Carl's Guide: A History of the Sims 4

"Sk8rblaze;c-17837454" wrote:

"Sallycutecat;c-17836544" wrote:
I like the Sims 4. I can do what I want and there's not really any obstacle to overcome. I found Sims 2 to be too challenging. I didn't like the aspiration meter, the wants and fears, and the need decay was too fast. I got bored playing Sims 3. I find it boring to watch and wait while my Sim walks from one side of town to the other. The game was also very laggy and didn't run well on my computer. Sims 4 is the first Sims game where I don't need cheats to keep on top of their needs. It's easy to get promotions or do well in school, build relationships, and skill up in whatever I want my Sim to be good at. Sims 4 really suits me and my way of playing.

To preface this, I’m glad you found a Sims game which meshes better with your style of play, and I wouldn’t want them to radically redesign TS4 to take that away from you.

But I don’t think the solution for everyone is to strip the game entirely of fun gameplay systems and make retained systems like Needs way too easy to manage. Not at all insinuating you are, but I’m personally not someone that lives vicariously through my Sims. Keeping the game in normal mode and watching them slowly ski, rowboat, or go to the spa does absolutely nothing for me. That’s all visual stuff. I need depth/meaning behind it, and I need to feel like the game is challenging me in some capacity, otherwise I leave. And I don’t even think it needs to be complex. Things to the extent of TS2’s dating or headmaster system were fine enough.

I’ve said it before, but I definitely think they should make a simplified sandbox mode for players like you and a life simulation mode for players like myself that want challenge, risk, and spontaneity.

The thing is they haven't stripped the game entirely of fun gameplay. What is fun gameplay is all a matter of preference and personal taste so it's not right to say there's no fun gameplay in Sims 4. For me, the need decay being slower allows for more time to do the actual fun stuff. I found having to focus entirely on my Sims needs and have no time for anything else to be rather boring. In Sims 4 I can have them snowboard nearly all day and it only takes a small amount of time for them to take care of their needs. I can play a family of 5 and have them all live a fullfulling life (including their social life). There's not many games out their that meet the needs of those of us who don't want challenge. Sims 4 is one of the few that does.

I do agree that difficulty options would benifit more people. The problem with different modes would be neither mode may suit exactly what we want, but if we could all alter the difficulty in the game options menu then we could set them to what we each individually prefer. Options to change the speed of the need decay, the difficulty of getting promotions, etc. It may be too late for this kind of system to come to Sims 4 so maybe people could advocate for it to be in Sims 5.