I'm so sad and so disappointed to say..... I don't like The Sims 4
I have gone off it now - I have lost 2 Sims to death by laughter.
Probably the most hostile, aggressive and outright nasty game I have ever played - apart from any of the other The Sims games.
Hm. Guess they're trying to make death easier now. Can't say I'm a fan of emotional deaths though. I'd rather a satellite fall on them, tbh.
I only have an issue with laughter because it stacks with all happy boosts. You get goof ball who was recently married/engaged and live a decent life in a nice house with high tech upgrades... well it's a death trap really.
Ah. I didn't have that problem. I wonder if they made those deaths easier? Mind you, I never decorated my homes in 4. I can't stand emotional auras and nicely decorated buffs. Maybe that had something to do with it *shrugs*
All I know is I don't like those concepts. It's beyond childish to me.
And then some people say that TS4 is targeted at 16-24 yrs olds just like hardcore action games, hardcore sports games, hardcore war games and hardcore RPG games are
No, nothing can convince me that the main target group isn't younger and too inexperienced for hardcore games at all
Quit spreading #$^% Erpe some people didn't say it at all , John Buchanan said it, EA Play's senior marketing director for Sims 3.
I'm so sad and so disappointed to say..... I don't like The Sims 4
I have gone off it now - I have lost 2 Sims to death by laughter.
Probably the most hostile, aggressive and outright nasty game I have ever played - apart from any of the other The Sims games.
Hm. Guess they're trying to make death easier now. Can't say I'm a fan of emotional deaths though. I'd rather a satellite fall on them, tbh.
I only have an issue with laughter because it stacks with all happy boosts. You get goof ball who was recently married/engaged and live a decent life in a nice house with high tech upgrades... well it's a death trap really.
Ah. I didn't have that problem. I wonder if they made those deaths easier? Mind you, I never decorated my homes in 4. I can't stand emotional auras and nicely decorated buffs. Maybe that had something to do with it *shrugs*
All I know is I don't like those concepts. It's beyond childish to me.
And then some people say that TS4 is targeted at 16-24 yrs olds just like hardcore action games, hardcore sports games, hardcore war games and hardcore RPG games are
No, nothing can convince me that the main target group isn't younger and too inexperienced for hardcore games at all
And some old people are playing a game they believe is designed for 13 year old children. Quit spreading #$^% Erpe some people didn't say it at all , John Buchanan said it, EA Play's senior marketing director for Sims 3.
And he is your big guru who never makes mistakes, always knows everything and always tell the truth?
Sorry. But he isn't mine and when he says something that doesn't make sense and only is contradicted with everything else then I don't believe him. But he is quite right in one thing: 16-24 yrs olds buy and play more games than everybody else. But this still doesn't mean that all types of games are played mostly by this age group. Kids games are of course played mostly by kids, Sims games are played mostly by the youngest teens (like other types of dress up games and dating games) and casual games has the oldest average age for all types of gamers.
But do you really think that nobody are allowed to play a game just because it was mainly targeted at another age group? I don't
Still I wonder why builders still play a game like TS4 so much when there are much better building simulations for all types of builders to get and TS4's building options only are secondary and targeted at young inexperienced teens. But this is a problem for only those builder and surely not something that I care about
No he is not my guru I quoted from an interview yet you attributed his words to other people as though you were referencing what other Sim players had said. No one here said it only quoted it. You're an adult Erpe probably twice my age, a teacher at that too, start to act like one.
No he is not my guru I quoted from an interview yet you attributed his words to other people as though you were referencing what other Sim players had said. No one here said it only quoted it. You're an adult Erpe probably twice my age, a teacher at that too, start to act like one.
John Buchanan is Vice President of Worldwide Marketing in EA. So it is his job to select slogans that can make EA's games sell better and plan advertising campaigns. How to obtain better sales numbers by doing this is what he thinks about all day long.
So you should take his statements the same way as you take all other advertising. Do you really believe in everything you are told in advertising?
Of course I don't know exactly why he in 2009 said that the Sims games now are targeted mostly at the 16-24 yrs olds on https://beyondsims.com/7339/interview-with-ea-plays-john-buchanan-about-marketing-the-sims-3/ But at least you can see that he talks advertising and marketing all the time in the interview. So my main guess is that he thought that he could attract more gamers to the Sims games if he with a campaign could remove the idea about those games only being targeted at younger teen girls. I just don't think that he succeeded anyway in attracting older hardcore gamers at all because such gamers still only talk about the same hardcore games as they always have. And even EA seems to have given up on that idea because TS4 is surely even less hardcore than any of the previous Sims games. Instead it is the easiest and most childish Sims game yet
Two main reasons why teens/young adults probably get targeted:
1) The generic "generation of tomorrow" belief and wanting to cater your product towards an audience you expect to be around a while. Also helps that teens and some young adults have jack all to do all day so they're more likely to sink time into video games.
2) Children are too young and there's extra care gone into legislating what they can and cannot be sold, plus parents will screen the product. The next best unsuspecting customers are teens and young adults. This is the crowd that doesn't know better; if you sell them a game only half as good as it's predecessor, well, half of them may not even be old enough to know this or to have played the predecessor. Makes them easy to please, means you can get away with missing features, means you're not held to a higher standard of quality from an experienced audience that knows how various games performed and know whether they should be able to expect more or not.
Two main reasons why teens/young adults probably get targeted:
1) The generic "generation of tomorrow" belief and wanting to cater your product towards an audience you expect to be around a while. Also helps that teens and some young adults have jack all to do all day so they're more likely to sink time into video games.
2) Children are too young and there's extra care gone into legislating what they can and cannot be sold, plus parents will screen the product. The next best unsuspecting customers are teens and young adults. This is the crowd that doesn't know better; if you sell them a game only half as good as it's predecessor, well, half of them may not even be old enough to know this or to have played the predecessor. Makes them easy to please, means you can get away with missing features, means you're not held to a higher standard of quality from an experienced audience that knows how various games performed and know whether they should be able to expect more or not.
It isn't targeted at kids in the English speaking countries who think that it contains too much nakedness and woohoo for kids to play it. So the Sims games have always been T rated be the ESRB for North America.
But Europe can't really see why the Sims games can't be played by kids too. So earlier the Sims game were rated 7+ by PEGI and even as "suitable for all ages" by the German USK.
But then the U.K. joined PEGI and objected against the 7+ ratings. Reluctantly PEGI then accepted this wish from the U.K. and changed all the ratings for Sims games to 12+ for all Europe with the exception of Germany and Russia who have their own rating systems. Germany has the USK which now for years have rated all the Sims games as 6+ and Russia changed the rating to 18+ for TS4 because it has same sex relationships. But I think that all the earlier Sims games still have a much lower age limit also in Russia.
So it was very okay when there even were 10 yrs olds in the Danish Sims 2 forum
I'm so sad and so disappointed to say..... I don't like The Sims 4
I have gone off it now - I have lost 2 Sims to death by laughter.
Probably the most hostile, aggressive and outright nasty game I have ever played - apart from any of the other The Sims games.
Hm. Guess they're trying to make death easier now. Can't say I'm a fan of emotional deaths though. I'd rather a satellite fall on them, tbh.
I only have an issue with laughter because it stacks with all happy boosts. You get goof ball who was recently married/engaged and live a decent life in a nice house with high tech upgrades... well it's a death trap really.
Ah. I didn't have that problem. I wonder if they made those deaths easier? Mind you, I never decorated my homes in 4. I can't stand emotional auras and nicely decorated buffs. Maybe that had something to do with it *shrugs*
All I know is I don't like those concepts. It's beyond childish to me.
And then some people say that TS4 is targeted at 16-24 yrs olds just like hardcore action games, hardcore sports games, hardcore war games and hardcore RPG games are
No, nothing can convince me that the main target group isn't younger and too inexperienced for hardcore games at all
There is data that says the average gamer is about thirty five years old, this takes into consideration all games, no matter the type. So, those people anyone is playing against in a MMO or who is playing something like Candy Crush, or someone who is playing some little tycoon game or The Sims or any other type of game averages out to be around thiry five. So, I have no idea why EA keeps thinking teens are the biggest market. lol
"Games Are Not The Place To Tell Stories, Games Are Meant To Let People Tell Their Own Stories"...Will Wright.
I'm so sad and so disappointed to say..... I don't like The Sims 4
I have gone off it now - I have lost 2 Sims to death by laughter.
Probably the most hostile, aggressive and outright nasty game I have ever played - apart from any of the other The Sims games.
Hm. Guess they're trying to make death easier now. Can't say I'm a fan of emotional deaths though. I'd rather a satellite fall on them, tbh.
I only have an issue with laughter because it stacks with all happy boosts. You get goof ball who was recently married/engaged and live a decent life in a nice house with high tech upgrades... well it's a death trap really.
Ah. I didn't have that problem. I wonder if they made those deaths easier? Mind you, I never decorated my homes in 4. I can't stand emotional auras and nicely decorated buffs. Maybe that had something to do with it *shrugs*
All I know is I don't like those concepts. It's beyond childish to me.
And then some people say that TS4 is targeted at 16-24 yrs olds just like hardcore action games, hardcore sports games, hardcore war games and hardcore RPG games are
No, nothing can convince me that the main target group isn't younger and too inexperienced for hardcore games at all
There is data that says the average gamer is about thirty five years old, this takes into consideration all games, no matter the type. So, those people anyone is playing against in a MMO or who is playing something like Candy Crush, or someone who is playing some little tycoon game or The Sims or any other type of game averages out to be around thiry five. So, I have no idea why EA keeps thinking teens are the biggest market. lol
For a casual game like Bejeweled Blitz the largest group of gamers are 25-34 years old and the next largest group is 35-44 yrs old. Females are close to 75% of the casual gamers who play this game. But it isn't played much by people less than 25 yrs old.
For a mid-core game like Clash of Clans the largest group of gamers are 21-35 yrs old and 77% of the gamers are males.
For a hardcore game for PC or console like Call of Duty the main group of gamers are 18-24 yrs old and the next largest group are 25-34 yrs old. No less than 92% of the gamers are males and only 8% of the gamers are females.
So you can see that both the age of the main group of fans and the division between male gamers depends heavily on the type of game. Therefore it is just a mistake to assume that the average age of simmers is in the mid 30s just because this is the case for all games without distinguishing between the type of game. And it is similarly also (an even bigger) mistake to just assume that the biggest group of simmers are the 16-24 yrs old just because this is the case for all games without distinguishing between them. And it is also a mistake to assume that there are a 50-50% division between males and females playing Sims games just because this now is the case for all games put together.
Action games are still played by many more gamers than the Sims games are and they have a very different division between both the age groups and the females/males who play them.
Erpe all your arguments are based on assumptions while other people's arguments are based on data. But you have this singular vision that you have tenaciously adopted that puts you in the "way I see it" mindset. My original posting was nothing to do with what John Buchanan said but what you said "And then some people say that TS4 is targeted at 16-24 yrs olds" basically implying me who said that quote. Sims 4 is certainly childish and probably aimed at them but you consistently say ALL Sims games were targeted to preteens when the evidence suggests otherwise. I fully expect that even this explanation may release an unrelated tangent. PS my favorite game, even way over the Sims. is GTA 5
I will say this very fast this thread was made in January 2016 way before the toddlers, I am sure they like sims 4 now. but I , I have to run fast before the big bad wolf come out to get me. byee
we'll give you a full refund. Just make sure you make your request within 24 hours after you first launch the game, within seven days from your date of purchase, or within seven days from the game's release date if you pre-ordered, whichever comes first.
Who said EA doesn't have a sense of humor
Erpe all your arguments are based on assumptions while other people's arguments are based on data. But you have this singular vision that you have tenaciously adopted that puts you in the "way I see it" mindset. My original posting was nothing to do with what John Buchanan said but what you said "And then some people say that TS4 is targeted at 16-24 yrs olds" basically implying me who said that quote. Sims 4 is certainly childish and probably aimed at them but you consistently say ALL Sims games were targeted to preteens when the evidence suggests otherwise. I fully expect that even this explanation may release an unrelated tangent. PS my favorite game, even way over the Sims. is GTA 5
You forgot to read my link on http://developers.magmic.com/demographic-breakdown-casual-mid-core-hard-core-mobile-gamers/ You arguments are based on wishful thinking and selected content from advertising while I always avoid such things unless they are backed up with facts from more than just one not very reliable source. We learned this method while I was studying science at the university and all scientists use it.
Your other problem is that you apparently don't know the differences between the different types of games because you only focus at the Sims games, yourself and the few simmers who have told you a little about there ages in this forum. But this isn't at all a representative group of all simmers in the world.
EA usually avoid to talk about the target group because EA of course doesn't want to discourage other games from buying or playing the games. But it isn't by random that EA always have made them easy and more and more childish for each version. As a game type they are clearly targeted at children. But their T rating in the US means that we have to say that they are targeted mainly at the youngest teens instead (which also are seen as children in most countries).
Some have said that the Sims games are targeted at casual gamers - or more correctly that they are big games meant for gamers who usually only play small casual games (like solitaire, crosswords, sudoku and so on). But casual games are actually mostly played by adults and rarely by young teen girls who until recently played with real dolls instead of virtual dollhouses on a computer.
Yes Erpe lets all take your word for it that your superior knowledge from your maths class Vox pop and your world view to guide us over actual company statistics that really aren't relevant. And yes I only focus on the sims never a game like say GTA 5. Oh I'm 23 and also at uni.
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
Exactly!
Thank you very much for telling us this! It just confirms what I already knew from others. But it is too hard to find the documentation about which age group the Sims games are targeted mostly at (even though the developers of course know but just aren't allowed to tell us) or who play it mostly. For other games it is much easier because those data aren't kept as secrets in the same way. So EA must obviously has a reason not to want them published for the Sims games and I guess it is to avoid that even more people will see the games as kids games.
It is amazing that you still play it at the age of 17. But you are not alone. I guess that your friends would too if only they hadn't become more interested in other games which is what usually already happen when simmers become 15 yrs old.
It seems that especially action games is what the 16-24 yrs olds play instead. But when they become even older than that some of them slowly stop playing action games and some of them even begin to play Sims games again
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
what year did you start playing the sims? you were very smart.
we'll give you a full refund. Just make sure you make your request within 24 hours after you first launch the game, within seven days from your date of purchase, or within seven days from the game's release date if you pre-ordered, whichever comes first.
Who said EA doesn't have a sense of humor
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
And why does the sim has to have darker aspect to it if it were for adults too? It does not have to be dark! Many adults play simulation games like the farming sim games they will have alot of adults in them.
Erpe the reason your friends left the sim cause to them its more enjoyable playing FPS and actions games! Like Ark survival? But if your more family friendly you would like the sims! But with the price and seeing how its the same like the sim 3 i too will wait till the next sim game will be cheaper if I ever will get it.
I also have to add this cause I think we have forgotten! Isn't anyone annoyed that now the sim 4 has been out sometime we got to buy the same packages again like the pets!? Is this going to happen too with sim 5? Open world then toddlers dlc, pet dlc, outdoor dlc and we just have to buy it all over again makes me so depressed i don't know why we are not talking more about this?
They should make a base game and add on it with out having to remake and buy everything from scratch cause i certainly will not be doing that even if they have open world. If we invest $600 in the game why do we need to pay more again for the same thing??? Or give existing players discount to the same package so we don't need to spend twice.
Anyone here wanting to buy the pets if you had it in sim 3? I will just play it in sim 3 instead.
It's not a likeable game. Especially when its shallowness is compared to the deeper base game and subsequent immersive content of ts2 and ts3. If this is winning, I'm tired of it.
I think all ages that can play games are attracted to TS4.. I have seen old fogies like me to very young players.. If anything the Sims games have a much wider player base than any hard core game..
Yes we all know the game is far from perfect, but I will keep playing as long as it's playable or as long as I can make it playable..
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
But that's your experience. And kids are whishy washy like that. They float from one thing to the next. Whatever captures their interest for that fleeting moment. But the majority of the Sims and many other games - fanbase are long time players (i.e. adults) because they have that extra spending money to pour into a game. Of course EA/maxis knows kids/teens will play the Sims, but they also know that they will not keep 60% of that demographic for a long period of time. Whereas 90% of the adult players will stay.
And you use social media as a point of proof. Again, that's not really proof, since social media reflects the whisy washy-ness of said teens. But again, just like you, these are my own opinions. And that's great that we all can share them! Thanks for your insight.
It's a fact that with each generation The Sims became more vanilla, so yeah there must be a reason they do that other than following the TS1/TS2 route. If the majority playing were adults they would keep the dark aspects of the original game but obviously kids/pre-teens are still a big group of buyers and you really can't deny that. Just search sims 4 on YouTube, twitter, tumblr and see it for yourself. I played TS1 when I was 6 years old and only when I was 9 I went back and played TS2, had a lot of friends in my age who played it too. I'm 17 now and all of my friends who played it stopped and I see myself getting bored of it too. This is my personal experience and not some statistic that isn't even about the sims so take that as you want.
But that's your experience. And kids are whishy washy like that. They float from one thing to the next. Whatever captures their interest for that fleeting moment. But the majority of the Sims and many other games - fanbase are long time players (i.e. adults) because they have that extra spending money to pour into a game. Of course EA/maxis knows kids/teens will play the Sims, but they also know that they will not keep 60% of that demographic for a long period of time. Whereas 90% of the adult players will stay.
You underestimate by a lot how much money modern parents use on their kids
Yes kids are wishy washy in the sense that they spread their interest much more than adults do. But they also have much more time for gaming than their parents have. The parents have their work to do. They have to shop. They have to invite guests such that they can have share friends with eachother. They have to take care of the house and maybe a garden too. And so on. So they have little or no time for gaming. But they will usually let their kids play games because they also want their kids to have fun when their parents are too busy with other things. Therefore they usually don't mind giving their kids cheap games or cheap expansions quite often. They just don't want to give their kids too expensive gifts when it isn't Christmas or the kid's birthday because they still want those events to be special and therefore the only time when their kids can get more expensive gifts.
So when we are talking about adult simmers we usually never talk about busy parents because they don't have the time to be active simmers. My guess would be that most adult simmers are either singles or don't work anymore. If they have kids those kids are probably most often adults do such that the parents don't have to worry about them or take care of them anymore. But this type of adults aren't the majority of all adults. Therefore adult gamers are only a minority of all adults while almost all kids usually play games.
There are a lot of other signs that the Sims games are mostly meant to be played by kids:
1. The humor and voices in the game has always been quite childish.
2. If EA mainly wanted to sell the games to experienced simmers then EA would have made each version of the game more challenging, harder, more difficult and more advanced. But EA has instead chosen to make each version even more simple and more childish than the previous version.
3. If the majority of simmers were adults then EPs sure still would sell much better than SPs because the price isn't very important for adult simmers. But the quality is.
4. That SPs and GPs now sell so much better than the expensive EPs that EA almost doesn't make EPs anymore can IMO only be explained by the majority of expansions being bought as daily gifts from parents to their kids.
Personally I don't care what games were made for who or what age they had in mind no more than I care what books were made for what age or what movies are made for what age or even what clothes and hair styles are made for what age - if I like something I do not let AGE influence me PERIOD!!!
So I just don't care. If I like something - I buy it - I use it, I wear it, I read it, I watch it. ENough said.
I am a Simmer, I will stay a Simmer, and I enjoy playing ALL the Sims series games just like I love all Shrek movies, All Star Wars Movies, All Twilight and Harry Potter books and movies - and not anyone will ever tell me they were not made for me if they are in fact something I like and enjoy. So just stop it!
Ratings are just a guide. Adults can buy and use anything they want - whether or not you approve. What is your point. You are here on a Sims forum I swear just to annoy the players of all ages if you ask me. Especially when you choose for yourself not to play the Sims series anymore - why do you persist in antagonizing those of us - regardless of our ages - that do want to play the Sims series on forums where age discussion is prohibited to start with.
As an adult I do not even look at age ratings when I buy something - I go by if I like it and if I feel it is appropiate for other family members who also share my kind of taste - then I will also buy it for them.
As long as Maxis can keep me happy and entertained - I will keep buying the Sims and keep EA - the parent company making me money in my stock portfolio. And that ERPE is the way it is - whether or not you agree - or disagree. You sir, have no point in my view. Repeating the same garbage over and over does not change that one IOTA.
"Games Are Not The Place To Tell Stories, Games Are Meant To Let People Tell Their Own Stories"...Will Wright.
In dreams - I LIVE!
In REALITY, I simply exist.....
Thanks for the response Erpe, but I don't bother to read your posts anymore. I hope you don't take offense to that or anything. Have a great day!
It is okay You are the kind of person who chooses to close your eyes and only read things that supports your own wishful thinking and you like to deny the real world. That is your own problem
But I will answer anyway because otherwise your false statements would stand without anybody to correct them and they could confuse others. So even though I would ignore you if we were alone in the forum I won't anyway because our messages are read by a lot of other simmers too
Personally I don't care what games were made for who or what age they had in mind no more than I care what books were made for what age or what movies are made for what age or even what clothes and hair styles are made for what age - if I like something I do not let AGE influence me PERIOD!!!
So I just don't care. If I like something - I buy it - I use it, I wear it, I read it, I watch it. ENough said.
I am a Simmer, I will stay a Simmer, and I enjoy playing ALL the Sims series games just like I love all Shrek movies, All Star Wars Movies, All Twilight and Harry Potter books and movies - and not anyone will ever tell me they were not made for me if they are in fact something I like and enjoy. So just stop it!
Ratings are just a guide. Adults can buy and use anything they want - whether or not you approve. What is your point. You are here on a Sims forum I swear just to annoy the players of all ages if you ask me. Especially when you choose for yourself not to play the Sims series anymore - why do you persist in antagonizing those of us - regardless of our ages - that do want to play the Sims series on forums where age discussion is prohibited to start with.
As an adult I do not even look at age ratings when I buy something - I go by if I like it and if I feel it is appropiate for other family members who also share my kind of taste - then I will also buy it for them.
As long as Maxis can keep me happy and entertained - I will keep buying the Sims and keep EA - the parent company making me money in my stock portfolio. And that ERPE is the way it is - whether or not you agree - or disagree. You sir, have no point in my view. Repeating the same garbage over and over does not change that one IOTA.
The problem is that I actually agree with you about this
I buy the games I like no matter which age they are made for. So I sure would never attempt to stop anybody from playing any game either just because the game they have chosen was meant for another age group!
So you have just completely misunderstood why I have used so much time to understand what EA's intention is with the Sims games and which type of customers EA has in mind when EA is designing those games. But the reason is:
When I was playing TS2 I was for a long time like everybody else. We loved the game and fantasized about all the wonderful things that EA could do with this game. But we were always disappointed and although we liked some of the new things too they were never perfect. Why did EA ignore most of our proposals if we were the target group? Why didn't EA just give us the game we wanted? A lot of us got angry because why couldn't EA just understand what we said?
This only got worse and worse and even worse when TS3 was our game. Yes there were improvements in TS3. But why had EA taken out all the family stories and neighborhood stories we had loved so much in TS2? Couldn't the developers read our messages? Or what was wrong?
Finally I decided to find out what was going on instead of just becoming more and more angry over things that I couldn't do anything about because I don't like to be angry and disappointed all the time. So I studied the games a little more and tried to understand EA. This gave the result that EA ignores us more and more on purpose and not because EA doesn't understand us. But because EA sees us as a quite unimportant minority of the customers for a game which mainly is targeted at the youngest teens who therefore matter a hundred times more to EA.
So no. We shouldn't stop playing Sims games as long as we like them. But we shouldn't just expect EA to make the Sims games as we want them either. EA will release a new basegame every 5 yrs until the games stop selling and EA will make about 30 expansions for each game because that is the number of expansions which EA thinks can be sold without the sales numbers going down - and EA will from now on focus much more on SPs and GPs than EPs just because SPs and GPs sell better to young teens. That is how EA thinks and plans the future for the main line of Sims games. We can accept it or not. But to become angry because EA doesn't make the game as we would have wanted is alas just a waste of energy because EA won't obey us anyway
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Quit spreading #$^% Erpe some people didn't say it at all , John Buchanan said it, EA Play's senior marketing director for Sims 3.
Sorry. But he isn't mine and when he says something that doesn't make sense and only is contradicted with everything else then I don't believe him. But he is quite right in one thing: 16-24 yrs olds buy and play more games than everybody else. But this still doesn't mean that all types of games are played mostly by this age group. Kids games are of course played mostly by kids, Sims games are played mostly by the youngest teens (like other types of dress up games and dating games) and casual games has the oldest average age for all types of gamers.
But do you really think that nobody are allowed to play a game just because it was mainly targeted at another age group? I don't
Still I wonder why builders still play a game like TS4 so much when there are much better building simulations for all types of builders to get and TS4's building options only are secondary and targeted at young inexperienced teens. But this is a problem for only those builder and surely not something that I care about
So you should take his statements the same way as you take all other advertising. Do you really believe in everything you are told in advertising?
Of course I don't know exactly why he in 2009 said that the Sims games now are targeted mostly at the 16-24 yrs olds on https://beyondsims.com/7339/interview-with-ea-plays-john-buchanan-about-marketing-the-sims-3/ But at least you can see that he talks advertising and marketing all the time in the interview. So my main guess is that he thought that he could attract more gamers to the Sims games if he with a campaign could remove the idea about those games only being targeted at younger teen girls. I just don't think that he succeeded anyway in attracting older hardcore gamers at all because such gamers still only talk about the same hardcore games as they always have. And even EA seems to have given up on that idea because TS4 is surely even less hardcore than any of the previous Sims games. Instead it is the easiest and most childish Sims game yet
1) The generic "generation of tomorrow" belief and wanting to cater your product towards an audience you expect to be around a while. Also helps that teens and some young adults have jack all to do all day so they're more likely to sink time into video games.
2) Children are too young and there's extra care gone into legislating what they can and cannot be sold, plus parents will screen the product. The next best unsuspecting customers are teens and young adults. This is the crowd that doesn't know better; if you sell them a game only half as good as it's predecessor, well, half of them may not even be old enough to know this or to have played the predecessor. Makes them easy to please, means you can get away with missing features, means you're not held to a higher standard of quality from an experienced audience that knows how various games performed and know whether they should be able to expect more or not.
But Europe can't really see why the Sims games can't be played by kids too. So earlier the Sims game were rated 7+ by PEGI and even as "suitable for all ages" by the German USK.
But then the U.K. joined PEGI and objected against the 7+ ratings. Reluctantly PEGI then accepted this wish from the U.K. and changed all the ratings for Sims games to 12+ for all Europe with the exception of Germany and Russia who have their own rating systems. Germany has the USK which now for years have rated all the Sims games as 6+ and Russia changed the rating to 18+ for TS4 because it has same sex relationships. But I think that all the earlier Sims games still have a much lower age limit also in Russia.
So it was very okay when there even were 10 yrs olds in the Danish Sims 2 forum
There is data that says the average gamer is about thirty five years old, this takes into consideration all games, no matter the type. So, those people anyone is playing against in a MMO or who is playing something like Candy Crush, or someone who is playing some little tycoon game or The Sims or any other type of game averages out to be around thiry five. So, I have no idea why EA keeps thinking teens are the biggest market. lol
For a casual game like Bejeweled Blitz the largest group of gamers are 25-34 years old and the next largest group is 35-44 yrs old. Females are close to 75% of the casual gamers who play this game. But it isn't played much by people less than 25 yrs old.
For a mid-core game like Clash of Clans the largest group of gamers are 21-35 yrs old and 77% of the gamers are males.
For a hardcore game for PC or console like Call of Duty the main group of gamers are 18-24 yrs old and the next largest group are 25-34 yrs old. No less than 92% of the gamers are males and only 8% of the gamers are females.
So you can see that both the age of the main group of fans and the division between male gamers depends heavily on the type of game. Therefore it is just a mistake to assume that the average age of simmers is in the mid 30s just because this is the case for all games without distinguishing between the type of game. And it is similarly also (an even bigger) mistake to just assume that the biggest group of simmers are the 16-24 yrs old just because this is the case for all games without distinguishing between them. And it is also a mistake to assume that there are a 50-50% division between males and females playing Sims games just because this now is the case for all games put together.
Action games are still played by many more gamers than the Sims games are and they have a very different division between both the age groups and the females/males who play them.
I will say this very fast this thread was made in January 2016 way before the toddlers, I am sure they like sims 4 now. but I
Who said EA doesn't have a sense of humor
Your other problem is that you apparently don't know the differences between the different types of games because you only focus at the Sims games, yourself and the few simmers who have told you a little about there ages in this forum. But this isn't at all a representative group of all simmers in the world.
EA usually avoid to talk about the target group because EA of course doesn't want to discourage other games from buying or playing the games. But it isn't by random that EA always have made them easy and more and more childish for each version. As a game type they are clearly targeted at children. But their T rating in the US means that we have to say that they are targeted mainly at the youngest teens instead (which also are seen as children in most countries).
Some have said that the Sims games are targeted at casual gamers - or more correctly that they are big games meant for gamers who usually only play small casual games (like solitaire, crosswords, sudoku and so on). But casual games are actually mostly played by adults and rarely by young teen girls who until recently played with real dolls instead of virtual dollhouses on a computer.
Thank you very much for telling us this! It just confirms what I already knew from others. But it is too hard to find the documentation about which age group the Sims games are targeted mostly at (even though the developers of course know but just aren't allowed to tell us) or who play it mostly. For other games it is much easier because those data aren't kept as secrets in the same way. So EA must obviously has a reason not to want them published for the Sims games and I guess it is to avoid that even more people will see the games as kids games.
It is amazing that you still play it at the age of 17. But you are not alone. I guess that your friends would too if only they hadn't become more interested in other games which is what usually already happen when simmers become 15 yrs old.
It seems that especially action games is what the 16-24 yrs olds play instead. But when they become even older than that some of them slowly stop playing action games and some of them even begin to play Sims games again
what year did you start playing the sims? you were very smart.
Who said EA doesn't have a sense of humor
And why does the sim has to have darker aspect to it if it were for adults too? It does not have to be dark! Many adults play simulation games like the farming sim games they will have alot of adults in them.
Erpe the reason your friends left the sim cause to them its more enjoyable playing FPS and actions games!
I also have to add this cause I think we have forgotten! Isn't anyone annoyed that now the sim 4 has been out sometime we got to buy the same packages again like the pets!? Is this going to happen too with sim 5? Open world then toddlers dlc, pet dlc, outdoor dlc and we just have to buy it all over again makes me so depressed i don't know why we are not talking more about this?
They should make a base game and add on it with out having to remake and buy everything from scratch cause i certainly will not be doing that even if they have open world. If we invest $600 in the game why do we need to pay more again for the same thing??? Or give existing players discount to the same package so we don't need to spend twice.
Anyone here wanting to buy the pets if you had it in sim 3? I will just play it in sim 3 instead.
Yes we all know the game is far from perfect, but I will keep playing as long as it's playable or as long as I can make it playable..
But that's your experience. And kids are whishy washy like that. They float from one thing to the next. Whatever captures their interest for that fleeting moment. But the majority of the Sims and many other games - fanbase are long time players (i.e. adults) because they have that extra spending money to pour into a game. Of course EA/maxis knows kids/teens will play the Sims, but they also know that they will not keep 60% of that demographic for a long period of time. Whereas 90% of the adult players will stay.
And you use social media as a point of proof. Again, that's not really proof, since social media reflects the whisy washy-ness of said teens. But again, just like you, these are my own opinions. And that's great that we all can share them!
Yes kids are wishy washy in the sense that they spread their interest much more than adults do. But they also have much more time for gaming than their parents have. The parents have their work to do. They have to shop. They have to invite guests such that they can have share friends with eachother. They have to take care of the house and maybe a garden too. And so on. So they have little or no time for gaming. But they will usually let their kids play games because they also want their kids to have fun when their parents are too busy with other things. Therefore they usually don't mind giving their kids cheap games or cheap expansions quite often. They just don't want to give their kids too expensive gifts when it isn't Christmas or the kid's birthday because they still want those events to be special and therefore the only time when their kids can get more expensive gifts.
So when we are talking about adult simmers we usually never talk about busy parents because they don't have the time to be active simmers. My guess would be that most adult simmers are either singles or don't work anymore. If they have kids those kids are probably most often adults do such that the parents don't have to worry about them or take care of them anymore. But this type of adults aren't the majority of all adults. Therefore adult gamers are only a minority of all adults while almost all kids usually play games.
There are a lot of other signs that the Sims games are mostly meant to be played by kids:
1. The humor and voices in the game has always been quite childish.
2. If EA mainly wanted to sell the games to experienced simmers then EA would have made each version of the game more challenging, harder, more difficult and more advanced. But EA has instead chosen to make each version even more simple and more childish than the previous version.
3. If the majority of simmers were adults then EPs sure still would sell much better than SPs because the price isn't very important for adult simmers. But the quality is.
4. That SPs and GPs now sell so much better than the expensive EPs that EA almost doesn't make EPs anymore can IMO only be explained by the majority of expansions being bought as daily gifts from parents to their kids.
So I just don't care. If I like something - I buy it - I use it, I wear it, I read it, I watch it. ENough said.
I am a Simmer, I will stay a Simmer, and I enjoy playing ALL the Sims series games just like I love all Shrek movies, All Star Wars Movies, All Twilight and Harry Potter books and movies - and not anyone will ever tell me they were not made for me if they are in fact something I like and enjoy. So just stop it!
Ratings are just a guide. Adults can buy and use anything they want - whether or not you approve. What is your point. You are here on a Sims forum I swear just to annoy the players of all ages if you ask me. Especially when you choose for yourself not to play the Sims series anymore - why do you persist in antagonizing those of us - regardless of our ages - that do want to play the Sims series on forums where age discussion is prohibited to start with.
As an adult I do not even look at age ratings when I buy something - I go by if I like it and if I feel it is appropiate for other family members who also share my kind of taste - then I will also buy it for them.
As long as Maxis can keep me happy and entertained - I will keep buying the Sims and keep EA - the parent company making me money in my stock portfolio. And that ERPE is the way it is - whether or not you agree - or disagree. You sir, have no point in my view. Repeating the same garbage over and over does not change that one IOTA.
"Games Are Not The Place To Tell Stories, Games Are Meant To Let People Tell Their Own Stories"...Will Wright.
In dreams - I LIVE!
In REALITY, I simply exist.....
But I will answer anyway because otherwise your false statements would stand without anybody to correct them and they could confuse others. So even though I would ignore you if we were alone in the forum I won't anyway because our messages are read by a lot of other simmers too
I buy the games I like no matter which age they are made for. So I sure would never attempt to stop anybody from playing any game either just because the game they have chosen was meant for another age group!
So you have just completely misunderstood why I have used so much time to understand what EA's intention is with the Sims games and which type of customers EA has in mind when EA is designing those games. But the reason is:
When I was playing TS2 I was for a long time like everybody else. We loved the game and fantasized about all the wonderful things that EA could do with this game. But we were always disappointed and although we liked some of the new things too they were never perfect. Why did EA ignore most of our proposals if we were the target group? Why didn't EA just give us the game we wanted? A lot of us got angry because why couldn't EA just understand what we said?
This only got worse and worse and even worse when TS3 was our game. Yes there were improvements in TS3. But why had EA taken out all the family stories and neighborhood stories we had loved so much in TS2? Couldn't the developers read our messages? Or what was wrong?
Finally I decided to find out what was going on instead of just becoming more and more angry over things that I couldn't do anything about because I don't like to be angry and disappointed all the time. So I studied the games a little more and tried to understand EA. This gave the result that EA ignores us more and more on purpose and not because EA doesn't understand us. But because EA sees us as a quite unimportant minority of the customers for a game which mainly is targeted at the youngest teens who therefore matter a hundred times more to EA.
So no. We shouldn't stop playing Sims games as long as we like them. But we shouldn't just expect EA to make the Sims games as we want them either. EA will release a new basegame every 5 yrs until the games stop selling and EA will make about 30 expansions for each game because that is the number of expansions which EA thinks can be sold without the sales numbers going down - and EA will from now on focus much more on SPs and GPs than EPs just because SPs and GPs sell better to young teens. That is how EA thinks and plans the future for the main line of Sims games. We can accept it or not. But to become angry because EA doesn't make the game as we would have wanted is alas just a waste of energy because EA won't obey us anyway