There are elements of the Sims 3 store I’d like back.

You could create an entire amusement park in The Sims 3 with the store (across multiple overpriced sets). Casino, Circus, Vehicles… the sets were also highly usable.

Lucky Palms Deluxe is still a great piece of content. Everything was great, including the marketing.

This or you're going to need the EA Play subscription.

The subscription is the most likely outcome in my eyes. So many things these days are becoming subscriptions. I miss the days I could just, I don't know, own something.

Totally 1000 percent agree with this!

Exactly. People can complain about TS3 Store as much as they want, but here's the thing: it's entirely optional! Thing is, you can still have a LOT of fun with Sims 3 as is without getting extra store content. But with Sims 4, you can buy literally every pack/kit/whatever and you still get bored within five minutes, if that long...that is, assuming, it doesn't break the game even more.

And I agree about subscriptions. There's nothing that isn't this day and age. I miss when programs like Photoshop, etc were just a one time payment and you actually owned it. I wouldn't be surprised if EA goes down the subscription route as well.

I watched a video yesterday from some guy I've never heard of complaining about subscription services yesterday. The video explained how companies make more on a monthly sub rather than somebody paying in full for the year. Anybody can take a minute with a calculator and already know this, but judging by his comment section, apparently people didn't know this.

Then he went on to talk about how companies make it hard to cancel subscriptions. When I "closed" my Amazon account a couple of years ago, they put me on a endless loop. I'd click cancel on one page, then I'd have to click cancel on another page, then I was sent to another page. Rinse, wash, repeat until I got pissed off and called them.

Why did I use quotes around the word closed? Because they didn't actually close my account. Amazon isn't charging me money as they can't. The credit card I had at the time no longer exists due to fraud ( not Amazon related) but I still occasionally get emails from shady Amazon sellers wanting to pay me to review their products. I report these emails as phishing scams via my email provider. People like to try to gaslight me for ragging on Amazon and shady reviews on their website. Gaslight away, friends. I get those emails just like everybody else does.

If anybody is rolling their eyes at me wondering what this story time has to do with sims, I'm getting there.

The loop thing that Amazon does, Playstation does the same thing which was also mentioned in said video. In order to cancel a sub to Playstation, a person has to dig around in their settings. https://www.ign.com/articles/how-to...laystation-plus

Lyndsay Pearson has stated that Project Nay-Nay will not be subscription based. Do I believe her? I want to, but I don't simply because all big tech companies are pulling these shenanigans in hopes that the subscriber will simply give up and continue to hand over their cash because canceling is so aggravating. Don't give in! People in the US have the option to report these companies to the Better Business Bureau. I'm sure other places around the world also have somewhere they can go to report a company that refuses to cancel a subscription. Another alternative, close the credit card account that is being used. Note that some credit card companies allow a person to close account that carries a balance, others do not. When in doubt, use a gift card. A company can't charge a person if the source of money is shut off or beyond it's limit.

The new EP leaked… The Sims 4: Lovestruck
Somehow, they managed to make a dating expansion pack sound so boring, because WHAT ARE SIMS GOING TO DO ON DATES!? There is no mention of new places to go or new activities for Sims to do together. We’ll see, but…

Early Purchase Incentive:
Runny Mascara
Messy Bed
Decorative Plushy

New & Updated Mechanics:
Turn Ons & Turn Offs
Online Dating
Date Planning
Additional Relationship Dynamics (Wholesome, Steamy, Strained, Unpredictable)
Romantic Satisfaction

New City World:
Ciudad Enamorada

New Interactions:
Cuddling In Bed
Seductive Dance

New Items
Heart Shaped Bed
Romantic Blanket (Interactive)

New Skills:
Romance

New Career:
Romantic Consultant

New Lot Trait:
Singles Hangout

We also appear to be getting food related gifts, such as chocolate covered strawberries, and more apartments - the lot shown in the screenshot of the rewards appears to be fairly high up with windows that match the deco apartment block across the street.

Come on, this is the amazing Lovestruck Pack!!

The couple will have a lovely romantic evening in stunning Ciudad Enamorada. They have planned the date through the Romantic Consultant and met at the Singles Hangout.

They will become "steamy" and "unpredictable" eat chocolate strawberries and do seductive dances until they WooHoo on a Heart Shaped Bed, which causes their mascara to run and scares the living heck out of their romantic plushie .

Leaving their messy bed, one of the now Romantically Skilled pair heads to the kitchen to buy some romantic DLC food (Cucumbers maybe?) from the EA App!

There, after a memorable and touching Romantic evening with their new lover, they run into a random townie they have never met before...
*FLIRTY*
"Common Snarla?"
*blows kiss*
*VERY FLIRTY*
*giggle*
and off to WooHoo in the Rocket Ship in the back yard while your date is still in the messy bed, repairing their mascara and wondering where the heck you've gone!!

Thats amore EA style!

Ok so let's see if I need this pack or not.



I really hoped they are going to release new and exciting content... Now they just copy mods which already exist for years and sell this as something new.

This feels like a patch. I complained that growing together felt like a patch to the social systems that was sold as an expansion pack, but this really feels like a patch to Growing Together.

Like, sure, we can plan a date, but they didn’t advertise anything new to do. I’d be happy if they added little things here and there to the existing base game lots to make dates more engaging.

Billiards, Poker, and Mechanical Bulls to Bars.

Payable VIP Doors, Stacked Sparkling Nectar Glass Trays (that Sims may shatter), and Nectar Fountains for Lounges.

Table/Bar Dancing, Effect Machines, Bogos for Nightclubs.

Guided Tours and Art Auctions to Museums.

Even customizable attributes like entry fees, genders, minimum ages, occults, attire, menus (in line with dine out), dancing, and preferred music would be a great next step to making bars feel unique.

I love how TS4 always adds these systems such as likes and dislikes, milestones, sentiments and others that have very little impact on gameplay. I think Turn Ons and Turn Offs are going to be just like likes and dislikes. I think it's funny how certain activities that your sim likes conflict with their traits. That is what I learnt from SatchOnSims.

There are so many systems, but with no deep meaning, such as the infamous secrets from the For Rent expansion pack. On the other hand, milestones are just a simple copy of memories from TS2. We should have gotten a proper expansion of TS4 memory system. Milestones (or memories) is a nice concept, but it is just too shallow. The sims don't even get milestones for completing a skill (there is a mod for that).

All of this is going to be interesting with in-place, much ignored, incest bug.

I want to say more, but I'm going to play nice today and tap the brakes.

I feel like, as an observer, the things they added to flash out the sims seem so redundant and overly=added (like I notice how many mild features should been mashed into one), which is perplexing because it still didn't manage to fix the core issue how lackluster Sims are. Lifestyles are traits that are on top of pointless traits, sentiments (aren't exactly memory synonim) covering up for lack of chemistry and strong relationship dynamic, milestones that are for whatever reason in expansion pack.... and don't get me started how fears don't even look fears (in TS2 you're Sim would lose it if you're children get taken, you lose your job and on top your husband has cheated with the maid. TS4? How, she's just moody. She'll get over it after a nice meal) and how whims are superficial. It's funny how it earlier games, Sims having less of fancy-smancy Simology features had more depth and stay true true to their personalities and sexual orientation. No flimsy cosmetical Secrets or dislike preferences gonna make you feel your Sims are smart AI characters (which is pretty ironic, as in 2024 AI was all the talk but Sims Teams misses a mark to incorporate it. They should ask ChatGPI with the question "what makes older Sims games better" and "why Fans find TS4 a step backward".)

Yes, the feeling on the EA forums was that most off this was readily available via Mods. I use mods so I have whole menus of ways you can kiss.

But you know what this means don't you?.... ALL of these mods are NOT going to work when the game is patched.

Simplicity.

Attention was placed where it mattered most and made sense. Personality in TS2 was selected based on qualities, aspiration, and turns ons/off. Everything was superfluous filler. When you only have 8 aspirations or 5 qualities, you can get a lot of depth out of these systems because there are so few of them.

If they layered actual traits on top do these, it would be perfect in making Sims more unique - I don’t eat meat, I’m fearful of technology, I love dogs - simple, effortless. Now, you’d have several active Sims in a neighborhood instead of a handful, who have personality limited to being 1/3 active. With qualities, it’s 1/5, but it’s more of a scale as to how active or lazy a Sims is. Depending on how high the scale is, this would determine if Sims have other implicit character traits as well.

We weren’t waiting around for more personality traits because the core 5 qualities are actually based around an actual personality system and was made easy enough to understand.

More aspirations? Didn’t need more than 8, and one of them was a joke (although power would be nice). Aspirations were kept vague and allowed players to implant goals on to their Sims. When aspirations are defined, things feel missing when omitted. “Pleasure” or “Knowledge” are just vague enough to give a Sim purpose at whatever they choose to do, instead of “Woo Hoo with 5 different Sims.” That goal should be implicit based on the “Romance” aspiration. It didn’t need to be said.

More over, in game, experiences slowly shape their personality - memories, social interactions, and wants/fear slowly dictate who Sims are and how they react to the world around them.

Content was made with all personalities and ages in mind because they remained the same for the games 4-5 year run.

Interesting.
I understand a lot better now.