The Festivals are boring

"Zeldaboy180;d-992508" wrote:
I'll be the first to post about it, the festivals are incredibly boring. I'm loving this pack so far, but I haven't gone to a single festival since I won the needed prize for my aspiration. I actually like the City Living festivals, most of them anyway. The Sulani/San Myshuno festivals are kind of meh compared to city living, but at least there's actually activities to do and unique collectibles you can only get at those festivals.

You can't say the same for the cottage living fairs. All it is is submit entry and wait 8 hours for the world's slowest judge to make up her mind. There is nothing else you can do. The shops sell the same stuff they always sell, no unique merchandise or shirts. There isn't even a unique reward besides the Ribbons you get. There is quite literally nothing unique to do in a festival after you submitted your entry besides bribe the judge or wait.

Speaking of bribing the judges, I'm convinced that the results are complete random chance and has nothing to do with quality like it says. My sim's max happiness/max relationship rainbow cow lost to a normal cow with low attention. My friend's cow came in third place in the competition when there were only TWO competing cows. You can't convince me it's not just random chance.

Combining all of this, it just makes for a boring fair that I find myself skipping every week now that I have my aspiration.

I usually don't skip a lot of the city living festivals. The Flea Market is a good chance to find rare collectibles, The spice festival has a lot of unique collectibles and is generally a fun time, not to mention rare garden plants can be found. The Humor and hijinx festival is a great way to improve comedy/mischief skills and is great for a rags to riches challenge with the cash bonus if you win, and I've lost it a couple times or drawn so it's not always an easy guaranteed win. The romance festival just has an all around great atmosphere.

It's just sad that these festivals feel so lackluster. They didn't even have to do much. Make the prize a chance at an animal upgrade part since they seem to be so rare for me. Or earn valuable treats. Make the stalls sell unique rare items. Have music playing and activities for children. Even a pie eating contest would have been great.

If i would be honest with you the only festival that I enjoyed was the Sims Sessions, and that was a free update which surprised me how it was a better experience than the City Living, Island living, Snowy Escape, and Cottage Living festivals.

In that free limited time event, Sims do actually have a behavior routine to follow that felt you can only experience at that place, making it fun to watch, Even when there is not a lot to do.

Look for example at GeekCon. There is a programming, and the 3D gaming thing competition where supposedly they compete yet you don't feel that. NPC's just go on those objects like normal and use them that's it. There is no announcer NPC that will host the competition, the Sims won't cheer on the participating sims, and they all just mind their all thing like they are at a community lot. It felt that they just put random objects and call it a festival...

Compare it to Sims Sessions where they added new objects at the world BUT also created new sims behavior for those objects. When a performer on the stage all sims would actually gather, watch and cheer, getting the feeling that this behavior is unique to this place and I would like to visit this again, because this concert behaviors is fun to watch, unlike the sims just Sitting participating but you don't feel it.


Another example is the Humor and Hijinks Festival where it is pranksters against jokesters... They added a bunch of objects and after that they just set sims who use a specific drink to use a specific interactions no new behavior created. It's a competition yet they don't even recognize if the sims they are talking to are their team mates or not. I have seen pranksters pranking their team mates yet still earning points while it was supposed to be then pranking the jokesters...

Don't get me started on the empty Island living Family Fun Festival ????

So Yeah in summary in all EP so far it feel that the team just put random objects outside the world and made notifications to tell us what is happening (a supposed competition for example that is hard to feel) yet the sims in these places don't act what those notifications are saying. Instead they should add new behaviors for sims inside this festivals while adding these objects so that players will feel that the experiences and unique and there is a reason to visit it.

If anything in my opinion Sims Sessions is the only festival that they have done right and well. That should be the standard for them when creating similar content to these.

Another comparison is the Spicy Food Eating challenge compared to the Food eating contest in TS3 Festivals. In CL they just pick food and eat it like normal food except with spicy animation whereareas in TS3 it is an actual competition with it's own animation, Sim roles and good behaviors.