Henford-on-Bagley is a new ridiculously small world again

@EmmaVane, thanks. I'm waiting for TS4 to come to an end before trying MCCC. :)

"Sindocat;c-17911692" wrote:
But give me a space, in every neighborhood, that I can place my own lot in. I hate to have to pick a lot to do without to make space for my creations, or a family to evict to house my ever expanding extended Legacy family, their in-laws and offspring.

I will be totally glad if they make 50% empty lots and 50% premade lots made by simmers for every expansion. If someone doesn't like to build, EA can also add some premade lots to the personal gallery as they did for Dine Out or Spa Day for example. I don't expect to have for example 30 fully built lots as in Windenburg.

"Naus;c-17911665" wrote:

"ACruelButLovingGod;c-17911352" wrote:
The moral of the story is that you're guaranteed to anger someone whenever you have to deal with a super long-running game that's active many years after you launch it (heck, look at World of Warcraft, which came out in 2004 and which Blizzard has to keep current so it doesn't feel and look like a relic today compared to other MMO games). Keep it accessible and people complain about the technical restraints. Keep up with developments in tech and game design and older players feel left behind or like they have to buy a new computer. You're pretty much boned either way.

Sorry, but the moral of the story is that games SHOULD NOT run for so long. This Games-As-A-Live-Service model may work for MMOs like WoW, but it's a terrible idea for single-player games. They should be released, expanded for a few years, and then move on to a new version.

I don't believe should be made to buy the same basic stuff such as weather over and over either. A basic weather system should be part of the base game like it's part of MOST games nowadays. Just because The Sims has been doing something for years, it doesn't mean it's a good thing.

If they keep up, they're going to end up killing the franchise, especially if competition comes out such as Paralives or whatever game Paradox is developing with Rod Humble.

See, I disagree with that idea. I love single-player games with massively long tails that are nearly endlessly expandable and get new content support many years after initial release form a good chunk of my actual gaming time.

I think of it as being like in the old days of stuff like model railroading. You'd buy the "starter set" which was usually a small oval loop of track and a small train (maybe even just a locomotive) to run on it. But if you went to the hobby shop or bought stuff by mail-order from magazines like Model Railroader you could get layouts like the one my stepfather had in the basement or that formed the backbone of the intro to Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, itself loosely modeled on Pittsburgh, where the show was filmed. Rolling stock, scale model houses and civic buildings, as much as your imagination and floor/table space would allow.

Indeed, Steam will happily sell you something like Train Sim World, which is basically model railroad meets computers, and there's a good reason flight sims have been a pillar of PC gaming for just about as long as home PC games have existed—the very first Microsoft Flight Simulator came out in October of 1982; the first MS-DOS based PC launched in 1981, and in the 40 years or so since, both officially supported and fan-made expansions have been part and parcel of that franchise. Simulation gaming did it first, but Paradox figured out you can do it pretty well with strategy games too. Crusader Kings only got a third installment because they reached the absolute limit of what the engine could do with CK2 (initially released in 2012) and it finally had to be rebuilt; I'm not sure Sims 4 is at that point yet (then again, neither were 2 or 3 when they were done.)

What's more, it's pretty obvious that model is wildly profitable—I wonder how much DLC the average player of such a game actually buys, but I know the enthusiasts (like me) can and will spend a ton of money on them, like hundreds of dollars, over the game's lifetime. As long as it's singleplayer and doesn't have mandatory online components (grouses angrily at both SimCity 2013 and Fallout 76), bring on the long-runners!

@elanorbreton I only have a few pre-made families. The Goths in Willow Creek, the Pancakes in Oasis Springs, the Bjergsens in Windenberg, Vlad in Forgotten Hollow, the Heckings in Brindleton Bay, and Mr. Cahill in Strangerville. So 6 households.

For me I do not care how many neighborhoods they make for every single one of them will not be free and also have static lots and Having let say fifty neighborhoods is not necessarily an good thing it involving an search for something. It still limits my creativity as you run out of space real quick and some times moving an sim to another neighborhood may not serve an players purpose.

"SimmerGeorge;c-17911678" wrote:

"Naus;c-17911665" wrote:


Sorry, but the moral of the story is that games SHOULD NOT run for so long. This Games-As-A-Live-Service model may work for MMOs like WoW, but it's a terrible idea for single-player games. They should be released, expanded for a few years, and then move on to a new version.

@Naus Agree. Especially games that were not designed to. The Sims 4 is cracking and it's been showing for years now, even if people don't like to admit it.
How much better the experience could be compared to what we have now is honestly one of the saddest things ever. People are like I don't mind this I don't mind that, but you know if certain things weren't so limited, or badly executed it would be a better experience for everyone no question.

The game is cracking as EA/Maxis does not tweak the game as often as they should but is quick to produce an pack.

They need to give us CAW and stop punishing players who have systems who can handle large worlds I'd rather have 1 world with 50 lots than 5 worlds with 8-12 lots it should be my choice.

"ACruelButLovingGod;c-17911785" wrote:

"Naus;c-17911665" wrote:

"ACruelButLovingGod;c-17911352" wrote:
The moral of the story is that you're guaranteed to anger someone whenever you have to deal with a super long-running game that's active many years after you launch it (heck, look at World of Warcraft, which came out in 2004 and which Blizzard has to keep current so it doesn't feel and look like a relic today compared to other MMO games). Keep it accessible and people complain about the technical restraints. Keep up with developments in tech and game design and older players feel left behind or like they have to buy a new computer. You're pretty much boned either way.

Sorry, but the moral of the story is that games SHOULD NOT run for so long. This Games-As-A-Live-Service model may work for MMOs like WoW, but it's a terrible idea for single-player games. They should be released, expanded for a few years, and then move on to a new version.

I don't believe should be made to buy the same basic stuff such as weather over and over either. A basic weather system should be part of the base game like it's part of MOST games nowadays. Just because The Sims has been doing something for years, it doesn't mean it's a good thing.

If they keep up, they're going to end up killing the franchise, especially if competition comes out such as Paralives or whatever game Paradox is developing with Rod Humble.

See, I disagree with that idea. I love single-player games with massively long tails that are nearly endlessly expandable and get new content support many years after initial release form a good chunk of my actual gaming time.

I think of it as being like in the old days of stuff like model railroading. You'd buy the "starter set" which was usually a small oval loop of track and a small train (maybe even just a locomotive) to run on it. But if you went to the hobby shop or bought stuff by mail-order from magazines like Model Railroader you could get layouts like the one my stepfather had in the basement or that formed the backbone of the intro to Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, itself loosely modeled on Pittsburgh, where the show was filmed. Rolling stock, scale model houses and civic buildings, as much as your imagination and floor/table space would allow.

Indeed, Steam will happily sell you something like Train Sim World, which is basically model railroad meets computers, and there's a good reason flight sims have been a pillar of PC gaming for just about as long as home PC games have existed—the very first Microsoft Flight Simulator came out in October of 1982; the first MS-DOS based PC launched in 1981, and in the 40 years or so since, both officially supported and fan-made expansions have been part and parcel of that franchise. Simulation gaming did it first, but Paradox figured out you can do it pretty well with strategy games too. Crusader Kings only got a third installment because they reached the absolute limit of what the engine could do with CK2 (initially released in 2012) and it finally had to be rebuilt; I'm not sure Sims 4 is at that point yet (then again, neither were 2 or 3 when they were done.)

What's more, it's pretty obvious that model is wildly profitable—I wonder how much DLC the average player of such a game actually buys, but I know the enthusiasts (like me) can and will spend a ton of money on them, like hundreds of dollars, over the game's lifetime. As long as it's singleplayer and doesn't have mandatory online components (grouses angrily at both SimCity 2013 and Fallout 76), bring on the long-runners!

Yikes. Just because something is profitable, it doesn't mean is good in any way. Mobile games are very profitable thanks to whales who buy anything, but that doesn't make those games good for the average player. You're forgetting how much of an addiction compulsive spending is. But I guess you probably don't recognize it in yourself, so you probably don't think it's an issue. But it is.

Once again the EA team is putting quantity over quality, and not very much in the way of quantity either. The excuse they have given for why they won't do any more is just that, but then any "reasonable excuse" can be used to justify not doing more for the game as they can do that. No, i see it that EA want to spend as little on the project as possible and have the developers get what they can out on an arbitrary time limit set by EA, regardless if the quality of the product and then simply move on and do it again.

I'm not at all convinced of the EA management and how they use their developers on this game and neither do i hold it against the developers for the excuse itself.

"ACruelButLovingGod;c-17911785" wrote:

"Naus;c-17911665" wrote:

"ACruelButLovingGod;c-17911352" wrote:
The moral of the story is that you're guaranteed to anger someone whenever you have to deal with a super long-running game that's active many years after you launch it (heck, look at World of Warcraft, which came out in 2004 and which Blizzard has to keep current so it doesn't feel and look like a relic today compared to other MMO games). Keep it accessible and people complain about the technical restraints. Keep up with developments in tech and game design and older players feel left behind or like they have to buy a new computer. You're pretty much boned either way.

Sorry, but the moral of the story is that games SHOULD NOT run for so long. This Games-As-A-Live-Service model may work for MMOs like WoW, but it's a terrible idea for single-player games. They should be released, expanded for a few years, and then move on to a new version.

I don't believe should be made to buy the same basic stuff such as weather over and over either. A basic weather system should be part of the base game like it's part of MOST games nowadays. Just because The Sims has been doing something for years, it doesn't mean it's a good thing.

If they keep up, they're going to end up killing the franchise, especially if competition comes out such as Paralives or whatever game Paradox is developing with Rod Humble.

See, I disagree with that idea. I love single-player games with massively long tails that are nearly endlessly expandable and get new content support many years after initial release form a good chunk of my actual gaming time.

@ACruelButLovingGod You do realize though that there are big issues that come with such games running for a long time. First of all, the game cannot evolve and become better and we see that in the Sims 4, how difficult it is for it to be something more than it's predecesors. We can never change the engine/fountation of the Sims 4. It's there and it will be there until we decide to evolve and move on. All we can do is throw things over it to make it seem like it's changing. There is no fundamental change in the Sims 4 and there will never be unless we decide to move on.
Then there is the problem of newer machines having trouble running such old software. It is already happening with the Sims 4 not running well enough on newer machines.

And then most importantly there is the issues of "spaghetti code", which is a huge problem the Sims 4 has been facing for so many years and there is no way to overcome it unless we start over.

In theory it is a nice concept to be adding to a game so you "make it better" but in reality it doesn't work like that.

I understand people are very attached to their money, especially when they have spent so much but I think it's important to realize that the products you bought will not be taken away from you if the Sims team decides to move on from this game.