Island Living; is it lacking?
Do you believe Island Living is lacking or feels empty? Many people believe that Island Living is beautiful, and the aesthetic is spot on, however the gameplay is bare and direction missing. Also p...
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I actually really liked the ability to scuba dive in dive lots in sims 3 too; I think they should have added it here. I only didn’t mention it before because the poster to whom I was replying had mentioned swimming, not diving. I also didn’t mention boats for the same reason and because I have only used the canoe for fishing, so my experience of them in TS4 is limited. To me, IP was more about vacationing and leisure activities, which is fine, but the emphasis in IL is just different.
However I have played with swimming in both games extensively and I feel confident in saying that I have found swimming much more satisfying and developed in TS4. Not only do sims have the full range of socials with each other in water, unlike in TS3, but (as I already mentioned) they can swim together, coach swimming, skinny dip and back float — these are all new as is the ability for dogs to swim in ocean water (a first for the series) and for sims to be tugged away by currents, which I forgot to mention before. (The ability to have sims peeing in water I mentioned only because it wasn’t at all possible in TS3 — sims just used to have bladder failure which used to annoy me considering how slowly they swam and how long it took them to come ashore).
In my game I have also seen a couple sharks, too, which have passed close by and scared away dolphins, so they do exist. They are beautifully animated. I haven’t had a sim attacked yet by a shark but only because they’ve all been immediately so scared that they autonomously swam for shore (an action I haven’t canceled but I know it is possible to do so). I do admit that TS3 had more varieties of shark (I think there were 4 types) while all I have seen in TS4 is the great white. It looks pretty good though.
As for the FX fish, I never get tired of them; it is much preferable to see them, in all their variety, than a blue expanse of nothing. I only wish sims could photograph them in water with a waterproof camera. That’s an ability I wish they’d add to swimming.
And finally the animations and levelling up of swimming is much better in TS4. It just looks better and is more fun to do, in my experience.
However I have played with swimming in both games extensively and I feel confident in saying that I have found swimming much more satisfying and developed in TS4. Not only do sims have the full range of socials with each other in water, unlike in TS3, but (as I already mentioned) they can swim together, coach swimming, skinny dip and back float — these are all new as is the ability for dogs to swim in ocean water (a first for the series) and for sims to be tugged away by currents, which I forgot to mention before. (The ability to have sims peeing in water I mentioned only because it wasn’t at all possible in TS3 — sims just used to have bladder failure which used to annoy me considering how slowly they swam and how long it took them to come ashore).
In my game I have also seen a couple sharks, too, which have passed close by and scared away dolphins, so they do exist. They are beautifully animated. I haven’t had a sim attacked yet by a shark but only because they’ve all been immediately so scared that they autonomously swam for shore (an action I haven’t canceled but I know it is possible to do so). I do admit that TS3 had more varieties of shark (I think there were 4 types) while all I have seen in TS4 is the great white. It looks pretty good though.
As for the FX fish, I never get tired of them; it is much preferable to see them, in all their variety, than a blue expanse of nothing. I only wish sims could photograph them in water with a waterproof camera. That’s an ability I wish they’d add to swimming.
And finally the animations and levelling up of swimming is much better in TS4. It just looks better and is more fun to do, in my experience.
