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your wishlist for The Sims 5
I don't know where to even put this as this is not really The Sims 4 stuff. And I know that some people will say "it's way too early", or "The Sims 5 won't even come out", so the other possible name for this topic is "your perfect The Sims base game". There's obviously things they can and can not do with an established game and nobody got hurt by dreaming, so thought it could be a fun topic 
I'll start.
1. Lifestages. People wouldn't be happy with just getting toddlers back, as that would just sound as "we took a feature out to use it as a marketting ploy the next time around", so I suggest in the worst case scenario, at least adding pre-teens like they are in the mobile version.
However, ever since The Sims 2, I thought that natural progression would be gradual aging. You can still keep the lifestages and "how many day till birthday" panels, but I thought it would make sense if every single day between the lifestages of toddler/child/teen, your sim would grow a bit (shrink a bit in case of elder) and gradually unlock all the interactions leading into the next lifestage. For example, if we took "teen" as a lifestage, the first part of it, you sim could still generate wants to play with toys, though most of their wants would be to do with friendships, middle part of teenagerhood, your sim could start having such interactions with their parents as "ask about woohoo", would turn rebelious, wish to skip school, stay out late, perhaps take up graffiti. That sort of thing. Late teenagerhood would resort in them generating wants for independence, such as getting a boyfriend/girlfriend, getting a part time job, buying something with their income (even if income goes to general family funds, if the computer knows that they earned 100 simoleons that day, it could generate a wish to buy something for that exact amount of money). If gradual growing would be too taxing, gradual wishes/ interactions, depending on how many days till birthday left should be possible at least.
2. Personalities. I suggest crossing the The Sims 2 personality system, WITH The Sims 3 traits system, WITH the emotion system, with some changes of course. For example, I don't think that decor should grant ANY emotion. Emotion should be reserved for happenings and actions. Personality could judge how much they would be inclined to do some things (like an active sim would not want to spend their time sitting and watching TV, while those with activity 0, would want to laze around) and traits could decide special interactions (kleptomaniac, insane, daredevil, etc). What I am saying is pretty hard to imagine, as it seems clunky and convoluted, but no matter what system would be employed, bottom line is, I want more character depth and the 3-trait system, plus emotions just don't seem to be delivering it.
3. Food preferences. I don't think that "Vegetarian" "Vegan" "meat lover" should be traits, but rather go into a separate panel (kind of like clubs) where we could just select all food items that our sim likes and all the food items that they don't like. It could come with presets like "Vegetarian" and it could just be set to "omnivore" (aka, a regular sim diet) from the beginning, so those that wouldn't want to fiddle with it, wouldn't have to. Like a "family tree" or "memories" interface in The Sims 3, it could be accessed with like a tiny button on one of the panels, so that it wouldn't take up too much space for those that don't want to look at it.
4. Neighborhood. Open world was too taxing, current The Sims 4 style world leaves a lot to be desired. In my perfect The Sims game I would suggest a cross - we have access to one street strip at a time, like in The Sims 4, however traveling to houses on that strip should not require a loadscreen. It would be more taxing than The Sims 4, but less taxing than The Sims 3, so it's a middle ground that I would be willing to settle for. That being said, terrain tools should come back, even if the general world would be mostly flat and "Create Your Own World" should be a thing, with perhaps allowing people to mark zones which would reside under one loadscreen. Meaning that those of us with power PCs could download worlds with many houses on the same load zone.
Another thing, while traveling to a different strip without all of your household, the best thing to do, just like in The Sims 2, might be to freeze time for everyone, or let people choose the time flows normally or freezes. As otherwise sims just drop what they're doing and you're discouraged from traveling and exploring.
5. Expansions. You can not continuously resell the same stuff over and over again and every base game should be worth buying, meaning, I propose releasing the base game with 1 expansion built it. The one to make the most sense would be the weather from seasons. That way you wouldn't need to remake seasons, allowing you for more creativity in your expansions and at the same time the base game would feel more worth it, as you wouldn't feel like you're just rebuying an empty shell again.
I propose to have natural disasters, like earthquakes that we're currently getting into The Sims 4 with a lot trait, lighting storms that used to kill sims in The Sims 2, hails and meteor showers. These natural disasters should not hit too close to home to upset anyone, as we already had them before, but at the same time should be a toggle, in either the options, or trough a system similar to lot traits.
Okay, this would be my realistic perfect Sims game that I can only dream about. Oh and one thing that I nearly forgot attention to detail. Small interactions, elevator and car animations, just make people happy. It's in the small things. And I would like as much as it is possible of it in a game.
And now, what would be your wishes? Perhaps developers could one day use this thread as inspiration. Or perhaps we could just come to a consensus of what would be awesome. Either way, can't wait to hear your hopes and dreams simmers ^^
I'll start.
1. Lifestages. People wouldn't be happy with just getting toddlers back, as that would just sound as "we took a feature out to use it as a marketting ploy the next time around", so I suggest in the worst case scenario, at least adding pre-teens like they are in the mobile version.
However, ever since The Sims 2, I thought that natural progression would be gradual aging. You can still keep the lifestages and "how many day till birthday" panels, but I thought it would make sense if every single day between the lifestages of toddler/child/teen, your sim would grow a bit (shrink a bit in case of elder) and gradually unlock all the interactions leading into the next lifestage. For example, if we took "teen" as a lifestage, the first part of it, you sim could still generate wants to play with toys, though most of their wants would be to do with friendships, middle part of teenagerhood, your sim could start having such interactions with their parents as "ask about woohoo", would turn rebelious, wish to skip school, stay out late, perhaps take up graffiti. That sort of thing. Late teenagerhood would resort in them generating wants for independence, such as getting a boyfriend/girlfriend, getting a part time job, buying something with their income (even if income goes to general family funds, if the computer knows that they earned 100 simoleons that day, it could generate a wish to buy something for that exact amount of money). If gradual growing would be too taxing, gradual wishes/ interactions, depending on how many days till birthday left should be possible at least.
2. Personalities. I suggest crossing the The Sims 2 personality system, WITH The Sims 3 traits system, WITH the emotion system, with some changes of course. For example, I don't think that decor should grant ANY emotion. Emotion should be reserved for happenings and actions. Personality could judge how much they would be inclined to do some things (like an active sim would not want to spend their time sitting and watching TV, while those with activity 0, would want to laze around) and traits could decide special interactions (kleptomaniac, insane, daredevil, etc). What I am saying is pretty hard to imagine, as it seems clunky and convoluted, but no matter what system would be employed, bottom line is, I want more character depth and the 3-trait system, plus emotions just don't seem to be delivering it.
3. Food preferences. I don't think that "Vegetarian" "Vegan" "meat lover" should be traits, but rather go into a separate panel (kind of like clubs) where we could just select all food items that our sim likes and all the food items that they don't like. It could come with presets like "Vegetarian" and it could just be set to "omnivore" (aka, a regular sim diet) from the beginning, so those that wouldn't want to fiddle with it, wouldn't have to. Like a "family tree" or "memories" interface in The Sims 3, it could be accessed with like a tiny button on one of the panels, so that it wouldn't take up too much space for those that don't want to look at it.
4. Neighborhood. Open world was too taxing, current The Sims 4 style world leaves a lot to be desired. In my perfect The Sims game I would suggest a cross - we have access to one street strip at a time, like in The Sims 4, however traveling to houses on that strip should not require a loadscreen. It would be more taxing than The Sims 4, but less taxing than The Sims 3, so it's a middle ground that I would be willing to settle for. That being said, terrain tools should come back, even if the general world would be mostly flat and "Create Your Own World" should be a thing, with perhaps allowing people to mark zones which would reside under one loadscreen. Meaning that those of us with power PCs could download worlds with many houses on the same load zone.
Another thing, while traveling to a different strip without all of your household, the best thing to do, just like in The Sims 2, might be to freeze time for everyone, or let people choose the time flows normally or freezes. As otherwise sims just drop what they're doing and you're discouraged from traveling and exploring.
5. Expansions. You can not continuously resell the same stuff over and over again and every base game should be worth buying, meaning, I propose releasing the base game with 1 expansion built it. The one to make the most sense would be the weather from seasons. That way you wouldn't need to remake seasons, allowing you for more creativity in your expansions and at the same time the base game would feel more worth it, as you wouldn't feel like you're just rebuying an empty shell again.
I propose to have natural disasters, like earthquakes that we're currently getting into The Sims 4 with a lot trait, lighting storms that used to kill sims in The Sims 2, hails and meteor showers. These natural disasters should not hit too close to home to upset anyone, as we already had them before, but at the same time should be a toggle, in either the options, or trough a system similar to lot traits.
Okay, this would be my realistic perfect Sims game that I can only dream about. Oh and one thing that I nearly forgot attention to detail. Small interactions, elevator and car animations, just make people happy. It's in the small things. And I would like as much as it is possible of it in a game.
And now, what would be your wishes? Perhaps developers could one day use this thread as inspiration. Or perhaps we could just come to a consensus of what would be awesome. Either way, can't wait to hear your hopes and dreams simmers ^^
2
Comments
Terrain Tools
Ability to edit my towns (or strip!) the way I like it.
Natural disasters would be interesting.
- Flexible personality. Traits are nice but in reality, personality changes with time and it was more realistic in the sims 2. It can be combined with chosen traits that reflect lifestyle (repeating some actions could offer to acquire such traits : for example, not eating meat for a while could eventually offer the sim to become a vegetarian, option which could be accepted or refused), but basic personality needs to be changing, both with autonomy and the player's choices. It makes sims unique and true good AI can do that.
- Seasons should be a part of base game, not an EP. The world just doesn't look realistic without them.
- Transportation. Please, bring vehicles back. Cars, bicycles, boats, I'd even love seeing airplanes and toys such as drones in a next game. And I'd like to see vehicles part of base game too.
- I think a semi-open world could be a good compromise. Closed world, but open neighborhoods to make the game both realistic and stable. It would give the illusion of districts.
- I'd like to see expansions with vacation worlds where sims can decide to live permanently. It's impossible to do this without mods in current and past sims games, which is sad.
- Please, bring create a style and recoloring back !
- Life simulators don't need to be utopias. Little children want utopias, but few adult players want that. Sims don't need to be super happy all the time. It's just boring and immature. Success is hard to reach and to maintain in real life, and IMHO, it needs to be hard in the sims as well. It's challenging and it's interesting to do in game, because it's extremely rewarding. It doesn't make the game so much darker, just much more realistic and actually much more fun.
My Sims 3 blog, Back to the Sims 3
1. Free Will off for real, please. No sims attempting their own actions, not even to save their lifes. The holding hands we currently have kills the challenge.
2. Return to the Sims 2 system of no time passing while on community lots and when playing other households.
3. 100% optional story progression. This includes an option where you can set the level of culling in accordance to what your machine can handle. I agree that Sims should be possible to be played on the lowest specs possible, but mid and high end users should get options to tailor the game to their engines.
4. Optional dlc instead of life service. Players should decide for themselves if they want new features like ghosts, pools, townies getting jobs, door locks, acting inappropriately and anything else that was introduced after basegame. It's really frustrating when you have to decide whether you really want to buy a new stuff pack and risk the latest patch hitching a ride into your game or rather keep playing the game as it is and forfeit the SP.
5. Jackets being handled seperately from the rest of the outfits. Small change, big effect.
6. Teens' facial features should reflect their age. Size is okay as outfits can be shared this way, but they need to look younger.
7. No deleting of sim children and babies that were taken away for any reason (neglect, failing school).
8. Focus on the play, not the stage. Great looking backdrops mean nothing if they cannot be interacted with. For example those cute pigeons in Windenburg and the San Myshuno cityscape are only good for screenshooting at the moment. But 90% of the time I look at my sims and their statistics instead of the background, so it's a waste of ressources.
at the very start of my post:
"I don't know where to even put this as this is not really The Sims 4 stuff. And I know that some people will say "it's way too early", or "The Sims 5 won't even come out", so the other possible name for this topic is "your perfect The Sims base game". There's obviously things they can and can not do with an established game and nobody got hurt by dreaming, so thought it could be a fun topic
so this is a topic for dreaming. About a game that might never come, or rather about your perfect sims game. Everyone wants to change something, so why not to just write up all the wishful thinking for fun?
Yes, there are apartments and lot traits, but that doesn't offer a whole lot and is very limiting for those of us who don't want to deal with ghosts. Those haunted apartments then are off limits to us.
Sims 4 is certainly pretty, and for Sims 5 I hope they continue with that. But they need to move back to move forward. Worlds/neighborhoods need to be larger with a feel of real community. Get rid of daily tasks. Yes, in order to get promoted a Sim should hone their skills. That's a given. But don't give specific other tasks-that just turns everything into a grind that gets old after the first time of doing something.
Same with social events. Yes, have meters to determine how the event is going, but let the player choose how to do the socializing. See how things go based on that.
Bring back risk. Death by flies, easier to get accidental deaths. Bring back the burglar and fire fighters and yes, meteors and satellites. The last should be rare, but it should be able to happen.
Give us options. We don't all want ghosts or supernaturals in our game and should be able to turn them off or on. Or choose which ones we do want in game. Some of us don't mind some of those things. Vampires and werewolves should be unusual in that they aren't taking over the entire town, either. Same with ghosts and aliens.
Get rid of the stupid potty humor. We aren't kindergarteners.
Bring back cut scenes for major moments in life. Give us the option of turning them off for those who don't like them.
Little kids shouldn't be left on their own. In many places it's illegal. Kids in elementary school or younger should need a baby sitter. They shouldn't be left on their own during the day or while on a date without a thought from the parents.
Cars. Cars that park on the street or in your driveway, not in your pocket. Cars where teens can make out and adults can woohoo in the back seat.
I could go on and on, but I've already done enough of that already.
Mainly, my ideal for Sims 5 would be a combination of the past two packs ( I never played the original Sims so I can't say what I'd want from there.) Open world is optional to me, I don't mind loading screens, but loading to visit your next door neighbor is silly to me. Personalities based on traits like they did in Sims 2 is great. Really, really in-depth backgrounds on townies like they did in Sims 2 as well.
Maybe they could even come up with a group of townies that are completely different from the last crew so we can have a fresh start and not worry about who did what with which townie; ie: the Goths, Caliente. I think it's time for some fresh blood with new stories and entanglements.
Ok. Enough of my ideas.
Dear is much much MORE I wanna add, but I'm too lazy to type that in. Adding to that I'm afraid writing a long essay may someone do something to this page that I may need to rewrite the whole thing down, so I'm gonna instead type it in google docs and then paste it here after I finish it
Oh ok. It's just I think I agree with @SimChickee . We have at least 3 years of the sims 4 left and I'm also hoping for it to get better.
Maybe seasons, pets and more worlds would make a difference but developers only seem to be working on multiple SPs that hardly do anything to the game. I hate that we had to wait a year for a GP and EP. If this keeps going I'll get even more irritated.
Anyhow with the sims 5 I would love:
Creative worlds
Color wheel
Transportation
Open worlds
More challenging
Go back to ts1 roots and make it less childish
Memories from Sims 2, as well. Not that constant "wall update" garbage that I never look at until it alerts me that it's full. I'm talking the fun memory system where sims do actions based on their life experiences or what they've heard/seen other sims do.
All of the Sims 5 topics get moved to Off Topic.
I'd really love the color wheel back.
Prior to Sims 4 they started working on the sequel 2-3 years before release so it really isn't too soon to talk about what we want in Sims 5. If they follow the same 5 years then new series they should be in the early stages of sims 5 or starting soon. If there is one...
Lots of good ideas in this thread. I would like to see a more depth and details like in previous sims games. I would like
- an open world with ability to travel between neighbor hoods.
- Create a style back.
- A graphic style similar a to sims 3 and 2. Not so cartoony as 4 but not super realistic.
- A combination of sims 2 and 3 for personalities. I like the idea of points then having the options to select some special traits
- More creative tools and world editing tools.
- More consequences and challenge brought back in the game
My most important wants for the game:
1. Bring back the sand box. Let me truly rule my game and play it my way. I don't need a list of must do tasks. If need be make it like sims 3 where the check lists were options.
2. Make the game to suit all play styles. Not every simmer wants to write stories or make you tube videos. Don't just cater to them like you have with sims 4.
3. Bring back family play! All life stages (babies, toddlers) unique to each other. Activities for families, ect.
4. Keep the sims an off line single player game. Don't repeat the Olympus disaster. Make a separate game if you feel the need for online.
Have all the tools to create the worlds and everything in them ready and working ahead of time for all 3rd party and Player/builders - crush the market.
Adding to that, maybe add something new to the series -- maybe an actual mall
For example:
Newborn 0-1 years old,
Baby 1- 2 years old,
Toddler 3-4 years old
Child 5 - 9
Preteen 10-12
Teen 13-17
Young adults 18-39
Adults 40 - 59
Seniors 60+
So a sim would age by years with the label beside their age depending on their age.
1. More life stages - baby, toddler, child, pre teen, teen, young adult, adult, elder.
2. Seasons, after all if harvest moon can do it ts5 oughta be able to. - I want to see rain, snow, hail, storms like tornadoes, hurricanes, earth quakes, stuff like that.
3. Pets, why have a life simulator without pets? - Dogs, Cats, Horses, Cows, Pigs, Alpacas, Sheep, Goats, Rabbits, Ducks, Chickens, Geese, Turkeys, and id like to see reptiles and stuff as well.
4. Vehicles need to make a comeback, - Cars, Trucks, Motorcycles, SUVs, Bicycles, Horse and Buggie perhaps? Stuff like that. Oh and bring back boats that can actually travel in water and ones you can actually live in like yachts.
5. Open world or at least a semi open world, preferably a full on open world like sims 3 because my computer runs sims 3 perfectly fine on high / ultra but I can settle for semi open world.
6. Bring back the ability to change the land terrain.
7. Make rivers, lakes, and oceans swimmable.
8. Make more ways to die, I know it sounds terrible but I want ts5 to be more realistic, - along with starvation, we should also have one where they can literally eat / gorge themselves to death, keep the ability to drown to death, get shocked to death, get over exerted and die, also add being shocked to death like heart failure, and I would like more but I don't want to anger anyone. Oh also add fainting, more illnesses kind of like sims 2.
9. The ability to have a rat, roach, bed bug, ant, wasp, etc infestation. Like I want to see wasp hives on houses like real life, stuff like that.
10. I want to see problem critters like bats, coons, possums, skunks, bears, stuff like that.
11. An ability to house more than like 8 sims, maybe at least 20?
12. Polygamy, I want the ability to have multiple marriages.
13. Bring back astrological signs, hopes and fears, I also want more traits, keep memories, maybe add wishes and dreams or something?
14. I would like to see religions added in ts5, I mean harvest moon even has churches.
I may add more later.
- Height Sliders I know the developers would have to create different animations so that any sized sims could lock lips or complete any realistic looking interaction, but I really expect them to do so only. All the games, male sims have always been taller than the female sims you create. I find it unfair that us shorter people cannot make authentic short sims. They have custom height sliders as such, but most of the sim interactions do not look so good.
- More REALISTIC Graphics The lighting and graphics itself is fine on the Sims 4, but there is no realism. The sims look like cartoon characters. I want a more realistic feel to my sims game as I'm playing.
- Vehicles We need cars, bikes, vans, etc. Have the option to drive to work or a restaurant, and drive your kid to school. It's not very realistic if I have a wealthy sim who still has his/her child travel on public transport... Car washes, repairs, and upgrades should be options too.