For what it's worth, I can play the Sims perfectly on XP. However this is The Sims + every expansion pack including unleashed. Since every expansion has a more up to date executable, it might help to buy a more recent one like vacation. yeah, yeah, I know, this sucks. It seems like Maxis isn't really to keen on bringing out free updates, and prefer to instead update the executable in the expansion packs. It's a cruel world out there, but with the Sims you can do the same to your own virtual people