TS4 needs a difficulty system.

"invisiblgirl;c-17339780" wrote:

"LiELF;c-17338945" wrote:

"invisiblgirl;c-17338887" wrote:

"Nindigo;c-17338825" wrote:
I disagree with OP.

The Sims is what you make it to be. You can impose all kinds of rules on your play to make it difficult - take on challenges and whatnot. Try a challenge on short lifespand, etc.

The Sims is like a virtual dollhouse. If you get bored playing, find a different game to test your limits. The Sims is not about difficulty. It's a game of creativity and living out ideas.

Exactly what I was thinking. One of the best things about S4 is being able to switch aspirations on the fly. You can always impose rules on yourself to make it more difficult - there is nothing stopping you from making a rule in your game that aspirations can't be changed. Just because a toddler or kid can take care of herself doesn't mean you have to play it that way - my parents spend most of their time teaching and caring for their toddlers, and they always help with homework and projects and have family meals together.

Will Wright imagined players as the director - it's not a game in which you cope with whatever the game throws at your Sim, but rather, a game in which you decide what to throw at your Sim.

This isn't quite correct. Will Wright's original intention for The Sims was to explore states of failure because it was more interesting and engaging than consistent success. The purpose of the actual gameplay was for the player to decide if they would allow Sim needs and aspirations to bottom out, resulting in Sims having breakdowns or dying, ...or if they would care for their needs and goals, resulting in happiness and fulfillment. It put the player in the position of a God. The entire premise was to put the fate of the Sims in the player's hands, and when you activated live mode, the game would creep towards failure without player intervention. And there were higher chances of random failure and disaster from unskilled Sims. The player creativity came mostly from build mode and the extra content, but the essence and the core of the actual gameplay was to simulate ultimate failure if left to its own devices. It was more about getting through life's obstacles and the struggle to succeed and meet fulfillment while confronting fears and failures, so when the player finally got their Sim to reach their end goal in their aspiration, there was a sense of accomplishment and reward. It was satisfying because it had challenge and purpose.

The game used to be a lot more than a simple virtual dollhouse of happiness. It used to be an actual game. The devolution of the series has led it to become more of the opposite of what it used to be; it's now a Utopia simulator with the option of failures that actually need to be more forced into happening, which is why people get bored all the time. The challenges and obstacles have been neutralized. It has completely lost its way from Will Wright's original design. And I'm not saying many people don't enjoy Sims 4 for what it is or are wrong for doing so, but it's definitely not the kind of game that Will Wright had intended.

“Instead of putting players in the role of Luke Skywalker, or Frodo Baggins, I'd rather put them in the role of George Lucas.” Will Wright.

It's never been a game to me - it's always been about telling stories through my Sims. In previous iterations, I used a number of mods to take out things that I found difficult or not suited to my storytelling. (For example, I always eliminated the requirement of making and keeping eight billion friends in order to get promoted. In S4, if you like that sort of challenge, you can try the 'Friend of the World' or serial-romance aspirations, or simply set a goal for your Sim to make a certain number of friends. Why does this have to be imposed on those of us who don't like that aspect of the game?)

That's what makes the Sims different from every other game - there are very few game-imposed requirements. You decide how to play, rather than the game making up scenarios for you to navigate. That's the difference between being the director and a role-player.

Exactly; it was never meant to be a game game, it was supposed to be a sandbox. They started adding more and more goals as time went on to try and get more traditional players, I think. I get people wanting some games to be harder, and I hear it all the time (in Fallout, etc). It's just really not what the sims was ever supposed to be about (winning and all those little endorphin rushes). But yeah, unpredictability, more variety in how sims act so they're fun to put in different situations, and being surprised is what should be keeping the game interesting. Something closer to a good role playing game, maybe.