Hmm, maybe computer repair would be a basic Logic thing, then.

Handiness and Logic should be big umbrella skills that are raised at the same time one of their sub-skills (Woodworking/Mechanical/Electrical or Chess/Scientific/Programming) are, and used for more overarching things.

Sigh, yet another mod I want to make but don't care about the game enough for...

I get this feeling that this goes back to them choosing the most streamlined way to make the game. Their goal seems to be to eliminate as much of the 'crazy complexity' as possible, and that included a lot of daily simulated life tasks and activities. 'Players have an easy way to wash dishes? Check! No need for dishwashers.'

The fact that they don't seem to understand why players missed them is very problematic because it indicates their lack of understanding what draws a lot of players to a life simulation game in the first place. Sure, there is a subset of players who won't care about these details but they are once again leaving out a big portion of their player base. They don't seem to realize that what they did served to eliminate players' options, and having lots of different options for everything in the Sims is why they had such a large and diverse customer base with so many different play styles.



Exactly. The fact that you could replicate (more or less) different real-life scenarios was what drew a lot of players in. For many, it was fascinating to see how closely you could mimic certain lifestyles or situations.
They focused too much on saving time and money and not enough on creating a fun simulation game. This streamlining and reduction of complexity is why I have said before that the game doesn't feel like a real life simulation game any more. I agree that they concentrated on making weird and whacky and goal achievements for the player and didn't pay enough attention to simulating life with the sims themselves. (And btw I think when *they* say they concentrated on 'the sims themselves', they just mean they choose not to focus on the world and it's environments in this version of the game.)

Happy days are here again, the skies above are clear again...

I hate the way male sims gets fat. All the male townies in my hood who have gotten fat have developed a feminine pear shape. Seems like they're using the same weight gain formula for males as they're using on females, where the primary point of weight gain is at hip level. It's very unrealistic. My fat males all have narrow shoulders, wide hips, and fat butts. Granted, there are some men who are pear shaped when they get fat, but that's a vast minority. Majority of males put the weight up top on belly and chest, and the shoulders also widen. My fat male sims look nothing shaped like fat men in real life. It's pretty annoying.

Well, the fact all my townies got fat is annoying in itself, but if they're gonna be fat, they should at least look right.

How convenient they can't show for the Q&A. Last week was Mac Launch Day, this week they can't even get online.

Why not a different day of the week?

Y'know, I called it a month or so ago when they posted about the downgrading of software packages for "economic efficiency" that putting the whole studio on a single shared Comcast cable modem for internet access might save them a few bucks, but would cause them headaches down the road. And look what happened..........................

Have you tried out this no fatness / no muscle mod? Works well for me.

Has anyone watched LGR's review of the Sims?

https://youtube.com/watch?v=bsob06m9p_4

Its actually both beautiful and sad. I didn't begin my journey with the Sims franchise until around 2006 when i first got my hands on the Sims 2. There was something, exciting about building my Sims for the first time. Discovering how custom i could make her, picking clothing and choosing her aspiration. Then choosing a house, even though 20,000 simoleons won't buy anything to brag about. I remember how excited i was when i made my first 5,000 simoleons and could afford a decent bed. When i adopted my first child, when i moved for the the first time, when I got my daughter into private school. When i reached cooking level 10 or when i first meet Dina and Nina. When, though i had to sit through unbearble load times because this was 2006 and my computer just wasn't up to the task, i visited a community park and cooked hotdogs near the pool. I remember when i got my first expansion pack, NightLife, and visiting clubs for the first time, shopping for clothes. I remember when i got the celebration stuff pack and how much fun it was to finally have beautiful weddings. When you only plan the play the game for an hour, and then realize its 3 in the morning. remember the car ride home when my Mother took me to best buy, how excited I was to finally crack open the new expansion pack.

Then i look at what the series has become and i just feel sad. The sims game took up a decade, my teenage years, and was a huge part of my life. To see it turn into something so...foreign and so ccorporate kills the teenage animator606432. I still turn into that chubby girl spending hours drawing and playing computer games, when I crack open the sims 2. Despite the Sims 3 failing to live up to what it could be, i still have fond memories of getting it opening day. Its just sad that EA doesn't seem to want this time of customer anymore in favor of the fickle phone and smart pad market..

Sequence Nostalgia...
I'm a bit older than you, Animator, and I discovered the Sims in the early 2000s, probably 2001 or 2002. I was at the university, at that time, and it was the Sims 1. I had never been that much of a video gamer, I never could exactly understand how it happened, but fact is that I felt in love with this game. I still remember my all times favorite EP, it was the one in a simili-Hollywood - I don't remember its name. I think it was the penultimate TS1 EP.
But, of course, it's TS2 which got all my favours a few years later.
I'm sad, with you and most of the people here, that today youngsters won't have the chance to live with TS4 the love story we had. Will they only remember what the Sims are (were) in like 4 or 5 years ?

I believe you're thinking of the Sims Superstar, the one that had Drew Carey and Alanis Morisette. Funny how even in a game completely built around actual celebrity culture and real celebrities they managed to avoid a Katy Perry sweet treats like crap pack. Much like you i wasn't a big gamer and i to feel in love with the gamr. I've actually gone back and played the original Sims and had a lot of fun. Yeah, its limited but there is so much creativity there and humor then you get attached to it. Suffice to say, i played for longer then I did 4.

I owe the game with the whole reason i even want to become an artist to begin with. Of course Disney and Don Bluth are obvious when people look at my work but the sims was a huge part of that. I remember, a while ago, in a interview a Sims designer talked about how important detail and depth is when it comes to art. How studying the fundamentals are so much more iimportant then substance and that really stuck with me.

I doubt anyone starting the franchise with the Sims 4 will have the fond memories you and i have. There's no surprises with 4, none of that quirky humor we love. There not really creativity with in the game itself. Everything is laid out in front of you and it never gets anymore complex then that. Part of the reasons we built this connection is the sheer amount of play time we put into the game. Now, even as they track our play habits, no one invest hours upon hours into game play.

We need a Will Wright back to be honest. Not to say he was perfect and the only reason the game was awesome. But Will Wright was a person who was creative as hell and could bring that out of people. I know Spore was crap, but the more i read about the more I realize how the end product was way off from what he wanted to do.

I don't believe the team that worked on 4 are untalented. But they are just artist who are being told to stay in the lines and don't dare to try anything risky. You can see them trying to mimic the Will Wright and early Maxis humor with the rockets, poop jokes, and focus on the weirder stories. But the magic of the first 2 Sims game was making the mundane task in life as important as they where in real life.

Lucy Bradshaw, for all this talk of vision, is no artist. She will never understand they way the creative mind works and that's what simmers really are, creative people. Those of in specialty fields like myself remember how hard it was to explain to family members why you choose the career you did? That's what its like dealing with the Bradshaw and co, they just dont get it.

Woah, sorry about this post being so long, but this has been on my mind for a while.

I am pretty sure Drew Carey was in before that - maybe in the Houseparty EP?

Oh right that was house party. But was i right about superstar being the one with the celebrities?

Correct. Some other celebrities that appeared in that EP include Avril Lavigne, Andy Warhol, and I think Marilyn Monroe even makes an appearance. Maxis even offered a free download to add Freddie Prinze Jr. to your game.

House Party rocked! I remember throwing these epic parties in a separate room to my house, complete with its own toilet - it was decked out like a mini nightclub complete with black walls and metal floors, lol. My Sims would DJ, lay on food, socialize and dance with the neighbours all night. It was brilliant - I even got Drew Carey to turn up twice! The original Sims captured my heart like no other game to date has done, and it will always be special to me... I miss it so much; methinks I may have to purchase the full collection, and try out those parties again

Why can one of my teenage Sims give $ 1000 per time to charity with an auto action and doe this multiple times? Why is this even an option for an auto action and why can teenagers give away their parents money?

The funny thing was, I always did like computer gaming. Everything from simulations (starting with The Sims when it first came out after being a sim city player, and by then, I was way into adulthood) including Sim City(s) (many, many, many hours wasted on those), to Roller Coaster Tycoon (all, was it three? versions, plus the addon parks like the Sea World one) and even Zoo Tycoon, especially with my daughter. I also loved FPS from the start, and some RPGs/adventures along the way. But none of them captured my attention for so long as the Sim series did. OK, SC did back in the day, but it still never had the staying power the Sims evoked for me.

I was one of those weird folks who actually didn't get taken by TS2 that much, after the original. I know, but that's how I felt. I remember when TS3 came out thinking I'd give it a spin just because. Well, damn. Between CAST and an open world, I was hooked. Building was fun without tracking a thousand recolors. Zipping around the map in real time was magical for me. Add in SP (well, really, SP replacements that worked) and no more rotation play, which I personally didn't care for. I wanted the town to progress without my having to do all the lifting, and now I had it!

Needless to say, with that experience, it's easy to figure out why I never warmed up to this "new" edition. Everything I liked was gone. Even toddlers, who I had down to a spin and rinse cycle for walking, talking, potty training, and some quality reading time (boring, but my sim parent did it, while I head off with another family member to cause all sorts of trouble somewhere else in town) were gone. Who would have thought they would pull that one?

At least I have 15 years of fond memories of time spent with The Sims. And I have my still installed TS3, and still racking up several hour play sessions at a time. I even have TS2 UC still installed, even though when I open it up, I feel claustrophobic, and run back to 3 (sorry to 2 fans, it's just me, not you). But picture a new player coming to this series through TS4. Do you really think they're likely to rack up YEARS of enjoyable play starting with this as their introduction?

Ugh. Drew Carey. Don't remind me. I hated it when he showed up and he pretty much always did when my Sims had parties.

At least he only showed up during a party which you expect a lot of sims. Unlike the psycho stalker neighbors in sims 4 who just show up when the fuck ever.

I seriously feel like Bella Swan from Twilight in that despite being the most boring person, with a personality as stale as month old rice cakes, everyone wants to be my best friend for some reason. Its so bizarre.

Drew Carey always came to mine and so did the police, cos the mods I used ensured I had shedloads of attendees!

Is this a place where we can complain about toddlers and CaSt?
okay, here goes:
._. I still miss toddlers and CaSt.
[/vent]

To keep going on with nostalgia, a thing I have missed later (with TS3) was having to regularly check the communauty websites in order to download all the splendid creations very talented persons were (freely !) offering. Many/most of these creators were way more talented than those at the Maxis studio.

I did a quick search just before writing this post to see if some of them I can recall the name were still alive, looks like they're not. A period is gone for good.
Another thing today youngsters will not have to do... For them, the VISA card of their parents is the only form of creativity they have to know...

Any news here of the possible class action ?

Class action for what?