Clipping vs Routing Issues

"netguysteve;12478470" wrote:

"MoonShadow;12413708" wrote:
IThere is a reason why The Sims doesn't have a competitor and that might be because a Sims game is mighty difficult to make

It has more to do with the fact that it's not wise to try to enter a market where a competitor has a high level of brand loyalty. Some of the fans of The Sims are downright rabid in their defense of their favorite version of The Sims. Just look around these forums for proof of that.

There actually was a short-lived game called "Singles" which was pretty much a Sims clone. It didn't work out because The Sims was already too well known and had established too much brand loyalty.

That being said, if TheSims were to lose some of that loyalty, a competitive product that addressed some of the issues that disgruntled fans had would look very appealing to another studio and publisher. If The Sims 4 truly does turn out to be a disaster, that could be the tipping point and clones could indeed start popping up.

This is exactly what happened to Sony with Everquest. They were really the only game at the time that was popular and in 3D and all that. They had no competition to speak of so they didn't cater to fans much. Yeah we got answers but it was just blah blah blah. They really didn't "address" the issues so many fans complained about. They pretty much did what they wanted and said the game wouldn't be fun if they didn't make everyone run 4 real time hours to get their corpse, etc...said it would take the challenge out of the game.

Blizzard saw an opportunity and ran with it. WoW had different more cartoony graphics but could run on many many computers, everything the fans complained about was addressed and now look. I think history speaks for itself and some day EA might have some competition if things continue and people really don't buy the game or EP's. Because if the base game isn't fun, I plan to go no further.