In what way could a Generations pack differ from its Sims 3 counterpart?

I 100% agree that there shouldn't be a new world with a generations pack. The budget should be used for new animations and unique objects. I also agree that we don't need more clothes for young adults. We need more focus on toddlers, children, teens, and elders (and babies if we get better ones). We need more activities for all of these life states. I want to be able to take my toddlers for a walk in a stroller, but I also want them to be able to go to their grandparent's house for a few days. It would also be really awesome if we could have sleepovers for children and teens, but I would also like a non-romantic option to invite family members to stay at your house during the holidays or whenever.

I want grandparents to tell their grandchildren stories about their own childhood/teen years. I want a bake or cook with grandma/grandpa option. Child sims should be able to dance with an older relative by standing on top of the adult's feet. It would be funny to have an interaction "In my day" where an elder sim gives the speech of "In my day we walked 15 miles to school and back..." I'm all for the return of the midlife crisis as well. Elders could also be an option for childcare instead of a nanny or preschool. My grandma watched me when I was a toddler and my parents were at work. Teens should also be able to be hired to babysit children and toddlers.

Teen and child sims should have more options for being involved in sports or other after school activities, but I don't want it all to be rabbit holes. I want to follow them to some of their gatherings or events. I want the costume trunk back, but I also kind of want to see sims be able to perform in a dance recital or a play at school. It would be cool to add arcade games and comic books, so kids and teens can go to an arcade or comic book store. They could upload these builds to the gallery for us to place in our towns. I also want mini golf, so families can go together or teens can go with their friends. Maybe we could even get a skate park? Again, these places would be lots we could choose to place. Teens also need more to do socially. I want the hangout option back where they would sit around on the floor an chat in a group. Slow dancing should be added back, and I want proms that we can actually attend. This is probably unlikely, but I wish they would redo the teens to make them actually look like teens. I wish they were a little shorter and looked a little more awkward (like Sims 2 teens).

There is a lot more I'd love to see, but I will leave it at that. It's supposed to be a life simulator, but there are huge parts of life that are still missing from the game.

I don't think it needs to be different. We're asking for returning content. If they imported all the stuff from the old pack into the new one, would anyone really care? As you said, it was well-executed in 3. Especially since most creative liberties and differences the Sims 4 team makes are usually for the worse.

But here are some changes from Generations I'd like to see added in addition to what we could already get. As in, build on what we got before, asmost sequels should do.



Babies

• Freedom from bassinets, and we also get cribs
  
• Being able to put them in a stroller or one of those baby-holders you keep on your chest.
  
• Letting them roll around a baby mat.
  
• Toddlers can walk automatically in Sims 4. If this isn't changed, maybe you can teach older babies to stand up.
  
• Returning feature: Babies will barf on people.
  
• Letting your baby out of the basinet and interacting with it will give it a head-start on toddler skills once it ages up.
  

Toddlers

• Returning feature from Sims 2: A hungry toddler will try and take food/bottles from another toddler.
  
• Once a toddler maxes a skill, it can start learning the corresponding child skills.
  
• Toddlers can be put in cribs, as they could in older games.
  
• Include a TV channel for pre-schoolers, where toddlers can watch and gain some skills. Sometimes, an episode might be too scary for a child and frighten them.
  
• Obsessions. Like how TS4 pets could become obsessed with things, kids can become obsessed with certain TV shows, NPCs or items. You can indulge your kid with plumber costumes, give them a Grim Reaper plush, or slap Voidcritter posters all over their room.
  
• Returning feature: Toddlers can sleep in regular beds. Maybe they can autonomously climb into their parents' bed if they wake up from a nightmare.
  
• Toddlers not properly potty-trained might wet the bed. You'll have to wash the sheets, or use a special spray to clean it.
  
• Rabbit hole: Puppet Play Theater. Take your toddlers to a puppet show, where they can learn important life lessons and be entertained. Your sim may or may not hate it, but at least they can bond with their child and sibling.
  
• In Generations, kids could have tea parties. Here, toddlers can have tea parties, as well.
  

Children

• We got afterschool activities in Generations, as well as in two TS4 EP's. Let's bring back ballet, but also add a chess club, a swim team, a book club, and a Voidcritters card-collecting club. They'll be simpler than Seasons' scouts, but deeper than Get Famous' drama club. Doing well in them will give you bonuses related to that club's theme, like learning Logic faster and doing better in chess; swimming faster and being able to keep your weight under control; and getting Bookworm interactions despite not having the trait.
  
• Bullies. Some townie kids might get the designation, where they will perform mean interactions on other children or get into physical fights. Bullied kids will cry, some will fight back, some will try and bribe the bully, and some will try to befriend the bully. A parent can also call the bully's parents over the phone and end the bullying instantly, if this gameplay is too much for you.
  
• Kids can develop crushes on each other. At most, they can hand-hold, kiss each other on the cheek, and send love notes through the mail.
  
• Returning feature: Tag, Cops & Robbers, etc.
  
• Children can now garden.
  
• Voidcritters return, this time with a ton of merch and a new set of cards. There will also be a rival franchise with similar merch. If your child has declared a preference for one franchise (and hasn't done to the same for another), they can fight other kids in the opposite fandom.
  
• (Shared with teenagers) active school days. May only be for regular school, and not boarding schools.
  
• Homeschooling.
  

"Gordy;c-17869072" wrote:
I don't think it needs to be different. We're asking for returning content. If they imported all the stuff from the old pack into the new one, would anyone really care? As you said, it was well-executed in 3. Especially since most creative liberties and differences the Sims 4 team makes are usually for the worse.

But here are some changes from Generations I'd like to see added in addition to what we could already get. As in, build on what we got before, asmost sequels should do.



Babies

• Freedom from bassinets, and we also get cribs
  
• Being able to put them in a stroller or one of those baby-holders you keep on your chest.
  
• Letting them roll around a baby mat.
  
• Toddlers can walk automatically in Sims 4. If this isn't changed, maybe you can teach older babies to stand up.
  
• Returning feature: Babies will barf on people.
  
• Letting your baby out of the basinet and interacting with it will give it a head-start on toddler skills once it ages up.
  

Toddlers

• Returning feature from Sims 2: A hungry toddler will try and take food/bottles from another toddler.
  
• Once a toddler maxes a skill, it can start learning the corresponding child skills.
  
• Toddlers can be put in cribs, as they could in older games.
  
• Include a TV channel for pre-schoolers, where toddlers can watch and gain some skills. Sometimes, an episode might be too scary for a child and frighten them.
  
• Obsessions. Like how TS4 pets could become obsessed with things, kids can become obsessed with certain TV shows, NPCs or items. You can indulge your kid with plumber costumes, give them a Grim Reaper plush, or slap Voidcritter posters all over their room.
  
• Returning feature: Toddlers can sleep in regular beds. Maybe they can autonomously climb into their parents' bed if they wake up from a nightmare.
  
• Toddlers not properly potty-trained might wet the bed. You'll have to wash the sheets, or use a special spray to clean it.
  
• Rabbit hole: Puppet Play Theater. Take your toddlers to a puppet show, where they can learn important life lessons and be entertained. Your sim may or may not hate it, but at least they can bond with their child and sibling.
  
• In Generations, kids could have tea parties. Here, toddlers can have tea parties, as well.
  

Children

• We got afterschool activities in Generations, as well as in two TS4 EP's. Let's bring back ballet, but also add a chess club, a swim team, a book club, and a Voidcritters card-collecting club. They'll be simpler than Seasons' scouts, but deeper than Get Famous' drama club. Doing well in them will give you bonuses related to that club's theme, like learning Logic faster and doing better in chess; swimming faster and being able to keep your weight under control; and getting Bookworm interactions despite not having the trait.
  
• Bullies. Some townie kids might get the designation, where they will perform mean interactions on other children or get into physical fights. Bullied kids will cry, some will fight back, some will try and bribe the bully, and some will try to befriend the bully. A parent can also call the bully's parents over the phone and end the bullying instantly, if this gameplay is too much for you.
  
• Kids can develop crushes on each other. At most, they can hand-hold, kiss each other on the cheek, and send love notes through the mail.
  
• Returning feature: Tag, Cops & Robbers, etc.
  
• Children can now garden.
  
• Voidcritters return, this time with a ton of merch and a new set of cards. There will also be a rival franchise with similar merch. If your child has declared a preference for one franchise (and hasn't done to the same for another), they can fight other kids in the opposite fandom.
  
• (Shared with teenagers) active school days. May only be for regular school, and not boarding schools.
  
• Homeschooling.
  

Oh, I would absolutely love if it was just the same stuff. I'm just skeptical that they would do it. Generations was introduced with TS3 so I'm not sure if they consider it one of the packs whose content is as obvious as that of pets or seasons. Your suggestions are sooo cool though.

First of all, you've got to ask, what parts of Generations aren't already in Sims 4. We got Toddlers and Parenthood, and Discover University. We will probably get a pack dedicated to babies when babies are unlocked.

We have a lot of the stuff from Generations, but it's spread out over multiple packs.

"MElleSims;d-989330" wrote:
I've been thinking about a potential Generations expansion pack and I actually believe it's really likely we'll get one. At least if they were interested in community wishes we'd be getting one for sure. It's almost always the pack brought up when people are asked what they want, even more than a farming pack (also a popular choice).

However, I'm having trouble coming up with ways they could make a Generations pack unique in the Sims 4. Or rather, I'm dreading the ways they could make it unique. It was such a wonderfully executed idea in the Sims 3, and in the Sims 2 it just wasn't needed, since the family gameplay was already top notch. I'm just skeptical that the things they would come up with would be good enough to compete with the Sims 3 version, yet they can't possibly release an expansion that is exactly the same. What do you think?

Working Cinemas and Malls.

"Loanet;c-17869206" wrote:
First of all, you've got to ask, what parts of Generations aren't already in Sims 4. We got Toddlers and Parenthood, and Discover University. We will probably get a pack dedicated to babies when babies are unlocked.

We have a lot of the stuff from Generations, but it's spread out over multiple packs.

No, it's not, there is a lot missing that made TS3 Generations great, e.g. more playground equipment (we have less than in TS2 and TS3 and I really miss the mary-go-round, the seesaw, slides and those little thingies for toddlers), teaching your teenager how to drive, slumber parties, canes for elders, school dances, prom night, graduation ceremony, bachelor/bachelorette parties, boarding school, more after school acitivites (we only have like 2 so far!), costume chest, strollers, tree houses (I loved those so much), midlife crisis, field trips, spiral stairs (yes, they came with TS3 Generations), a daycare profession and also body hair came with TS3 Generations!

We are far away from having all of these features "spread out over multiple packs". The only things we have that came with TS3 Generations: slip'n'slides, bunk beds (which came in an update only recently), wedding arches & cakes, dating, the entertainer for parties and woohooing in the shower.

So there really isn't a lot. Also I would really like to see the best babies TS series ever had for TS4. I love the toddlers they made, I think they can do even better with making babies similar to TS Freeplay.

And let's not forget we miss group activities for our Sims and that lots of great activities we got in TS4 are tied to one world or are only be done with 2 Sims only (not more). We miss real soccer matches for it being an activity for more than 2 Sims, hiking in every world, swimming in open waters in every world, skiing/sledding on slopes and hills in every world, board games for more than 4 sims that are dragable and not tied to a table.

Then we also miss

• a beach ball / volley ball net
  
• the pool table
  
• a trampoline
  
• a ballet bar (I could even pretend ballet classes if they gave us an interaction to teach ballet)
  
• an activity table for toddlers where they can play and interact with each other (I would love two options: one for drawing and one for building blocks)
  
• balls Sims can just throw to each other like they could in TS3
  
• games like marco polo Sims can play in the pool
  
• we miss specific interactions for kids and teens in the pool (play together like kids and teens would play and tease each other)
  
• we miss an attraction system (which is romantic, but romantic relationships are the root for all family gameplay so we need more romantic gameplay!)
  
• and wants & fears (I hope the latter come with growing pains we read about in one of the surveys)
  
• I also would like a "daycare career" for toddlers (comparable to the one KawaiiStacie made, unfortunately she's very slow updating it out of personal reasons, so you can't use it all the time)
  
• and more instruments (I always loved to play music families like The Kelly Family and have my family make music together)
  
• I also would like instruments for toddlers even though we never really had those.
  
• hopscotches

I hope toddlers are not excluded when we get a music pack at some point. We also miss singing around the campfire - why can't you use the guitar sitting in front of the campfire anymore? I miss it. :(

I also really miss the hobby system we got in TS2. I know some people found it annoying, but I think it's fun and there should be an option to toggle it off.

If we get most of these things and perhaps even preteens, then I'm as happy as I can be and will stop complaining about TS4 missing family gameplay because there will be nothing to complain about anymore. This could be a really great game for family gameplay. But it isn't so far.

Honestly I think that a world will be an important part of potential Generations pack. EA has enough money to create strong EP with a lot of gameplay, huge world, nice CAS and BB. We shouldn't accept any limitations. I expect a new world with big open areas for families. For example interesting playground for todlers and kids, open picnic area, parks ect. Something similar to Mt Komorebi, but with less fake textures. In this world we can have also school and daycare (as a rabbit hole or not).

"Sthenastia;c-17869584" wrote:
Honestly I think that a world will be an important part of potential Generations pack. EA has enough money to create strong EP with a lot of gameplay, huge world, nice CAS and BB. We shouldn't accept any limitations. I expect a new world with big open areas for families. For example interesting playground for todlers and kids, open picnic area, parks ect. Something similar to Mt Komorebi, but with less fake textures. In this world we can have also school and daycare (as a rabbit hole or not).

I totally agree that they have the funds for it.i hate that the community feels like we have to compromise because they haven't given us detailed content in the past. If there was a choice between detailed gameplay and town, I would go for gameplay in a heartbeat. If a nice town did not gave an effect in gameplay, I would really like a small town type of world. Think it would fit the theme nicely.

You both are right. I totally agree. After all of these years of shallow gameplay we should finally get a huge gameplay expanding EP for family gameplay (and for farming for the second EP this year) - and I also want occult players to get really good gamepacks and have the occults updated that aren't on the level like Vampires and Spellcasters. And why can't children and toddlers show SOME occult features? I'm not an occult player, but the whole occult vs. family gameplay issue is an issue because there is not enough gameplay on both sides and this is EA's fault.

"Dakota88;c-17869631" wrote:
You both are right. I totally agree. After all of these years of shallow gameplay we should finally get a huge gameplay expanding EP for family gameplay (and for farming for the second EP this year) - and I also want occult players to get really good gamepacks and have the occults updated that aren't on the level like Vampires and Spellcasters. And why can't children and toddlers show SOME occult features? I'm not an occult player, but the whole occult vs. family gameplay issue is an issue because there is not enough gameplay on both sides and this is EA's fault.

Yeah exactly! And this possibly alienates some family players who might want to try occult: they won't because gameplay for younger occults is nonexistent. Also family needs a huge update, and needed one since the start. I can't believe they launched the game without toddlers. At least they mostly did a good job when they added them in.