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How Many Invisible Sims 4 Players Exist?
simgirl1010
Posts: 35,866 Member
Are they the ones keeping the game afloat?
From an article on a gaming site:
The Invisible Gamers
I grill my friends relentlessly about their gaming habits.
I have a pretty good network of close friends and acquaintances, and they share many traits that make them attractive to the gaming industry. Most are in their mid-30s, and they have a pretty good disposable income. They may game for an hour or two a night after the kids go to sleep. They upgrade their PCs every few years, and buy two games or so a month.
And they're completely invisible to the industry outside of their gaming purchases.
HOW MANY OF THEM ARE THERE?
It's tricky to track the number of these "invisible gamers," but my gut says there are way more of them than there are of us. And by "us," I mean people who read gaming news on a daily basis, and talk about games on our social networks. We read reviews the day they come out and argue about review scores. We may post comments on articles like this one, and talk to developers on Twitter.
We're loud; everyone knows we're here.
Many people I know, on the other hand, just play games. They may look up a review or two when a new game comes out, but they look at commenting on articles or arguing about review scores the same way most of us look at our parents talking to the TV when a presidential candidate they don't like is on.
This is the gamer that companies try to reach by running trailers in movie theaters, because the reach of gaming media is much more limited than we like to admit. We speak to the people who are engaged in the hobby enough to care about the day-to-day news of gaming, but these invisible gamers aren't reading many articles about the games they buy. They don't interact with the hobby on a regular basis outside of their purchases and actual play time.
They may even see the maelstrom of controversy over a review score as something actively keeping them from interacting more directly with the hobby. I often talk to people about the daily arguments in gaming, and they look at me like I'm making stuff up. They're adults who don't really care about the Metacritic score of a game; they just want something that's fun that they can play with their friends, or a game they can spend some time with alone at the end of the day.
They fascinate me because I don't reach them, outside of my personal friends sometimes reading my columns to be polite. And there are millions of people like them, who will see my N7 hoodie and ask if there's ever going to be a new Mass Effect, and I'll tell them what's going on with the release date. They're the ones who play Call of Duty without watching every trailer, and go into retail stores just to browse and see what's new.
The invisible gamers are the reason I'm leery of calling the number of dislikes on a trailer any indication of actual consumer behavior. The majority of the people who will buy either the new Call of Duty or Battlefield game are likely unaware that a movement for likes or dislikes on YouTube exists for either game, and they may not have even seen the trailers yet.
THEY DON'T INTERACT WITH THE HOBBY ON A REGULAR BASIS OUTSIDE OF THEIR PURCHASES AND ACTUAL PLAY TIME
I asked my Twitter followers if they thought that the like-to-dislike ratio on these games meant that Battlefield was going to outsell Call of Duty this year, and next to no one said yes. Fans may post stats about each trailer as evidence that one will do better than the other, but the person making funny memes about Activision isn't speaking for a large movement of gamers in relation to the size of the market. We're all throwing pebbles into the ocean and pretending the ripples are waves.
The vocal gamers are the visible upper crust of the hobby, but those who move silently hold most of the power, simply due to their buying habits. Publishers don't really care if we don't like them on Twitter or argue about them on the forums; they care where people spend their money.
So I grilled my friends, who are a limited and self-selected representative of the silent majority of people who just buy and enjoy games. How did they hear about Stellaris? Apparently, many people on their Steam friends list were playing, and they looked up the trailer and liked what they saw, so they bought it. How did they get hooked on Overwatch? It was promoted on Battle.net and they saw it when they logged in to play Diablo. If they're bored, they may just look at the new and top-selling games on Steam and pick something to buy on a whim.
But they don't interact with sites like this one, they're not leaving comments on trailers, and they're certainly not arguing on Twitter. They're living their lives and playing games in their spare time. For me, and for much of the industry, they're completely invisible until they interact via purchases.
It's important to know that they're out there, and that those of us who are loud about our habits and interact vocally with the industry may not match them in size or importance. We don't speak for what could be the silent majority of gamers, and likely never will. Marketing budgets in the millions are spent trying to reach them, and the vocal minority of gamers may understate their own importance simply due to the fact these silent folks don't exist in a meaningful way outside of our real-life social circles.
Whatever controversy boils up today, these invisible gamers may be completely ignorant of it, and are likely happier with the hobby due to that fact. The tempest may feel big, but the teapot may be much smaller in relation to the actual market than we like to admit.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, Polygon as an organization.
http://www.polygon.com/2016/5/11/11656126/the-invisible-gamers
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Comments
My brother stopped playing the Sims with the Sims 2. My sister stopped playing with the Sims 3. So my siblings were also invisible players.
I'm not a psychopath. I'm a high-functioning psychopath. Reaper
Well, as a former invisible gamer (not just Sims, though they were part of it), I can say for me I never looked at news blogs or anything like that. I looked at games, read the descriptions, watched preview videos (not usually let's plays or anything like that because I didn't want to spoil the game), and every once in awhile I might read a gaming magazine or look at reviews. So, controversies and discontent weren't usually that obvious to me. Though, the ME3 ending controversy did actually filter into my awareness because it was so volatile and, well, I was pretty unhappy with the endings myself. But that's really more of a one-off regarding the types of games I mostly played back then.
The Sims 3, for instance, is a good example of my perspective. I found the zombie overpopulation annoying but it never occurred to me that this was a big complaint other players had. Or the celebrity system and paparazzi issues. I had no idea that other people thought the ice cream truck was super creepy, too or found Island Paradise as buggy as I did. Because I never interacted with other simmers and hardly read or saw any info related to the game. I used to see most games simply from my perspective--my likes, my dislikes, my annoyances, the bugs I couldn't stand and the ones that I lived with. If I had major bug issues with a game (or pack in Sims, for instance), I just stopped playing with it rather than figuring out how to fix it.
In a way, things were a lot simpler for me back then.
I'm not a psychopath. I'm a high-functioning psychopath. Reaper
I'm pretty similar to you. I played Sims 1 on PC, played a bunch of Sims console games, never played Sims 2 (honestly I didn't even know it existed for a while), played Sims 3, and just started becoming active on the forums after Sims 4 started. Before Sims 4 I was basically in my own little world...I bought what I wanted purely because it looked good to me, and not because of reviews or ratings.
However I am changing with Sims 4. Now that I am more active on the forums, I see so many POV that it actually has changed me a little. I research and watch more videos/LPs and think more before my purchases. I was definitely invisible before, but not as much anymore.
I didn't know zombies was a big complaint either until I joined forums for this game. Same with the other issues you mentioned too. I miss the simpler times too. I had no idea people even hated life stages or supernaturals back then.
Or like the author said they're bored and go on Origin or Steam to see what's new.
I don't buy everything because I'm blind. I buy it because I love it.
Not entirely true. I was a silent player for many years because when I enjoy a game, I have little reason to leave my game to chat it up with other players. That's why I've been pretty quiet lately. I've been playing a game and enjoying it. Silent players are not always casual players. Silent players can be quite the opposite. I only have time to chat when I'm at work, because the game I'm playing isn't keeping me occupied and breaks are pretty boring. *throws that theory out the window*
That's how it worked for me, for the most part. I'd finish a game and be looking for something new. Or, more common for me with the Sims, I used to binge play it. I'd play it exclusively for a couple of months and then put it down for a couple of months while I played something else. Then I'd start thinking about playing it again and just check to see if anything new was out.
I'm not a psychopath. I'm a high-functioning psychopath. Reaper
Heh. I'm very similar. I also have a hard time sharing my creations. My gameplay is very private and I get so into it that I don't even think of taking pictures or sharing my experiences. I'm having fun. I don't feel like I need to share it. I only tend to be vocal when I'm bored—we may differ that way.
Yeah. Some people play for the stories. That's too much work for me
They're the silent majority. We may never know the numbers. Rest assured, they are most-likely the ones that matter most on the profit-margin. Some are casual. Some are die-hard. Many don't feel the need to communicate their experiences at all. Others are the buy-it, play-it, leave-it type. So many variables come into play, but the vocal minority has always been just that—a minority.
We'll never know how the majority feels or what percentage they make up.