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Re-work on detective career.
Heidr
Posts: 148 Member
I think the detective career need a re-work. I wish I could know what exactly the case they are investigating instead of just a plain quest done and move on until I caught a suspect and put them to jail for a day. An actual danger during active work hours like the Fire Fighter career in sims 3 sounds great too. Maybe they can be actually in a fight with the suspect? Then, instead of just to spill out the confession, maybe interrogating is more like trying to know the motive or something else?
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and when finding out the suspect is, you're right they just "Go quietly." I would hope they put up a fight, maybe even get away.
and the crimes are bland. As much as it pains me to say I wish there was more of a story when getting a case.
Sims can't kill but what about the idea of murder taking place, assassination or an attempt.
I'm just noticing that when you're not placing as an officer, you're just a sim, there are no officers on patrol at least from time to time.
It would be cool if there was an officer npc(s) from time to time do patrol the active neighborhood. but the game doesn't force fights to break out, but if say a vampire was harassing your sim for blood, and a Officer was in close proximity, they could try to arrest the vampire, or the vampire can get away.
even vampire break-ins, it could be possible the midnight feeder can get arrested.
again its so hard to keep prisoners tho. because even when you rotate households you see those prisoners walking around when they're suppose to be locked up.
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But yeah I agree it has to be reworked and also it feels so separate from the actual world. What would be good if they brought burglars back and your on the job catching (meaning fighting like they did in Sims 2 and 3) if they catch the burglars and you see them in jail or let's say your playing another family getting robbed they call the police and your police detective sim comes and gets the robber and whenever you play your police sim you see the robber in jail (if he got caught.) That's how they can be connected because right it seems separate we go to work and that's that.
Right? I totally wish they put more effort in detective career! I understand that they need to make the game as 'kid-friendly' as possible since they probably doesn't want to be sued, but they always can replace assassination with something else. Such as a humorous terror message sent to victim (Example: He shot him with a gun water balloon!) or something wackier. They should add burglar/pickpocket along with their upgrade, then perhaps adding mafia/hacker role in society could work too!
I personally like the detective job the most since the doctor and scientist are just as plain and repetitive. But yes, I wish they put those NPC officers out of the active job. It's so strange that the city doesn't have them roaming around!
I don't think we can drag an innocent suspect to office. The game will tell us that we caught the wrong person before then. Please remind me if I'm wrong. But either way, the interrogating doesn't give us any clue about what exactly happened after we successfully interrogate him/her. We just know that the person is confessing and put him/her to jail after.
And yeah, the most favorite thing when i do the law enforcement job in sims 3 is that I got a hidden trait : can apprehend burglar, then why i love investigator is that i get to read some funny story even though it might repeat with different characters. The Stake Out is kind of a little buggy too since it was an open world and sometime the actors are taking so long to reach the destination / late to come and I had to repeat the action until i get the non-buggy actors (That's why I'm not really fond of the open world, btw, but it's not like I hate them too, I love the way I can open other's trash can/mail box to search for clues).
Oh yes! Totally! I really prefer to be able to pick between them! I also prefer it if they have 3 branches instead. Ace Detective, Chief, or Forensic. Not every detective likes to be in an organization, right?
Yeah I agree with everything you've written. I really, really wish the officers you see walking around from time to time would actually respond to events in the game. It'd give my sim much more of an incentive to start a fight in a public place, or to go to a dark alley to accept a bribe or drink plasma from a sims. As it stands, you just get a few negative reactions from sims my sim mostly doesn't care for anyway ^^
ETA: same goes for the doctor career - why have so many different diagnosable illnesses & treatments when playing at the hospital, but only one medicine for everything outside of it? Why can't I take my sims to the hospital when they're sick to get tested? Why can't they go there to get an artificial insemination baby like TS3 introduced with Into The Future? So many whys. They really missed the mark on both these careers in GTW. They should've made them less "parallel universe-y" and more integrated into the overall worlds and gameplay. It would've been so much fun! I'd even wish that there was a link between the science career & the worlds, but I understand it would've been less obvious. Although, if we still had newspapers for example (please, please), they could mention something like "contact with aliens made!" after you reach that level. Something, anything
Kid friendly doesn't mean coddle, heck it's the reason why people are so darn sensitive these days.
Really water balloon? they could make it funny, and wacky but Don't make me question "How does a water balloon kill?" ...unless it was frozen... then perhaps!
I would just say "Victim was murdered, find the person responsible and bring them to justice!"
No one was actually murdered, and the player should assume the victim was already identified and taken to the morgue at the hospital, and there would be the chalk outline on the floor in their place.
but the tricky and annoying thing is when you catch the "murderer" the game still chooses a random sim, from both played and unplayed house holds or townie, to be the murderer, and it could conflict with a story.
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I had two kidnapping scenarios, one successful and one unsuccessful , a mafia family, a false arrest all in my story.
I really liked the Scientists and Doctors career and played them to the end, but the Detective career was so repetetive that I got bored and stopped playing it altogether. Isn´t the job of a detective a little more diversified?
I would like it, to do more different chores on the different career levels.
Something like:
Also from time to time a suspect or relatives of a prisoner could try to bribe the detective and if he accepts there is chance, he´ll be suspended.
Hmm... How to say this. I'm working in a game industry as a QA. When we are testing a game, there's a Checklist for every game. There's a rule where it says : Game must NOT promoting an action that is punishable by law of action. (This is on Kids and Teen game rating, btw. Sims 4 is rated 12+ which mean its rated for teens and above). If they are to create a content that is punishable by law of action (putting aside user's hobby to kill sims just because it's funny or wanting a ghost sim), they need to go through some... administration work to make their game legal and prevent anyone to sue them.
Accidental Death or natural death (which is the only existed death in Every Sims game) are different than murder. When you add a 'murder' content, it means that the game has a content which is promoting an action that is punishable by law of action. Then as for thievery / burglary, it is rated as the most minor crime where even a game that is rated for Kids (Ex: Dora the Explorer's sweeper). Even though it is not suggested, most company are able to get away with it because it's minor and they don't exactly promote it but telling that its a no-no and doesn't involve additional graphic content such as gore or violence which might be as bad as ...woohoo.
That's why, I think. All they need to create is the base system and if user doesn't like the content, there always be mods to work. Then as for this topic, it's better to put in ideas for the base system and think about what kind of mod can be done after modders got their facility.
Even if there was a disclaimer?
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How to explain it. I can't really say much for the Sims 4 case since i haven't got any answer from Sims Guru, but as far as I know, violence in teen rated game is extremely limited. Then just like what MadameLee said, Germany put The Sims 4 in 6+ rating (which mean it's for kids). Changing one content rating will affect the whole game especially on the administration. The only acceptable level of violence is probably like Tom & Jerry level.
They have different treatment for fantasy game with battle theme such as Sims Medieval. (and nope, EA made Dragon Age and Mass Effect, but they are rated for adults.) They might allow one or two but they still couldn't feature graphic content such as blood, gore, or anything that relate to 'what exactly happened to the prisoners in medieval time'.
Back to our topic. When you ask for 'murder' to be featured in game. You might easily think like: It will be fine! We are fine! Don't be too sensitive etc. but they might have to go through administration and explain to public: Why on earth your life simulator feature a murder? What kind of impact you want to expect from public? Why do you think murdering someone is interesting? Did you know that murdering someone is as horrible as sexual harassment, child predator, 🐸🐸🐸🐸 etc and they are punishable by law? What if kids see those content in your life simulator (since they are putting up 6+ rating in their game, they have to explain this)? What kind of reaction you are expecting from them?etc etc.
So yeah, upgrading the detective career doesn't have to be to that extreme. The minor crime (which might often be done by kids) such as thievery, vandalism, pranks, bullying, fist fighting are probably the only thing that can be featured in The Sims (with a side note, the company also has to tell their audience/clients that those are a big No-no in the society).
I guess my imagination likes to fill in the holes. The only thing I would change is those who are suspects aren't counted toward townie population, and they remain in jail, that would be nice. I'd like to see the jail full with all the suspects my Sims did catch over the last two years.
Totally saw this coming. But this is exactly what I want to see in this discussion. While 'murder' case might have to be as subtle as possible to keep the game rating, they could've put more effort on detailing. While we users a.k.a players are good at imagining, why can't we also get a system that will allow us to at least get a good (yet not so obvious) detailed story instead of just a plain Go to Office > Check Computers > Go to crime scene > Collect Evidences > Return > Investigate > find clues > catch suspect > interrogate > Put to jail for a day > repeat.
In The sims 3, we got a set of story with different actors and path. We even got a set of quest such as stake out, rummage, or look for clues in mailbox without being caught by the owner, search for finger prints, interview, blackmail, hack, etc etc, I really like everything about the Sims 3 investigator job (Except for the bug where sometime you have to repeat action over and over to actually trigger the completion, thanks to the open world that cause this kind of un-fixable bug to happen forever).
there must be something EA and Maxis can do to make detective career more exciting than the previous Sims Series.
So far I know too, some detective cares for the life of his/her ex-prisoner, they don't always just catch criminals and done, they might be secretly watching over their life and make sure they are doing fine out there. While some ex-prisoners might not had enough time sleeping on the cold concrete and locked, some of them might have some dramatic reunion with family, regretting what they did and promising to themselves that they'll be better in the future. I think it could be a great addition to detective career- to make sure the ex-prisoner are doing well.
The one thing that I guess kind of bothers me about the career is it's always the same house and the same witnesses. Like... how many times does this person's house get broken into??
I personally would like if the science career had an overhaul first. I mean how many times am I going to talk to employees or make them change clothes\sit\eat with the freeze gun.
I was expecting something a bit more like discovering planets or stars and naming them, engineering food not just potions literally GMO plants, discovering medicines when combining plants\fish\metals etc instead of just buying meds from the computer, etc My sims are studying metals and looking at slides with nothing coming of it. The best thing about it going to Sixam but even then there is nothing to do there either besides talk to aliens, get some plants and metals.
Doctor career is okay for me. I just would have like to be able to move patients to a room to keep them overnight. Maybe those random emergency patients. I would also like to see them with a saline drip bag while in their room. Doctors could also perform rounds to check in on those patients.
Anyway, I think all three careers could use improvement but my vote would be for the science career before detective.