What is the appeal of The Sims?

[DaShi]

Maybe Wiglaf really finds the Sims too difficult and is just afraid to admit it.

[El_Cid]

The Sims(original) isn't about challange so much. heck they only put a mission layer with goals in the console versions, I believe the PC game was just the sandbox.

I think the Sims is about diversion, in the same way soap opera's on tv work. It's about taking your mind of your life and putting that focus somewhere else which is fairly comfortable to deal with.

It's also more of a 'toy' than a game - it encourages experimentation to some extent. It's not about the winning, it's about the taking part - to use that old chesnut.

The settlers was also a series that had elements of this, although it did have much more obvious goals to acheive, it still had a fairly relaxed play style about it. So yeah don't look at the Sims if you're after a challanging game with lots of hard decisions to make - thats not what it's about imo.

Still I'm only watching it being played at the moment, and hearing feedback about that.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
Simcity 4 is actually really difficult compared to the sims. If you'd play it you'd know that.

Ive only played Simcity 2000. Simcity 4 is on my list. Have you played Simcity2000?

It may well be that SC4, which, I note, is the FOURTH iteration of that series, is more difficult, and deeper, than the first two iterations of the series. (I never played the original SC, either)

I would certainly hope that the Sims 4, when it comes out, is far more open to playing for challenge then the Sims.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by DaShi
What's success in Simcity?

Meeting the goal youve set for yourself. Building a city of a certain size. Getting to a certain amount of money. Managing to build something thats not easy to assemble the resources to build, like an arcology in SC2000. Keeping up a certain level of quality in your city - low pollution, no abandoned buildings, whatever. Or it could be a more subjective goal - an city that is aethestically appealing, that looks like you want a city to look.

So goals are self chosen (its a sandbox) and can be either objective, or aesthetic.

In that way its just like the Sims. Wiggy suggests that meeting numerical goals in SC (at least in SC4) is far more difficult than meeting any numerical goal in the Sims. Spike makes the distinction that a larger share of the Sims user base is interested only in the subjective aesthetic and RP goals, not in "challenges" (IE quanititative goals) as compared to SC (well he doesnt actually make the comparison to SC, but I think thats implicit)

Im not sure I can disagree with either of these assertions, but I find them differences of degree, and not of kind.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by El_Cid

Still I'm only watching it being played at the moment, and hearing feedback about that.

One of the things about the Sims, it seems to me that its a much more fun game to watch someone else playing, than most PC games. POTM and I have had some good daddy-daughter time while one or the other of us was playing the Sims.

[DrSpike]

The Sim City games have more depth than the Sims easily. I'm still not a fan but I have no problem with those who are.

[Blake]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
Simcity 4 is actually really difficult compared to the sims. If you'd play it you'd know that.

Uh... you're just bad at SC4 then...

It's a VERY easy city builder.

Depending on what your goals are....



Three Dumb Tricks to earn Cash:

1) Zone everything in low density, let it populate and let the taxes roll in. Turn the speed up and leave the computer on overnight or something. You have big piles of cash in the bank and can now build a perfect city even if you blow chunks at managing the finances of such a city.

2) Toll Booths. Separate your residential and job zones, by roads which pass through toll booths (preferably multiple toll booths on each road). Enjoy the vast piles of cash.

3) Dirty Tax. Zone a lot of dirty industry and let it all move in. Then crank the taxes up to 20%. They'll never leave. Enjoy the significant boost to your finances.

How exactly is #1 different from your Sims complaint that "You can just take longer rather than play better".


If SC4 is difficult, it's because it's BAD, not because it's good. The thing which makes it difficult is that there are many bugs and incoherent gameplay mechanisms which get in the way of honest ways of raising prosperity, until you learn to work around those bugs (and/or install a mod to fix them). Because most of this nonsense isn't readily visible to a player, most SC4 players are basically lost - they can't use their intuition to play, they need to learn the way in which the game differs from how you'd expect it to work, in order to be able to play it well...

[Wiglaf]

2) Toll Booths. Separate your residential and job zones, by roads which pass through toll booths (preferably multiple toll booths on each road). Enjoy the vast piles of cash.

I don't remember these even being in the game. Probably in an expansion.

Uh... you're just bad at SC4 then...

YES. MAYBE SO. The point is YOU CANNOT BE BAD AT THE SIMS. It is a PHYSICAL IMPOSSIBILITY.

I never said SC4 is hard for nerds who have memorized the mechanics of the game and hunt for exploits.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Wiglaf


I don't remember these even being in the game. Probably in an expansion.



YES. MAYBE SO. The point is YOU CANNOT BE BAD AT THE SIMS. It is a PHYSICAL IMPOSSIBILITY.

I never said SC4 is hard for nerds who have memorized the mechanics of the game and hunt for exploits.

Zoning light early is as basic to SC (it was a strat in SC2000 as well, and one anyone could figure out after playing a few minutes) as going to work without buying lots of needless stuff is in the Sims.

[Wiglaf]

Leaving the game on for a week making minor profits is an exploit, and that's what he was talking about.

Zoning light is otherwise not a permanent, always useful strategy in SC4.

The Sims has no choice. Just go to work and do not overspend. Yay for retarded girl doll games.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by DrSpike
The Sim City games have more depth than the Sims easily. I'm still not a fan but I have no problem with those who are.

Depth, or difficulty? From what little Ive played, theres ALOT of moving parts to the Sims, and lots of potential strategic interactions. Maybe fewer than SC2000 (and if we're going to talk SC4, it would be fairer to compare it to the Sims2, which I cant, as I havent played it) but not appreciably less. The real difference, as Wiggy points out, is that the moving parts in the Sims matter far less, cause the game is easier (self-imposed challenges aside). To which my response is, that SC2000 at least (and Blake seems to suggest, SC4, as well) is not THAT much harder. Differences of degree, and not huge ones.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Wiglaf
Leaving the game on for a week making minor profits is an exploit, and that's what he was talking about.

Zoning light is otherwise not a permanent, always useful strategy in SC4.

The Sims has no choice. Just go to work and do not overspend. Yay for retarded girl doll games.

Wiggy, just so I know if we're talking about the same thing, have you played SC2000?

[Wiglaf]

Yes, a long time ago.

[Dis]

my theory is people who hate the sims are covering up the fact they like to play with dolls. You know, similar to how really homophobic people are actually gay. I never had any urge to play with dolls when I was younger. But years of chemicals in our processed food has lowered my testosterone enough that I like to secretly play with dolls in the sims.

btw the above paragraph is a joke. As I said the sims can be fun for a while. but without a challenge, what reason is there to play after you've seen the various actions the characters can do, and the various objects/floors/colors you want to see in a house. What's the point of continuing playing?

[lord of the mark]

ok, so this non-challenging thing.

Other day POTM needed the desktop for homework, like all day (long story) so I had to leave off my game as Kingdom of Naples in CK. I wasnt going to load up any more of my games on her laptop, and I wanted to explore some of the themes we raised here, so i opened up the Sims. Since she has her own families shes playing in the first two neighborhoods, I decided to start a simple family (one adult) in a modest house in neighborhood 3, where the only neighbors are the Mashugas.

My character gets a job as a musician, and I basically "power game" it, trying to focus on doing only whats absolutely necessary to get more money and get promoted (as a musician) rather than RPing ("playing dollhouse"). So far, so good, it IS easy.


But then, to get the next promotion, my character needs two friends. Well guess what, there are only two potential friends in the neighborhood. And one of them, Frank Mashuga, has an opposite zodiac sign to my character, and trying to raise their relationship level is very frustrating, and apparently futile.

When taking a break from homework, POTM hinted there are ways of dealing with that, but never finished telling me what those were.

Im assuming Wiggy here can tell me the easy way to overcome this (excluding the exploit of simply creating ANOTHER new family).