🚀 go-pugleaf

For those who are confused, we're talking about a new game called "The Sims"
from EA/Maxis.  It's supposed to be a "people simulator" but because of its
very odd implementation it is really more of a Neighborhood Simulator,
static and dynamic at the same time.  If you're already confused, then my
work on this particular subject is done although for extra measure I'll
refer back to this subject in better detail a little later.  One of the
career tracks you can choose for your sims is the military.  Since you never
know the details of what your sim is doing at work, I'll say mine is a
F/A-18 pilot just to keep this thread on topic in the flight-sim group
<chuckle>.

First of all, this isn't a pure review because I'm going to immediately
address issues instead of explaining the whole environment/gameplay.  In
fact, some familiarity with the basic mechanics of the game will help you
understand this post rather than vice versa.  This is not an introduction to
the game and how it works, it's a review of what I don't think works very
well and why I feel that way.  As a bonus, I eventually offer potential
solutions to all my most serious grievances.  Let's get started.

The game is unbelievably addictive at first but the gameplay balance falls
under serious scrutiny once you've played it for 10-20 hours.  In my
experience the foremost object that you're always doing everything else to
improve is the social rating -- I have found that this is the hardest
element to maintain because so much is needed while at the same time it's
one of the activities over which you have the least direct control.  You
must interact with the computer- and user-controlled sims and to say they're
less than accommodating is being remarkably polite.  You have to take these
social and friend elements seriously and WORK at them.  In my game,
everything else ends up hinging on this.  FWIW, I think energy is the second
hardest element to maintain but that's something that could be fixed by
simply lowering the deceleration rate of that specific timer.  The social
interactions, on the other hand, needs reworking from almost the ground up.

I spend three or four days getting all my happiness factors raised then I
[finally!] invite over some neighbors to try to get that ever-elusive social
rating up and also to acquire new family friends if needed and available.
In my opinion, most of the game's essential flaws are illustrated by what
follows.

First of all, if unknown sims are not available you have to save and exit
this house, go back to the neighborhood menu and start a new sim or family
and move them in to a different house.  After doing this once or twice there
are no more affordable houses for new sims so you have to either vacate your
current home and move up (if you can afford it) or you must build the news
sims' first home yourself.  Then exit back to the neighborhood screen,
reenter your first house and continue your regularly scheduled program.
Every promotion requires more friends so you have to do this a lot just to
keep your first sim going.  Oh, and by the way everything that happens in
the neighborhood screen is instant and permanent.  Bulldoze a house and you
can't get it back without uninstalling and reinstalling and then only if you
bulldozed one of the default houses.

Who in the hell thought of this whole implementation?  Could they have
possibly made it any more annoying and less intuitive?  [Ed note: Sorry
about lying earlier by saying I wouldn't address this subject again but it's
*really* irksome -- the game does not come with enough sims in your
neighborhood to get very far in your career so the process described here is
NOT optional.])

While you're setting up these new homes, your sim (from your first game!)
might come meandering by and meet the new sims you're setting up.  If so,
you'll already "know" them when you get back to your first game.  This sort
of breaks the "save game" paradigm since things are still changing in your
world after the save, but I guess that's acceptable in practice while still
terrible in theory for having broken the save game rule.  Anyway, because
all I want to do is get back to my first sim (I have neither the time nor
the inclination to run the whole neighborhood) I do as little as possible
when building a new home for new sims.  One room, one phone (so I can call
these new sims from my original game when I get back to it) and that's it.
Whether or not this scarce living of the alter-sims affects their
personalities when I go back to my first game (which would affect how well
they interact with me) I do not know, but I must say I wouldn't be surprised
at all to find out that's the case.  The design decisions in this game are,
in my opinion, the new standard to which all How Not To Do It courses of
study should be referred.  The curriculum simply writes itself.

Now, back to the socializing.  I've done all the junk above (so many times
that I'm getting good at this worthless diversion which I have no desire to
perform in the first place but must in order to advance the one sim I am
interested in) so now I'm back in my original game with my original sim and
even though I'm working from a saved game, the new sims are now in the
neighborhood.  I'll try a group activity and invite over a bunch of friends.
I call each one and most of them arrive at the same time with one or two
stragglers.  Go to the door and commence the first exercise called, "Try to
greet all the sims bunched up around the door one by one, individually".
Don't forget now, that ever-so-precious timer is ticking so do not dally!

We just hit our first serious snag in two respects: greeting multiple sims
doesn't work well and it's entirely illogical to boot.  In real life, my
front door is not a formal receiving line.  I open it, people come in, most
of them smile and say hi as they walk past, voila.  Instant party.  Happens
just like that <snaps fingers>.  In the case of one or two visitors I might
take the time to stand there and provide a short personal greeting but most
of the time, you know, like when I've just called someone and casually
invited them right over, I just yell from whereever I am, "C'mon in!"  Heck,
I've even been known to tell folks during the phone call that, this is
tricky -- pay attention, "Since I'm expecting you the door will be open,
just c'mon in when you get here, Slim!"  <gasp>  Whether I'm a Renaissance
man or a simple heathen I don't know, you decide, but I sure get tired of
the front door shuffle in the game.  It's really not fun, especially since
it doesn't even make logical sense.  I should be able to click Greet (so I
can control who comes in, after all) but after that they should just enter,
regardless of where my greeting sim is.  I really don't think I should have
to walk over to the door and hold their hand just to get them inside my
house, especially with the congestion problems that are only naturally going
to occur in this or almost any simulated world, AI being what it is today.

Ok, 45 game minutes later and I've got four greeted sims in the house and
two outside that I guess are heading around to come in the back door.  One
of them fired up an immediate conversation with my sim outside (after he
rang my doorbell he walked a half a block up the street while I was trying
to navigate through and greet the other sims so I had to follow him before I
could issue my ever-important face-to-face Greet command).  My
environment-factors outside are nil which means several of my happiness
indicators are now going south, so I had to cut off the other sim
mid-sentence, move my sim inside, try to "call over" the other sim, and then
just hope for the best.  That's one of the sims that headed for the back
door.  No wonder my friend meter is so low with that one; he been here a
whole hour and the only thing he's accomplished is raising my level of
annoyance (my real one, this game thankfully lacks that rating lest it
always be pegged) and he's still not even inside yet.  I've thoroughly
enjoyed all the precious game minutes (hours sometimes!) that have been
wasted on such an illogical evolution.

Ok, forget that sim.  Let's interact with the other ones that miraculously
survived the greeting phase.  I walk over to one, start a conversation which
seems only to serve to immediately prompt that sim to disengage from our
conversation and help theirself to my 'fridge.  Let me see if I'm following
this correctly:  they won't come in the door until I personally greet them
up close and personal, but my food, 'fridge, stove, microwave, cookware,
dinnerware, and table are all fair game and require no consent on my part
whatsoever?  Help yourselves, guys, there's more where that came from.  Have
I mentioned yet how much fun I'm having while all this is going on?

No sweat, this is why I invited a group.  Forget group activities (the
benefits and machinations of which aren't explained anywhere anyway), I just
wanted to have access to several different sims on this, my self-declared
Social Night.

I'll mosey over to the sim who appears to be watching TV.  That's really
cool, I can increase my fun (TV), comfort (couch), social rating (by
watching with another sim), and friendship level with that particular sim,
all at the same time.  This is social nirvana, a truly religious experience.

The TV scene looks good.  Both sims have occasional bubbles over their
respective heads, it looks like they're enjoying some great TV, but
something's wrong.  I'm having fun and I'm getting comfortable, but my
social rating is doing squat, zip, nil, nada.  It appears they're both
watching TV but they're not watching TV. . . together.  You figure that out.
Anyway, I click on the other sim, click talk, and nothing happens except
"talk to that sim" is added to my command queue right after "Watch TV" (the
current activity in which my sim is apparently completely engrossed).  That
means my sim won't talk to the other sim until after I'm done watching
television.  And this means even though they're sitting on the same couch
and doing the exact same thing, the social meter is still not running.  Is
everyone following this?  Ok, never mind that, delete the "Talk To" command.
Click on TV.  Ahh, that looks interesting: a new option called "Join".  Holy
Moses, that's it, I've struck paydirt!  Nevermind that it doesn't make sense
that I have to specifically "join" the other TV watcher, that I can't just
be there and do it and the rest falls logically into place, none of that
matters now that I've got something happening.

All indicators are responding as desired now and progress is being made.
Time elapsed: two and a half joy-filled sim hours.  That's just to get my
sim finally engaged in socially-benefitting activities.  Have I mentioned
the word "fun" lately?  I'm talking buckets of it.  Keep in mind, I don't
want social points or friends; I need them, and I need them tonight.  The
short answer is the circle of activity is too big in The Sims.  In other
words, you only have time to fix a few ratings per day so you kind of have
to spread them out and get a pattern going: these two factors today, those
three tomorrow, etc.  You'll hear the word "pattern" from any reviewer of
The Sims who has played the game more than a couple of hours.  Social
activity needs a dedicated night out of every three or four, and tonight is
my big one.  You don't have to do it this way but the other way, piecemeal,
trying to do more than can be done efficiently and completely, is somehow
even less efficient than the method described here.  (I know, I know, I
didn't believe there could be anything less efficient that what I just
described, either, but I'm finding there are several ways to try and still
not to get anything done in The Sims.)

At the first commercial (a big 10 simulated minutes and one "social" point
later), the other sim decides he's had enough TV.  Well, I guess so after
two hours of trying to watch it while putting up with my sim's antics to get
his attention.  The other sim goes to the bathroom.  I smile.  I cannot
believe my good luck.  The bathroom is THE room in my sim house where stuff
really happens.  If you're playing the game, don't lie: this is the mother
of all rooms and you know it.

If the sim in the bathroom is not a good enough friend you cannot go in
there until they're done with their business some 30 or so sim minutes
later.  It's now 9:30 and I have only two social points (out of what, about
10?) and no real increase in friendship to show for my efforts so far.  The
other sim finishes his business and I immediately rush the bathroom (that
commando training at work really pays off here) and trap him.  My sim now
engages the other in Talk, Dancing, Hugs -- a whole bevy of all things
social.  It's time to go for the big one: Back Rub.  Now right here I'm
thinking yeah, baby, turn that sim around and let's get some back rubbing
action going.  But alas, it is not to be.  My sim would rather (read "must")
maneuver so as to place himself behind the beneficiary of the back rub, or
the back rubee.  The other guy doesn't know it's coming till it's there so
he will not help prepare for it.  Someone explain to me again why I'm even
trying to make friends with this guy.

There's not enough room in the bathroom to get around the other sim but the
bathroom is such a choice spot (sims seem to move around less in there) so I
make the relatively short trip out of the bathroom through the bedroom into
the living room past the other sims still knobbing on all my food and
finally back into the bathroom through a different door.  I almost stop at
the table but one of the sims leaves and starts cleaning my place.  Thanks,
but I have a maid and I NEED social interaction.

Anyway, back to the guy in the bathroom.  No!  What has happened!?!  The
other sim, the back rubee, has <grabs chest> turned around.  Criminy sakes,
it's now 10:15 and I really want to rub that back.  Well, it can't hurt to
try again and at least now I know my way back past the moocher and the
cleaner, back through the living room, back into the bedroom, and finally
back into bathroom.  The moment of truth has arrived -- the back rubbing
commences at 10:50.  The birds are singing, the moon is shining, sim life is
good.  My energy level is getting critical but who cares?  We have
established the back rub groove (I mean it's happening right now, baby!) and
I earn one more social point and 4 more friendship points with the back
rubee.

A little more and I'll have half my social bar restored but as they say, all
good things must come to an end.  One of the other guests, having gorged
themselves on my groceries, needs to use the bathroom.  What a dilemma!
Since we're not friendly enough to watch him, my sim automatically queues up
a "move" command as does, I guess, the back rubee (because he won't talk to
me now) but it would appear as if everyone is in everyone else's way because
no one is going anywhere.  Several clicks later I've finally got my sim back
in the living room (you should know the route by now) and I'm talking to one
of the other sims who was a member of the raiding party on my refrigerator.
I can no longer tell what's going on between the two sims still in the
bathroom and, to be honest, I no longer care.  I'll try to continue mending
that friendship later, but right now it's past midnight and I've simply GOT
to get some more social activity before my energy bar causes me to pass out.
This is my dedicated Social Night, I won't get this chance again until after
I've rescued all the other personality factors and errands that have been
neglected by this evening's pursuit of social excellence.  If I take a day
off, I should be able to have another equally satisfying Social Night in
only three or four sim days!  What a deal!  What fun!

Let me save both of us some time and allow you to just guess how long my sim
stayed awake and how much social karma I netted for the evening.  When you
consider how long it'll be before I can do this again during which time my
social rating will be in decline, the net effect of tonight's efforts will
round off to, oh, ONE good point, maybe two if I managed to Talk to back
rubee while that other guy was waiting to use the john.  Golly, this simply
redefines the word "fun".

Rinse, lather, repeat.  And repeat, and repeat.  Then, repeat once more.
Finally, repeat.  Well, one more can't hurt, go ahead and repeat.  Ok, got
it?  Great, now repeat one more time just for good measure, then repeat.

I have to be fair (even though I don't feel like it at all anymore) and
admit that there have been Social Nights when everything absolutely fell
into incredible, albeit still happenstance, place.  It was something to
behold.  I laughed, I cried, I saved my game.  Sims joined me at the TV or
the piano, we all ate together, we listened to music, we turned the radio
off, we danced (did you catch the order of that?), and the bathroom
performed as the shrine I always knew it was capable of being.  Several of
us made love (apparently my sim's sexual prowess is something that must be
seen to be believed.  While we're redefining words, let's go ahead and add
"slut" to the new list.  I'm a guy, a normal horny guy who thinks about and
engages in sex a lot, but my sim; you just gotta see this guy.  I think he
has intimacy issues but who am I to say?)

You have now experienced the social aspect of The Sims which serves as a
pretty good generic example of other problems in the rest of the game.

Pop-quiz: What is the relationship between music and dancing?  None
whatsoever that I can tell!  What an interesting design decision!  Zowie.

So, I've bitched and bitched and bitched (sorry but after playing The Sims
I'm getting used to repeating stuff endlessly) and only offered two
solutions:  the one about lowering the rate at which energy declines and the
whole Greet orgy thing.

I won't address the obvious stuff like pathing issues and the way the sims
must all be positioned just so before they can converse or whatever, and all
the other multitudes of things Maxis must already know needs improvement,
but how about this very simple twist: what if when you are around another
sim (I'm talking mere presence in the same house!) if both your social
rating and your friendship rating with that sim are increasing at, say, a
quarter of the rate that they would increase if you were actually engaged in
direct activity with him or her?

Since most of the game is more manageable than the social stuff, I think
this might really balance everything out nicely.  Those who are driven,
driven, driven [slap!] to succeed can still do so but, more importantly,
those who want to actually have a little, dare I say it, "fun" could
actually do so and would still have plenty of pressures to keep them busy.

Not only might it help gameplay, but this modification makes much more sense
to me anyway.  I don't know about the folks at Maxis, but people I don't
like aren't in my house in the first place or are there very briefly.  I
certainly don't call people over with whom I am merely neutral just so we
can both do our own independent thing in the general vicinity of my plot of
land.  If someone is at my house, their mere presence should be boosting
both my social rating and my relationship with that person, even if it's at
half or one-fourth of the speed of the "engaged-in-activity" multipliers,
PER visiting sim.  That means four sims present (in your house or yard,
anywhere past the new Greet phase, period) would equal the same refresh rate
of your generic social rating as engaging one sim in partner activity, while
at the same time your friendship level with each sim would be increasing by
1/4 the normal "engaged" rate.

I suppose the most predicatable response to this suggestion is that this
will make the game too easy.  My response is, "Do you promise?"  Being able
to occasionally get just a little bit ahead and actually "play" a little
more in this sim could only be a good thing in my mind.  So what if I invite
eight friends over and thereby slowly increase my relationship with each and
my social rating in general without doing much more than answering the door?
Heck, maybe I could actually spend one day out of every four or five just
kind of screwing around and exploring my sim's world and capabilities and
play with all the cool toys and furniture.  Maxis already left out any trace
of weekends (revisit redefine list, add "week").  Do we EVER get a break, a
break, a break from the monotony?  Holy cow, just imagine it!  Playing with
the game as if I was actually having some fun (there's that word again,
hmmm)!

If you get past that one then I have one more.  Populate my neighborhood
autonomously!!  This whole thing of play, exit, do the same thing I just did
for sim number one except now do it for sims two, three, and four is absurd.
In SimCity (never played one) do you have to leave one city and create
entirely from scratch and fully administer another city just so the first
city can establish trade and commerce with external centers?  What in the
heck were you guys thinking?

As it stands now I'm experiencing deja vu, feeling like I'm preparing for an
archer rush that will arrive at any moment.  Wrong game, same feeling,
except this feeling was appropriate for the "other" game and seems entirely
out of place in this one.  Pardon me, but my life is not this harried.
Admittedly, I'm 35, retired from Silicon Valley and living way out in the
middle of nowhere, Montana, but I already took into consideration that The
Sims would be simulating my old life, not my new one.  ;)

Regards,
Rick

P. S.  Anyone looking for a game reviewer who will work remotely and, since
money is an issue but not a critical one, would be selective in which titles
he would agree to review to the point of being offensive?  I didn't think so
but had to ask.  After all, someone came up with this terrible
implementation of The Sims and it flew <grin>.  As a reference point, this
writing represents a second-cut working copy, minimal edits with no external
feedback.  Suitable for usenet, in other words.  I can do better, especially
with a good editor.  :)