I was forgiving of DHD until this.

"CK213;d-990496" wrote:
I knew going in that this was a lightweight Game Pack.
However, I did like the idea of a pack that encouraged Builders to play and Players to build.
The sectional furniture system is cool and I like giving my sims likes and dislikes.

But this pack is not strong in the area of getting Builders to Play.
I went into this pack with the idea of the growth and development of my sim as an Interior Decorator.
There is not enough focus on your sim's game play as I had thought there would be.

There is not any skill based growth and development.
It's just performing gigs and the player getting information and making choices. Your sim doesn't factor into it much.
I thought Charisma, Photography, and an art skill would be what boosts performance. If it does, the game is putting it in the background.
Your sim is just a visual proxy, on-site for your building activities as a builder, not a player.

This pack should have had a new skill, like Design Theory and Practice.
Something that would encompass history of design, color theory, materials, composition, structure and form etc.
Get Famous actors have their acting skill that they can practice in a mirror, on a microphone, or with other sims.
Stylists have a style-board and are required to level up in certain skills, that help in their performance.

I thought the designer career would be similar to the stylist because of this desk and style board.


But they are just a picture and desk and have nothing to do with design other than visual immersion.
They are just for show. It really is a builders pack, thinly disguised as game play, repurposed from existing systems.

This is a wonderful Stuff Pack.
It's an underwhelming Game Pack. The focus is narrow, as it should be, but the depth is shallow as far a role playing your sim in this career.
It's especially aggravating since other career features that would have given it more depth already exists in the game.

I still like the pack, but it misses the mark for me.
I will get my enjoyment out of it, but I certainly overpaid for what I got.
What would this game need for me to be happy with it?

Not a lot. That desk and style board being functional for starters, and skills determining performance.
I would also like my sims Charisma, Photography and Interior Design skill levels being useful for drumming up new clients and getting repeat business. This would allow me to target households I would like to have as clients. I want the game to be more about the sims and less about the number of gigs performed. A career aspiration would be nice, as well one for sims wanting to improve their living spaces.
And the ability to send your sim out on a rabbit hole client visit.

I will have to be more creative to get the game play immersion I need. My sim will run a Home Decor business (Get To Work) that provides interior design services (DHD). She will have a media arm of her business where she has a Simtube channel and does live streams from client homes (Get Famous), if that's possible. I haven't tried it yet. She is also an artist and will sell her art at her business and on Plopsy.

I believe just performing gigs will get boring, despite providing build challenges.
It's not something I will want to do everyday for my sim. That's why I have the Home Decor business. She can take Gigs as she pleases for alternative income and I can role play her having a design studio in her business.

I actually foresaw all this from the trailer and description. I now have experience in deciphering the marketing versus the experiential reality of these packs. I knew this was basically a glorified stuff pack which in and of itself is fine except that it cheats us out of an actual game pack release. We get so few releases compared to other versions of the game not to mention so little news about upcoming developments that missing out on a bona fide game pack is sorely disappointing but I am used to disappointment by now. The problem is as they say, don't do you know what to my leg and tell me it is raining.