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Pinning this as a dedicated thread for discussion, see you then!
Lore historian and Sims influencer PleasantSims, who has recently returned to making Sims content, reviews and analyzes the Caliente refresh and "s'more lore." She offers great feedback.
"Amapola76;c-18282710" wrote: This Project Rene quote was... unfortunate:
I assumed that meant that the team are aiming for more "show don't tell" with Rene, instead of having notifications saying what is happening on screen and colors and emotional buffs displayed below the player is supposed to understand what is happening by just playing because the game is showing small hints of what is happening and what a sim is feeling. Instead of having to look at a UI to tell how much a sim likes one another maybe you could be able to tell just by the way sims are talking with each other.
So this sentence is telling that "Avoid to overload the screen", nothing else.
This is a good maxim or principle to abide by. But it's more complicated than that.
If I could speak to Trisha, Experience Designer on the Sims 4, I would tell her this:
Problem 1: the Sims 4 lacks important status monitors, info panels, and gauges that are typical of the simulation genre. It could actually do with MORE information.
Problem 2: Smart organization of information is important to not overload the screen.
Specifically, the Sims 4 relies on vertical scroll bars to move between modules. This is bad practice as you can't preview which panels are included in the scroll as a lot is hidden; it puts the burden on the user to find and remember locations of panels. See this scroll bar to switch between skills, relationships, and accolades. These scroll bars are used heavily in TS4 user interface
Instead, I would urge the UI Experience Designers on Sims 4 and Project Rene to use the best practice - menu tabs - to switch between panels. Look at Sims 2: the panel selections are shown via universal symbols. Currently, it is on the career panel, with the career icon highlighted:
The one thing I hope they don't do is veer toward realism. The other two life simulators are doing that, and they seem to be quite dull gameplay wise as a result. Please remember the oddities and occults that made the Sims great!
"Amapola76;c-18282710" wrote: This Project Rene quote was... unfortunate:
Yes, many Sim influencers in their Youtube reaction videos (Plumbella, SimmerErin, SatchOnSims etc.) as well as multiple Twitter threads are really caught up on this sentence, in a negative way.
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