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[Knight of Fools]

RPS Article Here. I don't know why they needed an inside source, since the EA Announcement is Here, and is just about as informative.

At the moment, it's just a bunch of bland vagueries intended to create hype and a creepy picture of three staring Sims. I'm guessing that they're going to be expanding the sharing aspects of the game, maybe to the level that Sim City 4 did, but they're quick to stress that the game is a "single-player offline experience", so they may have learned their lesson from SC4's poorly disguised DRM. Or, maybe they've just gotten better at disguising it.

Expect rehashes of old expansion packs selling at only 80% of the price of the full game, an in-game store, and countless hours spent telling digital simpletons to poop and go to work.


I'll admit that while the Sims series has been a gigantic cash grab for EA since its inception, I've enjoyed every iteration that's come out and have spent more time that I'd like to admit playing them. I'm hoping that the Sims 4 will add a more open world (Connections between neighborhoods, more places to build houses), and I wouldn't mind a few more features that don't scream "casual time waster". As much as I liked the older ones, I'll be standing a few steps back until the reviews come in, and even then I'll wait until the modding community has a chance to dig into the game.

We'll see where this ship docks, and whether or not Maxis/EA will make a mess of it.

[BigD145]

TS3 was less open that TS2, much like SC5 is less open than SC4. Perhaps they'll finally not allow you to make your own homes this time around.

[codyorr]

TS3 was less open that TS2, much like SC5 is less open than SC4. Perhaps they'll finally not allow you to make your own homes this time around.

[Neonivek]

I am actually really looking forward to this game. The Sims 3 was two steps forward but one leap back making a game that is both inferior and superior to the second.

The largest mistake being that The Sims 3 engine was very antagonistic towards expansions and even user content.

If they fix everything that was wrong with The Sims 3, add in all the functionality it required, bring back the features that the game needed, fix up the sims personality, and add a bunch of their own content.

It really could work.

Examples of the give and take of the Sims 3

Sims Personality
Good: The trait system allows your sims to have quirks and eccentricities that the sliders couldn't provide
Bad: The trait system doesn't allow the fully faceted personalities to be expressed making all the Sims somewhat bland.

Pets
Good: Pets are now full sims in their own right and it is easy to ignore them unlike The Sims 2, if you so desire.
Bad: There isn't much for Pets to do anymore and their inability to get around can really mess you over. Dogs are brokenly good at finding expensive gems.

Supernatural Sims
Good: A on-off switch, ability to make Sims in supernatural form (later on), Some super naturals are actually great and I love the ghost gimmick.
Bad: Most are too uninteresting or slow, They are FAAAAR too populous, quite a few are "better then Sims", The Robotsims are far inferior to Simbots, some don't have any traits at all, People never get used to them, There isn't enough bad aspects of them, many cannot be customized.

Expansions
Good: With the amount of expansions it has perfected the expansion type formula. A mix between previous expansions and new ones. As well as giving the best Pets expansion of all the Sims.
Bad: The expansions do not mix well and are often broken with other expansions, they are incredibly glitchy, Some expansions do not update base content (for example the Piano skill doesn't help with the music career).

Collectibles
Good: Items strewed around town that are worth cash and can be collected by us excessive collectivists? Awesome!
Bad: There is no good way to display collections nor a way to really use them for anything interesting. In fact the only Aquarium in the game only has digital fish. Bug cases, brick stacks, and heck a Gem display would have been great. Giving them a use would have been better.

You can see why I want the Sims 4... All the good is there, the bad just needs to be taken away or the good needs to be supported.

Though let me be straight. The Sims 2 is the better game, it is just that the open neighborhood of The Sims 3 is so convenient that it is hard to give up.

In a similar way that Monster Rancher 2 was better then 3... but the encyclopedia made going back to 2, impossible.

[alexwazer]

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. You need to eat and poop and so do your Sims. Besides, think of the incredible possibilities! DLC with 3 new prefab models for only a few dollars! Your 10 houses (count them: 10) are no longer limited to the 5 prefab models initially shipped with the game. That's every gamer's dream come true, you know it and, if you don't, no worry since EA knows better.

As you've probably figured out, I'm overly optimistic about TS4.


Still going to keep an eye out for this in case I am surprised by EA.

[Sensei]

I personally felt like Sims 3 was too goddamn easy, no matter what you did. There's certainly potential for Sims 4 to be a good game, but I'm going to refrain from getting excited until after it releases.

[Neonivek]

I personally felt like Sims 3 was too goddamn easy, no matter what you did. There's certainly potential for Sims 4 to be a good game, but I'm going to refrain from getting excited until after it releases.

It is probably a result of a few things but mostly they wanted to design a Sims game where they could care for themselves.

Did you ever time how long it can take to suffer from starvation and how easy it is to replenish?

[Sharp]

The Sims isn't a survival game, it isn't supposed to be hard, it's a creative game and your only playing against yourself so saying stuff like "dogs finding gems is broke" is pretty silly, the player sets their own goal and the game is pretty easy to do it.

I liked the original Sims more though, much harder to raise a baby without social services trying to steal it all the time, and the random electrocutions.

Sims is definitely a guilty pleasure but I find it unfulfilling in the end so I doubt I will be getting Sims 4, some of the Sims 3 expansion packs are just downright annoying at some parts, the nightlife+vampires one was interesting and fun but the celebrity thing really annoyed me, it's almost impossible to not be a celebrity (unless you play as a hermit) and it just makes the game weird, especially when you sim isn't trying to be famous, and then it adds them damn paparazzi following you around.

[Mookzen]

For me it's most certainly a love-hate relationship, I've picked the game up again at least 5 times, had this whole elaborate plan, was creative and meticulous with crafting both the sims and their homes and then inevitably got bored after like a week in-game... every time... maybe I'm just not that creative or perhaps the simulation just highlights the bland, unfulfilling mess that is my real life, in that way I suppose the devs ought to be congratulated. In any case I do look forward to what they're gonna do this time.

[werty892]

Guys, remember something. This is EA...

[Neonivek]

Guys, remember something. This is EA...

I am aware that The Simcity 5 has pretty much proven that they can put out any sort of crud and get away with it.

But it doesn't mean this game is going to be bad.

from the look of things The Sims is going to be much more cartoony which... I can't say I am against. Their realistic models just didn't work out, perhaps these more cartoony models will work better.

[Trapezohedron]

Sims 3 was great. The open neighborhoods were a nice touch, custom textures allowed people to design the homes of their dreams properly, traits system was better than personality bars, ghosts are actually playable to an extent and are much safer/less annoying than the previous games.

What I don't like about it is that you weren't allowed to add lots, only edit preexisting ones; they borked one of the nicer features of Nightlife (TS2), which is proper garage animation (I HATE teleporting cars); added previous game content, but deliberately ignored a few of the essentials (jacuzzi on TS3 base game, seriously?); and lack of proper bug fixes has led to a patch that is about 1 or 5 GB all in all. Not to mention that the full game with expansions itself is larger than most games, being a whopping 60+ GB or so. Also, having found out that the TS3 modding scene was large due to TS2 being moddable, they tried to kill it by making their own cash shop where they charge you for artificial bits of furniture and hair.

Sims 3 was a suitable successor for TS2, but they borked it, because EA. And I don't think I will buy TS4, because they'll rehash the expansions for over-the-top prices. I've had enough with it for TS1 and 2, didn't do it for 3, and will not do it for 4.

[Glloyd]

Sims 3 was great. The open neighborhoods were a nice touch, custom textures allowed people to design the homes of their dreams properly, traits system was better than personality bars, ghosts are actually playable to an extent and are much safer/less annoying than the previous games.

What I don't like about it is that you weren't allowed to add lots, only edit preexisting ones; they borked one of the nicer features of Nightlife (TS2), which is proper garage animation (I HATE teleporting cars); added previous game content, but deliberately ignored a few of the essentials (jacuzzi on TS3 base game, seriously?); and lack of proper bug fixes has led to a patch that is about 1 or 5 GB all in all. Not to mention that the full game with expansions itself is larger than most games, being a whopping 60+ GB or so. Also, having found out that the TS3 modding scene was large due to TS2 being moddable, they tried to kill it by making their own cash shop where they charge you for artificial bits of furniture and hair.

Sims 3 was a suitable successor for TS2, but they borked it, because EA. And I don't think I will buy TS4, because they'll rehash the expansions for over-the-top prices. I've had enough with it for TS1 and 2, didn't do it for 3, and will not do it for 4.

This. A million times this. I had the exact same experiences. Sims four is definitely not on my buy list.

[NobodyPro]

Am I the only person who never actually got past the construction phase of the previous two games?

[krisslanza]

I will keep my eyes open about this. I liked Sims 3 really, heck I didn't mind Sims Medieval (sometimes)... but time will tell.