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I finally realized what was bothering me about how Sims behave in this game.
Wasting_Night
Posts: 800 Member
And it isn't just their complete lack of awareness to their surroundings either. It's the fact that they all act the same way because their behavior and wants are dictated by their current "emotion" and not their personalities. It's probably why we were given only three trait slots since the traits in this game doesn't decide your Sim's personality - it decides what emotion they feel at any given time. If they had given us the five slots like in TS3 our Sims would have been even more neurotic. Aspirations no longer dictate what a Sim wants in life - it's simply the goal you have to achieve using that Sim and it's probably the reason why you're allowed to change it anytime.
With this realization in mind I like the game a little less now.
With this realization in mind I like the game a little less now.
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You find my sims in the gallery tagged with #SimsFairy.
I agree and why I made the thread about the Life Simulator VS the TS4, because if this game was focused on the life simulator and not the buffs which are only ways to goal no matter the goal, (even get in the right mood to make a friend etc.) traits would be much more important. It's a long discussion if you haven't read it. Aspirations are just as set of busy work goals for those who get bored in life simulators. They have absolutely nothing to do with the Sim, even gaining an earned trait doesn't matter (unless it's steal bladder etc.) those aren't traits, they are rewards to cater to the rpg players.
ETA: This game isn't a life simulator because the buff system is an RPG system so it is the core and the game just has some life simulating elements thrown into it, rather that the other way around.
Honestly I feel like the RPG elements and busy work are just another unfortunate holdover from the game's time as Olympus. The open world and CASt being removed are most likely because of it either.
I'm under the strong impression the game was never meant to be The Sims as we know it from the get go because of it's rpg foundation, and if that is due to the left over Olympus project then I agree, but I think EA has been trying to get rid of the dollhouse/life simulator for years now and it started with EA's vision and Ron Humble in 2007 when they decided this game didn't have enough to do in it and started to change the genre long before the TS2 was even over.
I agree ...
and as furniture with an emotional aura is extremly powerful with regards to indfluencing a sims mood/emotion, it is very easy to get all Sims behave similarly, just by putting them into the same room (with a few pieces of aura furniture)
For me I felt the game was trying to play me rather than me playing it. It was influencing me because of the linear play and the emotions throwing up further examples of this. I like my sims emotions to be an added extra, not the be all and end all. The game wants my sim kids to be inspired before school? You must do this task before you can get there. Urgh.
https://twitter.com/sparkfairy1
After 55 days of playing each of my 4 starting households (+ the kids households as they move out), they are all exactly the same.
-They all have 7 children (I only try for baby when they have a whim for it).
-They all have all instruments, gym equipment, pools, fruit and vegetable garden, easels, that darn ugly giant telescope and ditto microscope. Those things are only bought when someone has a whim for it, but they all do, and fast (3 to 5 days played max).
-All kids want to do their homework every day, and 80% want to do extra credit as well.
-When inspired, they all want to cook, grow plants, play music and paint, but never write books unless I made them an author or they are a chef who gets the ability to write a cookbook - then they want to write one once. Mostly they want to paint, followed by buying instruments, and playing music.
-They all want to play chess, play videogames and program, but only 3 of the 4 families have wanted a workbench, and only 2 of them have wanted to use it (once each). One family uses their telescope and microscope frequently, the others just want to buy new ones, but never want to use them.
-Each household has 1 sim that everyone wants to socialize with (and it is never an outgoing sim).
-Family sims all start their day wanting to buy a toy, whether they have kids or not is not important. Other than that the only way that trait shows is that they usually get sad and are missing relatives right after leaving for work, even if they spent the morning taking care of the baby (oops, forgot. That is an object and not a relative) or have done nothing but socializing with their kids. I use to like the family trait, but it seems to only be a negative trait in sims4 - they have a hard time getting promoted since they spend their workdays being sad. When they get home, they couldn't care less about their kids unless I direct them to because of the kids' whims.
-All kids have finished 2-3 childhood aspirations by the time they grow into teens, just by following whims.
-No matter which traits they have, they all are upset about not living in a luxury home and want a pool.
-Loners want to socialize just as much as everyone else. And everyone wants to meet new people constantly.
- All sims no matter what traits spend most of their time either inspired or focused. At least the active sims start their day wanting to go for a jog, but after work/school they are like everyone else.
This almost ranks up there with the Mr. Sausages thread for pointing out how borked the emotion system is, how little content this game has, and how many short cuts have been made in the simulation. Really glad you took the time to post this info.
Where are we going, and why am I in this hand basket?!
I was so happy with the game when it first came out, because it seemed so much more like the "old" sims style compared to TS3 (which was just not enjoyable for me), but now after playing it for more than 200 hours, it reveals how shallow these new sims are, despite their emotions, or maybe even because of their emotions.
I still have fun playing the game, but I wish they could add more depth to it.
You find my sims in the gallery tagged with #SimsFairy.
great summarization
i too have similiar experiences especially with sims with the Family trait. after several families being so underwhelmingly lookwarm towards their relatives but always eager to become sad because not socializing enough with the family, i just stopped to play the families alltogether. it's one of most worthless traits.
& yes, all traits i played for now are rather unimportant because sims wish mainly according to their emotional state & not to their trait.
i had the most fun till now playing Cooks & Athletes.
those wish mainly what they should, to cook & to excercise in some way.
currently playing also an Astronaut, she's rather surprisingly straight forward with her wishes.
i chose for her the aspiration Nerd Brain
& traits are :
Genius
Self Assured
Active
she wished for a rocket & likes a lot to tinker there still
the most difficulties i had so far with a Businessman,
i even am currently trying a hand on an own Workaholic trait cause his performance as a businessman is most underwhelming & i really don't know what traits he should get to be playable as a businessman
the best so far but still not satisfactory are
Active
Cheerfull
Self-Assured
his Aspiration is Fabulously Wealthy
but he doesn't like to work at all, he becomes Tense at work, even as he had the trait Ambitious
& since there is no aspiration towards being a businessman it's problematic
maybe i should change his aspiration to Friend of the World, but somehow it just really doesn't make sense, a businessman who wants to befriend others but doesn't want to make money
indeed in TS3 my businessmen were always not only eager to wish to work, to go to work, they wanted to get promoted & they also autonomously took out their laptop everywhere & made extra work in their free time, i had to hinder them doing so
& the trait Outgoing is really a laugh,
cause all sims chat literally with everyone till they drop,
well, one of my outgoing sims wished mainly meeting new people, that was more than easy to do of course but also dull to play
i suppose the Creative trait is the most strenous
cause those sims wish always the entire programmed round of inspirational stuff, like TriX0099 said, painting, cooking, playing instrument, gardening, but never writing & tinkering - the game is so unbalanced !
Wrong thought, I guess
I think maybe it should even go a step further and having certain aspirations should disallow you from later having others. A family Sim shouldn't be able to later have a serial romance aspiration. Maybe this is taking it too far?
> TriX0099 wrote: »
>
> I see the same thing as the OP, and that contributes heavily to the lack of replayability with this game. I've always created a few different households with different traits and aspirations, and alternated between them to prevent things getting boring. My play mainly is directed by their whims and aspirations, but I do take care of their needs first, and do homework/work chores anyway.
>
> After 55 days of playing each of my 4 starting households (+ the kids households as they move out), they are all exactly the same.
> -They all have 7 children (I only try for baby when they have a whim for it).
> -They all have all instruments, gym equipment, pools, fruit and vegetable garden, easels, that darn ugly giant telescope and ditto microscope. Those things are only bought when someone has a whim for it, but they all do, and fast (3 to 5 days played max).
> -All kids want to do their homework every day, and 80% want to do extra credit as well.
> -When inspired, they all want to cook, grow plants, play music and paint, but never write books unless I made them an author or they are a chef who gets the ability to write a cookbook - then they want to write one once. Mostly they want to paint, followed by buying instruments, and playing music.
> -They all want to play chess, play videogames and program, but only 3 of the 4 families have wanted a workbench, and only 2 of them have wanted to use it (once each). One family uses their telescope and microscope frequently, the others just want to buy new ones, but never want to use them.
> -Each household has 1 sim that everyone wants to socialize with (and it is never an outgoing sim).
> -Family sims all start their day wanting to buy a toy, whether they have kids or not is not important. Other than that the only way that trait shows is that they usually get sad and are missing relatives right after leaving for work, even if they spent the morning taking care of the baby (oops, forgot. That is an object and not a relative) or have done nothing but socializing with their kids. I use to like the family trait, but it seems to only be a negative trait in sims4 - they have a hard time getting promoted since they spend their workdays being sad. When they get home, they couldn't care less about their kids unless I direct them to because of the kids' whims.
> -All kids have finished 2-3 childhood aspirations by the time they grow into teens, just by following whims.
> -No matter which traits they have, they all are upset about not living in a luxury home and want a pool.
> -Loners want to socialize just as much as everyone else. And everyone wants to meet new people constantly.
> - All sims no matter what traits spend most of their time either inspired or focused. At least the active sims start their day wanting to go for a jog, but after work/school they are like everyone else.
>
>
>
>
> great summarization
>
> i too have similiar experiences especially with sims with the Family trait. after several families being so underwhelmingly lookwarm towards their relatives but always eager to become sad because not socializing enough with the family, i just stopped to play the families alltogether. it's one of most worthless traits.
>
> & yes, all traits i played for now are rather unimportant because sims wish mainly according to their emotional state & not to their trait.
>
> i had the most fun till now playing Cooks & Athletes.
> those wish mainly what they should, to cook & to excercise in some way.
>
> currently playing also an Astronaut, she's rather surprisingly straight forward with her wishes.
> i chose for her the aspiration Nerd Brain
> & traits are :
> Genius
> Self Assured
> Active
> she wished for a rocket & likes a lot to tinker there still
>
> the most difficulties i had so far with a Businessman,
> i even am currently trying a hand on an own Workaholic trait cause his performance as a businessman is most underwhelming & i really don't know what traits he should get to be playable as a businessman
> the best so far but still not satisfactory are
> Active
> Cheerfull
> Self-Assured
> his Aspiration is Fabulously Wealthy
> but he doesn't like to work at all, he becomes Tense at work, even as he had the trait Ambitious
> & since there is no aspiration towards being a businessman it's problematic
> maybe i should change his aspiration to Friend of the World, but somehow it just really doesn't make sense, a businessman who wants to befriend others but doesn't want to make money
>
> indeed in TS3 my businessmen were always not only eager to wish to work, to go to work, they wanted to get promoted & they also autonomously took out their laptop everywhere & made extra work in their free time, i had to hinder them doing so
>
> & the trait Outgoing is really a laugh,
> cause all sims chat literally with everyone till they drop,
> well, one of my outgoing sims wished mainly meeting new people, that was more than easy to do of course but also dull to play
>
> i suppose the Creative trait is the most strenous
> cause those sims wish always the entire programmed round of inspirational stuff, like TriX0099 said, painting, cooking, playing instrument, gardening, but never writing & tinkering - the game is so unbalanced !
Haha, I had the exact same problem with my business man. There is no aspirations that goes well with it, he had the ambitious trait, and would come home from work, all tense, with 3 hours of chores to do (that doesn't build skill) and his whim would always be to take a day off work, and he would only get the whim to get a promotion when he had the next 3 days off, so it just wasn't going to happen. He ended up half way through his elder stage before finally reaching the top of the career.
Traits, especially giving only 3, are pretty useless.
oh yeah, i forgot his wish to take a day off shortly after he started to work, what an ambitious businessman !
after that i changed his traits
what's also absolutely "great"
are Self Assured sims who wish to embrace themselves in the mirror, find then a spot they don't like & become embarrassed or tense or whatever negative emotion they have in store
somehow the devs of TS4 seem not to understand psychology & sociology at all
self assured comes before looking into the mirror not afterwards
not self assured people want to admire themselves in a mirror but vain people
self assured people do not need to admire themselves, sorry Maxis, but what a childish idea that is
I have a Sim in one of my active games that had 8 traits by the end of their teens
No mods required
And as for the emotional-traits, they do help create unique Sims, like the Romantic traits is good for Flirty Sims the Energized Trait is good for Athletic Sims, and the Inspired Trait is good for Artistic Sims.
But there's no rule that says you ever have to use any of them.
To be honest I feel like the only way to fix it is to completely overhaul the emotion system because at this rate it's just a glorified collection of buffs and debuffs - it has absolutely no bearing to a Sim's personality and only serves to help or hinder progress to a goal like aspirations.
I've been working on my business person for a while now..........and dull as dish water. I was hoping to make her the owner of a retail shop......so attempted to guide her traits to what I thought might help. I believe it's ambitious, cheerful, and outgoing. Doesn't seem to be helping her much. Her aspiration is fortune.
I ignore whims much of the time, I always have since they were introduced back in sims 2. If they don't mesh with the personality of my sim, I ignore them. Still.......that doesn't help much either.
I don't think all of what we're seeing in sims 4 stems from it going to be an online game either. I believed EA was attempting to take the game closer to an RPG style clear back in sims 3 starting with world adventures. While I liked WA quite a lot and played it also quite a lot, I wished they'd have made it a side game as they did Sims Midevil (sp) and given us a real vacation destination. I'd have played it just as heavily as a side game, especially if they'd added to it over time.
If this style is what is the future of the sims, then there is no hope unless developers/EA realize this is NOT what sim fans want. If they keep along this path their cash cow will dry up as sim fans move on to other things or just turn back to the versions that were their favorites.
I play sims 4 perhaps an hour or so a week at best. It just can't keep my attention for long these days. So I go back to sims 2 and play 8 hrs without realizing that much time has passed. I only play sims 4 at all because I spent so much money on it that it seems wasteful to never load up the game at all.
Yes, you get more traits after completing aspirations (which is a huge bore if you want to play multiple Sims), but the traits received are basically just powers. For example, after completing the body builder aspiration, my Sim receives the trait "Long Lived", which allows him to live longer. That really doesn't define a person's personality, nor is it a trait..
There is a rule that says I have to use 3 of them. If I don't, I can't leave CAS.
If you actually watch your Sims, you will notice they don't just act "Tense" and that's it. If you have the Materialistic trait, and your Sim hasn't made a purchase, those "buffs" that we got in The Sims 3, also cause a separate Animations to those Sims. I believe my Sim occasionally looked around in disgust and also a look of worry every so often.
The emotion animations are very bold, but the animations that come with Traits are still there. It was just more noticeable in The Sims 3, because Sims behave like any other Sims, and then you would get some exclusive animations based on those traits.
Active Sims will occasionally do Sit Ups, or Push Ups and will go Jogging at their own accord, Cheerful Sims will often tell jokes and talk to different people and rarely get Sad or Gloomy. Glutton Sims will often burp or fart, and eat really messily. Creative Sims will Paint or Create different things in their spare time. I could go on.
All the traits do have the same effect on Sims, they are just harder to notice because Emotions are very prominent. In The Sims 3, if they weren't behaving off a moodlet or trait, they behaved the same as every other Sim.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
& did you try the businessman career ? did you play the family trait with a family ?
those additional traits are rewards, they do not shape the sims' personality
& there is no shy sim, or fearful one, no workaholic ...
in TS3 there are in the base game alone 63 traits + as well more or less the same rewards which in TS4 are called traits