Ambitions and SURPRISE! - CTDs

[Tangie]

I went out and purchased the darn thing, tried to install it, got a message to patch the base game first so clicked OK on that, then installed Ambitions. Fired it up and looked around. Map view was fine and could enter buy and build, but every time I tried to select a pre-made household I got a CTD. No error messages, just BAM, looking at my desktop.

It turns out that adding the EP02 to your windows DEP list stops this from happening...just thought I'd pass that tidbit along. Worked for me, anyway.

[Claeric]

From what I'm hearing people are actually having little to no issues with ambitions. No bugs, no nothing. So while crashing to desktop sucks, at least it's not widespread and you can prevent it.

What is the DEP list?

[Tangie]

What, you don't feel like Googling it?

From Microsoft: "Data Execution Prevention (DEP) is a set of hardware and software technologies that perform additional checks on memory to help prevent malicious code from running on a system. In Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) and Microsoft Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005, DEP is enforced by hardware and by software."
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875352

I have Windows 7, but it's the same idea. There are instructions for editing your files to add it on this site, I believe, and at MTS. And I think Rainbow Brite added the instructions to her space on the TSCExchange site because I saw it after Googling DEP myself.

A relatively easy fix after a frustrating 4 crashes in a row. So yeah, could be worse.

[Ruffinshot]

Thanks Tangie. I'd completely forgotten I'd set that.

[Claeric]

I just got a crash after looking through the catalog and placing objects I wanted to check out. ;-; I'll try this.

[janedivided]

I spent half an hour trying to figure out what was crashing my game before I checked here, and duh, adding it to the DEP list fixed it.  So thanks for the reminder and saving me god knows how many more hours of frustration.

[gelfling]

From what I'm hearing people are actually having little to no issues with ambitions. No bugs, no nothing. So while crashing to desktop sucks, at least it's not widespread and you can prevent it.

I have Ambitions running on my Windows 7 x64 PC without issue thus far. I applied the 4Gb patch at the outset and have never needed to bother about with DEP.

[Tangie]

The first thing I tried was to use CFF Explorer to increase the 2GB limit on the EP02 exe file, but that didn't fix the problem for me. Not until I added the EP02 file to my DEP exception list in my Windows system folder did my crashing stop. I'm using a laptop with Windows 7, an i7 processor, and have 6 GB of RAM.

[StormchaserOne]

Glad to hear you are using CFF it was the only program I could find which almost stopped all DEP crashes.  EA just found out and are trying to fix ASAP.  Since many many customers are complaining it is the only game which crashes.  The most bought Windows 7 is 64 bit and EA is clueless.

[Klinn]

Just another data point: Two days ago my system ran the base game + WA just fine. A fresh completely vanilla install of retail base+WA+Ambitions led to game freezes every few seconds and crashes after a few minutes.
 
No CC, not even EA store items, no mods at all, started completely fresh with a brand new family in Twinbrook. Even moved all the previous user data, caches, and saves etc out of the My Documents folder, so anything in there is also freshly created.
 
The DEP trick did nothing for me. Tweaking the Ambition executable to use 4GB on my Vista x64 system seems to have cured the crashes, but the freezes remain. For example, with my sim just sitting in the library reading a skill book, approx every 5 seconds the game freezes for 3 or 4 seconds. This is a complete freeze, even the trees and other graphical effects halt. Lots of audio problems too, such as popping and dropping sounds, but I suppose this is likely tied to the same issue.
 
I'm going to try a new game in Sunset Valley next, but not holding out much hope for improvement.

[Buzzler]

 
The DEP trick did nothing for me. Tweaking the Ambition executable to use 4GB on my Vista x64 system seems to have cured the crashes, but the freezes remain. For example, with my sim just sitting in the library reading a skill book, approx every 5 seconds the game freezes for 3 or 4 seconds.

This is an old issue. There's probably a sim somewhere causing this. Resetsim would help, but there's no way to know which one it is. Once AM is updated, try resetworld. It worked for me.

[GnatGoSplat]

It turns out that adding the EP02 to your windows DEP list stops this from happening...just thought I'd pass that tidbit along. Worked for me, anyway.

I'm curious why the DEP fix would work for anyone.  By default, Windows installs with DEP set to, "Turn on DEP for essential Windows programs and services only."  The default option should only apply DEP to Windows system binaries.  Any other executable, including Sims 3, should be unaffected.  For those where the DEP setting made any difference, was your DEP setting different than default to begin with?

[Tangie]

Well, that's an excellent question.

Back when everyone was having so much trouble with the game crashing, someone (I believe this originated on the EA BBS) reported that changing the setting to allow DEP for everything but the EA executables seemed to fix their crashing, so many of us followed suit and it seemed to help. But of course every time there is an expansion, the new exe file is going to have to be added to the list. If I have time I may experiment by changing the setting back to essential Windows programs and services and see what happens.

[ShortyBoo]

I'm curious why the DEP fix would work for anyone.  By default, Windows installs with DEP set to, "Turn on DEP for essential Windows programs and services only."  The default option should only apply DEP to Windows system binaries.  Any other executable, including Sims 3, should be unaffected.  For those where the DEP setting made any difference, was your DEP setting different than default to begin with?

This is the same thing my brother said when I told him about it awhile back. I never did mess with it, either. I still get the Access Violation exceptions after crashes, but it's not too often. I remember reading something before, though, about how those crashes are actually the result of bad programming on EA's part. Like mine always says "ACCESS_VIOLATION writing address 0x00000000" and according to what I read, that 0x00000000 address is supposed to be only used by Windows and when another program tries to access it, it stops it, causing the exception. Apparently the same problem exists with Spore. I'm not sure if it's right or not since I'm not an expert, but it does kind of make sense.

[That Eighties Guy]

Ach, this DEP voodoo magic didn't work for me. If I wasn't so damned tired from work, I'd experiment all night.
Using regular XP, by the way. herp a derp.

[dragonic]

I found that the launcher loads store items in a snap! Before Ambitions, it would load 3 items and then freeze.
EA did something right this time perhaps?

[spaceface]

My report:

Yesterday I patched, took out AM etc, made a test hood and played a random household for a bit.

Today I bought the EP, installed the EP, opened my test hood whereupon I was asked if I wanted to put in the new lots so I did, no problems there. As soon as the game opened up the household it crashed to desktop.

I added the EP to the DEP list, and have now been able to play for quite a while with no problems.

(For the record, I'm using store-bought copies of the base game, WA, HELS as well as Ambitions.)

[Alwayswatching]

I never had an issues with crashing. Alls I did was patch, install Ambitions, remove AM, change other mods to new structure, then play. I can even load up old AwesomeMod saves without hassle.

[Tangie]

This is likely to only be an issue for people who changed their DEP settings for EP01. Once you make changes to add EA executables as exceptions, each new expansion will have to be added to the list. I am still hoping, sometime this weekend, to return the settings to the default and see if I have any problems with crashing.

[That Eighties Guy]

How does one run the game without AM installed? I don't want to use a crack on my lovely babies.

...
No, I won't buy it.

[Sarafina]

I use the Nrass no cdmod and it works just fine when am isn't avaliable.  Just drop in packages folder.

[That Eighties Guy]

Ah, m'yes. Got it to work using Nraas' No CD. But despite what other people say, I am getting the worst performance I have ever seen out of TS3. Now, my computer isn't very powerful. In fact, it just passes the Recommended hardware. But pre-Ambitions I could play with my settings on Medium-High with little to no stuttering or hiccups.

Now with Ambitions installed and running (AND no mods installed), it's near unplayable. Fucks sake.
Fiddled with some options, now, for no apparent reason at all, it's running fine again. CTDs are still roaming mystically though. Completely random (and common) actions can give me a crash, sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

[nekochanpurr]

I've tried DEP, CFF, putting the game on my 'safe' list for comodo, making my game run as administrator, also trying to make it run as XP system pack 2. Took out all CC, pretty much everything besides a complete reinstall.. Which I have a feeling will end up tomorrows venture. My game is crashing straight to desktop, no message, black screen, etc. Oh! I'm also using 3booter and limiter. Anyone else having this kind of shitty luck?

[That Eighties Guy]

When entering a lot? Or is it when the game is loading?

Also, my sim can't take a fucking piss without the game crashing.

[nekochanpurr]

They don't have to be doing any certain thing. It seems to range anywhere from 5-10 minutes though.. Oddly, it crashes quicker without any mods. It could possibly be when leaving lots, but I'm not 100% sure on that because of how random it feels. Going on my third day of googling for answers..