should i buy the sims 3?

Sims 3 is the best if I had to choose between 3 and 4.I played a grand total of 3 hrs on four, I couldn't stand the closed world, the restricted game play, when I say restricted, I mean for example throwing a party, you have to meet "goals" and that was annoying instead of just letting sims go about their business I had to quickly do things like try and get sims to eat together etc.Same with the careers, I ended up modding the doctor career so completing one task met the goal for the day and I could go about how I wanted the rest.

With sims 3 I feel I can be more creative with story telling and gameplay, feels more realistic, and I like the graphics better.I couldn't stand the cartoony feel of Sims 4.

Now I wish some of Sims 4 features were in Sims 3, like dining out and owning retail stores and vet career.



https://scontent-mia3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/54514777_269088640682062_634431467790794752_o.jpg?_nc_cat=107&_nc_eui2=AeG9eWu9NTX4ztC-D2ygbw7mB9q3kloaWPpsOfYIx0XOSG0dH_jOCV-zh76nbCmd5udxs89k8uj1MNbAKPfbOq5z4U7lQRk6gAFy__5jg01rfA&_nc_ht=scontent-mia3-1.xx&oh=84fadb2124572fb23083e40a50823035&oe=5D1955E8

https://scontent-mia3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/55823837_269661233958136_3548361908186775552_o.jpg?_nc_cat=108&_nc_eui2=AeH6pwcFmgBnNnqLcmSTh035xDgu89L08F9NMkPtoUklFO7dde5ZHPX7lpvAbJGDbMZc4oYFAg_WSqCROs5dQb5zmREmEYF7FlnyTIPyDn-0kg&_nc_ht=scontent-mia3-1.xx&oh=95f385060c6966d755df3ce2c5dfc691&oe=5D075849
I think Sims 3 has lovely graphics, I prefer them much more than Sims 4 and my laptop is far from being"high end"

I would say it's worth it to try it in my opinion. I was one of these players who started with TS2 and got to listening to most of the dedicated TS2 players on the old TS2 site on how they hated TS3 when it first came out. They complained about how the Sims looked ugly or how they didn't like the open world, etc, etc... So I had decided that I wasn't going to move to TS3 until I started watching some of promo videos for the game and ended wanting to try it out. And well since then, I love it. And even though I loved TS2 and have the TS2 UC, I have a very hard time going back to TS2. So I understand where some of the members are coming from who've commented about going backwards to an older game and how hard it is to get into them to get back into playing the older game/s. But what it boils down to is that you're the only one that can decide whether or not that you want to try it out or not. And I agree with some of them that have said about watching TS3 videos or other players gameplay to help you decide if this is the game for you.

Now I will tell you what I love about the game myself... :)

I love that we a variety in Supernatural creatures such as witches, werewolves, fairies, zombies and vampires. And yes, I know that TS4 has vampires as well. And yes, I know that some people may not like the zombies as they can be annoying and eat your unfenced in plants.

I also love the fact that we can create our Sims to be Supernatural Sims in CAS providing that you have the EP's to do so. Ex: SN Ep for witches, werewolves, fairies. We have Genies that can also be created in CAS if you have the Showtime EP... :)

We also have the University Life EP where we can send our Sims to the Uni world to further their education and get degrees. Of course when your Sim gets a job or profession that they got their degree in, they will start at an higher level of that profession. ex: Final grade C=level 2, final grade B=level 3, final grade A=level 4.

Of course we have World Adventures where we get 3 worlds to go and explore. But you only get 3 days for your vacation as the player needs to do assignments to up their visa points for longer stays. But of course if one has the NRaas Traveler mod, then you stay longer without having to up your Visa. Of course I am one that have the Traveler mod as I wanted to be able to visit other worlds in my game that was either in the EP's or store worlds or custom worlds. But of course in order for the travel mod to work, you would need to have either World Adventures, University Life or Into the Future EP's installed. Plus I wanted to take my Scooby Doo on vacation with the rest of the Scooby gang since pets can't go on vacation in a mod free game.

We also have a Create-a-pattern (CAP) tool that we can install on our PC's that allows us to create unique patterns that we can install into our game and/or share to the exchange for others to use.

Like this pattern on the top and mini skirt that I created in CAP... :)
https://i.imgur.com/zhqhf6dl.jpg

And then another TS3 player had given me instructions on how to take some of our in game pictures and put them on walls. But of course, the instructions are for placing pictures on the lower half of the wall and not the full wall like in this picture.
https://i.imgur.com/0Bha6Uwl.jpg

We also have a Create-a-word tool that allows players to build their own worlds. I have installed but haven't yet tried it as it is a bit complicated in my opinion. But we do have some very good world builders for TS3 such as Rflong7/13. Rflong goes by 7 and 13 on the old TS3 site as she has so many worlds that she's created as well as her own blog site for her worlds for download... :)

I won't bore anymore with other things that I love about TS3... :)

So I like what I said earlier, just watch some of the older promo videos as well as some of the "Let's Play" videos and read reviews from other sites before making up your mind about trying out the game or not... :)

Whatever you decide to do, Happy Simming from another Sims player... :)

@lisasc360 I think you have said all that needs to be said about the best game of the franchise so far :) Each release has it's own special features but who would have thought they would still be findin new things in TS3 to enjoy after 10 years. Yes it has problems but what computer game has not and there is a solution to most things.

I agree with the others, start with the base game, check your computer can handle the specs especially if you plan to add packs and store content. Personally I found it necessary to adjust my graphics settings. You can get advice on that in the Help section. I think you will not be disappointed with the level of gameplay in the base game so enjoy :)

"Bettyboop55;c-17011331" wrote:
@lisasc360 I think you have said all that needs to be said about the best game of the franchise so far :) Each release has it's own special features but who would have thought they would still be findin new things in TS3 to enjoy after 10 years. Yes it has problems but what computer game has not and there is a solution to most things.

I agree with the others, start with the base game, check your computer can handle the specs especially if you plan to add packs and store content. Personally I found it necessary to adjust my graphics settings. You can get advice on that in the Help section. I think you will not be disappointed with the level of gameplay in the base game so enjoy :)

Thank you @Bettyboop55... :)

Has the OP read any of this? I was noticing a lack of reply.
Also, I figured this would get moved.

Well I play both. It depends on what I'm in the mood for...

Some key points to consider:
- Can your PC handle TS3?
- Do you mind rabbit holes?
- What's your play style? (Family, building, etc...)

Personally, I love TS3 graphics with Reshade. A lot of TS4 players use Reshade as well. I would recommend that for both games. Just make sure your PC can handle it. TS4 is less demanding than TS3 though.

"ClarionOfJoy;c-17012155" wrote:


Last and not least, get to know us TS3 simmers! We love the game and have better knowledge of how it works than the people who hate it and want to make it unappealing to you!

This!
And make up your own mind! Don´t just ask people who don´t want to or who are not able to play The Sims 3, because it´s "too ugly on their computers" or "it´s too unplayable on their computers" and who sometimes not even played the game but just repeat false statements about the game they hate!

It all depends on what you want out of a game. For me, I can't go forward (backwards, IMO) to TS4 because the open world is something I could never give up. I love big families and being able to send various family members to different parts of the world and being able to keep tabs on them without loading screens and knowing they are only a zoom away is my idea of an almost perfect life simulation game.

Here's an example. I sent the kids out while the parents stayed home to care for the toddler (a life stage I didn't have to wait for). The sims at the venue are sims who live in actual houses my sims can visit (without loading screens) and who are getting on with their lives, working, skilling and raising children that my sim kids go to school with and can socialize with.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4814/32448922867_590264323b_o.jpg

Meanwhile, back at home, the parents are doing their thing, still playable, and not in limbo until I want to go back to them.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4855/32448922217_231411f4d5_o.jpg
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7890/33514583258_77d429fb34_o.jpg

My rig is old, beat up, limping on it's last leg (in fact had to reload windows on it just today.) I run TS3 and all expansion packs just fine. It can occasionally get a teeeny bit laggy but usually that just means it's time to reboot my machine. I only played TS4 for a free trial but personally, to me, the open world of TS3 is everything and CAS is second to that. But, and I haven't read all 3 pages so if this has already been posted I apologize, do *NOT* play TS3 without the NRAAS performance mods - it is completely unplayable without them imo. The mods take the lazy coding and glitch laden game and fixes like 99.9% of them painlessly. And the people there are incredibly helpful. And they work with a LOT of the modder community to try to be as compatible as possible and there's a bunch of gameplay mods. And you can know that they're 100% trustworthy. No I do not get paid by them, they're just that good. :) Just to be clear it wasn't TS3 that crashed my system. It happens with or without it, my rig just doesn't like Win 10.

Now that that's been said, TS4 looked too cartoony to me. I don't understand the term "Pudding face" so much, but you can really get some beautiful sims without any mods at all if that's your thing. It just takes a bit of practice or 5 minutes and a youtube video. :) If game play is your thing, if you like content, I've been playing TS3 since it was released and there are still things I haven't done, there are still parts that I haven't explored. My household consists of a genie, a werewolve, a fairy, a mermaid and a witch yet you can still be a zombie, a vampire, a mummy, a ghost, a plant sim, an alien... I can go jet skiing, scuba diving, snow boarding, to China, to France, to Egypt, to the FUTURE! And that's not even a drop in the bucket of the ocean of stuff to do. I can drive a boat, a sports car, a motor cycle, a jet pack, a horse, a truck, a unicorn, a moped, a bike, my own two feet in a jog to work, my HOUSE. I can be a fireman in my whole town, I can literally see my kids go to school or play in the park across the street from their grandparents that live on the other side of town while I work at the hotel I own out in the middle of the nowhere while I drive my house around in the ocean, see it all happening at the same time and FEEL that connection. When you zoom into the spring festival downtown and you see your sim's parents whoopin' it up on the dance floor? So fun. When your kid asks if they can go to their friend's house after school and you can still play both? When you can have that open world? That's my happy place in all of the Sims franchises to me. Without that there's very little reason to even care about the other sims in your game to me. Someone else said it earlier, it's like they're props. But when you are in "map" mode and you can see everything whenever? You can see the little old lady that lives next to you whippin' across a lake on her jet ski? That gives me SO much content that I'm just even witnessing, not responsible for but get to enjoy. Plus CAS makes every place unique. You can have an entire world that you designed where every single wall is different and that's not an exaggeration at all. CAS does take a bit to load but I just multi task during that time. I read or email or work or whatever. I play a lot of armchair catch with my dog. I get that it's a downside, but after trying TS4, I just kept waiting for an expansion pack exciting enough to give up the open world. The fact that TS3 still has so much more content than TS4, to me doesn't bode well for TS4 in my future. But everyone is different. My niece plays TS4 and loves it. :)

I have an Asus and I have the whole store & all the packs and extras ever made and it runs great. I don't use mods or custom content as those do hurt the performance of S3. No game is going to run as good as it could, if it is played on a computer that isn't listed as a gaming computer. It needs a good computer to run on and I can't stress it enough not to download from the Sims3 site or use cc or mods. I had cc right before Sims 3 Supernatural came out and I completely got rid of everything and played with no cc/mods and I never had any of the issues that other simmers described. I only crashed once or twice after supernatural and that was playing daily for many hours. If you have a good computer and play vanilla, then I really think it is a game that could hold your interest.

Getting out of CAS and saving the game is slow on Sims3, but worth the play. As far as the graphics, I play a little above the sims and really never noticed any problems. The graphics is a totally nonissue for me and I didn't notice anything wrong, but some people might play different. Even close up on the sim, I didn't notice anything. The worlds are beautiful and unlike the other Sims versions aren't limited. You can totally bulldoze a world and make it from scratch and put lots anywhere on the maps. I hate loading screens and tiny small worlds and that is one thing the Sims3 doesn't have. The basegame alone has so much to do that it holds your interest from the start. Here we are years into the Sims4 and no grocery stores, university, freed infants, collecting of insects, small pets(lizards birds ect.), no toddler riders for the playgrounds, no beach, no cars, no pool floats, no 60x60 lots, no fiancée/ect in CAS relationships, no major interactions with Grim, no grave yards, no lots of things. People talk about going on to Sims5 when Sims4 has no where near the content as Sims3 has. I, personally, want many more years out of the Sims4, so that it was worth buying. Sims5 can offer me nothing new over Sims4 unless they go back to open worlds and if not, I don't plan to buy it.

Sims 3 does have these that I find very interesting:

Generations- added so much to toddlers and elders had walking sticks

Seasons- sun tan machines, blankets to lay on beach, beach, build sand castle, can go in haunted house, but you come back out,

Island Paradise- live on houseboat, swim under ocean, see mermaids, be a mermaid, collect things

University- classes- I always cheated by bringing a load of potions(from Supernatural)- best friend, full energy, ect.

Supernatural- not for me except vampires, but you could be a fairy, wolf, witch, ect. and there was a bunch of details to it unlike S4 packs, plus they are all together.

In general: Can't remember where everything comes from, but here are some of my favorite things from Sims 3(some are from the Sims 3 store):

graveyards- interact with ghost and go inside mosuleum
Loads of toddler toys
toddlers don't get out of the highchair- which I loath in Sims4
frizbe
toddler riders and other play stuff on playground
mats for infants
swing for infants/toddlers
walker/playpen for toddlers
stroller
collecting insects, minerals, flowers
Easter eggs collecting every spring
potion to make so vampires can be in the sun for a while
unicorn
make your own lot any way you want and put a house anywhere you want on the map
map has around 20 houses or so, plus rabbit hole stores
World Adventures_ go to China, France, Egypt- some didn't like it because going in the caves was the same each time; wasn't a problem for me
slept in a sleeping bag on the ground, could buy countless energy drinks-those are the ones I took to university
Casinoes in the desert- play slot machines; actually kind of liked it.
cars, trucks, vans, bikes,bicycles- all kinds like over 20 or 30
Into the future- robots if you like that kind of thing
The famous type careers- liked going all over the map doing gigs
Katy Perry Sweet Treats- Many didn't like it, but it had a gorgeous long gown that was one of my favorites. I used many of the decorations to
make a neat swimming pool & bakery type business/hangout
Nice city EP- I liked it. Would've been nice to own them or for them to be more like many have commented about Sims2, but still nice.

60x60 lots, which I used heavily and also used to make my own hangouts ect.

babysitting career, real stylist career, home interior decorator career- all of them so much fun

Real fishing out in nature- run to a pond or the ocean and throw the line anywhere you want

Someone commented it was hard to keep track of your sims, but that wasn't so- clicking on the picture of your sim takes you to them or you can watch them from above. You can que in all of your sims at the same time and fill up there actions and they don't cancel them out like Sims 4. Also, I always used the pause button and it was extremely easy to keep up with them and multitask

They have carnival rides in the Sims store

From store to games, there was several full size worlds to explore like maybe 15?

shower woohoo

of course horses in pets along with dogs, cats, hamsters, lizards, birds and their cages

Loads of clothes and hair and stuff

more arcade and workout stuff

make your own resort with Island Paradise, which I enjoyed

Instore- tractor with track, cow sheds, chicken coops, ect. Many more plants and a large plant water sprinkler system


There is so much more I'm forgetting, but for me, hands down Sims 3 is the best. You can't say hardly a thing about everything above for the other games and I know that Sims4 will never have the content Sims3 has. We had many packs a year and the store had something every couple of weeks. It was exciting and now I could probably go on the Sims4 site 4-5 times a year and get caught up easily. I was on the Sims 3 site everyday, because you never knew when new stuff would arrive. Sims4 needs two EP teams and someone to do the smaller stuff.

I have everything except Strangerville for Sims4, but I really don't get immersed in it like Sims3. There are things I love about the Sims4 like being able to find townies and do what you want with them(can't in Sims3; have to make friends with them), build, moving lots in build, saving fast, accessories off with a click, ability to make a club for gardening and have sims come over and do all the work(harvest before they come), the yardsale table, the ability to run the store, the hospital, snowglobes, and the fact that it could be added to for many years with no need to go on to another game unless they offer open worlds, because Sims 5 would be just another Sims4 if not. But, aside from farming stuff I wanted and hopes for more workout equipment, Sims3 supplemented with the store has everything you could want, just about. Any minuses on Sims3 is easily overlooked as far as I'm concerned when you look at the bulk of play that it has and is missing in all the other ones. It is easy to say that Sims3 isn't good/fun, but if faced to look at the content missing, the play of Sims3 can't be dismissed that easily. I have so many fond memories and favorites in Sims3; I don't even think that way at all in Sims4. If you want more, Sims3 is what you are looking for.