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[Ultimuh]

The only good thing I see about this is that the 3rd game's expansions, will be cheaper to buy.¨
Those that I don't already have, that is.

[Mech#4]

I quite admire "The Sims 3" for the depth of it's creative mechanics. The ability to completely customise wallpapers, object surfaces, floors and walls means I have a lot of scope for variety. I've managed to make gridded paper walls with using pre-set surfaces. Heck, you can make a bed that looks like the blanket is made out of bricks and a pillow made from plank wood.

That being said, I've found "The Sims 3" isn't so good for uniqueness of play. I've seen a few Let's Plays of "The Sims 3", as well as done on myself, and while the environments can be quite different the way the games played is quite restrictive, so all the stories tend to be the same "watch the Sims do silly/stupid things".


I'm not sure what I'd like in that regard. If there's a tree I'd like a Sim to be able to climb/try to climb it, to not need your children to go to school, to be able to make days longer (and as such needs fill more slowly).

One annoying thing I find is it's difficult to make a Sim have a normal schedule. Get up at 6:00am, have breakfast and a shower, get dressed, go to toilet and get to the car, that can take 2-3 hours in game where I can get that done in 1 hour. Normal schedules end up with the Sims missing out on something because time moves by too quickly.
(I can't remember if you can slow down time in game).

[Ultimuh]

(I can't remember if you can slow down time in game).

I am sure there are mods out there that does that.

[Mech#4]

(I can't remember if you can slow down time in game).

I am sure there are mods out there that does that.

Oh, but of course. I shall have to look into that, but that's another slight issue with "The Sims 3". They update it quite frequently so mods need updating every time as well. I was using one mod ("Awesome Mod" or something) to gain more functionality, but... sometimes "The Sims 3" has stability issues.

You know the case, a patch is made to fix one problem and introduces 3 others.

[Darkening Kaos]

If you want mods like that, Mech#4, google Nraas Industries and get some of Twallan's mods, it actually makes TS3 playable.

  My original Sims 3 guy, my forum avatar, was planned to be a busker, living by moving from park to park playing his guitar for tips, charming the pants off the local girls and staying at their place overnight.  But in TS3, you cannot play without first choosing a place to live.  I choose the smallest plot, built what was essentially a cargo container with a fridge, toilet, shower and stove.  He rarely spent any time there and visited only to pay bills.
  Without warning, somehow, he ended up with a three storey mansion, 65 children, {only one living with him and that one child came out of the time machine}, using a couple of Nraas mods, I crammed twenty people into one house, although I controlled only four.  There were enough simoleons to break the display and he was friends with everyone in town.  I might just spark up the game and shift him to a new neighbourhood so he can start over afresh, {skills notwithstanding}.

But, yeah.  Each expansion broke the game, needing a progressively larger patch to fix, and thank Armok that they eventually rolled it back to the base game running things, otherwise you had to fetch two patches.  So much aggravation that caused me to stop playing TS3 altogether, I also will wait for the dust to settle on TS4.

[BuriBuriZaemon]

Inb4 the rage

Online only DRM

[Zangi]

Perhaps they'll finally not allow you to make your own homes this time around.

That would make sense. Seriously, who wants to waste hours building and designing a house when you could have prefabs? Think about it, it's the much less time for your Sims to prepare meals, eat and poop. *snip*

Considering it...  I go prefab or barebones myself. 

But, from what I figure...  house/building design in the Sims is the same as spaceship design in space games like Aurora and Fortress design in Dorf Fort...  It ain't for everyone, but some of us will willingly spend the hours to do it.  Probably more so for the mainstream audience...

Also, Awesomemod is best Sims mod.

[Neonivek]

Each expansion broke the game, needing a progressively larger patch to fix

Even without talking about glitches this was true.

With World Adventures you had Tiberium and a way to get easy gemstones. Tiberium if you cut it will grow to tens of thousands of simoleons worth of gemstone.

Wow that must be broken right? Well with the Pets expansion, Dogs can just dig it up easy. In fact it is the easiest way to break the bank.

--

Now what about friendship do you want to break that until it is meaningless?

Well in Supernatural you can force two people to fall in love. Even better in University you get a pathetically easy to obtain blogging ability that lets you rewrite relationships.

---

What about age? You want a sim to live forever without cheating?

Well in Generations there is a lab kit where you can reset your sims age to young adult EASILY (Don't want them to be a young adult, just use a cake).

---

If there is one trend I REALLY dislike about Sims expansions (outside the first where it wasn't as much of a problem) is that each expansion finds ways to make whatever semblance of challenge or pacing in the game completely superfluous.

You essentially break the game by buying expansions without a new challenge to take its place.

[BigD145]

If there is one trend I REALLY dislike about Sims expansions (outside the first where it wasn't as much of a problem) is that each expansion finds ways to make whatever semblance of challenge or pacing in the game completely superfluous.

You essentially break the game by buying expansions without a new challenge to take its place.

One of the expansions had spiral staircases. It was the only place you could get them... for 6 or 7 gigs of HD space and a bunch of crap.

[krisslanza]

I always had more fun with The Sims when I could actually enjoy it, personally. The biggest problem with the original was the game was incredibly tedious, and after a few days at working, your Sim never had time to do anything BUT work. Until you could scrap together enough money to buy better and better stuff, or realize you skip a day of work and go in the next day without penalty.

I don't remember much about Sims 2. But I felt Sims 3 was easy enough, while still feeling like a proper game with progression. Sure, there was ways to make the game easy, but Sims wasn't a game meant to be challenging I feel. It's just a game to play to have fun.

[Ultimuh]

It's just a game to play to have fun.

Which is why I play it once in a while.

[Neonivek]

It was always a game you at least could work towards if you wanted to Krisslanza.

Even then the fact that you can ignore any semblance of difficult and turn The Sims into freeplay mode without even cheating is a problem in my eyes.

When money, friends, family, needs, and aspiration are no longer things you have to aspire for but are things that because you bought enough expansions just suddenly have... There is a problem.

It kills the fun when the game no longer matters.

For some people it doesn't matter and for them they can cheat their hearts out. For people like me who likes to explore even the gameplay of The Sims, I shouldn't have to feel like I am cheating without cheating.

[Knight of Fools]

Inb4 the rage

Online only DRM

In Sims 3 it was pretty easy to get a no CD mod, which is pretty much essential for when you share the game with family (In the same house, of course). I wouldn't be surprised if they took steps to make it harder to run games that way, but it would be disappointing if they made it so you couldn't do it without getting a cracked version. When your game plus expansion packs cost $429.83 at full price*, you can't expect the typical family to buy a copy for everyone.

I'm actually curious as to how they're going to release everything. None of the recent EA releases have been on Steam, yet the new Sims 3 expansion packs have. Will they pull an Ubisoft and allow you to buy it on Steam, but still have to run it through Origin? Will they make it an Origin only release, like the new SC? Will they skip Origin altogether with the Steam version and just rely on their launcher? Will the Disk version just rely on Origin, the Launcher, or both?

It'll be interesting to see what happens.


_{*I think it all went on sale on Steam for $147.45 or so total a few months ago (University was full price), which is still way too much.}

[Hugehead]

Inb4 the rage

Online only DRM

single-player offline experience.

[Scelly9]

Agh, I will be happy if they don't innovate at all, and it's just TS3 bugfixed.