How can I play Sims 4 on Ubuntu?

Question

I have a computer running Ubuntu installed by someone else, and I know nothing about how to use it. My kids want to play Sims 4 on it.

I have Wine & Play on Linux. I managed to download Origin, which is what is needed to play from, but it won't open at all.

Can you please help me to set this up?

Solution 1

Make sure your computer meets requirements.[1] Check your version of Ubuntu, you may need a current version. Either 16.04.2 LTS or 17.04.

WineDB shows the game does work in Origin, and the comment from July 22nd lists a method to get it to run.[2]

[1] https://www.thesims.com/faq#what-are-the-PC-minimum-system-requirements

PROCESSOR: 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, AMD Athlon 64 Dual-Core 4000+ or equivalent (For computers using built-in graphics chipsets, the game requires 2.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.0 GHz AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-62 or equivalent)
MEMORY: At least 2 GB RAM 
HARD DRIVE: At least 9 GB of free space with at least 1 GB additional space for custom content and saved games 
DVD-ROM: DVD ROM drive required for installation only 
VIDEO CARD: 128 MB of Video RAM and support for Pixel Shader 3.0. Supported Video Cards: NVIDIA GeForce 6600 or better, ATI Radeon X1300 or better, Intel GMA X4500 or better 

[2] https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?bShowAll=true&bIsQueue=false&bIsRejected=false&sClass=version&sTitle=&sReturnTo=&iId=33219

Getting Origin to work. by Nick Olson on Saturday July 22nd 2017, 21:12

If you are having problems installing Origin, or can't connect to EA servers, you can follow the instructions posted by Luca Weiss: 

Download www.dm.origin.com/download/legacy (legacy OriginThinSetup.exe). 
Create a fresh wineprefix (32-bit). 
Run the installer and leave the default options. 
When Origin launches it will tell you that "Your update could not be completed.". 
Download origin-a.akamaihd.net/Origin-Client-Download/origin/live/OriginUpdate_9_12_0_34172.zip and put the contents into your_wine_prefix/drive_c/Program\ Files/Origin/ , so that that folder contains a Origin.exe file. 
You can then start this Origin.exe and log in.

After this you should be able to install Sims 4 without any problems.

Solution 2

New Wine 4, new Sims 4 ;) Here's what I did - if you're on a different Ubuntu release, replace "bionic" as needed:

• On Ubuntu 18.04.1 ("bionic") x64, enable the WineHQ repo from https://wiki.winehq.org/Ubuntu

  sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
  
  wget -nc https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/winehq.key && sudo apt-key add winehq.key
  
  sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://dl.winehq.org/wine-builds/ubuntu/ bionic main'
  

• install current stable Wine (we needed to add the WineHQ repository above, as default repo has an older version)

  sudo apt update && sudo apt install --install-recommends winehq-stable
  

• Download the default Origin installer for Windows from https://www.origin.com/irl/en-us/store/download (the older one doesn't seem to work with current Wine out-of-the-box)

• Make a new 64bit prefix (I created it under ~/Documents, doesn't really matter where):

  cd $HOME/Documents; export WINEPREFIX=$(pwd)/sims4; wineboot -u
  

• Run the downloaded Origin installer in this prefix - note that

  WINEPREFIX=$HOME/Documents/sims4 wine OriginThinInstaller.exe
  

• Keep the defaults selected; a launcher for the Origin client will be created for you

• In the Origin client, sign in, download your Sims 4, and when it finishes, click Play. Voila!

Comments

[Admin]

According to this appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=33219 it (Origin) should work. However, if your intention is to play Windows games then please obtain an install Windows. Ubuntu is an entirely different OS. Some Windows software can run (results vary a lot) thanks to Wine but many won't, particularly high demanding games (no, not the case, just sayin').

[Admin]

And if you intend to keep Ubuntu make sure it is updated and supported. I wouldn't use an Ubuntu installed by someone else but that's me, you do what you want. In order to check if that Ubuntu is still supported please edit your question and post the release/version.