Kids walking the dog

JayandMeeka

I wonder if the gurus can answer..

Was there a reason why the option for children to walk the dog was not included? I would have thought it would be a great opportunity for kids to earn responsibility points (from the parenthood pack) when they did. Also kind of like a household chore for the child to do for those more domestic players like myself.

I am a little sad to see this wasn't included. This, and having dogs sleep on the bed with you. My pup does and I was looking forward to that. I totally get that in game design, decisions have to be made about what to focus on and include within the parameters of a budget. But I'm just wondering since walking the dog is an animation heavily focused on in the pack (as it should have been), I'm just wondering why children can't. I can't imagine the animations would have been drastically different.

Other than that.. loving the pack! My house of 4 sims and 4 pets is the busiest it's ever been in this series and I can't get enough.

Tagging @SimGuruJM @SimGuruGrant @SimGuruDrake and if anyone knows of any other gurus to tag that can answer this question, please kindly do so

HugoBee

I thought it was a bit weird too. Considering they went full into this expansion, attempting to fill it with realistic details (which they did splendidly), you'd think kids walking dogs would be a no brainer. I never had my own dog, but I used to always go around walking people's dogs for them when I was a kid, could've been a really cool feature for kids to be able to earn a bit of money! Anywho, I'm intrigued for an answer!

Dreamie209

I'll be bookmarking this thread in hopes of a answer, honestly I'm rather curious about it since the kids seem to be able to do almost everything else with the dogs.

Kamio

Probably to match current parenting/responsibility laws. In Australia you can't leave a child under 12 unattended - within reasons. Lots of parents are getting fined for letting theirs kids walk to school alone. It could be to reflect this?

BrokenChaos69

This is definitely a disappointing point of this pack. This is the Sims, not real life. I used to walk my dog around the neighbourhood as a child in the 90's and absolutely nothing bad happened. It was a fun bonding experience for us!

Dreamie209

Kamio wrote: »

Probably to match current parenting/responsibility laws. In Australia you can't leave a child under 12 unattended - within reasons. Lots of parents are getting fined for letting theirs kids walk to school alone. It could be to reflect this?

Interesting. I'm not sure if It's in the US...there's 7-10 year olds all over the place in my neightborhood, and at the mall all the time on their own...Well at least in New Jersey lol. Maybe Cali is a little different..which would make sense if EA maybe went this route. If that's the case then I understand it.

Mikado-chan

Kamio wrote: »

Probably to match current parenting/responsibility laws. In Australia you can't leave a child under 12 unattended - within reasons. Lots of parents are getting fined for letting theirs kids walk to school alone. It could be to reflect this?

Meanwhile we can see kids alone at night clubs in TS4 But walking dogs is too much!

Dannydanbo

I've noticed that kids generally play with pets but it's the parents that are responsible for upkeep.

MadameLee

Dannydanbo wrote: »

I've noticed that kids generally play with pets but it's the parents that are responsible for upkeep.

I think kids can get responsibility for feeding them? I don't have the pack yet. Wonder if a Modder could make it that sim kids can walk dogs?

Rudiarose

Yea, my dogs keep asking the kids to take them for walks and they cannot take them. Seems weird to me.

MadameLee

has anyone check to see if the option doesn't show up outside with the kids+dog?

JayandMeeka

It's their thanksgiving weekend so likely we won't get an answer until earliest Monday.

tegteg87

It was probably a cost/time saving thing - different height to adults therefore would need an extra leash animation added.

MicemSims

I don’t understand why children can’t walk the dog but they can do the heel command with dog which is basically the same animation except the kids aren’t holding the leesh. I feel like it should be very easy to add in...

MadameLee

MicemSims wrote: »

I don’t understand why children can’t walk the dog but they can do the heel command with dog which is basically the same animation except the kids aren’t holding the leesh. I feel like it should be very easy to add in...

which means a modder *could* probably figure out how to mod kids walking dogs

JayandMeeka

So it looks like we won't get an answer to this, which is unfortunate. Ah well. Thanks for the responses fellow simmers

Lumiasta

I would love this as well. The child in my current main household is a dog lover, and there's five dogs in the house. She plays and pets and even trains and lectures them, but can't take them for walks or wash them, and I really really wish she could.

oasis10

I would love having the children walking the dogs.

Cynna

It's really interesting that after being tagged, not one of the gurus have bothered to answer this.

In any case, it's probably exactly as @tegteg87 said: it was cheaper.

TS4 is the equivalent of cereal boxes that are half the size they used to be and the majority of that, filled with air. Being a consumer really sucks these days.