Duck and Cover

This game is what The Sims 2 should have been. It was actually somewhat exciting to play (in so much as a simulation game can be) and has left me with the contented feeling that The Sims (original) used to give.

I did play The Sims 2 many an hour and it was never very satisfying. It felt like a bloated yet bland version of the original. Too much to do, not enough incentive to do it. Even with the expansion packs, there was little replay value...At least for me.

The Sims 3 brings the series up to date. Finally. Honestly the best game in the series.

The sims are like real life only your living it virtually? I do not see the point.

I've never tried the sims or knew of any IRL friends who actually played it. What incentives does the game offer for you to do stuff in it?

MR Snake wrote:The sims are like real life only your living it virtually? I do not see the point.

yet that's what you've been doing

POOPERSCOOPER wrote:I've never tried the sims or knew of any IRL friends who actually played it. What incentives does the game offer for you to do stuff in it?

1. you can have someone jump in a pool and then swap water for concrete
2. you can design houses
3. you can lock the little people and watch them die / torment otherwise
4. you can watch them make out
= not much?

How's the modability? User made content or are you obliged to buy 10+ expansions by EA? :rapemod:

They reintroduced micropayments.

Heard there are a lot of major fuckups in it, that it fatally crashes on the most random stuff.

There's a lot to like here, and not much to hate.

Gameplay is guided by wishes Sims have, and these wishes are based mostly on mood. You can save up to four wishes, and each Sim has a lifetime wish. Working towards fulfilling these gives short and long term goals that guide gameplay, and the reward is generally improving the Sim's life - fulfilling wishes gets your Sim points that you essentially use to buy character upgrades. They've done some really nice things with careers, and each upper echelon of a career has it's own perks and opens up different activities. In the Sims 1 and 2, I never had a Sim get to the top of their career because of the friends requirement. Friends are no longer a requirement for careers, and in the past week I've had two Sims make it to the top of their career paths.

Character creation, instead of picking an astrological sign by assigning points into moods bars, is a lot more robust. Sims can pick up to 5 traits out of 65, and these determine their motivation behind behavior, their choice of lifetime wish, how they treat and are treated by others, how good they are at utilising skills, and a whole host of other things. Want to make a complete slut? A charismatic flirt who's a great kisser is probably your best bet. Go ahead and make them neurotic and overly emotional to simulate their daddy issues while you're at it. Want to make a mad scientist? Go with an evil bad-natured genius who's insane then pick a lifetime wish like robot-animal cross-breeder.

You can let them roam free without fear of them shitting themselves or collapsing from exhaustion in their living rooms. As a matter of fact, while you can only control one household at a time, all the lots run simultaneously and the neighborhood is one whole. As an example, I stuck some chick in the journalist career track with her starting out as a paperboy. I played other households for awhile, and when I came back to her she was married and was a news anchor. There's upsides and downsides - it gives the world a more realistic feel, but sometimes there's a sense of loss for not being around for major events if you get emotionally attached to any of the little bastards. The option for other Sims to progress with their lives while you're using the active household can be turned off, but slows the gameplay down significantly. Also could lead to some weird time paradoxes as found in the first two games.

You can see your Sim walk/run/bike/drive/be driven to wherever they're going, and it's a quick process that adds a lot to the feel of the game. And when they get where they're going, they conduct their business and interact with other Sims like you'd expect. Also their bars seem to not go down as fast while they're out, so you don't need to worry about the basics of keeping them alive while they're at a pool party or something.

They cut out a lot of the minutae. Sims automatically do most of the things that you'd expect something simulating life to do, there are no longer comfort and room bars, and virtually no load times other than on starting the game and switching houses, and even then those are minimal.

The modding aspect is a mixed bag. EA plans on making a custom town editor available in about a week or so, but things with a custom mesh cannot be added by players yet - probably because it would aid piracy of stuff from their online store. Balancing that out, however, is that virtually everything in the game, from clothes all the way up to buildings, can have it's coloring and the materials it's made out of changed at any time. Most of the mods made for the Sims 2 were recoloring existing objects, and this completely eliminates the need for that while making sure any room you can imagine matches. This is made even more robust by allowing you to use custom textures for materials, and also modifying the color of existing materials. Wanna stick your Sim in some shorts that look like they're made from wooden slats? No problem. Want your walls covered in carpet? Again, no trouble.

The online store offering additional furniture, building materials and clothes is pricey. However, the things are easily pirated and EA gives you 1,000 Sims points (that equates to $10 US, but it's 1,000 points regardless of where in the world you buy it) to use in the store when you buy the game. I'm also under the impression they'll be awarding additional points in the future for buying expansions and contests and whatnot.

I have no clue whether they plan on allowing people to add in custom meshes and object textures, because Maxis and EA weren't too terribly happy about all the anotomically correct Sims and borderline kiddie porn that some people modded into the last two. Of course, anotomical incorrectness in both Fallout 3 and The Sims 3 both annoyed me just because it isn't an accurate representation of reality, but that's neither here nor there.

The only part I really don't like about the interface is that the transition between active households could be simpler - from live mode you have to select an option called edit town from the game menu, experience a short load to be taken to the town management stuff, then exit out of the town management screen to get to an interface to slap new Sims into houses or select a house to play. I'd imagine they'll streamline that in patches.

To put it simply, this is everything the Sims 2 should have been and wasn't. They removed everything people who liked the game didn't enjoy, then worked in new features without making the game more complex. Sims have a lot more options in conversation and interaction, but these additions are more of a parralel complexity - giving you additional options for something easy - than making it harder to reach the goal.

EA also decided to release The Sims 3 without DRM, which is something that a lot of other publishers are considering a ballsy move. I'd imagination this is in direct response to their Spore fiasco.

Uber-ghey.

I first thought you just copied the thing from somewhere else. Now I think you just threw in "Fallout 3" at random, but still copied it.

Smiley wrote:I first thought you just copied the thing from somewhere else. Now I think you just threw in "Fallout 3" at random, but still copied it.

Thinking has never been your strong suit. Just sit there and look pretty while the adults make DAC function.

Retlaw did you actually write this essay?

PiP wrote:Retlaw did you actually write this essay?

Every last goddamn word. Feed some sentences into Google if you'd like.

I'm fucking flabbergasted.

Well I did you the honor of reading your whole paper.

I'm surprised that they decided not to let people modify the body more than currently possible, but in hindsigt it's probably for the best.
Maybe soccer moms are scared that their little precious girls will make Barbie standard with Double D's and 2 meters tall.

I downloaded it to try it out, after my initial post in this thread. Haven't had much opportunity to try it out, since it's like I heard, it crashes on the most random of things, like selecting the wallpaper tool or moving furniture.

No fix in sight. Maybe it's because it's cracked? I don't know.
Got all of the currently available downloadable content as well, which is obviously going to be their main revenue.

I bet they'll add pets that die, and that you can only get them again by buying it again.

My Mrs's first impressions were: "You can't change the size of boobs? That's just stupid!"

Smiley wrote: Haven't had much opportunity to try it out, since it's like I heard, it crashes on the most random of things, like selecting the wallpaper tool or moving furniture.

No fix in sight. Maybe it's because it's cracked? I don't know.

I'm guessing it may be because it's cracked, or maybe there's some kind of hardware incompatibility I've been lucky enough to escape. This is the first game I've actually bought since Left 4 Dead, and it hasn't crashed on me or had any glitches beyond some pathing problem to a bookshelf that had the object blocking it a square and a half away.

Got all of the currently available downloadable content as well, which is obviously going to be their main revenue.

It's pretty ridiculous. 2,100 points for a full set of matching furniture? It's especially dumb given that everything can be recolored to fit any theme.

I have all the downloadable content too - gogo Pirate Bay - but all of it I've encountered so far seems like it's rocking original meshes and not just redoes of stuff they already sold you.

As for not being able to change the textures on bodies or introduce custom meshes, I saw some pretty heinous kiddie porn type stuff for The Sims 1 while looking for mods back in the day. Wouldn't be shocked if something similar was made for The Sims 2 and Maxis said to hell with it.

Kashluk wrote:My Mrs's first impressions were: "You can't change the size of boobs? That's just stupid!"

tell her I thought this many a time

Some dude made some homeless Sims, and it's fairly interesting.

http://aliceandkev.wordpress.com/2009/0 ... e-and-kev/

Retlaw83 wrote:

Smiley wrote: Haven't had much opportunity to try it out, since it's like I heard, it crashes on the most random of things, like selecting the wallpaper tool or moving furniture.

No fix in sight. Maybe it's because it's cracked? I don't know.

I'm guessing it may be because it's cracked, or maybe there's some kind of hardware incompatibility I've been lucky enough to escape. This is the first game I've actually bought since Left 4 Dead, and it hasn't crashed on me or had any glitches beyond some pathing problem to a bookshelf that had the object blocking it a square and a half away.

Got all of the currently available downloadable content as well, which is obviously going to be their main revenue.

It's pretty ridiculous. 2,100 points for a full set of matching furniture? It's especially dumb given that everything can be recolored to fit any theme.

I have all the downloadable content too - gogo Pirate Bay - but all of it I've encountered so far seems like it's rocking original meshes and not just redoes of stuff they already sold you.

As for not being able to change the textures on bodies or introduce custom meshes, I saw some pretty heinous kiddie porn type stuff for The Sims 1 while looking for mods back in the day. Wouldn't be shocked if something similar was made for The Sims 2 and Maxis said to hell with it.

You fucking nerd. Go play reality instead of the sims3.

lol

MR Snake wrote: You fucking nerd. Go play reality instead of the sims3.

lol

Go play reality instead of DAC. Although since your reality is giving handjobs behind the local drugstore for 10 cents a pop, I understand your reluctance.

Worst comeback ever.