Carl's Guide: A History of the Sims 4

"PreCiious;c-17837006" wrote:



I think its sad, that this game is about the players and not so much about the sims themselfs

But then when you tell people you want to play an actual game and not make everything up like its a dollhouse they say "It's your fault you find it boring, you are not creative enough".
Since when do we have to make such a huge effort to enjoy a game?

"SimmerGeorge;c-17837160" wrote:

"PreCiious;c-17837006" wrote:



I think its sad, that this game is about the players and not so much about the sims themselfs

But then when you tell people you want to play an actual game and not make everything up like its a dollhouse they say "It's your fault you find it boring, you are not creative enough".
Since when do we have to make such a huge effort to enjoy a game?

What would you all want? Honest question, because I liked the fact StrangerVille gave you a goal and actually something to do besides go to work or a date, but everybody seemed to hate it. Or Jungle Adventure gave you a goal to explore the jungle and try to survive it, and there's a real chance your sim won't make it unless you have the right stuff. Is this stuff you all would want expanded more on? Or something totally different.

"eternalrainn;c-17837224" wrote:

"SimmerGeorge;c-17837160" wrote:

"PreCiious;c-17837006" wrote:



I think its sad, that this game is about the players and not so much about the sims themselfs

But then when you tell people you want to play an actual game and not make everything up like its a dollhouse they say "It's your fault you find it boring, you are not creative enough".
Since when do we have to make such a huge effort to enjoy a game?

What would you all want? Honest question, because I liked the fact StrangerVille gave you a goal and actually something to do besides go to work or a date, but everybody seemed to hate it. Or Jungle Adventure gave you a goal to explore the jungle and try to survive it, and there's a real chance your sim won't make it unless you have the right stuff. Is this stuff you all would want expanded more on? Or something totally different.

@eternalrainn What I meant is for example your sims personalities actually affecting their behavior. Kind of like they did in the Sims 2. So depending on what traits and personality you give them, they are attracted to certain people and not attracted to others, like doing certain things while not doing others, have certain goals that they won't to achieve or they will become miserable, have unexpected things happen to them like getting fired.
Also a better AI that allows them to automatically do different things based on their personality or their hobby. Not all drink water and play computer games for all sims. Maybe also interact and call sims they want to talk to without you telling them.
Another thing is long-term consequences, you do something, it has an effect on your life and the sims around you.

There are tons of great ideas to spice up the game that a lot of people in the feedback forums have shared, many are just features from previous sims games, like wants, fears, good aspirations, attaction systems, memories etc.

Just a way to individualize every sim so it doesn't feel like "This doll is gonna do this and that other doll is gonna do this".

"eternalrainn;c-17837224" wrote:

"SimmerGeorge;c-17837160" wrote:

"PreCiious;c-17837006" wrote:



I think its sad, that this game is about the players and not so much about the sims themselfs

But then when you tell people you want to play an actual game and not make everything up like its a dollhouse they say "It's your fault you find it boring, you are not creative enough".
Since when do we have to make such a huge effort to enjoy a game?

What would you all want? Honest question, because I liked the fact StrangerVille gave you a goal and actually something to do besides go to work or a date, but everybody seemed to hate it. Or Jungle Adventure gave you a goal to explore the jungle and try to survive it, and there's a real chance your sim won't make it unless you have the right stuff. Is this stuff you all would want expanded more on? Or something totally different.

Something totally different. It's kind of hard to explain, especially if you play completely differently.

I do not like linear gameplay like with Strangerville where you have redundant tasks to complete and an ending to the game with no replay value. So gameplay like that is very unappealing.

I'll speak from TS2, which is my favorite in the series and I still play it. The sims are all different personality-wise. There wasn't too many different personality types, but when you combine them with interests, points, likes and dislikes + the wants and fears system, it was possible to get unique sims. They behaved differently. And they had so many different interactions with unique animations that it was hard to get bored. Plus the gameplay was much more intricate and nuanced. Family members had special relationships and bonds. I love seeing my teens taunting their younger siblings. Plus they didn't all get along. If their interests weren't aligned, they wouldn't receive the social interactions well. Plus they have the ability to be really angry with someone whole still caring about them. I have had a couple of kids in the same family where one of the kids will be nice to everyone except one of the siblings. They will get into physical fights, but this kid is nice to everyone else in the world. I've also had a romance sim who started off wanting to woohoo the town, but I didn't let him. Instead he got married and had a family, all while being a romance sim and instead of cheating and those kinds of wants, he started getting wants to go on dates with his own wife. He was actually one of my most loyal sims in the end.

I guess that's the kind of underlying system I want for TS4. I want a system that makes my sims feel unique where they have their own personality and it isn't always rainbows and sunshine. There should be negative things that happen. There should be sims that don't all think the same and aren't always happy and smiling. They shouldn't just accept every interaction. And every family should be different. So when I move from one family to another, it doesn't just feel like I'm playing the same family over and over, which is what TS4 feels like to me. In the previous games, there were enough challenges and the sims had enough personality to be different. I could play the exact same scenario with 2 different households and none of it would go the same. In TS4 it is always the same and I have to use my imagination for most of it because the animations and interactions simply aren't there in this version.

"eternalrainn;c-17837224" wrote:

"SimmerGeorge;c-17837160" wrote:

"PreCiious;c-17837006" wrote:



I think its sad, that this game is about the players and not so much about the sims themselfs

But then when you tell people you want to play an actual game and not make everything up like its a dollhouse they say "It's your fault you find it boring, you are not creative enough".
Since when do we have to make such a huge effort to enjoy a game?

What would you all want? Honest question, because I liked the fact StrangerVille gave you a goal and actually something to do besides go to work or a date, but everybody seemed to hate it. Or Jungle Adventure gave you a goal to explore the jungle and try to survive it, and there's a real chance your sim won't make it unless you have the right stuff. Is this stuff you all would want expanded more on? Or something totally different.

I would want the game to direct me to different ways to play the game. That's what I have always thought the pre-made households, npc's, events and aspirations are supposed to do.

Right now the sims4 treats you as a god, not a player which makes you leave everything up to your own imagination and it doesn't do a very good job of encouraging you to create or try new things. I often think about this when I see their trailers, you could recreate what you see in the trailers, but the game doesn't really make it easy for you to do so with the way everything is limited and all packs are stretched thin.

People that design games often adds different things to encourage the player but with the sims4 it feels like they don't do that for the sake of it being a sandbox game and also because they just focus on making stuff, not expand or improve the game.

The game has turned into a dollhouse, not a life simulator.

I find ways to make the game fun for me and Carl's Sims has always been there alongside me. I am sort of disappointed with him for putting out such a video. YOU as the player have to put in the time and energy to make or break your game experience. It is the same with ANY game you choose to put your time and energy into.

"SimsLady2000;c-17837270" wrote:
I find ways to make the game fun for me and Carl's Sims has always been there alongside me. I am sort of disappointed with him for putting out such a video. YOU as the player have to put in the time and energy to make or break your game experience. It is the same with ANY game you choose to put your time and energy into.

I admire that you find the time and energy to enhance your game experience, me, I feel so limited. I visited the light festival in Snowy Escape yesterday and the experience was exactly the same as when I visited it with another sims family. Nothing happens there unless you make something happen.

I think the last time I really had fun at a festival was when I was playing Get Famous, I did silly things like doing promotions for movies by dancing around at San Myshuno Festivals in a Knight Costume. But that was all me, the game did nothing to encourage me to do that.

So again, more power to you, but I fear that with the direction we are going the sims4 is just going to be a dollhouse of untested packs where players and modders have to salvage what they can to have a good playing experience.

"SimsLady2000;c-17837270" wrote:
I find ways to make the game fun for me and Carl's Sims has always been there alongside me. I am sort of disappointed with him for putting out such a video. YOU as the player have to put in the time and energy to make or break your game experience. It is the same with ANY game you choose to put your time and energy into.

@SimsLady2000 I kindly want to disagree because in my opinion all games out there are made to be fun without you having to "force the fun". Even the Sims 2 was made in a way that you didn't need to go out of your way to think of ways to make the game fun since it was created in a way to be entertaining, always with a different outcome.

In a game you shouldn't have to force the fun, it's supposed to be entertainment, it's supposed to be fun already on its own, that's why it's a game. Games, no matter what time period of history you look at were made in way to be enjoyable, if that's board games, sports or anything else that fits the game category.

Imagine if there was a board game where you are supposed to create the fun. Just a blank piece of cardboard you have to somehow make enjoyable. Even if that's possible, it's still not a game, it's just blank. Why do you then have to pay so much money to then also have to make an effort to have fun. That way of thinking really doesn't make any sense to me.

some things have improved,
other things not at all

I see tons of potential
but i fear it will be left undiscovered

"SimsLady2000;c-17837270" wrote:
I find ways to make the game fun for me and Carl's Sims has always been there alongside me. I am sort of disappointed with him for putting out such a video. YOU as the player have to put in the time and energy to make or break your game experience. It is the same with ANY game you choose to put your time and energy into.

I have never had to do that with any game. If it isn't fun, I'm not playing it. That's why I dropped TS4 for years and am just giving it another go right now.

I think what people and especially the devs don't understand is that when we created stories in previous games, we weren't actually creating stories. The stories were being created as we played the game. Yes, there were some people that just posed their sims and called it gameplay, but for the majority of us, we played the game and let the story create itself. That's the difference between TS4 and the other iterations.