Wow where do I begin? I was thinking of something positive to start this off but I really can't find anything.
The game feels like it was designed before Sims 3 by people who loved Sims 2 but hated Sims 3. It feels very limited, nowhere near as free as they bragged. To go from Sims 3 where you had an entire town you could move around and modify (add houses, lots, shops, clubs, parks etc.) in an almost unlimited number, this feels like a huge step backwards. You have 2 towns with 26 houses (13 each town), I know because I counted, and 6 empty lots (3 each town). The town is split up into areas and you can't leave that area without having to go to map view, click the area you want and then wait for that area to load. This is not a small step back this is a giant leap in the wrong direction. When you consider the scale of the Sims 3 and compare Sims 4 with all the new and a lot more advanced tech out there, I would be embarrassed to be working for EA right now as this was such a huge mistake. Seriously, when you think of the scale of games like GTA 5, Watchdogs, Skyrim etc. this is actually pathetic.
On the good side the way the Sims themselves interact is well done, you can tell they have tried to make that better but there are still limits. For example on create a Sim (which is well done, they have at least tried) you can only choose 3 traits for your Sim. Why? Sims 3 you had the choice of 5 and there were a lot more traits to choose from, even from the base game, not including the add ons. They were saying about how unique you can make your Sims but the limited traits that you can have and the limited traits there are really reduces what you can do. Yes you can make them look unique and it is quite fun to quickly and easily manipulate parts of their body but there are still so many limits. Clothes, for example, nowhere near enough. I know it's a game designed for add ons and updates but seriously there are such a small variety of clothes that after creating 10 Sims they will start to look the same. And the styles as well have been limited. In the Sims 3 you chose a shirt, t-shirt, vest etc. that you liked the look of and you could then change its style. You had loads of different patterns to choose from (and I mean loads) and then you had an entire colour wheel to choose one (or more) you wanted. In the Sims 4 you are lucky if an item of clothing has more than 4 colour options. Pre determined by EA. Say you want a guy Sim to wear a pink shirt with a green tie. No can do as EA didn't think you would want this option and so didn't make it. Can I change the colours and patterns myself like the game before? No you can’t because they seem to have taken individuality out of this game. They say you can create what you want, how you want, in the way you want. There are so many restrictions that it feels like it's more like EA are saying "you are free to design as we tell you". And the build mode is exactly the same. Whilst easy to use it's so limited in your creativity. It does have a few nice features and it's easy to navigate but in the 5 years since the Sims 3 this is a very small step forward and more of a step back in the ways that actually count.
We are now 2014 not far off 2015. Technology has come a long way and when you see games like Skyrim, Watchdogs, GTA 5 etc. you can see how well these game developers have adapted new technology and graphics to create huge worlds with such intimate detail. Seriously, when Skyrim came out in 2011 it felt like the designers had placed and animated each blade of grass, the effects on Watchdogs are so well done that you can almost see individual strands of hair moving on the main character (in game not on movie clips), hell, even the footballers on FIFA are looking pretty damn good now. So why, with all this amazing tech, do our Sims still look like badly animated cartoons? I mean there is no hair movement which makes it look like everyone is wearing Lego hair. They could have done so much with the movement of clothes and interaction between items but it just looks really rigid and very lacking in fluidity. I added a TV to my first Sims house and it was, honestly, a black cube. Not a black cube that had texture, patterns, details to look like a TV, no, this was a black cube that had a black square on it where the screen was. That was it. I was shocked at the lack of detail on it and the lack of detail on everything. Everything looks square and almost like EA are limiting themselves to the standard boxy pixels. Everything looks really unrealistic which for a game that is meant to simulate real life in a computer age where things are beginning to look convincingly real, CGI wise, this was one of the biggest disappointments so far.
All in all the game is limited, makes you feel a lack of control and creativity, the graphics and details are appalling, the tiny size and lack of freedom of the town is so bad I don't think the English language has words to describe how terrible that is. When you consider the leap between The Sims 2 and Sims 3 this is such a huge step backwards. If it had gone from Sims 2 to Sims 4 then 3 you would agree it was going forwards but the Sims 4 is only a small step up from the Sims 2 and a huge step back from Sims 3. All in all a very disappointing game that had such a huge amount of potential and hasn't delivered on anything.
EA Staff (Retired)
