Let's Talk Babies «1234...Next Go

Anavastia

I'm not sure if this idea will be welcomed by many. However it's taken me a while to brainstorm this and come up with it.

I'd like to first always give my player type to show why these kinds of ideas interest me. I am a explorer type (means like traveling to visit other lots, family, neighbors etc* I am also a generational player. Meaning I like playing a variety of stages of life and interacting with it. I'm also a collector and a bit of a designer. So i like being able to change things up, i don't like looking at the same room after a while. Equally i have to have it all.


That being said with all of these things babies for me need some adjustments i think can work with their current design and make them more appealing if dev's would like to hear me out about it. I'll talk about the design aspect first.

1. I really like to just have my own look for my infants. I would like to be able to choose color swatches of outfits for them. i was curious of because the baby is an object and tied to the crib could not only the basinette have more color swatch options but also the infant object inside of it have more swatches to change the clothes. Sort of like the bed objects let me choose different patterns.

(I'm sorry i just couldn't find a pick of sims 4 swatch mode for the bed to display what i mean in changing the patterns of the infants outfit)

2. As a designer i have to have my nursery items. I'm just sorry. I am a generation player i can't move on to a game without my nursery items.



I was thinking how this could be implemented for a simmer when the babies are objects. Then i was thinking is it possible for the dev's to create what i call object sets.

Objects sets are buymode objects that have to be placed together and expand on another object to create a series of interactions that have to do with those object sets.

Example:

Baby crib and a baby bath. When placed they need to be interlocked next to each other. The game than recognizes the baby bath as apart of the crib object. This would allow parent to take the bath animation to activate. So the player can click the crib choose bath infant and sim will take the baby from the crib to the bath and bathe them.

Equally this set object can allow for a versatile use of functions and objects.
Baby Bath
Baby Changing Table
Baby Swing
Baby Bottle warmer
Nursing Chair
Rocking Chair/with lullaby interaction
Rattle
Pacifier
Baby Monitor

All of these things can be interlocked and trigger one big object of use associated with the crib. where in that nursery players pick the interactions the sims will act them out. this is nice because they can interlock and in different ways players can make and build using different combinations the room they want.

I feel this will become profitable to EA in the format that they can sell this as a Game Pack to players. also it creates more use of the babies, and more designer options for players.

Now, im not a fan of the whole take your baby to work in your pocket situation either. Please, please put the nanny in the game and have it so the player can schedule a nanny npc during work hours. that's more interesting. Or make it so players can build and purchase a robotic nanny.

Now as far as i can tell babies have to be linked to an object.

Might i suggest looking into making buggies. You're basinette looks like a buggy, just has no wheels. Why not consider that players could move the object from one association to another. In that way the baby can be mobile and not carried in to a pocket.

Or a more easier approach is to bring sims out to a newer age of robotics. Change the basinette to be versatile and at the players choice with the object can gain wheels and a push bar through a simulated push of a button and off we go grandma's house via buggy/basinette.





Equally you can also add a little mobile that will come out in sleep mode and spin around for baby at night.

Anavastia

So i got this brainstorming for this lifestage from this thread and i wanted to give the op credit for helping shap my idea a bit here

http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/814911/a-possible-toddler-alternative/p1

So one of things about this is preschoolers are toddlers

from k3 to k4 that is a 3 and 4 year old

Equally the toddler life stage can be a bit funny because children advance and grown differently. So i can only go by my own experience raising my kids this is where my ideas come from.

Now given if the idea of carrying around a toddler is a problem in sims 4. That doesn't mean we have to go without this life state. What it does mean is we forgo some interactions.

Now my family is tall very tall. my babies were all 9 to 10 pounds at birth with a length of 22 to 24 inches.

Those babies grew to be very heavy toddlers so i couldn't carry them around at 2 anymore and they were walking long before 2 anyway. That didn't mean at all we just jumped right into no diapers and no learning to talk and what not.

First of all i do not have to carry my toddlers to talk and interact with them. that's just a sims 2 and 3 thing in game. Toddlers still crawl and walk as well and kids play and crawl so this is not something we have to miss out on either. Toddlers can easily crawl into a toddler bed as much as they can stand and walk up to one it is that low to the ground and my kids did both.

So learning to walk should not be removed from the game. Now given my kids walked before their toddler stages, yes parents that does happen. That doesn't mean all children fully grasp walking. Again they do toddle and they do toddle over onto the ground. They toddle for a long time we still don't have very good coordination even up to 5 years old. Sims developer team could easily have little sims toddlers crawl around, and equally they can have it where sims can place them in strollers to push them around places in public. Also some things probably do need to have a limited i had to put baby gates on the stairs for my toddlers all as 2 bedrooms up 2 bedrooms down stairs. And i only let them upstairs until they were good at walking up and down stairs.



Equally potty training is a long process and i will say this. I don't know what parent thinks all toddlers at the age of 2 are potty trained, I tell you now every child on this planet is different. I had one kid at age 1 1/2 self teach and was potty trained. I had 2 kids that by 2 1/2 were fine with potty training but took a lot longer to grasp things and so at 3 1/2 a year later we got it. Equally i had one child that was terrified to potty train which can be very stressful on the child and i don't recommend ever trying to force a child, who is not ready, to potty train. I waited til that child was 3 and we got it grasped down at 4.

GreenXen did point out that players that do the legacy challenges don't like this particular skill. Chausser i believe came up with a wonderful solution that I think everyone can enjoy.

Chausser wrote: »
I think for potty training, they could treat it similar to the aging w/ birthday cakes that they already have in Sims 4. You could have the ability to buy, say, a special training toilet for the tyke that they could interact with to immediately be potty trained, or you could wait until they reach the correct age/interactions for it. You could even treat an object like this as a reward for training your first toddler. Once they age up, the seat becomes an option, so players can get the experience at least once and then avoid it at their leisure thereafter.

Now that is the first stage of potty training and at this time no i was not carrying my kids around they could already climb up on things, climb into things, climb over things. However i supervised, guided, and taught. For that we moved on to potty training stage 2 which was not wetting the bed. At this point this is quite a clean up. Though thank you toddler bed mattresses for being water proof lol.




Any way we got through this stage fairly well I did have a late bloomer and that's to be expected again every child is different and goes at their own pace. (i find my late bloomer incredibly adorable)

Anyway I only used the high chair on my infants from six months to 1 year. then we transitioned over to a small table and chairs. Which they ate at that till it was more comforatable to be at a regular table and chair. Which i think simmers can find cute. Besides the high chair your sim isn't really spoon feeding that toddler, not going to kill you to have them to eat at a little toddler and chair table set.



I still read with my toddlers, played with them, drew pictures, they had toys, they learned. all those things happened and sims doesn't have to remove toddlers if it can't animate picking them up.




I bent down to give my toddlers kisses and hugs( they literally where to heavy for me to lift). I think my kids liked it more that i got down on their level or let them crawl into my lap rather than me scoop them up and carry them off. they do have little personalities and it seemed at times they do like choice.




Bath time still can happen and little toddler sims can climb into the tub as animation with mom and dad holding their hand or bending over helping.




Just wanted to add my thoughts on how Ea could go about this and not deprive those who enjoy the toddler lifestage of actually raising them. There are are a lot of fun things that toddlers, have that i love. Little dances, little mischief, and a whole lot of cuteness, along with terrible two's oh and troublesome three's. All fun things i enjoyed.



Also i think another idea for players who want to get through skilling toddlers fast is to bring back Smart Milk as well! That was also a very good tool you could use and i think players having more options to them to adjust that play is much better for them.

[Deleted User]

I like your object set idea for babies if they can do it. It would be nice to have more to do with them to make them feel less like objects. I would love it if babies could be rocked in a chair, especially to breast feed. I think the lego-like, snap together objects sounds neat if they can do it, and fits in with the Sims being a creative and constructive tool.

******

It really does feel like there is too big of a jump between the baby and child stage right now. But, I think for me, either toddler or pre-schooler would be a fine way to bridge the gap, but I actually lean more toward the idea of a pre-schooler that @purplestarz2006 suggested. I think the pre-schooler option would work particularly if they were able to expand the baby stage as you suggested.

For one, we've done toddlers in The Sims 2 and 3. They were cute and fun, but it might be nice to try something a little different. It might mean some new animations and activities instead of just recycling the ones we've seen in previous games. Pre-schoolers are more mobile and have more motor coordination than toddlers, which opens them up to some new interactions like finger-painting, doing jigsaw puzzles, riding tricycles, playing nursery games like simon says and duck, duck, goose, and so on. They could sleep in training beds instead of cribs.

Secondly, not having to carry the toddlers around does seem to overcome a hurdle that the developers said they were having. Using a lifestage that doesn't need to constantly be carried seems like an easier workaround than making both crawling and walking animations.

Third, I get the impression that the developers were getting feedback that potty-training was not fun for many players. It may have been fun for the first 12 kids, but doing it for hundreds might not have been. And, if we use real life as a model as you've done in your post, it's not fun in real life for many parents. I understand that one of the things that many people want from toddlers is the ability to have 'teaching moments' with them. But, I think this could be accomplished in a number of other ways including: teaching them not to wet the bed (as you suggested); teaching them to read; teaching nursery songs; teaching them numbers and colors; teaching them manners; guiding them through various activities -- painting, legos/blocks, etc.

Having pre-schoolers would mean they could get into different kinds of trouble -- mommy's makeup, pots and pans, trying to get things out of the fridge, coloring on the walls, pulling stuff out of waste baskets, etc.

I guess I never saw this age difference as as big of a deal as some people do (in The Sims), and had just assumed that if the developers were having trouble with the carrying animation, they would come up with an early lifestage that didn't require it. The Sims has symbolic representations of lifestages, so the difference between a 2 and 3 year-old being the model they create the lifestage from is not big to me. There's definitely something missing by not including any early development stage at all, but because development is so varied, so I think either stage could fill in the gap, and a hybrid state seemed perfectly appropriate, too.

[Deleted User]

Also, @SimGuruLyndsay once asked about what it was that toddler represented and what we wanted from them. For me, it was this:

greenXen wrote:

1. The biggest thing I want out of the toddler stage is the ability to influence future behavior. In humans this stage is a cornerstone of development and many of the behavioral patterns and skills learned here will influence future behavior. I want toddlers who are read to frequently to learn skills from books faster and perform better in school. I want toddlers who eat good meals in the toddler chair to have an easier time keeping off weight. I want toddlers who don’t bond with anyone during this period to become socially awkward. I want kids who aren’t potty trained as toddlers to wet the bed as kids.

2. A carryover from the last one is I want hidden activities to influence behavior. So, allowing a toddler to draw on walls might up his/her chances of becoming a creative genius. I would like it if you could randomly (or not randomly) make it so toddlers have an affinity for certain types of toys or activities, which might subtly influence how players decide to assign personalities or proceed with encouraging development.

4. The opportunity to quickly form strong bonds with parents and siblings, as toddlers often do with their caretakers.

4. Spontaneity. Short attention spans, heightened curiosity, and limited understanding of the world around them makes for some funny interactions.

5. I want to witness their cuteness. The Sims 2 animations were really well-done. And, I’d like to see if you can’t improve on that as you have with the child life stage in Sims 4.

I think there are multiple ways to achieve that using the toddler, pre-schooler, or hybrid model.

Anavastia

greenXen wrote: »

I like your object set idea for babies if they can do it. It would be nice to have more to do with them to make them feel less like objects. I would love it if babies could be rocked in a chair, especially to breast feed. I think the lego-like, snap together objects sounds neat if they can do it, and fits in with the Sims being a creative and constructive tool.

******

It really does feel like there is too big of a jump between the baby and child stage right now. But, I think for me, either toddler or pre-schooler would be a fine way to bridge the gap, but I actually lean more toward the idea of a pre-schooler that @purplestarz2006 suggested. I think the pre-schooler option would work particularly if they were able to expand the baby stage as you suggested.

For one, we've done toddlers in The Sims 2 and 3. They were cute and fun, but it might be nice to try something a little different. It might mean some new animations and activities instead of just recycling the ones we've seen in previous games. Pre-schoolers are more mobile and have more motor coordination than toddlers, which opens them up to some new interactions like finger-painting, doing jigsaw puzzles, riding tricycles, playing nursery games like simon says and duck, duck, goose, and so on. They could sleep in training beds instead of cribs.

Secondly, not having to carry the toddlers around does seem to overcome a hurdle that the developers said they were having. Using a lifestage that doesn't need to constantly be carried seems like an easier workaround than making both crawling and walking animations.

Third, I get the impression that the developers were getting feedback that potty-training was not fun for many players. It may have been fun for the first 12 kids, but doing it for hundreds might not have been. And, if we use real life as a model as you've done in your post, it's not fun in real life for many parents. I understand that one of the things that many people want from toddlers is the ability to have 'teaching moments' with them. But, I think this could be accomplished in a number of other ways including: teaching them not to wet the bed (as you suggested); teaching them to read; teaching nursery songs; teaching them numbers and colors; teaching them manners; guiding them through various activities -- painting, legos/blocks, etc.

Having pre-schoolers would mean they could get into different kinds of trouble -- mommy's makeup, pots and pans, trying to get things out of the fridge, coloring on the walls, pulling stuff out of waste baskets, etc.

I guess I never saw this age difference as as big of a deal as some people do (in The Sims), and had just assumed that if the developers were having trouble with the carrying animation, they would come up with an early lifestage that didn't require it. The Sims has symbolic representations of lifestages, so the difference between a 2 and 3 year-old being the model they create the lifestage from is not big to me. There's definitely something missing by not including any early development stage at all, but because development is so varied, so I think either stage could fill in the gap, and a hybrid state seemed perfectly appropriate, too.

I am just not for the whole we remove something because one group doesn't like it while others do. Secondly i think potty training wasn't fun because in sims 2 and 3 to be honest it's not projected well.

Again that happens when people aren't catching on to the motives in time and i know a lot of times miss the chance to potty train. For me that kind of interaction is a must. Water downed toddlers aren't an option. Nor is removing the life state and exchanging it for something else. The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around. Again EA has to help generational and family players feel sims 4 is worth it and right now to me it's not. I rather play sims 2 and 3 because they have the lifestate i want to play and the challenges i want to play. Also, even preschoolers are potty training still. My point being this is why you have cheats to by pass things and we always had cheats for people to teach their children instantly skills in sims 2 or use the bottle thing which made learning that skill faster. It's still not acceptable to for go it. It's a challenge and for me a generational player which i did identify I am, would be highly upset with EA. I don't raise 100 toddlers that's legacy players. Legacy players have to do 100's of interactions on all life stages over and over. Should EA continue to alienate another group and just remove everything because they have to do something that is difficult because their trying to rush through to their legacy? No this is suppose to be a game for everyone, and at one time it was and now it isn't, i don't want exclude people.

Or we can look at it this way how would legacy players feel if ea removed their challenge of making 100 babies from the game and limited them down to 10 per save and then forced them to start a new save. In that same way removing toddlers and that potty training skill affects generational players and our challenge for the game. I just wish simmers would place themselves in someone's shoes sometimes and be understanding that just as it's important to have your ability to play it's important to get mine.

Anyway i don't hear that toddlers aren't fun to play. I heard they aren't fun to play in sims 3, but fun to play in sims 2. So what caused that shift. It might have something to do with the Smart Milk being removed from sims 3. If you think about it legacy players easily could get through teaching toddlers quickly by using that milk. That's probably why a lot of them are okay with bypassing and removing the toddler stages in the first place because they can meet their challenge a lot easier. If that's the case im not going to ever going to support brushing one group aside for another. Simmers have to stop doing that in the first place it creates hurt feelings for many people because they don't feel their important or cared about. Potty training is challenging it is in real life it should be represented as such in the game.

The other problem as i saw it with sims 3 has a lot of players like collecting the sims 3 skill books for toddlers. However toddlers still felt like all work and no play. Transitioning over they lost a lot of their interactions, toys, and what not. You couldn't give them bath time, (unless you bought the bath in the store towards the end of the game) no more toddler hugs, stealing bottles from each other, many of their individual toys were removed, they did't do their little toddler dance anymore. Nor did they get into mischief, sleeping in the dogs bed, eating dog food, and playing in the toliet. When toddlers are in a room and crying in sims 3 they gave the toddler an atmosphere of annoyance. Which we both know how you project something in the game also is how your audience perceives it. That plays a big part on why sims 2 toddlers are fun and interesting but sims 3 were not. Sims 4 removes them killing off play for generational players.

That leads me strongly to support their return, and equally have them transition to preschooler where they gain more interactions and fun things. Equally you can do this without having to ever pick them up if that is the problem.

Chausser

I think for potty training, they could treat it similar to the aging w/ birthday cakes that they already have in Sims 4. You could have the ability to buy, say, a special training toilet for the tyke that they could interact with to immediately be potty trained, or you could wait until they reach the correct age/interactions for it. You could even treat an object like this as a reward for training your first toddler. Once they age up, the seat becomes an option, so players can get the experience at least once and then avoid it at their leisure thereafter.

Anavastia

Chausser wrote: »

I think for potty training, they could treat it similar to the aging w/ birthday cakes that they already have in Sims 4. You could have the ability to buy, say, a special training toilet for the tyke that they could interact with to immediately be potty trained, or you could wait until they reach the correct age/interactions for it. You could even treat an object like this as a reward for training your first toddler. Once they age up, the seat becomes an option, so players can get the experience at least once and then avoid it at their leisure thereafter.

Oh that's a brillant idea! Way to go! Problem solved right. Do you mind if I highlight it in the top there and for sure i'll mention you had the idea!

Chausser

Sure! Go for it!

Anavastia

greenXen wrote: »

Also, @SimGuruLyndsay once asked about what it was that toddler represented and what we wanted from them. For me, it was this:

greenXen wrote:

1. The biggest thing I want out of the toddler stage is the ability to influence future behavior. In humans this stage is a cornerstone of development and many of the behavioral patterns and skills learned here will influence future behavior. I want toddlers who are read to frequently to learn skills from books faster and perform better in school. I want toddlers who eat good meals in the toddler chair to have an easier time keeping off weight. I want toddlers who don’t bond with anyone during this period to become socially awkward. I want kids who aren’t potty trained as toddlers to wet the bed as kids.

2. A carryover from the last one is I want hidden activities to influence behavior. So, allowing a toddler to draw on walls might up his/her chances of becoming a creative genius. I would like it if you could randomly (or not randomly) make it so toddlers have an affinity for certain types of toys or activities, which might subtly influence how players decide to assign personalities or proceed with encouraging development.

4. The opportunity to quickly form strong bonds with parents and siblings, as toddlers often do with their caretakers.

4. Spontaneity. Short attention spans, heightened curiosity, and limited understanding of the world around them makes for some funny interactions.

5. I want to witness their cuteness. The Sims 2 animations were really well-done. And, I’d like to see if you can’t improve on that as you have with the child life stage in Sims 4.

I think there are multiple ways to achieve that using the toddler, pre-schooler, or hybrid model.

I like all these ideas greenxen as well an i think it does add a depth of character too the toddlers.

I would also like toddler traits too to appear. At two my kids had personality, either shy, caring, selfish, a little mean spirited, clever, etc. I would love them to show toddlers as little individuals.

Anavastia

Chausser wrote: »

Sure! Go for it!

Thank you. I was feeling like this section is a bit void of readers but im glad to see someone came.

gayars

Ok so working on the premise of more the 3 to 4 year old age group as opposed to 1 to 3 which is more what toddlers are in 2 and 3, why couldn't they read to them like they do the older kids now? Same animation, and we all know they love short cuts, but it is a preschooler instead. The kids could look through books like they did in 3, and perhaps they could play with a child's easel and do fingerpainting or painting. Same animations again, but still a child only object, like the violin has one.



Also why couldn't preschoolers dance to the stereo like the kids? again, same animations, different life stage.

Anavastia

gayars wrote: »

Ok so working on the premise of more the 3 to 4 year old age group as opposed to 1 to 3 which is more what toddlers are in 2 and 3, why couldn't they read to them like they do the older kids now? Same animation, and we all know they love short cuts, but it is a preschooler instead. The kids could look through books like they did in 3, and perhaps they could play with a child's easel and do fingerpainting or painting. Same animations again, but still a child only object, like the violin has one.



Also why couldn't preschoolers dance to the stereo like the kids? again, same animations, different life stage.

Yup they can! They should be okay to add the animations, just in smaller format lol and maybe still a bit of toddling over.

I think it would be cute if they had little preschool items to play with. Simmers are big on fun and toys. I think even giving them little preschool instruments to play would be cute.

gayars

Thinking along those lines, perhaps they could add playing with blocks on the floor or an activity table like in the past, but use the same animations for both preschoolers and children. It would be a new animation (from what I remember anyway) BUT one that could be used with both groups, so they could still be recycling. The children and preschoolers could both build skills and relationships at the same time. It could be a container of legos or wooden blocks or tinker toys or something, then you put the container down where you want them to play, and they both play together.

They could add a swing, and push on swing interaction, and again, preschoolers and children could both use the same animations.

[Deleted User]

Anavastia wrote: »

greenXen wrote: »

I like your object set idea for babies if they can do it. It would be nice to have more to do with them to make them feel less like objects. I would love it if babies could be rocked in a chair, especially to breast feed. I think the lego-like, snap together objects sounds neat if they can do it, and fits in with the Sims being a creative and constructive tool.

******

It really does feel like there is too big of a jump between the baby and child stage right now. But, I think for me, either toddler or pre-schooler would be a fine way to bridge the gap, but I actually lean more toward the idea of a pre-schooler that @purplestarz2006 suggested. I think the pre-schooler option would work particularly if they were able to expand the baby stage as you suggested.

For one, we've done toddlers in The Sims 2 and 3. They were cute and fun, but it might be nice to try something a little different. It might mean some new animations and activities instead of just recycling the ones we've seen in previous games. Pre-schoolers are more mobile and have more motor coordination than toddlers, which opens them up to some new interactions like finger-painting, doing jigsaw puzzles, riding tricycles, playing nursery games like simon says and duck, duck, goose, and so on. They could sleep in training beds instead of cribs.

Secondly, not having to carry the toddlers around does seem to overcome a hurdle that the developers said they were having. Using a lifestage that doesn't need to constantly be carried seems like an easier workaround than making both crawling and walking animations.

Third, I get the impression that the developers were getting feedback that potty-training was not fun for many players. It may have been fun for the first 12 kids, but doing it for hundreds might not have been. And, if we use real life as a model as you've done in your post, it's not fun in real life for many parents. I understand that one of the things that many people want from toddlers is the ability to have 'teaching moments' with them. But, I think this could be accomplished in a number of other ways including: teaching them not to wet the bed (as you suggested); teaching them to read; teaching nursery songs; teaching them numbers and colors; teaching them manners; guiding them through various activities -- painting, legos/blocks, etc.

Having pre-schoolers would mean they could get into different kinds of trouble -- mommy's makeup, pots and pans, trying to get things out of the fridge, coloring on the walls, pulling stuff out of waste baskets, etc.

I guess I never saw this age difference as as big of a deal as some people do (in The Sims), and had just assumed that if the developers were having trouble with the carrying animation, they would come up with an early lifestage that didn't require it. The Sims has symbolic representations of lifestages, so the difference between a 2 and 3 year-old being the model they create the lifestage from is not big to me. There's definitely something missing by not including any early development stage at all, but because development is so varied, so I think either stage could fill in the gap, and a hybrid state seemed perfectly appropriate, too.

I am just not for the whole we remove something because one group doesn't like it while others do. Secondly i think potty training wasn't fun because in sims 2 and 3 to be honest it's not projected well.

Again that happens when people aren't catching on to the motives in time and i know a lot of times miss the chance to potty train. For me that kind of interaction is a must. Water downed toddlers aren't an option. Nor is removing the life state and exchanging it for something else. The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around. Again EA has to help generational and family players feel sims 4 is worth it and right now to me it's not. I rather play sims 2 and 3 because they have the lifestate i want to play and the challenges i want to play. Also, even preschoolers are potty training still. My point being this is why you have cheats to by pass things and we always had cheats for people to teach their children instantly skills in sims 2 or use the bottle thing which made learning that skill faster. It's still not acceptable to for go it. It's a challenge and for me a generational player which i did identify I am, would be highly upset with EA. I don't raise 100 toddlers that's legacy players. Legacy players have to do 100's of interactions on all life stages over and over. Should EA continue to alienate another group and just remove everything because they have to do something that is difficult because their trying to rush through to their legacy? No this is suppose to be a game for everyone, and at one time it was and now it isn't, i don't want exclude people.

Or we can look at it this way how would legacy players feel if ea removed their challenge of making 100 babies from the game and limited them down to 10 per save and then forced them to start a new save. In that same way removing toddlers and that potty training skill affects generational players and our challenge for the game. I just wish simmers would place themselves in someone's shoes sometimes and be understanding that just as it's important to have your ability to play it's important to get mine.

Anyway i don't hear that toddlers aren't fun to play. I heard they aren't fun to play in sims 3, but fun to play in sims 2. So what caused that shift. It might have something to do with the Smart Milk being removed from sims 3. If you think about it legacy players easily could get through teaching toddlers quickly by using that milk. That's probably why a lot of them are okay with bypassing and removing the toddler stages in the first place because they can meet their challenge a lot easier. If that's the case im not going to ever going to support brushing one group aside for another. Simmers have to stop doing that in the first place it creates hurt feelings for many people because they don't feel their important or cared about. Potty training is challenging it is in real life it should be represented as such in the game.

The other problem as i saw it with sims 3 has a lot of players like collecting the sims 3 skill books for toddlers. However toddlers still felt like all work and no play. Transitioning over they lost a lot of their interactions, toys, and what not. You couldn't give them bath time, (unless you bought the bath in the store towards the end of the game) no more toddler hugs, stealing bottles from each other, many of their individual toys were removed, they did't do their little toddler dance anymore. Nor did they get into mischief, sleeping in the dogs bed, eating dog food, and playing in the toliet. When toddlers are in a room and crying in sims 3 they gave the toddler an atmosphere of annoyance. Which we both know how you project something in the game also is how your audience perceives it. That plays a big part on why sims 2 toddlers are fun and interesting but sims 3 were not. Sims 4 removes them killing off play for generational players.

That leads me strongly to support their return, and equally have them transition to preschooler where they gain more interactions and fun things. Equally you can do this without having to ever pick them up if that is the problem.

Ana, I'm not throwing anyone under a bus. The pre-schooler concept is a good compromise, with possible wide-spread appeal (even if it doesn't please everyone), especially considering the trouble EA has mentioned with animating toddlers as well as EA's slightly different goals. Developer and player goals overlap a lot, but they are not exactly the same. In this case, as far as we can tell, EA was in favor of not having *any* intermediate lifestage between baby and toddler. So, adding back in any lifestage would already be a big concession on their side. It would definitely expand family play, which is a good thing. It's not that it isn't a compromise or a good compromise, it's as you said that you're not willing to compromise.

Anavastia wrote:

The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around.

This is fine. You like what you like, and you should advocate it. I'm not trying to discourage you or anyone else from asking for the things they want to see. But, it's not fair to try to paint me as ignoring everyone else's wishes because I'm expressing my own preference. Or, because I try to see it from EA's perspective as well of what might or might not be easy to animate or of what feedback they may be getting on their end.

Like I said, toddlers, pre-schoolers, some kind of hybrid is OK for me personally. I would welcome some new interactions, and to make room for new interactions, sometimes some old things have to get shuffled or dropped.

Anavastia

gayars wrote: »

Thinking along those lines, perhaps they could add playing with blocks on the floor or an activity table like in the past, but use the same animations for both preschoolers and children. It would be a new animation (from what I remember anyway) BUT one that could be used with both groups, so they could still be recycling. The children and preschoolers could both build skills and relationships at the same time. It could be a container of legos or wooden blocks or tinker toys or something, then you put the container down where you want them to play, and they both play together.

They could add a swing, and push on swing interaction, and again, preschoolers and children could both use the same animations.

I would love if the activity table allowed you to hang up their drawings on the wall again.

gayars

I do think the preschoolers idea has merit. Now whether they will catch on to this idea in time or if they are already working on toddlers and we get them, then that is great too! But maybe even IF they have started working on the toddlers, some of these ideas are still applicable to extend things, and to do it easily. Make it easy on them, and give us more to do. Win, win. And if they can't figure out toddlers, these ideas are a great idea for them to implement instead to calm people down, as well as an honest conversation as to why they couldn't really do it otherwise. (HA like they would ever be honest.)

Anavastia

greenXen wrote: »

Anavastia wrote: »

greenXen wrote: »

I like your object set idea for babies if they can do it. It would be nice to have more to do with them to make them feel less like objects. I would love it if babies could be rocked in a chair, especially to breast feed. I think the lego-like, snap together objects sounds neat if they can do it, and fits in with the Sims being a creative and constructive tool.

******

It really does feel like there is too big of a jump between the baby and child stage right now. But, I think for me, either toddler or pre-schooler would be a fine way to bridge the gap, but I actually lean more toward the idea of a pre-schooler that @purplestarz2006 suggested. I think the pre-schooler option would work particularly if they were able to expand the baby stage as you suggested.

For one, we've done toddlers in The Sims 2 and 3. They were cute and fun, but it might be nice to try something a little different. It might mean some new animations and activities instead of just recycling the ones we've seen in previous games. Pre-schoolers are more mobile and have more motor coordination than toddlers, which opens them up to some new interactions like finger-painting, doing jigsaw puzzles, riding tricycles, playing nursery games like simon says and duck, duck, goose, and so on. They could sleep in training beds instead of cribs.

Secondly, not having to carry the toddlers around does seem to overcome a hurdle that the developers said they were having. Using a lifestage that doesn't need to constantly be carried seems like an easier workaround than making both crawling and walking animations.

Third, I get the impression that the developers were getting feedback that potty-training was not fun for many players. It may have been fun for the first 12 kids, but doing it for hundreds might not have been. And, if we use real life as a model as you've done in your post, it's not fun in real life for many parents. I understand that one of the things that many people want from toddlers is the ability to have 'teaching moments' with them. But, I think this could be accomplished in a number of other ways including: teaching them not to wet the bed (as you suggested); teaching them to read; teaching nursery songs; teaching them numbers and colors; teaching them manners; guiding them through various activities -- painting, legos/blocks, etc.

Having pre-schoolers would mean they could get into different kinds of trouble -- mommy's makeup, pots and pans, trying to get things out of the fridge, coloring on the walls, pulling stuff out of waste baskets, etc.

I guess I never saw this age difference as as big of a deal as some people do (in The Sims), and had just assumed that if the developers were having trouble with the carrying animation, they would come up with an early lifestage that didn't require it. The Sims has symbolic representations of lifestages, so the difference between a 2 and 3 year-old being the model they create the lifestage from is not big to me. There's definitely something missing by not including any early development stage at all, but because development is so varied, so I think either stage could fill in the gap, and a hybrid state seemed perfectly appropriate, too.

I am just not for the whole we remove something because one group doesn't like it while others do. Secondly i think potty training wasn't fun because in sims 2 and 3 to be honest it's not projected well.

Again that happens when people aren't catching on to the motives in time and i know a lot of times miss the chance to potty train. For me that kind of interaction is a must. Water downed toddlers aren't an option. Nor is removing the life state and exchanging it for something else. The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around. Again EA has to help generational and family players feel sims 4 is worth it and right now to me it's not. I rather play sims 2 and 3 because they have the lifestate i want to play and the challenges i want to play. Also, even preschoolers are potty training still. My point being this is why you have cheats to by pass things and we always had cheats for people to teach their children instantly skills in sims 2 or use the bottle thing which made learning that skill faster. It's still not acceptable to for go it. It's a challenge and for me a generational player which i did identify I am, would be highly upset with EA. I don't raise 100 toddlers that's legacy players. Legacy players have to do 100's of interactions on all life stages over and over. Should EA continue to alienate another group and just remove everything because they have to do something that is difficult because their trying to rush through to their legacy? No this is suppose to be a game for everyone, and at one time it was and now it isn't, i don't want exclude people.

Or we can look at it this way how would legacy players feel if ea removed their challenge of making 100 babies from the game and limited them down to 10 per save and then forced them to start a new save. In that same way removing toddlers and that potty training skill affects generational players and our challenge for the game. I just wish simmers would place themselves in someone's shoes sometimes and be understanding that just as it's important to have your ability to play it's important to get mine.

Anyway i don't hear that toddlers aren't fun to play. I heard they aren't fun to play in sims 3, but fun to play in sims 2. So what caused that shift. It might have something to do with the Smart Milk being removed from sims 3. If you think about it legacy players easily could get through teaching toddlers quickly by using that milk. That's probably why a lot of them are okay with bypassing and removing the toddler stages in the first place because they can meet their challenge a lot easier. If that's the case im not going to ever going to support brushing one group aside for another. Simmers have to stop doing that in the first place it creates hurt feelings for many people because they don't feel their important or cared about. Potty training is challenging it is in real life it should be represented as such in the game.

The other problem as i saw it with sims 3 has a lot of players like collecting the sims 3 skill books for toddlers. However toddlers still felt like all work and no play. Transitioning over they lost a lot of their interactions, toys, and what not. You couldn't give them bath time, (unless you bought the bath in the store towards the end of the game) no more toddler hugs, stealing bottles from each other, many of their individual toys were removed, they did't do their little toddler dance anymore. Nor did they get into mischief, sleeping in the dogs bed, eating dog food, and playing in the toliet. When toddlers are in a room and crying in sims 3 they gave the toddler an atmosphere of annoyance. Which we both know how you project something in the game also is how your audience perceives it. That plays a big part on why sims 2 toddlers are fun and interesting but sims 3 were not. Sims 4 removes them killing off play for generational players.

That leads me strongly to support their return, and equally have them transition to preschooler where they gain more interactions and fun things. Equally you can do this without having to ever pick them up if that is the problem.

Ana, I'm not throwing anyone under a bus. The pre-schooler concept is a good compromise, with possible wide-spread appeal (even if it doesn't please everyone), especially considering the trouble EA has mentioned with animating toddlers as well as EA's slightly different goals. Developer and player goals overlap a lot, but they are not exactly the same. In this case, as far as we can tell, EA was in favor of not having *any* intermediate lifestage between baby and toddler. So, adding back in any lifestage would already be a big concession on their side. It would definitely expand family play, which is a good thing. It's not that it isn't a compromise or a good compromise, it's as you said that you're not willing to compromise.

Anavastia wrote:

The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around.

This is fine. You like what you like, and you should advocate it. I'm not trying to discourage you or anyone else from asking for the things they want to see. But, it's not fair to try to paint me as ignoring everyone else's wishes because I'm expressing my own preference. Or, because I try to see it from EA's perspective as well of what might or might not be easy to animate or of what feedback they may be getting on their end.

Like I said, toddlers, pre-schoolers, some kind of hybrid is OK for me personally. I would welcome some new interactions, and to make room for new interactions, sometimes some old things have to get shuffled or dropped.

No im not painting you as ignoring anything here im not even sure you're a legacy player or not lol. I'm speaking in terms like it's not fair for EA to cater to one side of the player spectrum than the other. Or listen to one voice because they don't like something when another does. that more so applies to EA not you. I think players like you said, who say they don't want toddlers back, or don't like that as skill and don't want it aren't placing themselves in other shoes. So i said that to make a point that i wish they would think along the lines of how would they personally feel if that happened to them. It's not a fun situation, and in EA shoes it cost them quite a bit of profit loss doing this.

To me compromising because of design issues is one thing.

Compromising because of players complaining is another. The first one is okay for me to accept the later is not. It just makes me feel that it's better to look for the cause of why those complaints all the sudden came about. Equally how can it be improved. That's pretty much what im getting at. Sorry if i made you feel i was painting you in a bad light. I didn't mean it that way or to sound like that.

Scobre

Nice ideas and I want baby slings for the object babies at least. Strollers are a good idea too.

[Deleted User]

Anavastia wrote: »

greenXen wrote: »

Anavastia wrote: »

greenXen wrote: »

I like your object set idea for babies if they can do it. It would be nice to have more to do with them to make them feel less like objects. I would love it if babies could be rocked in a chair, especially to breast feed. I think the lego-like, snap together objects sounds neat if they can do it, and fits in with the Sims being a creative and constructive tool.

******

It really does feel like there is too big of a jump between the baby and child stage right now. But, I think for me, either toddler or pre-schooler would be a fine way to bridge the gap, but I actually lean more toward the idea of a pre-schooler that @purplestarz2006 suggested. I think the pre-schooler option would work particularly if they were able to expand the baby stage as you suggested.

For one, we've done toddlers in The Sims 2 and 3. They were cute and fun, but it might be nice to try something a little different. It might mean some new animations and activities instead of just recycling the ones we've seen in previous games. Pre-schoolers are more mobile and have more motor coordination than toddlers, which opens them up to some new interactions like finger-painting, doing jigsaw puzzles, riding tricycles, playing nursery games like simon says and duck, duck, goose, and so on. They could sleep in training beds instead of cribs.

Secondly, not having to carry the toddlers around does seem to overcome a hurdle that the developers said they were having. Using a lifestage that doesn't need to constantly be carried seems like an easier workaround than making both crawling and walking animations.

Third, I get the impression that the developers were getting feedback that potty-training was not fun for many players. It may have been fun for the first 12 kids, but doing it for hundreds might not have been. And, if we use real life as a model as you've done in your post, it's not fun in real life for many parents. I understand that one of the things that many people want from toddlers is the ability to have 'teaching moments' with them. But, I think this could be accomplished in a number of other ways including: teaching them not to wet the bed (as you suggested); teaching them to read; teaching nursery songs; teaching them numbers and colors; teaching them manners; guiding them through various activities -- painting, legos/blocks, etc.

Having pre-schoolers would mean they could get into different kinds of trouble -- mommy's makeup, pots and pans, trying to get things out of the fridge, coloring on the walls, pulling stuff out of waste baskets, etc.

I guess I never saw this age difference as as big of a deal as some people do (in The Sims), and had just assumed that if the developers were having trouble with the carrying animation, they would come up with an early lifestage that didn't require it. The Sims has symbolic representations of lifestages, so the difference between a 2 and 3 year-old being the model they create the lifestage from is not big to me. There's definitely something missing by not including any early development stage at all, but because development is so varied, so I think either stage could fill in the gap, and a hybrid state seemed perfectly appropriate, too.

I am just not for the whole we remove something because one group doesn't like it while others do. Secondly i think potty training wasn't fun because in sims 2 and 3 to be honest it's not projected well.

Again that happens when people aren't catching on to the motives in time and i know a lot of times miss the chance to potty train. For me that kind of interaction is a must. Water downed toddlers aren't an option. Nor is removing the life state and exchanging it for something else. The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around. Again EA has to help generational and family players feel sims 4 is worth it and right now to me it's not. I rather play sims 2 and 3 because they have the lifestate i want to play and the challenges i want to play. Also, even preschoolers are potty training still. My point being this is why you have cheats to by pass things and we always had cheats for people to teach their children instantly skills in sims 2 or use the bottle thing which made learning that skill faster. It's still not acceptable to for go it. It's a challenge and for me a generational player which i did identify I am, would be highly upset with EA. I don't raise 100 toddlers that's legacy players. Legacy players have to do 100's of interactions on all life stages over and over. Should EA continue to alienate another group and just remove everything because they have to do something that is difficult because their trying to rush through to their legacy? No this is suppose to be a game for everyone, and at one time it was and now it isn't, i don't want exclude people.

Or we can look at it this way how would legacy players feel if ea removed their challenge of making 100 babies from the game and limited them down to 10 per save and then forced them to start a new save. In that same way removing toddlers and that potty training skill affects generational players and our challenge for the game. I just wish simmers would place themselves in someone's shoes sometimes and be understanding that just as it's important to have your ability to play it's important to get mine.

Anyway i don't hear that toddlers aren't fun to play. I heard they aren't fun to play in sims 3, but fun to play in sims 2. So what caused that shift. It might have something to do with the Smart Milk being removed from sims 3. If you think about it legacy players easily could get through teaching toddlers quickly by using that milk. That's probably why a lot of them are okay with bypassing and removing the toddler stages in the first place because they can meet their challenge a lot easier. If that's the case im not going to ever going to support brushing one group aside for another. Simmers have to stop doing that in the first place it creates hurt feelings for many people because they don't feel their important or cared about. Potty training is challenging it is in real life it should be represented as such in the game.

The other problem as i saw it with sims 3 has a lot of players like collecting the sims 3 skill books for toddlers. However toddlers still felt like all work and no play. Transitioning over they lost a lot of their interactions, toys, and what not. You couldn't give them bath time, (unless you bought the bath in the store towards the end of the game) no more toddler hugs, stealing bottles from each other, many of their individual toys were removed, they did't do their little toddler dance anymore. Nor did they get into mischief, sleeping in the dogs bed, eating dog food, and playing in the toliet. When toddlers are in a room and crying in sims 3 they gave the toddler an atmosphere of annoyance. Which we both know how you project something in the game also is how your audience perceives it. That plays a big part on why sims 2 toddlers are fun and interesting but sims 3 were not. Sims 4 removes them killing off play for generational players.

That leads me strongly to support their return, and equally have them transition to preschooler where they gain more interactions and fun things. Equally you can do this without having to ever pick them up if that is the problem.

Ana, I'm not throwing anyone under a bus. The pre-schooler concept is a good compromise, with possible wide-spread appeal (even if it doesn't please everyone), especially considering the trouble EA has mentioned with animating toddlers as well as EA's slightly different goals. Developer and player goals overlap a lot, but they are not exactly the same. In this case, as far as we can tell, EA was in favor of not having *any* intermediate lifestage between baby and toddler. So, adding back in any lifestage would already be a big concession on their side. It would definitely expand family play, which is a good thing. It's not that it isn't a compromise or a good compromise, it's as you said that you're not willing to compromise.

Anavastia wrote:

The only compromise i'll accept is not carrying them around.

This is fine. You like what you like, and you should advocate it. I'm not trying to discourage you or anyone else from asking for the things they want to see. But, it's not fair to try to paint me as ignoring everyone else's wishes because I'm expressing my own preference. Or, because I try to see it from EA's perspective as well of what might or might not be easy to animate or of what feedback they may be getting on their end.

Like I said, toddlers, pre-schoolers, some kind of hybrid is OK for me personally. I would welcome some new interactions, and to make room for new interactions, sometimes some old things have to get shuffled or dropped.

No im not painting you as ignoring anything here im not even sure you're a legacy player or not lol. I'm speaking in terms like it's not fair for EA to cater to one side of the player spectrum than the other. Or listen to one voice because they don't like something when another does. that more so applies to EA not you. I think players like you said, who say they don't want toddlers back, or don't like that as skill and don't want it aren't placing themselves in other shoes. So i said that to make a point that i wish they would think along the lines of how would they personally feel if that happened to them. It's not a fun situation, and in EA shoes it cost them quite a bit of profit loss doing this.

To me compromising because of design issues is one thing.

Compromising because of players complaining is another. The first one is okay for me to accept the later is not. It just makes me feel that it's better to look for the cause of why those complaints all the sudden came about. Equally how can it be improved. That's pretty much what im getting at. Sorry if i made you feel i was painting you in a bad light. I didn't mean it that way or to sound like that.

OK, thanks for clarifying. I guess because it was quoted I took that as being a more direct response to me it was. I'm sorry for the misunderstanding.

Shaobun

Anavastia wrote: »

I would love if the activity table allowed you to hang up their drawings on the wall again.

It does. Drag it from an inventory to the wall.

luthienrising

@Anavastia - I really like the idea of other objects that a baby might be tied to to enhance animation options. The one I've wanted most all along is to be able to have a baby be fed while not standing. If we could just have an animation for the adult-size mesh and a chair for both feeding and breastfeeding, I'd be a lot of the way to perfectly content with the baby stage.

Anavastia

luthienrising wrote: »

@Anavastia - I really like the idea of other objects that a baby might be tied to to enhance animation options. The one I've wanted most all along is to be able to have a baby be fed while not standing. If we could just have an animation for the adult-size mesh and a chair for both feeding and breastfeeding, I'd be a lot of the way to perfectly content with the baby stage.

Me too and i could feel like I was building back up a nursery room again. Along with the baby having more interesting thigns to do and feeling like was actually taking care of a baby.

gayars

Yes they could make a rocker for nursing that goes in the nursery. Of course, whether they would need to tie the baby to one chair, or it could be an animation that could be done in any chair is another question.

I agree with @Scobre as well, strollers and slings would be a great thing to transfer baby to. I am thinking it could be done anyway. Baby swings, changing tables, baby baths (perhaps on the changing table, like in sims 3 store, makes for one less item to be tied to) and playmats would all be great additions.

aws200

I have a pain about Sims having babies because they're locked in these generic beds instead of the crib and everything we had from TS3. I miss the changing table, smaller doll houses (TS4 one is ridiculously huge), that thing you hang above the crib that rotate with little decorations on it and can play music (though in TS3 I never seen do anything but be static decor), etc.

Those generic beds they spawn in, in TS4 get in the way, especially in non playing households. We have to manually switch over to that household to move that bed otherwise it's in the way or you can not get to the baby to tend to its needs. It really hurts the gameplay and I hope Maxis has something planned.

Andygal

For me the important part of the toddler stage is the transition between dependency to independence. I wish the previous games had given you the ability to buy toddler beds and transition your toddlers to a bed. It would have given them a greater sense of learning to be independent. I would love to see that in Sims 4.

And I like the idea of bringing back something like smart milk so those who find toddler training annoying could skip it and just enjoy the cute interactions.

Anavastia

gayars wrote: »

Yes they could make a rocker for nursing that goes in the nursery. Of course, whether they would need to tie the baby to one chair, or it could be an animation that could be done in any chair is another question.

I agree with @Scobre as well, strollers and slings would be a great thing to transfer baby to. I am thinking it could be done anyway. Baby swings, changing tables, baby baths (perhaps on the changing table, like in sims 3 store, makes for one less item to be tied to) and playmats would all be great additions.

From my understanding the problem in design is coming from not being able to carry sims around. So baby's as objects and made sense because they can be picked up in an animation and placed back down, (though even that gets a graphical glitch)

I would wonder if we have any examples that sims carry around as objects or acessories

Like purses or backpacks?

If they can be treated as such then i would think the animation works like this instead of being in the sims inventory it places itself in the sling pack the crib and all but the object once it's in the sling will show the object baby on the sims back or front. That might make it easier for sims to walk around with the baby. Then once you take it out of the sling it's still in the crib so to speak.

That's about all i can think of to get a work around. Cause I honestly think the problem is the new way they route int he sims 4.