The Sims™ 3

i have been playing sims since sim safari. sims 3 has BY FAR the best gameplay mechanics of any mainline sims game (ie not counting mysims, story games, or sims psp), and truly the sheer amount of options and interactions in this game (especially with expansions) absolutely dwarfs any simulator game i have ever played -- not even including invisible/hidden interactions, like how you can bounce a golf ball off of a building if you're close enough to it. there is just so much content in this game that i have never been able to put it down. is it the best sims game for modding/cc? no. does it have the largest fan community? no. is it the easiest to play as a beginner? no. but i think if you are even CONSIDERING playing this game, you are exactly the type of person who will enjoy it, and i couldn't recommend it more.

Love it so much I perfer it on steam since I had all the sims 3 packs on EA app and when I logged back on they were sadly gone but I am so thankfully for steam as nothing bad has ever happend to my game after years on here and I love it

This is a far better game than Sims 4. You have full access to the entire world with no load times when you choose to wander the landscape. You can explore easily, and can move from lot to lot without trouble. Mods are slightly more difficult to install, but I find they make for a richer experience. The visual quality is less than Sims 4, but I always had way more fun in Sims 3 and never got past a few Sim days before shutting down Sims 4.

fun game i like to make people i dont like irl do diabolical things sometimes game is laggy but i bought the cheapest laptop at best buy so maybe thats a me issue

Better gameplay than sims 4, graphics are horrible lol

i can't play it at all since i bought it. I Have it on my windows 11 laptop. serious error occured keep popping everytime i open the game.

Starting again after a few years of not playing. I have alot of games but this is the one I'm turning to to take a break from Minecraft because of the boycott. Is that a recommendation? You be the judge.

Took a little tweaking to run smoothly, but game launched immediately after downloading in 2025 without having to fix anything. Very happy so far, brings back a lot of nostalgia from when I played it as a kid.

Sims is always fun, what else to say, but this one has a special charm to it!

As a long-time fan of the sims 4, I can say that The Sims 3 has the game beaten in a few key categories. For the most part. Firstly, it is cheaper. Yes I am aware The Sims 4 is free, but it requires dlc. So it really isn't. Sims 3 dlc is better value and there isn't as much to get. The gameplay is a little more compelling too, sims are harder to look after, the rewards system has more variety. The create a sim isn't as fleshed out as The Sims 4, but you will likely be spending more time playing the actual game for that to be much of an issue. I also think Sims 4 has more cultural clothing options. The sims 3 overwhelms the sims 4 in terms of content, a few things are more fleshed out than they are in the sims 4, but on the other hand, the sims 4 has some things that are a little more fleshed out than the sims 3, namely social interactions. I like having a separate "pink" bar that makes tracking romance easier. All in all, the sims 3 makes a better attempt at making a game that mirrors actual life. The sims 4 has too many loading screens to be fully immersed in the world. I write this review for those who are becoming a little frustrated with the sims 4 and would like a breath of fresh air. Whether you like it or hate it, I recommend playing it, just to either realise what you're missing out on, or at the very least, come to appreciate the sims 4 for what it brings to the table.

am so angry my game crash for no reason i hope they can sort it out

It's Sims. So much to complain about, mainly the addiction and the inability to run it smoothly regardless of the computer I've tried to play it on. But at the same time, it's Sims. I will keep coming back and will play for a month straight, before never touching it for a year.

An amazing game, even though sometimes I spend more time troubleshooting then actually playing. But when I do get to actually play, it beats anything else in the life sim genre in my eyes.
(I would recommend acottonsock on YouTube for help getting the game in working order and generally getting better performance.)

I love this game but I won't review it positively or recommend you buy it. I do recommend you play it, however. This is a review of the total product, which is sub-par without serious modded help. The basegame and DLC have game breaking bugs, memory leaks, and all sorts of issues with amount of content for their cost, an issue that became worse in the sequel. Sims 3 saw me paying for the exact same DLC from Sims 2 instead of any integration. They expect you to have paid for winter three games in a row. A staple of the franchise is that all its features are piece-meal sold back to you at a premium every game. This game is no exception and the Katy Perry pack aged liked carbonera left on the ground right outside the fridge.

As a long time fan of The Sims franchise, what do I think about The Sims 3 (TS3)...I played it when it was first released in 2009; bought a collector's edition, then continued playing on Steam, ditching the Origin version.
After many hours, years playing it, I can safely say that TS3 still remain the best, fun, enjoyable game in the series/franchise and I consider it to be the top rank of TS game.

For a sequel, tons of improvements and new gameplay have been introduced, with a brand new mechanic of explorable open-world, new Sims' life management and better, deeper customization of your neighborhood, Sims, clothing, objects, and others, and yet still maintain the same formula of TS.

The game is even better with expansion packs and playing the base game alone is not recommended. A must have EPs like Seasons, University Life, Pets and Late Night should be added for more enjoyable TS3 experience. Other EPs are still great addition to make your Sims' life even better...or maybe even worst, if you choose to manage that kind of way.
How about Stuff Packs? Well, I don't care much about them but they are okay I guess if you like to have more stuff, but having custom modded objects just good enough for me.
(Though I don't know why EA still charge more with EPs with no sign of permanent price reduction. Better to wait them to go on sale)

In short, TS3 is a great sequel or life simulation game with new customization, gameplay improvements and updates over The Sims 2. Well, maybe with exception of certain details of animation, graphics and objects quality that TS2 remains superior.

To address some cons; the game unfortunately is not perfect. There are some flaws, mostly technical with some glitches. But nothing major that makes the game totally unplayable......except in regards of the performance which is the main issue of this series.
The game never received a proper update for modern hardware optimization and still stuck in 32-bit that can only handle up to 4GB RAM max. Even running with powerful hardware, the game still suffer with some lags, frames drop, improper load times or freeze and sluggish gameplay, especially if your save game has been expanded with more Sims, objects placement, continuous progressions (memories, inventory) and installed mods. The game would benefit a lot if it is updated with 64-bit that can handle more resources, but too bad EA would never make an update to address this problem, which is sad.

Despite such issue, it certainly does not stop me to continue playing, enjoying the game and also recommending it to everyone as long as it is remained playable and available.

First of all I'd like to say, recently I've hated EA. I cant stand sims 4, I stopped playing entirely. But I've always loved the Sims 3. I will never forget the countless hours I spent as a child and young teen playing and modding this game and I'm just so happy that I'm able to do it all over again. Yes it's slightly slow and at times glitchy but lets be honest, I'd rather have a glitchy game than an empty one.

Just your average sims game with the added edition of bugs and glitches. It wont save my progress with an error message popping up each time. The dlc is also wayyy too expensive for what you get.

too realistic, have to pay for dlc to experience university, have pets, and go on vacation?? I already get fucked irl for that already no thanks

its the best Sims game ever, but getting it to run on modern systems is too much of a pain to even bother with it. also if you want all DLCs, its gonna cost you a lot.

An absolute nightmare to get running on a modern machine (i7-14700K, RTX 4060) but worth it. 110% worth it
A classic with so much more soul and passion than TS4
Very addictive and pure digital nicotine

this 2009 game is better than a 2025(kinda) live service game. i'd recommend waiting if there's ever some deal on it as i got the base game, the pet dlc, the generational dlc, and the seasonal dlc all in a bundle thing together for cheap like ten years ago and then bought the night life pack, but honestly i think that the base game would serve enough entertainment for 20 bucks that the sims 4 could never offer.

fuck ea tho.

Doesn't launch and cant't get support, robbery!!

It's not working when I open steam and it says the game is already being played and it snot letting me play

very realistic, graphics are not the best unfortunately, the game would be so much better and worth the price if it was realistic like Inzoi or sims 4. Sims would be making thousands! Overall, game is amazing and totally worth it. Sims 4 isn't as realistic ( In life terms. ) But in graphic terms, it is AMAZING! I loved the graphics on sims 4 but I love the sims 3 wayyy more because, well I can just play it for hours and not get bored because of the open world and having to make sure your sim doesnt die or your child isnt taken away by social services. Sims 3 doesnt annoy me at all and my eyes will literally light up at the mention of it. Round of appalud to the developer/developers of this amazing game! It's probably one of the best life simulatours out there! This is my favourite computer game if all time, and all the girls and lads should try this, honestly its a game that can suit both genders, even if you're a boy you should give the sims a try! it's really impeccable! I love it, its the besr EVER MADE. ALL PERSONS SHOULD TRY THIS. ALL HUMANS SHOULD TRY THIS. ALL LIVING,BREATHING CREATURES NEED TO TRY THIS AMAZING GAME, IT SHOULD BE ILLEGAL TO HATE THE SIMS, I LOVE SIMS ITS ACTUALLY UNHEALTHY BECAUSE I STAY UP TO 10AM PLAYING IT FROM 12AM. I LOVE YOU, SIMS! PLEASE, NEVER DISCONTINUE SIMS 3, NEVER STOP UPDATING THIS AMAZING GAME, I BEG OF YOU, PLEASE NEVER STOP MAKING UPDATES, Also we need a sims 5 before we move onto inZoi, Thanks! have a good day, sims. Dag dag!

I sacrificed my college funds as a kid to buy a fancy desktop computer just so I could play this game on maximum settings, and I've been paying off student debt ever since.

The Sims 3 is the best Sims game. Great content and a ton more to do then in the Sims 4.

The Sims 3 is an old game, but not old enough for you to can't play it. This game is still very modern in term of gameplay, in fact i can say this is the best game in the series to play with a very advantage mechanic it has over the rest of the series and that is Open World, no longer you are required to load to every single place you want to visit.

With a help of mods, you can make your game smoother than a butter and gone the stutter or long loading because of what the modding community has done.

Very Recommended if you like Simulation and Sims series

Call me a madman, but once you get the ball rolling this is an immaculate steam deck title. Never in my life would I think I'd pay for this game on steam with the abysmal pricing even on sale, but here I am, and I gotta say life is quite nice without the EA Play/Origin launcher.

It's a good game... when you manage to run it! Thankfully community made a very thorough guide on Steam guide page that covers tons of bugs and fixes. It's unfortunate but as usual with older Sims games, Sims 3 has tons of issues that require patching. Personally, I'd say so far I find it less buggy than Sims 2?

I still consider The Sims™ 3 to be the best game in the series. I take long breaks but occasionally come back and spend many hours having fun.

The sims franchise is only as prominant as it is due to its creative premise and excellent marketing while I enjoy the more creative aspects of it you cant ignore the excessive loading times, the glitches and how overpriced it is for its age

Okay, so this game is by far my favorite sims game (as evidenced by my play time over the past 8 years lol) but with the Island Paradise expansion pack, it becomes very laggy.

DO NOT DOWNLOAD IT.

It makes the game pretty unplayable. Otherwise, it's great! Every other expansion works just fine.

A classic. The DLC is a little much even on sale for how old it is (You shouldn't need to spend nearly $200 with all DLC on 50% sale for a game released in 2009) but the experience is great and still holds up relatively well today

I bought The Sims 3 for my ex. She loved the series, and I thought this would be the perfect game for her. I still remember watching her play, getting lost in the world of virtual lives, creating stories, and designing houses with so much excitement. But that excitement didn’t last long.

She told me that The Sims 3 felt a bit empty without the expansions. The base game was fun, but it lacked the depth and variety that The Sims 2 (which I had bought with all the DLCs) had. In the end, she went back to The Sims 2, and The Sims 3 became more of a passing moment rather than a lasting favorite.

Still, every time I see The Sims 3, I can’t help but think of her—the way she laughed when her Sims did something ridiculous, how she meticulously decorated every house, and how, for a brief time, this game was a part of our story.

Even if the game didn’t stay with her, the memory of it stayed with me.

fun to play, buiding is fun and you get to be creative its relaxing

This game seems to be intentionally bricked. Does not work without a bizarre and inconsistent amount of fiddling.

I love playing this game so much more than sims 4. There's so much more life and character in this one that truly gives it a unique feel. The only problem is saving the game; you have to either pause or just stop Onedrive syncing while playing. I'm not the only one with this problem as it seems to affect a lot of other people in their reviews; this issue needs to be fixed, but I don't see that happening anytime soon since this has been happening for a while.

I wanted to play the game again for nostalgia's sake, but it never ended up working. I wasn't able to actually play it, and it never synced up to my EA account. I don't know if it's just aged and now it's outdated, but I was super disappointed. If you can get the game to work, it's absolutely fantastic, but for some reason, it didn't run properly for me.

I love this game. I think I spend the most time building and furnishing houses, but the gameplay is also so much fun. There are an incredible amount of things to do, and you can always find something new to focus on if you start to run out. Create a style (CAS) is by far the best cure for when you need to do something creative. Love it!

The Sims 3, like The Sims 2 and The Sims, is a life simulator. The difficulty has been toned down from The Sims 2, but I don't find that it detracts from the experience. I've thought about it a lot, and The Sims 3 is really somewhat of a missing link between the boring, pointless but fancy gameplay of The Sims 4 and the Sim City/excel spreadsheet gameplay of The Sims.

Mods like Nraas Overwatch and Nraas Error Trapper as well as simple stuff such as limiting the game's max fps to the refresh rate of your monitor really help the game as well. The game is sort of unstable without mods with frequent stuttering and the occasional Sims 3 crash.

ALWAYS REMEMBER TO SAVE YOUR GAMEPLAY EVERY NOW AND THEN
(or download a mod that reminds you to save haha)

great when it works, but for the steam version on windows 10/11 you have to open it in task manager and disable all your GPU cores except 0, then launch, then enable them again. They patched the EA store version but the Steam version still involves this pain in the ass step. When it works it's great. FIX THIS

Excellent game even after all these years. Stability issues aside, this is incredibly engrossing and packed with features that will last you a long time. The price point is a bit steep at around £20, but it's still worth picking up in my opinion.

I absolutely love this, sims 4 was my only sims game i'd play before but I enjoy this one a whole bunch more.

Even today, The Sims 3 remains a highly enjoyable game. While it may have its quirks, installing a few mods can significantly enhance its performance, resulting in an amazing experience.

I really wish they would make Sims 5, but I know they're making some fornite ass battlepass sims game that's suppose to also work on Mobile, just make a good game Maxis and we'll buy it. Stop scamming your audience for Microsoft or get fired anyway. Stop listening to your elites, they dont care about what could make the industry better. Also yeah, sims 3 doesn't work anymore because they're trying to figure out how to scam their playerbase again.

better than the sims 4, the details are so cute. EA needs to bring back this level of attention to detail.

the game gets stuck in the launcher, i open it and click play but it never actually opened. if anyone can help ill rebuy the game but as of right now it really sucks

The sims 3 is honestly the best sims game out there as of the time i costed this review. The DLC's are worth it too. I have a few of them and want more of them. Still to this day in 2025 i love the sims 3.

After many beloved hours I have played this game in my I decided to play this game again. But now, in our lords year of 2025, the game cannot even be started without some fiddling of letting firewall through or logging in or something, however. I cannot be bothered. Negative review because; Just let people play the game they bought.

First there were issues with launching the game to begin with, then through the community I found a workaround to make it launch. Then there were more issues getting the game to save, then still more issues being able to re-open the save files so that I didn't have to start over from the beginning each time I opened the game. Eventually using all of the weird little "hacks" to get the game to actually run on a modern PC stopped being worth it. It's a shame, because I remember loving the CD-Rom version of this game way back in the day, and was really looking forward to revisiting it. But in it's current form, it just doesn't run as intended.

its hard to play on windows eleven , had to check on forums how to play it on my laptops and now my saved games aren't findable due to one drive i guess.