"AmeliaTodd;c-17898333" wrote:
"NationalPokedex;c-17898303" wrote:
"AmeliaTodd;c-17898240" wrote:
"NationalPokedex;c-17898192" wrote:
"AmeliaTodd;c-17897997" wrote:
"Loanet;c-17897905" wrote:
Okay, let me put it this way - Does this hold up to a Game Pack? ANY Game Pack?
Pick a Game Pack at random. Vampires. Dine Out. Jungle Adventure. Three radically different packs. Dream Home Decorator doesn't stand up to their content. Its gameplay is based around two things - the Build Mode and the new Likes and Dislikes system, which is BASE GAME - Sims seem to base their appreciaton on whether they Like the items in the room, or Dislike them.
To be worthwhile, Dream Home Decorator really needed a new world.
(Disclaimer: I'm really fine with people wanting more out of this pack, also I like all the below packs for various reasons)
Ok, just for the argument sake:
Outdoor retreat has a whole world locked under vacation mechanic, went there for vacation once, aside from my sim getting hit twice by a lighting, nothing interesting happened, never used the gameplay again the way it is meant to be used. Can't even use the world it came with unless I'm on vacation.
Spa day has four or five intractable objects and a new lot type, sure it's reusable but also not the peak of gameplay.
Jungle Adventure stands slightly better than Outdoor retreat due to amount of stuff it comes with and a more outlandish quest, always if you like to play in a vacation world.
Strangerville got massively criticized for having the player to repeat same thing over and over again with new save (and that quest plus one fairly standard career is the only gameplay it has.)
Vampires have a new life state with very underdeveloped rpg leveling system as it's only gameplay (let's not even go into the miserable state it went after the nerfing), the only reason it stands solidly on its own is because vampires have a strong lore outside of the game and most players are familiar with it, plus it gave some bb variety. Strip it of that and how many vampires will you have fun leveling over and over again and how many garlic wreaths are you going to make (in a world where vampires don't even visit you anymore)?
RoM fairs better than Vampires in some sense because there is an additional secret world to it and NPCs that take active roles in your day to day life (not nerfed unlike vampires)
Journey to Batuu, too ambitious for its budget, and a bit weird choice (again locked as vacation world). From and rpg point of view very poor gameplay design.
Dine out only holds out if you like to build and visit restaurants (since people are saying that this pack is only good if you like to build, and it's a completely valid argument, but it can be said for many other things as well.)
Out of all of them, the Parenhood is the only one with good balance, so you see there are problems with everything if one is willing to go there.
So yes, it does hold to previous packs. Could it be more? Sure, like everything else.
You are bringing the like and dislike system, which is something I wanted to address for a while. There is no such thing as free base updates, Likes and Dislikes were getting developed to be included into this pack, same with bunk beds (we clearly got an early access) the side effect of it was that we got free updates. Same things happened with scared moodlet, Paranormal pack wouldn't be the same if sims would just get tense. So while it doesn't work exactly in direct correlation I imagine, some of budget do go to the free updates (the people at Maxis don't work for free, the money has to come and be allocated in some way)
You left out all of the other components these packs provided like the new traits, new aspirations, new lot traits, new lot types, new skills, new harvestables/collectibles, etc. that these packs introduced on top of what you did point out. These additions matter in this entire conversation because it shows the standard that the previous GPs have set.
DHD doesn’t include anything new aside from a career and the B/B and CAS. That’s why it’s most comparable to DO which also has just the new lot type plus new career of restaurant owner plus it’s B/B and CAS. But with that being said, between owning a restaurant and decorating a home, only one of those was new to the game.
I was talking about the major features of the gameplay of those packs. The collectibles locked behind of a vacation world isn't all that, couple new dishes again isn't peak of gameplay. Couple extra fishes and a glowing tree doesn't really make the gameplay.
In reality if you start to compare each one of them to each other without any bias you will see quite a bit of variety in this standard you are talking about, some have more of this, other have more of that, they did however created a pattern that build an expectation and by reactions that I keep seeing over these past 3 years I have the impression that these expectations were never met, so it's kinda amusing right now to me to see people bringing previous packs as the greatest achievement in sims.
But the point isn't about that. The budget allocated to DHD ended up bigger than the one of a stuff pack, that's the issue here. Even if the gameplay existed before, I'm sure it didn't took couple button clicks to make it work in the live mode. The gameplay is far more complex than what we have seen from stuff level budget packs. It's not the same to have program couple intractable objects, throw in couple collectables (while using an already existing systems), a lot type and build a career that requires more complex interactions from NPC. There is a reason why Dine Out is so bare bones. It had similar complexity. Also as I've said, it looks like quite a bit budget went into developing the like dislike system (even though the majority of it is offered for free, can you imagine the reaction if it wasn't?), another share of budget went to bunk beds and another to the sectionals (and also that clipping system which again is now base game but the main requirement for DHD functionality) in addition to developing all that BB (only JA can match it and not by much because if you add all the sectional pieces and the two kitchen it amount to 177 pieces vs 184 JA has).
There are issues with this game pack, there is an issue with sims4 marketing, but I don't really see how this pack could ever be in the stuff pack range.
My point is that the other packs offer these new mechanics or life states on top of all of these extras. All of these extras help to expand gameplay beyond just the face value of the pack because they are sandbox tools.
The reality is that I have compared the packs against one another without bias and have come to understand the commonalities they share and all of their own differences. To bring up previous packs is not to try to present them as the height of achievement, but to bring logic and reasoning into a discussion where people assume it’s all personal bias.
I am not arguing that DHD is better as a Stuff Pack, because I’ve also looked at the contents of SPs and concluded that this goes beyond the scope of a SP. I am saying as a GP, its sandbox value is weak.
And again, the fact that DHD, a Build pack, still has less B/B than JA, an adventure pack, is not a convincing argument to me. But it is what it is.
The height of achievement was more in line of the general reactions I'm seeing in these past days.
While your point is to say that the other packs offer these new mechanics or life states on top of all of these extras, what I'm saying is that a) in many cases it's not new mechanics, system developed for Vampires was used for Mages for example b) is often very simple (see Spa Day) c) don't have much replayability to the point of being considered annoyance (Strangerville) d) even if include a wold, it's a world locked behind the vacation wall which is not the same as freely available one for game purposes (all the vacation worlds packs). JA gameplay isn't very complex, reuses mechanics from Outdoor retreat and other existing mechanics, so it balances it by adding many items and collectables and tries to make its theme interesting. (it's not a badly made pack) DHD uses its resources elsewhere, the one big issue is that it uses its resources in a way a user may not appreciate them and this is a serious issue from development point of view. My point has always been that DHD doesn't fit the scope of a Stuff pack (to which we both agree, right?) and since they opted to the neat little boxes and gimmicks the next thing was the game pack category (because its complexity in development fits there even if the user might not appreciate it in the end result) You went and call it build pack exactly because it doesn't fit the neat little boxes that the marketing strategy created. We all love our nice little neat boxes until we don't.
And yes as a build pack i feel that it should have a lot more build and buy items (fridge, toddler stuff, even baby stuff even though the baby is an object) and better animations ( although I do appreciate the mini oven animations that seems to be new) and they also really should have fixed the stairs bug for this pack, if not for this pack then when? There are issues, but I do see why it's in the category that it is.
That post makes no sense. "The world doesn't count because I have to vacation there." It's a world. It's a vacation world.
Replayability is subjective, but strangerville still came with a whole world and new traits.
I'm tired of people calling the spellcaster system the same as vampires. It's similar but in the end completely different.
Vampires may only purchase a power in the tier they are currently at, in any order and purchase any power. However, for every few powers they must pick a weakness.
Spellcasters do not need to purchase powers via the perks system. They learn powers by dueling, training by themselves or with sages, reading tomes etc. The perk system only offers perks like faster brewing, lower spell charges.
The spellcaster perk system is also a talent TREE, and the vampire is not.
For those of you unfamiliar with gaming, a talent tree requires that you pick talents on the lower branches before you get the higher ones. You HAVE to go in a general certain order, there's less freedom. You can branch out different directions but there's still a certain order.
Even the get famous one is slightly different.
But even if the systems are the same, they DO different things. They can't just reuse the vampire power system over and over, that is NOT how video game designing works. Each talent tree has to be made from scratch and coded in. They may save on some assets and reuse minimal coding, but every single perk you can purchase requires it's own coding.