Scenarios Feedback
Saw this tweet by SimGuruDuck today:
https://twitter.com/SimGuruDuck/status/1456794189216108554?s=20
and since I was checking out short term scenarios (I'm too bad with earning money in Sims to even try and grind 1Mil one) I'd like to share some thoughts on them. Hope others would join and add more insight to this thread. Especially since my English is very awkward for such long topics.
1) Pretty obvious and mostly agreed by the community I feel. Please, no Limited Time Events. This immediately brings thoughts of FOMO, scarcity complex and mobile gaming. We already have Sims Mobile & Freeplay for this. PC gaming is for keeping up at our own pace & on our terms. If one is into this type of play I think Freeplay would be much more interesting for them, since it has lots of options still missing from TS4 like cars, horses, active babies... So at least events there are meaningful. But PC version is not free to play game it is a paid product and mobile practices are not welcomed here.
2) This brings me to the second point - meaningfulness of rewards. Aspiration Points given for Scenarios is an uninteresting and unmotivating reward. Because there are absolutely not enough reward traits/objects these Aspiration Points can be spent for. AP reward system is lacking and very watered down. So variant one for solving this - completing Scenarios would give Sim a unique trait instead. Like completing Toddlers one would give Nurturing, Surviving Holidays - Anger Management, Breakup - Couple Counseling (yes, I'm plainly using TS2 ideas here) and so on. Variant two - list of AP rewards should be updated and become considerably broader like it was in times of TS3 so that earning of AP would be desired by players.
3) There absolutely must be a way to make Scenarios available for already existing families. Many simmers have already developed saves and zero interest in adding new families/saves. So this feature plainly can't be used by this part of community. And what if they have some families in mind they would like to involve in scenarios? They still can't do it.
4) Scenarios starting conditions are too limited and inflexible in terms of Sims selecting. For example Breakup Scenario is ideal for Eliza and Bob but they can't participate in it since they are a married couple yet scenario demands sims to be unrelated. Married couple can't have a messy Breakup? Same for Surviving Holidays - participating sims can't be related, why??? Sibling rivalry is not a thing anymore? Why Pleasant sisters (DU version) can't be involved in it for example? Toddlers Scenario - why should there be strictly 3 Toddlers? If 3 is not challenging enough for a simmer why can't they have more? Winning condition still can be developing skills for any 3 of them. So why specifically limit the starting number? My point these starting conditions should be much more flexible for simmers to have more options creating/selecting families and determine family relations between them.
5) As always main focus of scenarios is YA+. Showing how painfully little interesting can happen with children and teens in this game. I would like to see some sort of children school struggle & friendship scenarios but for this I guess children gameplay must be improved first.
The only way for scenarios in their current condition to be redeemed I think is to be already included as background for the existing families in Willow Creek and Oasis Springs. Since we know lore update is coming probably this already was considered? I can picture this scenarios used for different families there like already mentioned Eliza and Bob and have some sort of TS2 scripted starting events in them. But for new gameplay I feel they need lots and lots of improvement.
https://twitter.com/SimGuruDuck/status/1456794189216108554?s=20
and since I was checking out short term scenarios (I'm too bad with earning money in Sims to even try and grind 1Mil one) I'd like to share some thoughts on them. Hope others would join and add more insight to this thread. Especially since my English is very awkward for such long topics.
1) Pretty obvious and mostly agreed by the community I feel. Please, no Limited Time Events. This immediately brings thoughts of FOMO, scarcity complex and mobile gaming. We already have Sims Mobile & Freeplay for this. PC gaming is for keeping up at our own pace & on our terms. If one is into this type of play I think Freeplay would be much more interesting for them, since it has lots of options still missing from TS4 like cars, horses, active babies... So at least events there are meaningful. But PC version is not free to play game it is a paid product and mobile practices are not welcomed here.
2) This brings me to the second point - meaningfulness of rewards. Aspiration Points given for Scenarios is an uninteresting and unmotivating reward. Because there are absolutely not enough reward traits/objects these Aspiration Points can be spent for. AP reward system is lacking and very watered down. So variant one for solving this - completing Scenarios would give Sim a unique trait instead. Like completing Toddlers one would give Nurturing, Surviving Holidays - Anger Management, Breakup - Couple Counseling (yes, I'm plainly using TS2 ideas here) and so on. Variant two - list of AP rewards should be updated and become considerably broader like it was in times of TS3 so that earning of AP would be desired by players.
3) There absolutely must be a way to make Scenarios available for already existing families. Many simmers have already developed saves and zero interest in adding new families/saves. So this feature plainly can't be used by this part of community. And what if they have some families in mind they would like to involve in scenarios? They still can't do it.
4) Scenarios starting conditions are too limited and inflexible in terms of Sims selecting. For example Breakup Scenario is ideal for Eliza and Bob but they can't participate in it since they are a married couple yet scenario demands sims to be unrelated. Married couple can't have a messy Breakup? Same for Surviving Holidays - participating sims can't be related, why??? Sibling rivalry is not a thing anymore? Why Pleasant sisters (DU version) can't be involved in it for example? Toddlers Scenario - why should there be strictly 3 Toddlers? If 3 is not challenging enough for a simmer why can't they have more? Winning condition still can be developing skills for any 3 of them. So why specifically limit the starting number? My point these starting conditions should be much more flexible for simmers to have more options creating/selecting families and determine family relations between them.
5) As always main focus of scenarios is YA+. Showing how painfully little interesting can happen with children and teens in this game. I would like to see some sort of children school struggle & friendship scenarios but for this I guess children gameplay must be improved first.
The only way for scenarios in their current condition to be redeemed I think is to be already included as background for the existing families in Willow Creek and Oasis Springs. Since we know lore update is coming probably this already was considered? I can picture this scenarios used for different families there like already mentioned Eliza and Bob and have some sort of TS2 scripted starting events in them. But for new gameplay I feel they need lots and lots of improvement.
