@JoAnne65 @Noree_Doree I find I just kind of fix any bug that comes up like any other action I'm doing in the game. It just kind of became routine. Hitting reset sim once in a while wasn't really that much different that fulfilling any other motive. It didn't ruin the game. That would be a different story.
@ApparentlyAwesome The sims 3 has 1,078 moodlets listed. The sims 4 page doesn't have nearly as many, and a lot of them are the same thing with a different color square for a different emotion (of which there are only a few.) That said, "mood(let)" is literally a synonym for "emotion." I didn't find the emotion system "new" when I played the Sims 4. I found it to be a simplified version of what was already there before. In the Sims 3 there were already many moodlets that were beneficial or detrimental to specific tasks or social interactions. For instance, you would get a job boost for being in a certain "mood," as in a specific moodlet the boosts work or certain social interactions relevant to work. This would typically be gone in specific ways relevant to your job, traits that boost the job, or doing something specific like eat an herb. You would get a boost by your general mood, which could be done in many, many ways. So many ways you could personalize your game, but also the core, usual things, like decoration. Your skills and how fast you got them and what kind of benefits you got from them were influenced by traits, and this in turn would influence your work, and by extension how people interacted and reacted to your sim (and how you could interact with them.)
Emotions were not absent in the Sims 3, even though a side of the screen wasn't plastered with one of a couple colors. I kind of found it just took something that was already there to the forefront. You already could do things, get into a "mood," so that you were more successful at romantic interactions (or writing romance novels), more "confident," or successful at socializing, or more "focused" or get a boost to your job or logic still, or boost your athletic ability, or the rate you gained the skill. In addition to the direct boost to specific activities, skills, or interactions (which in turn when successfully completed would be rewarded with another even more beneficial moodlet - such as getting a promotion, gaining level in skill, making new friends, the rewards for romantic interactions, etc, etc), the overall total of your positive and negative mood effected your sims overall mood, which would in turn effect everything else they do, like work, interactions - bad mood, bad result. So even the more general things had more power, and those topped off with all the interesting your-specific-build-of-sim could do for more points. In addition to that, once the mood was high enough (you can say "good" enough, but a sim didn't NEED to be "good" in order to do successful things so that they could be satisfied for their particular build) those efforts put into the mood would get dumped into lifetime happiness points, where you could choose benefits that further enhance this system/way of life/job, etc. All those "emotions" were there already, but they were packed into the moodlets and affected interactions, skills, and jobs. The sims 4 take on it just takes a part of the old moodlet area and puts it out front on another part of the screen, but the rest is remarkably more simple and limited.
I find I kind of require that "attachment" to the sims in order to enjoy Sims games. It's a bit too much a simple pet care simulator without it. I like to be able to look at the game and get my gears turning a bit in order to have a good time. The sims 3, while simple enough, had enough gears turning in the background that I could have a good time, be creative, and try out ideas. When I play the Sims 4, that's just not there. There are just not that many gears turning in the background, so it's too simple, and not enough to do or try. Not a lot of room to grow. That kind of makes it a game that's just on the surface for me, and doesn't have much depth, and doesn't really go anywhere. So, I don't really feel attached my my sims, and with that lack of complexity, I don't really see them do things that, for lack of a better word, endear them to me, like all the funny, quirky, and personality specific things there were in the Sims 3, and the visuals, moodlets, and lifestyles to go with them. So, unless the Sims 4 gets some depth so there is actually something in the background to BRING to the foreground (and in the Sims 3 there is so much of that it can take years and years to get through everything, and still you're left with the staggering number of possible combinations of traits, and many objects to use you can customize yourself), and the very frequent, long loading screens go by quickly as they should with a decent system, I can't say I'll ever be interested in playing again. With the price tag on content as it is, for what it is, I can't say it's appealing to pick the rest of it up just to be observant.
I don't really know where the 64 bit direction is going either. I really don't need more fuzzy visuals. I need more depth. I actually prefer my top setting Sims 3 game and how I can create my own colors and use textures in create a style to my liking to make it look it's best. Set the lights, etc. And there's depth. Can you imagine if in the next installment William Joseph "B.J." Blazkowicz showed up looking like a Looney Tune? It's wrong. People complained about the Sims this way, while some people liked it... but, for a different title, the complaining about the big change would considered justified, yet criticism of the Sims and big changes is kind of dismissed. Players seem to bicker about what incarnation of the Sims is best, maybe because people want to see a certain shape in the future and not be left in the past, but EA doesn't seem to take care of it's older versions of the game, remaster them, or offer them in a complete edition. They seem to be buried. I think it's ok to like more than one sims game! The last time all of the Sims 3 went on sale, other than a general store wide discount, was many, many years ago on Black Friday when each EP was $7. It was the same year Sims 4 was released. So, for 64 bit, I don't know... more fuzzy visuals won't fix the game. It needs more depth. You can't polish a plum, but you can roll it in glitter.
