Winter blog is out

"drake_mccarty;c-16515379" wrote:

"Cupid;c-16514249" wrote:

"jcp011c2;c-16514233" wrote:
While all this sounds nice, there is a pet peeve of mine being used in the blog that I can't stand about marketing tactics for new iterations for series. "For the first time in SIMS 4...you can...." yes, of course it's the first time in Sims 4. Did you think we would expect there would be nothing added in? It's not the first time in the series though so please entice us better as to why we should buy this game and not just fall back to what we already have*

*Mind you, I'm speaking in just generalizations. I have already pre-ordered and expect I will like the game. I just can't help but heave a sigh when marketing relies on advertising something "new" to a particular product, when, that has been in previous version of the product all along. Give us something to look forward to, not just expect us to be surprised at the same thing each time around when we already expect it will happen. Don't go marketing it like it's the best thing since sliced bread. The hype is not real.

previous versions of the game aren't relevant to everyone who the product is being marketed to.

That doesn’t really matter. A sizable chunk of their audience are players who have played the previous games, and realistically can see through the wording in the blog. They aren’t only talking to new players with their marketing either.

Now I don’t see anything particularly wrong with the wording, it’s accurate to say, but from a marketing standpoint they could have went with a different line and accomplished the same thing while adding in a nostalgic element for legacy players. For example “Ice skating, a fan favorite from past games, returns in The Sims 4 Seasons Expansion Pack....”. I think in general marketing should avoid labeling “firsts” when it’s been done before with the previous game. It makes it out to be like this was a “first”, which it only is in an oddly specific way.

That probably wouldn't sit will either, because then you'd end up with people expecting ice skating (as an example, there are probably better examples because I mean.. how different could ice skating be?) to work the same way it did in past games. As for players being able to "see thorugh" the wording.. what even is there to see through if the wording is all accurate? This just doesn't seem like any sort of marketing ploy or gimmick to me.

Mind you, I'm not saying the person isn't allowed to just have a pet-peeve. But reading their post it sounded like the issue was more than just the "first time" thing, and that they thought repeated features shouldn't be mentioned or emphasized at all in favor of newer features. That's why it does matter that plenty of people reading it, might not have experienced those things before.