Simsplified

Here we go, the post I have been dreading, I have needed to make this post for three months now and I have been procrastinating on it. Because I’m embarrassed.

I love the Sims 4.

The Sim 4 got a lot of bad press at release, angry people mad they had to pay for pools. Toddlers didn’t exists, color wheels are a thing of a past and so much more EA related nonsense.

Now it is often judged on its original press and ignored by any good self-respecting EA mocker. See also: decent people. People look at the bad reviews and figure, EA will always be EA, how could it be better?

But almost all the things complained about day one are gone now. And it’s the best goddamned Sims game yet.

I have probably put an embarrassing amount of hours into The Sims. Because while EA is a shameless, money-guzzling, soul thief’s, they are also creating one of the most sandbox, casual games on the market.

And let’s be clear here, I’m not saying it’s an amazing game, I’m saying it’s better than the others comparatively by EA standards. So, not incredible but you can choke it down if you like this sort of thing.

They still overcharge for expansion packs. And the in-game ‘community’ where you see other peoples’ sims and creations is still slow and broken. But if you look past that, it’s actually really fun.

For once thing it runs faster. Yes, it’s because they got rid of a lot of stuff. But a lot of the stuff they got rid of was unnecessary clutter and the smoother game experience is worth it. But also they went back to roots a bit, and don’t load up the whole world at once, just whatever home or venue you’re visiting. Which, yes, adds loading screens. But all those times your game got down to 5 FPS trying to watch ‘Thomas McButthead’ go to work on his little bike were not that much better. This way, sure, you have loading screens, but once its loading is done, no more slowness, you no longer have to worry that your game will crash and burn because it tried to load your neighbor’s house for no fucking reason.

But also they made cheating a lot easier, which seems silly but actually really opens up the game to be more sandbox.

Because, let’s be honest, how many people among us play Sims over and over to have them work up the career ladder or put in a Sims lifetime to learn an instrument? While these people exist, they are not the main Sims consumer and making cheats easier to access in no way ruins their experience. Cheats are shorter, easier to access, and there are more of them to allow you to have the exact game experience you want with just a few short commands.

These things may seem simple and more technical than game-play. But they both play a huge roll in creating a game that simply feels better in your hands.