Sims2 Sims 2 Red Blinking but Life Stories works fine

So I found all of my old sims 2 games and wanted to install them on my desktop to play considering I miss it so much. My computer is a gaming desktop so I can play any game on it without a problem. Well, every time I installed just the base game the whole neighborhood map would blink red, and the houses blink pink. Then it would crash any time I tried to see if it was the same in CAS. I REALLY want to run the sims 2 and all of its expansions and stuff packs. I installed The Sims Life Stories and have absolutely no problem with it but the small problem of the black box under the sims feet but that's an easy fix. How can I get the graphics fixed, stop crashing to play it? Please help.
Every forum I've read says that it's the video card and that it needs to be updated but this video card is not even a year old yet. Is there a way to trick the game into thinking I have an older card? I also have tried running in different compatibility settings such as the oldest and recommended Windows xp Service Pack 3. I don't understand why I am having no trouble with Sims Life Stories but a massive headache over trying to get the original Sims 2 to run.
(Posting on a different device so cannot provide config-log.txt at the moment.)


Here's my specs:



Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-7700K CPU @ 4.20GHz (8 CPUs)

System type: 64-bit, x64 based processor

DirectX 12

Do you have Windows 10? I am hoping not. Several threads popping up recently about Sims 2 not working well on Win 10 for some folks, including me. I have yet to find a good solution. Works for some, very broken for others. You may want to try getting Ultimate Collection from Origin instead, but UC seems to have broken recently under Win 10 for some too, including me. A config log file and your graphics rules sgr file may shed some light on this but I don't want to get your hopes up.