For me I see 5 out of 10 as being average. In terms of comparing Sims 4 to all games, I might give it a 5 out of 10. It offers more to do than most, but I feel that's a natural consequence of being a sandbox, open-world style game. Compared to other sandbox, open-world style games it's pretty generic.
I feel I should absolutely drop the score to 3 out of 10 for three main reasons:
1) This is the worst game of the Sims franchise, and as such when you grade it based on what could be achieved, using past games as evidence? This game lacks severely and thus I don't think it deserves a 5 out of 10 in this context.
2) They have yet to produce a single expansion that has been universally well received. To me, that's unprecedented. It's a bit difficult to rate this game above a 5 out of 10 when, if you were to average out the individual ratings and scores of each individual pack, that average would be low. I just find that inexcuseable that within 3 and a half years, they've produced a grand total of 2 out of 22 packs that seem universally well regarded by the fans. (Vampires and Parenthood)
3) To me perhaps the biggest "crime" of development is that they're clearly recycling everything possible in an effort to cut corners and reduce costs, to the point they're even willing to recycle broken systems. Recycling the animations from Get to Work for the Vet career...? It's a little "depressing" since it acts as an indicator the game's budget is lacking or the creators are focused on the cash, but you could also argue recycling such things helps them spend more time on important features.
However, they've also recycled that god awful retail system. Twice. Both times it's bugged out and performed just as poorly as the initial rendition did. They know it's flawed and buggy, and yet they don't care and bring it back again and again. Retail, to this day, has worthless employees and sales hindered by group convos of socialite customers. Three years later, they have yet to go back and simply patch the customers to socialize less or make employees actually work, and are content to leave that expansion pack's content in a completely disfunctional state. Dine Out is perhaps the most stable, but visiting a restaurant as a customer takes an entire day, and the system still bugs out regularly, causing a 1-star review from customers that simply couldn't sit or refused to actually eat their meal. The Vet career - big surprise - has the workers once again doing nothing.
To me if they're copy-pasting that system despite knowing how buggy it is, I take that as an insult. I take that as evidence the team truly does not care and just wants a quick buck. I mean that's like trying to sell a vase with a big crack down the side, the initial customer returns it when they notice it, and then they have the audacity to put the vase back on display for sale while trying to hide the crack from customers. How about actually improving your product instead of just trying to swindle customers...?
In that regard, I do absolutely think the game deserves some points knocked off in protest of such practices.
Overall I just find myself consistently unimpressed while packs produce forgettable experiences, and my motivations for voting it 3 out of 10 include the fact that this game underperforms vs. other games of it's kind/other games in the franchise, the expansion packs are absolutely awful, and all the while EA/Maxis seems completely shameless about recycling broken systems.
