(Sims 4 bug) Can't pause game

So since two or three weeks I have this really weird bug that happens every couple of minutes.

I try to pause my game and the pause button is highlighted, but the game doesn't stop. My Sims stay still then and they just have these small head/body movements they usually have when they're just standing around. The diamond above their heads also keeps rotating. At this point I can't interact with anything. No matter what object I click on, nothing happens. I also can't switch between my Sims. I can go into buy/build mode and open the menu, but the game still won't pause.
At some point (usually after 10s to 60s) the time will reset and I'll be back at the moment where this bug started and I can interact with everything normally. But a couple minutes later and the bug will appear again.

I googled a lot and went through many forums and I realized that I'm not the only one with this problem, but no one seems to have a solution for this.

My game is up to date (version 1.7.65.1020). I deleted all mods and cc, I tried playing fullscreen and in windowed mode, and I also deleted the localthumbcache.package file every time. But after just two minutes in-game the bug appears again, every single time.

Do you guys have any ideas or tips? Because I can't play like this anymore and it sucks

Thanks for the fast reply.

I renamed the sims folder and I played for an hour and so far everything works perfectly well, which is amazing! But what does that mean for me? Is something wrong with my savefiles or any specific files? Should I avoid putting any (specific) files back into the sims folder?

eeveelutionize wrote:Thanks for the fast reply.

I renamed the sims folder and I played for an hour and so far everything works perfectly well, which is amazing! But what does that mean for me? Is something wrong with my savefiles or any specific files? Should I avoid putting any (specific) files back into the sims folder?

Hi there, @eeveelutionize, and welcome to the Games4theworld Forum!

That is hard to tell. It's possible that one of the Mods you had started causing the bug in the Saves you had, and that bug lingered even after the Mod was removed. I mean, you could always try backing up the folder you are using right now (and that is working) and put your save back to check if the problem persists. If it does, just delete the folder and put the backup again; and if it doesn't, then at least you didn't lose *much* of your progress. Or you could just continue playing with the game you have right now.

If you want, you can update us after you try your old Save again. Or just let us know if you consider the problem solved so we can close the topic. Good luck!

So bit by bit I put my cc and save files back into the game. The cc worked fine and I had no problems, but as soon as I started to play my regular families it was buggy as hell again. So the only thing I know for sure know is that the problem isn't a broken mod or old cc, but something's wrong with my save files.

I'm not sure what to do now (if I'll start from scratch or delete every family to see which one might be responsible), but I thought I would give everyone who may check this thread an update .