you're navigating to exactly this path!)

3. Now you'll see 2 files called "Locale" and SKU. Double-click on it and change the value to "en-US" and change the SKU value to 7.
4. Click "OK", close the Editor and... ENJOY playing!

Hey thanks for your reply! I did exactly as you said and those values were already there
So I guess that isn't the problem..

I'm getting hopeless -.-

cat2006house wrote:Hello,


I suspect you did something wrong during installation. Did you use WinRAR to extract the torrent of the base game? Where did you download the base game and/or other expansions?

 

 I already have the base on a DVD that I bought 3 years ago. As for the expansion I think I got it off TPB and in the .rar there's an instructions file where "***TORRENT BY: Games4theworld***" is written. Since the installation is pretty straightforward I don't know if I could even screw something up. Except for the page where it says 'Choose your country' or something like that, I didn't chose US but my own country. Could that have an impact? o.O I don't think so.. but we never know..

Or maybe I should download the torrent version base game?

Oh my god.. after I read that link, I re applied the 1.55 patch one more time and cracked it according to the guide and... it worked! Everything seems to be back to normal.. Haven't played it thoroughly to test if its working 100% but I got past this problem. Thank you for you help!

Problem Solved!

Hey guys! New here  I have downloaded Sims 3 with all the Ex. Packs and Stuff Packs. After hours of installing, I get the same problem explained above. Blank main menu. At first I thougth it was a language error: My game was installed in greek - probably because of my location. I changed the language in regedit believing that the blank main menu was due to some of the expansion or stuff packs not being available in greek. I set the language as en-US and the value at 7, as advised above. Still the same error. I tried to re update the game, but it didn't work, as the patch there is outdated and my launcher was already updated to a newer version. I downloaded the fix anyway and followed the instructions to no success  I am using windows 8 as well btw, on my new laptop. I don't know what else to do. I guess the only thing I didn't try was uninstalling and re installing everything.. Any ideas? Do you think that would work?

//EDIT

Ugh! Sorry guys! Just saw the other post about this


Moderator edit: I think I can close this topic now.

- Carlos