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Grant Talks about the Future of TS4
catloverplayer
Posts: 93,395 Member
The way he talks we can expect an awesome 2018. He didn't give anything away though it's pretty vague.
http://www.pcgamesinsider.biz/interviews-and-opinion/66418/we-see-crunch-as-a-sign-of-failure-says-sims-4-lead-producer/
http://www.pcgamesinsider.biz/interviews-and-opinion/66418/we-see-crunch-as-a-sign-of-failure-says-sims-4-lead-producer/
22
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We all know it’s been successful, and Grant has been one of the leads of the Sims 3 and 4 base games, so imagine as long as he’s working on The Sims 4, there won’t be a Sims 5.
I imagine he’ll go low profile in 2019/2020.
I like how he mentioned how “after 4 years we’re still here” because after 4 years they usually move on.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
It was NOT one Expansion Pack per year lmao.
Unless he means *his team* were only working on one Expansion Pack a year, since Redwood had 2 EP teams (from memory) and then they added a 3rd with Salt Lake.
But yeah, that’s a mess of a quote.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
I find it amusing that Grant mentions Expansions are packed full of content, when Cats & Dogs scaled everything back.
I know there heaps of Animations etc in C&D, but it’s no secret there is a lack of Pet items and a lack of Pets in general.
The world and items are amazing, and the Pets are the best yet, BUT, it’s not as big as the previous 2 packs.
It’s not their fault though. It’s clear that once all the funding went to animations, there just wasn’t enough for everything else.
Also, the mention of Free Content tells me we’re getting something free in 2017 of worth.
Not Toddler level, but maybe a new world, or new challenge of some kind.
He seems to be drumming that home for 2018.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
They can’t talk about future content specifically.
I imagine it’s on the table. There have been too many references to Seasons this year for them to not to.
I imagine if it wasn’t coming, they would be avoiding the subject like crazy!
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
I think the next big update will be adding cars to the game. I believe the parking spaces added to cats and dogs is hinting to cars plus earlier this year a Sim Guru asked what would we want to see if they did decide to add cars.
Wait...so toddlers aren't fun?
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
I think he meant they had one team on EPs in TS3 till the end. In the last year they added a second team.
It’s clear that they’re making sure people realise they weren’t DLC. Press was reporting at launch that EA obmitted stuff just to sell it later.
The store sets were made by external teams, not EA.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
They were still from EA but it was the Salt Lake Team who did Store Stuff. Remembers the awesome SimGuruCopeland.
Nope, the second team was added with Late Night with Redwood,
And a Third was added in 2011 with Salt Lake City who stared with Showtime.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
That’s right. I knew they weren’t Redwood anyhow.
Grant seems to forget Salt Lake was there during The Sims 3.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
2) Sims 3 had two EPs per year. I'm sure he means one team made one EP per year and just left out the part where Sims 3 had double the teams.
3) That one of their five teams is assigned to consoles is disappointing to hear.
4) Bragging about toddlers and pools being "free" is starting to get on my nerves. They were "free" with Sims 2 and Sims 3 aswell, and even spared us the ridiculous wait times. Kind of insulting to realize a company wants to be rewarded for releasing content late and wants to be thought of as super generous. No, do it right the first time and stop expecting gratitude for screwing up and then correcting it.
5) The comments about crunch time. I wanna say in advance that I consider crunchtime controversial since yeah, the gaming industry works people hard. Having said that, I cannot help but wonder if this plays into the lack of content.
For those unfamiliar, "crunch time" is a period leading up to a title's release or a pack's release in which the team is expected to work extra hard. In the case of an EP I'd imagine it'd be 1-3 months and what it typically means is that the team works such long hours that some workers might sleep at the office because it's inconvenient to bother wasting time traveling home. Anyone who's ever seen a tour of a studio and thought it looked nice and had tons of stuff....? Yeah, there's a reason for that, and it's crunch time. Crunch time is such a common practice that it's a part of the training to get used to it.
I cannot blame them for wanting to do away with it, but I do have to question if it's part of the list of causes for lack of content. I'd be curious to hear how much crunch time Sims 3 had, because he actually makes it sound like it skipped it too. As he said, they only made 1 EP a year and I presume he means his team. If Sims 3 skipped crunch time too, then yeah, just another reason this game needs a second team.
If we take stuff packs to be analogous to premium store sets, we have 1 EP and around 2 GPs per year. The EPs aren't as big as S3 EPs, and the GPs are bigger than TS3 stuff packs. We also have the free stuff patched in, and while they were done well, it's also true that most should've been in the base game to begin with.
I guess after that whole Simcity launch disaster, they're making up for the time they lost when they scrapped Sims 4's online aspect.
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
I think the biggest issue here is that EA don’t seem to be giving them the budget.
And they DESPERATELY need to make the Free Team a QA team.
We don’t need free content, we need the paid content to WORK.
Most of the packs are good, but the base game, Get To Work, Dine Out and C&D need a HUGE overlooking because they’re giving Island Paradise a run for it’s money.
GRANTED, they shipped stable, unlike IP.
But they broke literally as soon as the next patch, which for Cats & Dogs was a few days after launch.
Which tells me these packs were held together like sticky tape, rather than actually finished.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
Cool.
Could you imagine the uproar?!
Nice to see that they're starting to tease the next expansion, likely due next November though.
What if they surprise us by having TWO EPs next year?
Race Against the Clock: Can your elder sim turn back the clock before their time runs out?
They’re not. They are reminding people they were free, not paid for DLC, because everyone assumed they would be paid DLC.
Also, Redwood are technically making more content than ever before. Salt Lake City made some of the EP’s, all of the TS3 store, and some of the Stuff Packs.
Take away the Salt Lake content, and the output from Redwood is 8 Expansions, and a few Stuff Packs (4 out the 9 that were released).
Salt Lake City isn’t Maxis. So Grant is correct.
Insta: https://instagram.com/jkarajs?igshid=oef2ymrand3g
As I said stop reminding people EA gave us base game content we had enjoyed previously free of charge. Had they given us something free we had previously paid for like I don't know weather I could understand it. (Note I don't expect weather for free)
So output from Redwood is 8 expansions previously, expansions we have had this iteration, what 4? And a number of stuff packs. Still don't agree that's more content then previously. If we were getting more content why are so many unhappy with how thin expansions are? If we are getting more content than ever before why are people complaining there's nothing to do in game?