It's up to you. I have TS3, and personally, it's okay, but it's lacking in many areas mainly in performance. As you can see in my signature, I have a really powerful over the top gaming PC. When I play the game, it lags and freezes too much, while on the other hand TS4 runs perfectly even with all the packs installed. The graphics are really hard to get used to if you are coming from TS4. It's really pixelated and looks pretty bad compared to TS4. And the camera controls are really funky, unless you've been using TS3 game camera in TS4. It's slow, choppy, and hard to use in my personal opinion. If you don't mind all that, then sure go ahead. It has more content compared to TS4, and you get a pretty good deal when you buy The Sims 3 Starter Pack, as you get Late Night EP and High End Loft Stuff. All the expansion packs are pretty good, but some of the stuff packs are pretty trash. I would play the game for a while before buying any DLC though.