Why does everyone hate city living?

Lag lag lag lag stutter stutter *plays a little song*. I don't hate it. But I feel they spent most of the budget on a fx world at the cost of actual activities and real apartments. And it doesn't even world for everyone, luck of the draw as well. Still waiting for the blessed day they decide to fix that so I can actually play an ep I bought 5 months ago. /rant over

I wrote in another thread that it was one of the worst packs. I probably should have thought that out better before posting it. The thing about city living for me is that I don't like being cramped up in an apartment.. period. I didn't like it in Sims 2 either. I'm sure if I'd played 3 I wouldn't have liked it. So for me it was based on that.. not liking living in an apartment.
However... I do very much like the stuff, skills, lot traits and singing skill (and items). I'm also warming up to the festivals and community lot areas. I decided to give it a go again after my dislike post because I was not in the best frame of mind when I bought it and tried it.. I was pretty sour actually and I think it magnified my dislike. After installing it initially I had tried living in an apartment for a few days after that I decided to ignore the city completely. After posting about my dislike I took a deep breath and dove in .. and was surprised that I was enjoying it. I'll probably just be visiting in the city at this point though.. or if I make an apartment dweller they will basically only use their apartment to green up.
I wonder if there is a mod that can turn a tent into a cardboard box so I can have my sim "live" in public areas... hmmm.

My major issue with it at the moment is that it spawns too many Asian sims. By the second generation of my game, just about all the spawned sims are Asian or Arabic.

I hate it because it offers nothing really game changinly new. It honestly (to me) felt like a slightly bigger world pack from the sims 3 but definitely not an expansion pack. Also I despise 90% of the CAS and build buy stuff and the new world (to me) is horrible and bland and just really, really, really small for a supposed city. I also don't understand why singing was the skill when it could have been used later on for like a singing career. I feel like street art could have been a separate skill instead. Also elevators having no animation was not only incredibly lazy from the team but just an overall silly and lackluster design choice. It's really annoying to me that I can't have my own elevators in my sims homes and businesses. And finally everything new is locked to the new world. I can't have apartments in Willow Creek. There will be no festivals in Oasis Springs. It was just (I feel) a very lazy and half hearted expansion that took a year to make. If this took a year to make them I'm honestly worried about future Expansion Packs because City Living was not up to scratch (in my opinion) and I feel like the team could and should have done a tonne better when it came to design choices with this pack.
I bought city living for half price (where I live that's $25) and I still feel like I paid too much for it because It added nothing much new at all. :neutral:

Oh,... I didn't know it was hated by many. :(

That's sad to hear. I really had some hopes for City Living even if I was disappointed with the building of Apartments-lack there of. :(

"Everyone" doesn't hate city living. You like it, so there you go. I like one apartment and have used it only once , I send my Sims to some of the festivals and sometimes I just go into town to see what's goin' on , not my very favorite but, it's up there.

I would ask the same question of why people like it. From everything I've seen....

-Apartments seem annoying rather than interesting. An apartment is just a house with obnoxious neighbors that never go away, as well as an extra obstacle that keeps your sims from sleeping. I don't like when my Sims constantly have to spray the monster under the bed, so why would I like constantly banging on the neighbor's door? Why would I enjoy if my neighbors can just walk in on short notice and act like my home is their home? There's a reason it's called "my home" and a reason doors have locks, but apparently in San Myshuno, these concepts don't exist. Enjoy neighbors barging in to drink your water and leave dirty dishes.

-Festivals are recycled content, save for the Flea Market. A 20% success rate is terrible. I really don't see the purpose of going to a festival to do things my Sim can do at home, especially when one of them is notorious for making married sims cheat on their spouse. The rewards for visiting are ugly T-shirts you'd probably never wear again. Woohoo~

-Why are the food recipes a selling point? I don't care what my Sims eat, especially since I'm personally not a fan of the calories system. That system just means my sims have to work out regularly, which is obnoxious for some. I just cook Fish Tacos and other 0 calorie meals all day. But oh boy, now there's new recipes that...don't really do anything special, but apparently I'm supposed to be really excited about that new texture my sim interacts with.

-The new careers seem pretty bad. The BEST earning career is actually mediocre in the grand scope of things. ~9k a week is about the average pay amongst Sims careers, and the best paying one is just below that. I actually like low-paying careers for a bit more realism, but I think it's important to have variety and a nice mix of low income and high. The best earner seems to be internet celeb, though that requires excess work in your off-time, otherwise it's mediocre; similar in concept to the writer or painter careers where the cash is more to do with a skill than with the career earnings. More importantly, the career rewards are....non-existent. I saw the career rooms posted as images online....man those are sad. They're all base-game furniture with 1-2 new items, meanwhile the other careers can fill an entire room with unique furniture.

-UGLY clothing. Some of those I saw I had no idea what they were even supposed to be. The clothing is like the Sims team made it a goal to make "noisy" clothing as a theme. They definitely succeeded...

-Extremely boring city. Go compare Windenburg and San Myshuno. Windenburg for example has a huge neighborhood connecting some commercial lots to the start homes. If you walk around, you can see plazas with Sims playing chess amongst some greenery, some select locations to paint with an easel set up, a plaza with a fountain, some statues, etc etc. If you go to Diskothek Pan Europa I believe it was, then you can again see fountains and statues and lots of nice stuff you don't really see anywhere else.....now go back to San Myshuno. What do you get? Four lots encircled around a central plaza, with one commercial lot per neighborhood. Wowowowowowowowow how exciting! It's absolutely mind-numbing to me that they built an expansion pack that focuses on a location, and the location itself is the most dull they've ever produced because every single neighborhood has a recycled layout with nothing special.

-Again, why should I buy this? What exactly is the selling point? Where's the must-have feature? I know I buy Get to Work for the careers, I know I buy Get Together for the clubs....but why should I buy City Living? Certainly it's not that bland location. Certainly it's not the festivals that recycle base game content. Certainly it's not for the careers with far less detail and depth than Get to Work's careers. Certainly it's not just for the food or clothes....but what the heck is left!? Oh right, the Singing skill, and I refuse to believe one skill is worth $40.

Because City Living disappointed. People had their hopes up high but they were disappointed with the amount of features limited to San Myshuno and so was I. It was just disappointing, not bad but disappointing.

I like it. As someone who likes to build; the only problem I've found is that you can't build or edit an apartment. Which isn't a big problem. It just brought a new dimension of playing to the game.

I don't hate CL. IMO, it's merely the better of an already lack luster selection of EPs. I was disappointed in it for all the reasons already mentioned. Specifically, everything is fake and there's really nothing new brought to the table. San Myshuno is city with fake scenery, fake buildings, and fake "culture". The "city" is just as tiny as the other worlds. Yet, it's full of tourists -- tourists that have nowhere to really go and nothing to really see.

I had high hopes for the festivals, though. I really enjoyed the festivals in TS4 and was looking for something even more exciting. However, in TS4 the festivals are always the same. You seen 'em once, there's really no reason to see 'em again. The worst thing is that I have no control to change them into something that I would enjoy. EA took all the flexibility and choices away.