Still disappointed?

I know exactly what you mean. A couple of different times I wanted to create a story involving an evil step-parent, and to make the child's life very miserable. But what always ended up happening was that the step-parent ended up having a very close and loving relationship with the child.

Granted there are things I really do love involving this game, but the characters in the game just don't seem to be as full as they were in past sims series. I would love for EA to take a look back at sims 2 and 3 and bring some of those things forward into this game.

I think this is one of the main complaints I have with the game. Traits don’t really do anything but give a moodlet that lasts for only a little bit. I know the traits supply the moodlet that is ideal for certain aspirations, but every sim can complete them. Traits should ALSO greatly effect behavior not just moods. Also there are fewer trait slots than there were in previous installations. Don’t get me wrong I still love the game I just wish it was deeper. So yes, I certainly agree with you. Unfortunately I don’t see it improving with that and if they improved it then I would be surprised.

Ditto. Although I do accept that my sims' personality is not only in the game but also exists inside my head - I control most of what they do and don't - I'd much prefer if the game made them more unique. I added an extra factor in my game, I call it social status, it helps me seeing what sim should more likely reach the top of a career, or aim for certain successes. I also added a DNA-string giving me some hints on how a sim thinks, behaves and reflects. Such as intellect, masculinity vs femininity, success and a lot more. I wish the game had some of this implemented though. And like you, I would like traits to have a bigger impacts. Most of them should go deeper than just giving a temporary moodlet. And it would be cool if there also were additional moods/traits as a result of rare combinations of traits/aspiration/skills etc. Some kind of synergies.

I love the graphics and the CAS, but unfortunately I don't enjoy the gameplay at all. I can only really do gameplay for at most like 30 minutes before getting bored. It's unfortunate because I remember loving the Sims 3 gameplay, and wish they would have done things a bit more similarly for the Sims 4.

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"youilivefor92;d-967134" wrote:
While I've thoroughly enjoyed all the additional packs added to TS4, and i've loved all the things that said packs have added (weather, pets, magic, etc.), I'm still feeling an overall disappointment with TS4? Like, idk, although the "traits" were a huge selling point of TS4 and the promise that our sims would feel like true individuals, i still feel like that has never actually come to fruition? Not like they had in TS3 or TS2, you know? It just feels like any sim can just complete any aspirations regardless of whether it should realistically conflict with their traits (i.e. a commitment-phobe who has the large family aspiration). It feels kind of flimsy in that if I made a sim like that, the actual conflict of having an aspiration conflicting with one of their traits doesn't really happen? You could easily have your sim do that and it wouldn't bother them at all and i think that's pretty lame. Idk i just think older iterations of the sims had my sims feel more like unique individuals and despite it being the main selling point for TS4 it just never actually happened and instead we just keep getting "stuff" and "things" for our sims to do thrown at us in the game with no real depth for the sims themselves and i'm just endlessly disappointed by it honestly. Anyone else?

Agreed traits don't feel impactful at all really. There are a few that can change the way you play but more than a few deal with emotions. I feel like emotions was something that wasn't properly implemented to its fullest potential. Emotions play a much bigger part in determining how your sim interacts with the world but the problem is that the emotions are too....idk basic maybe binary? I have 1500 hours currently and I have only ever had angry sims about 4 times that I can recall. There are lots of emotions with cool effects but they are to powerful and there is no nuance. I can either be crying hysterically then one second later be extremely happy (...wait maybe this is realistic).

The overall complexity of the game has suffered too there isn't a ton of depth. Writing is a great example of this. In the sims 3 the traits you had effected how well/fast you wrote books, also the skill itself allowed you to specialize in a genre. For instance if you wrote romance novels as a new sim with no traits you would make vastly less money than a sim with hopeless romantic, perfectionist, bookworm and a writing specialization in romance novels. In the sims 4 you just....write books. You still have perfectionist but there is no specialization and no nuance. You write whatever you want and they only benefits you get are from emotions or aspiration points both of which again are flat boosts to everything. You aren't rewarded nearly as heavily for strategizing or thinking ahead.

Don't EEEEEEVEN get me started on nectar making. That was game-play at its finest. There were like hundreds of different ways you could make nectar. I have a feeling when/if it returns to sims 4 it wont be like it was.

Sims 4 does have moments where it shines though. Occults are much better than previous iterations, somehow they all ended up more rich in game-play than previous iterations (except plant sims). The perk trees were extremely inspired and the weakness on vampires was an excellent choice.

I feel like careers have taken a direction for the better. Its 2019 getting close to 2020 the fact we still have rabbit hole only careers is infuriating. Rabbit holes themselves are just immersion breaking and my only hope is they are eliminated from the next entry. They should remain an option for those who want them but definitely should not be the standard. Was my biggest gripe after booting up sims 3 for the first time and realizing all the non residential homes are just....voids of nothing was that of pure disappointment. I was like 13 at the time and my imagination was even better than it is now at 25. My bar for suspending disbelief is only getting smaller. Overall the active careers have been a great step in the right direction. The business and work from home careers aren't bad either. If it wasn't for get to work I probably would have dipped from the sims 4 for quite a while.

EDIT: also unpopular opinion. The apartments and penthouses in city living were also groundbreaking stuff. It feels and looks like a real city. They got real elevation and compactness that the sims never got before. It came at the sacrifice of player made apartments and editing of building itself but....honestly it was a worthy trade one that I would accept again in sims 5. If they actually would have let players make their own apartments on regular lots AND added san myshuno as an option city living would have been regarded as one of the best packs ever I think.

Totally agree with OP. What I don't understand about the development of Sims 4 is, why do they avoid upgrading, improving, changing, and adding to Sims personalities aside from a single trait here and there and aspirations that have no impact on a Sim's life? In previous games, it seemed that they were always expanding the individuality and system of Sims behaviors, which was the essence of why they were so engaging. But in Sims 4, they prioritize the superficial things around them instead.

"LiELF;c-17265326" wrote:
Totally agree with OP. What I don't understand about the development of Sims 4 is, why do they avoid upgrading, improving, changing, and adding to Sims personalities aside from a single trait here and there and aspirations that have no impact on a Sim's life? In previous games, it seemed that they were always expanding the individuality and system of Sims behaviors, which was the essence of why they were so engaging. But in Sims 4, they prioritize the superficial things around them instead.

I thought that fear would be added at some point.

Vampires are pretty good sims to me. You can set one up to be a sloppy drinker that feels guilty for going after the other sims and spends a large time feeling quite depressed. It felt amazing to be able to set specific sims up that way.

Now I use a mod by Triplis to lock skills. My sims are around for a long time so unless I mod them then all of them will have 10 across the board and be pretty alike. Just deciding to have a sim being good at something but less proficient in other was helpful.

I hope that some kind of system for friendship and attraction will be added at some point.

Evil mean sims in sims3 were scary. They were actually, evil and mean and caused fights. In sims4 they smile and are super friendly. A bummer really.

Yep, all sim behavior is exactly the same except for a few random differences. A supposedly mean sim still acts exactly the same as a cheerful sim, but they will randomly say some "mean things". My genius/snob sim will run around in the rain like a doofus as much as my playful/loves the outdoors sim. It would definitely be nice to see major differences between sims.

I'm currently playing a sim with the "loves outdoors" trait. It's basically a useless trait imo. He doesn't actually do anything outdoors. He will get on the computer, read books and watch TV all day even when getting the stressed moodlet. I want to see him go outside and cloudgaze, go fishing or do something, anything outside.

Same with the "outgoing" trait. When people come over to the house to visit, the sim will read books, get on the computer or watch TV. These sims should be going out of their way to engage in conversation with guests. Nope, same behavior as every other sim.

Don't get me wrong, I still think the game is pretty amazing and I enjoy playing the heck out of it, but I definitely want to see improvements to individualized sim behavior in future iterations of the game.