Babies, toddlers and children—OH MY!

"RebeccaThurston;c-17293292" wrote:
I will be honest, children and toddlers to me are simply a stage they have to go through to get to be an adult or young adult. But since I play with my aging off maybe others do too in which case the toddler, child and teenager stage is a permanent thing.

I think they could add in some of the items they had for the Sims 2 and 3 for toddlers and children. But I also think that they have already made a stuff pack devoted just to toddlers and made a parenthood pack that added a lot of realism to the interactions of sim parents and their children. I think in this version they made children, teens and toddlers more real. (My one teen is having a huge mental crisis at the moment and is fighting with her dad). It makes me think, considering what they did with Parenthood, that instead of just giving us items they gave us interactions instead to help our sim parents raise their children. Those character values for positive or negative will have a lifelong impact on the child/toddler/teenager. They determine what kind of sim they grow up to be, will affect how they interact with the world and sims around them. From all I remember of the Sims 2, I think that what they did in the Sims 4 is so much more important than earning a few extra points in charisma, logic and creativity at an early stage of life development. The point I am trying to make is that I simply don't know what they could add that would be more valuable than what they have done. Now sim parents have to really interact with their sim children not just give them a toy to play with. Stuff is nice but relationship and values are more important.

As for babies, I did like the items that were put in like the play mat and swing in the Sims 3 but like I said, to me this is such a temporary stage that I wonder if it's worth it if they could add in something else.

I totally agree about the changes Parenthood brought. My Sims in previous games never seemed to know that they were parents, whereas in S4, there are numerous ways in which parents and children can interact, building a more real parent-child relationship.

I like the baby stage, but I think they could do more with it. And we haven't really had any new objects or game play for toddlers and kids in quite a while. (Island Living did give us swimming in the ocean and playing in the sand, but that was limited to the island world.) I'd really like some new objects with new animations and interactions and maybe some new skills. At very least, it would be nice to get something new to build the 'thinking' skill for toddlers.