I've not owned a mobile for seven years, I get newspapers and magazines delivered weekly and I live in an English village with two well maintained classic red phone boxes. One was almost removed due to construction work in 2018 but locals saved it with a petition.
Things that are obsolete to some folks or places aren't to others. It'd be nice to have a choice. Grant even says in the article that it's odd not to give those choices after saying the game is all about giving players a choice.
Wow. I couldn't get newspapers delivered here if I wanted them. Does anyone use the red phone boxes?
I've not owned a mobile for seven years, I get newspapers and magazines delivered weekly and I live in an English village with two well maintained classic red phone boxes. One was almost removed due to construction work in 2018 but locals saved it with a petition.
Things that are obsolete to some folks or places aren't to others. It'd be nice to have a choice. Grant even says in the article that it's odd not to give those choices after saying the game is all about giving players a choice.
Wow. I couldn't get newspapers delivered here if I wanted them. Does anyone use the red phone boxes?
All the time. One is positioned across from the village pub, the other is across from the social club, both next to bus stops (one of which doubles as a school bus stop) so they see a lot of use. Saves data/credit. Good for calling a taxi/takeout on or after a night out.
I've not owned a mobile for seven years, I get newspapers and magazines delivered weekly and I live in an English village with two well maintained classic red phone boxes. One was almost removed due to construction work in 2018 but locals saved it with a petition.
Things that are obsolete to some folks or places aren't to others. It'd be nice to have a choice. Grant even says in the article that it's odd not to give those choices after saying the game is all about giving players a choice.
Wow. I couldn't get newspapers delivered here if I wanted them. Does anyone use the red phone boxes?
All the time. One is positioned across from the village pub, the other is across from the social club, both next to bus stops (one of which doubles as a school bus stop) so they see a lot of use. Saves data/credit. Good for calling a taxi/takeout on or after a night out.
That is why I liked @SimGuruLyndsay's interview. What is normal in one part of the world may not be normal in other parts of the world. I think people sometimes forget how diverse and worldwide the Sims franchise actually is. Sure it is still a tall order to be inclusive to Simmers worldwide and represent them and the people around them, but when the Sims 4 is done I hope a majority of Simmers can say "yes I was represented in this iteration of the Sims. Not only I was but my friends and family were too." I am very multiracial and my family is too. My family and I all come from different backgrounds and mental and physical abilities and beliefs and parts of the world. My friends are even more diverse. So I try to remember that when coming up with new ideas.
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.” –Helen Keller
What I drew from the 20th Anniversary coverage on Polygon & elsewhere is that Maxis is an atypical studio, in that many of its developers have been with the franchise over multiple iterations, and that the culture of The Sims is one of continuity, not turnover.
No one can help if you feel disappointed but you. May I recommend you take a look at the assumptions and expectations you bring to the experience? They are trying to make the best game they can, for the largest audience they can. It's that simple. Honest.
I could be over thinking it. I just didn't like where the direction of this game is headed according to my understanding of the article.
I love the gender update, I'm glad everyone feels included and I love making diverse sims.
But I feel like the "little things" are being sacrificed for the new cooler trendy things. And it's the little things that mean the most to me in this game.
The telescope is the perfect example. They could have just given us a little perfectly normal telescope but probably decided that was too outdated. So they gave us this super cool trendy giant modern looking thing that everybody hates. I never used it and never will.
I just want my mom sim to play cute little games with her toddler. Peekaboo is just one example. But instead she has to throw her up into the air and on her back and swing her around wildly because it seems more flashy and modern. Peekaboo is probably considered boring and outdated.
And all the time they are spending on thinking and researching the latest trends, could go to adding sweet memorable details.
But anyway, I'm not complaining. There is enough complaining about this game that I don't plan to add to it. I was Just expressing my Dissapointment. I love all things sim regardless 🙂 I think the team works hard and does a great job according to what they are working with.
And I know it's impossible to please everyone.
> @fullspiral said: > (Quote) > > Here's where we differ. Humans are quite capable of maneuvering through life without the tech of today. Back in the day, we had MAPS. And the ability to ask directions. Reliance on tech isn't necessarily a good thing. It makes people stupid and unable to problem-solve and reliant. > > Perhaps the game should reflect some of the pitfalls of tech reliance that is occurring in the real world.
By-and-by, I'm a fence sitter on this subject. I remember when there was only one or two people who owned cell phones because the landline was already there, or that there was maybe one computer in a set of ten or twenty houses. I learned how to read a map (and I can still read it better than googlemaps). But, yes for some this has help them stay connected with the world better. Truly, they should consider giving the simmers who wish to play without technology a way of turning off tech use other than being a technophobe or hitting the cancel option all the time. I do know they have an off the grid building option but I do not know if it also include the sim being off the grid. This puts us in a conundrum as to whether they show add such a feature. I'd advise to appeal to the creators and techs for another expansion that gives such options.
What I drew from the 20th Anniversary coverage on Polygon & elsewhere is that Maxis is an atypical studio, in that many of its developers have been with the franchise over multiple iterations, and that the culture of The Sims is one of continuity, not turnover.
No one can help if you feel disappointed but you. May I recommend you take a look at the assumptions and expectations you bring to the experience? They are trying to make the best game they can, for the largest audience they can. It's that simple. Honest.
I could be over thinking it. I just didn't like where the direction of this game is headed according to my understanding of the article.
I love the gender update, I'm glad everyone feels included and I love making diverse sims.
But I feel like the "little things" are being sacrificed for the new cooler trendy things. And it's the little things that mean the most to me in this game.
The telescope is the perfect example. They could have just given us a little perfectly normal telescope but probably decided that was too outdated. So they gave us this super cool trendy giant modern looking thing that everybody hates. I never used it and never will.
I just want my mom sim to play cute little games with her toddler. Peekaboo is just one example. But instead she has to throw her up into the air and on her back and swing her around wildly because it seems more flashy and modern. Peekaboo is probably considered boring and outdated.
And all the time they are spending on thinking and researching the latest trends, could go to adding sweet memorable details.
But anyway, I'm not complaining. There is enough complaining about this game that I don't plan to add to it. I was Just expressing my Dissapointment. I love all things sim regardless 🙂 I think the team works hard and does a great job according to what they are working with.
And I know it's impossible to please everyone.
Very good comment. It is the little things that help. I wouldn't take it seriously what Grant says about trends. It is like trying to explain contouring makeup to SimguruGraham. They will never understand it like girls and people in the the LGTBQIA+ do. 1950s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s are back now so what old is new and it is so blended I read multiple Simmers call 1960s style a retro 1990s fashion which highly amused me. Anyways the whole yibsim idea that only positive feedback matters is so not trendy and 2013 and even then it was deemed as stupid. http://modthesims.info/t/510461
Keep doing you and if someone tells you not to be disappointed in a thread clearly labeled with the word, then joke is on them for not reading.
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.” –Helen Keller
I've not owned a mobile for seven years, I get newspapers and magazines delivered weekly and I live in an English village with two well maintained classic red phone boxes. One was almost removed due to construction work in 2018 but locals saved it with a petition.
Things that are obsolete to some folks or places aren't to others. It'd be nice to have a choice. Grant even says in the article that it's odd not to give those choices after saying the game is all about giving players a choice.
Wow. I couldn't get newspapers delivered here if I wanted them. Does anyone use the red phone boxes?
I got my first cellphone last year. No data on it. Everyone in my city gets newspapers delivered 2x a week (unless you call them and ask for it to stop but it's a free automatic service). And there are still payphones here but not too many. There was one where I work until last year but then it broke and the phone company decided not to replace it.
Isn't that more of a reflection of the times rather than an indictment of gameplay? The advent of the SmartPhone has fundamentally changed the way that we communicate, or even handle day-to-day life, and not just for kids. We're Vegas natives, so when we went to Philadelphia for medical treatment for my wife we were all lost and turned around. So what did I do? I pulled out my phone, went to Google and used their GPS to locate not only where I was, but what direction I was facing. Disaster averted.
I don't think that acknowledging the reality that this sort of technology has become integral to life in 2014 or 2020 is a gameplay issue. Maybe that's where we disagree. Maybe I am wrong. I always am.
You do know not everyone wants to play modern stories set in the current date and year but instead some play their game in different times when cell phones did not exist. I seen you mention MP3 player in Sims 2 as some kind of victory to prove yourself right when the reality is they were optional and had to be purchased unlike the cell phones in Sims 4 the player had the control. In my opionion the game play issue is this game only allows modern tech and features when it should open up different possibilties like news papers landlines and so on for people who want to play different generations and slowly change their worlds or a world with no tech at all and not have everything be so limited from 2014 - 2020 how boring.
Sims 4 went from "You Rule" to "One of the stories we want you to tell"
@fullspiral pretty much nailed it! If they are going to hyper focus on trends and technology how about giving me the trendy option to block sims from my phone so I’m not disturbed by their meaningless and bothersome texts and calls? Lol 😆
The telescope is the perfect example. They could have just given us a little perfectly normal telescope but probably decided that was too outdated. So they gave us this super cool trendy giant modern looking thing that everybody hates. I never used it and never will.
I just want my mom sim to play cute little games with her toddler. Peekaboo is just one example. But instead she has to throw her up into the air and on her back and swing her around wildly because it seems more flashy and modern. Peekaboo is probably considered boring and outdated.
I wouldn't consider either of these things the fault of trends. Peekaboo and normal-sized telescopes are still very much relevant to the modern day. I'd say the culprit here is TS4's more exaggerated style, where everything has to be bolder and wackier.
The way the internet generations are evolving (or devolving when it comes to social honesty, self-representation and emotional stamina and behaviors), if the game continues to emulate the sheltered lifestyle of falsehoods on social media, there's going to be no gameplay left whatsoever. The Sims 5 will literally be a virtual young adult Barbie dream house of superficiality with selective inclusivity, claiming to be diverse while catering to the immaturity of childish ideals.
It's not that I'm exactly psyched about them focusing more on younger generations - even though it's not exactly hard to see why they do it, cause they do need to reel in new players over and over again, and it's arguably questionable how often we'll pay for exactly the same game and packs (1, 2, 3 .. 5 sims games?), but that's a different matter - but ... I'm also not fond of calling "internet generations" lacking compared to us. Isn't that, technically, what all "older" generations think about the young? And ... aren't we on the internet as well, typing here on this forum instead of, you know, out there socializing with like-minded people?
I'm not trying to be contrarian or annoying, and I have my fair share of disappointments with this game, but I wouldn't underestimate younger generations just because they're young and doing things we may not always understand. People definitely didn't always understand us either, and most of us turned out just fine.
I definitely get what you're saying and it's a fair point. I wasn't trying to trash a whole young generation, however, so my wording was probably too hasty and incorrect. I'll try to clarify without going on about it too much, but I don't know if I can explain it well. But I was referencing this quote from @fullspiral :
"This game forces the social aspect of these sims which is a false dichotomy of the real world we live in as it is lived on line through the computer. People aren't actually social in the real world. And the lives they present on line on their simstagrams are mostly fake stories. I guess maybe that's why these sims seem so fake and shallow...."
When I responded, I meant to refer to how online trends integrate with the false perceptions that people (of all ages) portray of themselves, not just "all of those darn kids", lol. That's why I used "generations" in the plural. I was trying to reference the illusion of the self on social media; for example, how people generally misrepresent themselves to make everything in their lives seem stellar and enviable when in reality, they might be struggling with finances or depression or any other life obstacle. I was also trying to reference social internet-based trends (which are indeed usually led by younger generations) where a virtual playground of social media sites dictate what's socially acceptable, and where disagreement or debate is often dramatized as hateful or malicious (and sometimes it is, surely, but often it's just discussion of an alternate perspective.) I feel that a company like EA, who when they say they cater to current "trends", it means including pandering to those types of illusions and close-mindedness in the name of representation, to gain social points with the online crowd, yet in gameplay terms, it also means moving away from some of the honest depictions of life, in the challenges, humor and obstacles that we used to have in previous games. Maybe that's looking too deep into a simple interview, but that's just what I see.
My stance is, I absolutely support the continuing inclusion of races, cultures, and sexual identities, etc. in the future of the franchise. This is a given. And I understand (but may not necessarily like) updating fashion trends and the evolution of society and technology, although I would prefer options for playing retro households. But what I fear for the future of the game is having EA force my gameplay into a socio-political trend that feeds into the ideals of a focus group and strays from the honesty and relatability of life outside of the internet. I know, it sounds dramatic, lol. But it really isn't. I just feel that a game that wants to represent trends of life in modern times isn't going to be that interesting or entertaining in general because, from an outside perspective, the people aren't either.
Apologies for my late, late response, but I can't seem to shake whatever I've come down with, so I just chilled and played the game yesterday, and didn't feel like typing a lot. I still don't, but I also don't want you to have written all of this in vain, sooo ...
See, I totally get where both of you are coming from, I'm just also very conflicted about the real influence social media have on our behavior. And I'm not saying they don't affect it at all, but we've always presented the best sides of ourselves in public, even when public life was largely offline because that's just what people do. Sure, I may talk a lot to myself, but I'm not about to broadcast this to the world while standing by myself in a supermarket, conversing with .. myself ... about my thoughts and feelings. I'm sure lots of people do this, but I don't see any of them doing it publicly either.
In a sense, for me, social media are just an extension of that very tendency to present what we don't consider weird or embarrassing about ourselves and omit the rest. And frankly, I'm sorta glad about it too, because I really wouldn't want everyone to constantly share their toilet habits and depressive thoughts with me 24/7. I just don't care enough about most people I have on Facebook to want to read that stuff about their lives. And I'm pretty sure they feel the same way about mine. We're all struggling, yes sure, but us not sharing those struggles on the internet with our acquaintances, family and coworkers really isn't that strange to me. And it also doesn't necessarily cheapen the way we relate to each other offline, because real friends - the ones who'd actually know about our struggles - are rare and they don't need Facebook to know how we're doing. Those friendships haven't disappeared in the 21st century. Social media hasn't destroyed them, and although it surely influences society in a lot of different ways, as a philosophy and psych enthusiast/major myself (;)) I also think that its negative impacts are often exaggerated, especially in those instances where we forget to mention the positive ones.
See, this forum could be considered a form of social media. Just like YouTube, Reddit, Discord. Without those places - even if none of the people here or there know me - I'd feel less connected. Cause I simply don't have any real life friends who enjoy every single thing I'm into, and the internet has managed to bridge those gaps. And yes, maybe in some instances it feels like social media / internet are destroying real debate, but I'm sure there are many instances that would perfectly contradict that statement as weell. Because it's never that simple - and I don't think public debates were any more honest when we had no keyboards to hide behind.
You know, sometimes I think I'm becoming too old for many things, and maybe that's a feeling many of us share... but, in the end, social media and technology are here to stay, and leaving out how they've come to shape society, jobs, and everyday life, especially in a game like the sims, would simply be wrong. It needs to be there. And with things like YouTubers and freelance marketers/writers/photographers, etc. being real, valid career choices for many people, yeah, I think that this needs to be reflected in the game. This is our reality now, and it's going to stay. For me, personally, that's all the article implied. That when you look at which features to include or not, you can't just look at how things were when you made TS1. You need to look at where society is at now and where it's going in the future .... and who better to tell you that than those who are young? You can be against it, you can criticize it, you can even think that what's influential today isn't as good as whatever we think we had in "the good old days"... but none of that matters. The sims team doesn't shape reality, but they have to take it into account.
[Apologies if none of this made sense. Feel free to tell me, and I'll try again when I'm healthy again ]
I've not owned a mobile for seven years, I get newspapers and magazines delivered weekly and I live in an English village with two well maintained classic red phone boxes. One was almost removed due to construction work in 2018 but locals saved it with a petition.
Things that are obsolete to some folks or places aren't to others. It'd be nice to have a choice. Grant even says in the article that it's odd not to give those choices after saying the game is all about giving players a choice.
Wow. I couldn't get newspapers delivered here if I wanted them. Does anyone use the red phone boxes?
Those red phone boxes are only in those touristy villages with posh influential inhabitants We lowly city dwellers here in my UK city have to suffer the 3 sided glass ones which are drafty at the bottom! To prevent homeless people sheltering in them I presume. None of my newsagents offer home delivery either. I love my mobile but still have the landline. Each one to complain to the other service about the other when the other isn't working! When you're getting old the mobile is a lifeline by the side of your bed. All old people should have one.
The way the internet generations are evolving (or devolving when it comes to social honesty, self-representation and emotional stamina and behaviors), if the game continues to emulate the sheltered lifestyle of falsehoods on social media, there's going to be no gameplay left whatsoever. The Sims 5 will literally be a virtual young adult Barbie dream house of superficiality with selective inclusivity, claiming to be diverse while catering to the immaturity of childish ideals.
It's not that I'm exactly psyched about them focusing more on younger generations - even though it's not exactly hard to see why they do it, cause they do need to reel in new players over and over again, and it's arguably questionable how often we'll pay for exactly the same game and packs (1, 2, 3 .. 5 sims games?), but that's a different matter - but ... I'm also not fond of calling "internet generations" lacking compared to us. Isn't that, technically, what all "older" generations think about the young? And ... aren't we on the internet as well, typing here on this forum instead of, you know, out there socializing with like-minded people?
I'm not trying to be contrarian or annoying, and I have my fair share of disappointments with this game, but I wouldn't underestimate younger generations just because they're young and doing things we may not always understand. People definitely didn't always understand us either, and most of us turned out just fine.
I definitely get what you're saying and it's a fair point. I wasn't trying to trash a whole young generation, however, so my wording was probably too hasty and incorrect. I'll try to clarify without going on about it too much, but I don't know if I can explain it well. But I was referencing this quote from @fullspiral :
"This game forces the social aspect of these sims which is a false dichotomy of the real world we live in as it is lived on line through the computer. People aren't actually social in the real world. And the lives they present on line on their simstagrams are mostly fake stories. I guess maybe that's why these sims seem so fake and shallow...."
When I responded, I meant to refer to how online trends integrate with the false perceptions that people (of all ages) portray of themselves, not just "all of those darn kids", lol. That's why I used "generations" in the plural. I was trying to reference the illusion of the self on social media; for example, how people generally misrepresent themselves to make everything in their lives seem stellar and enviable when in reality, they might be struggling with finances or depression or any other life obstacle. I was also trying to reference social internet-based trends (which are indeed usually led by younger generations) where a virtual playground of social media sites dictate what's socially acceptable, and where disagreement or debate is often dramatized as hateful or malicious (and sometimes it is, surely, but often it's just discussion of an alternate perspective.) I feel that a company like EA, who when they say they cater to current "trends", it means including pandering to those types of illusions and close-mindedness in the name of representation, to gain social points with the online crowd, yet in gameplay terms, it also means moving away from some of the honest depictions of life, in the challenges, humor and obstacles that we used to have in previous games. Maybe that's looking too deep into a simple interview, but that's just what I see.
My stance is, I absolutely support the continuing inclusion of races, cultures, and sexual identities, etc. in the future of the franchise. This is a given. And I understand (but may not necessarily like) updating fashion trends and the evolution of society and technology, although I would prefer options for playing retro households. But what I fear for the future of the game is having EA force my gameplay into a socio-political trend that feeds into the ideals of a focus group and strays from the honesty and relatability of life outside of the internet. I know, it sounds dramatic, lol. But it really isn't. I just feel that a game that wants to represent trends of life in modern times isn't going to be that interesting or entertaining in general because, from an outside perspective, the people aren't either.
Apologies for my late, late response, but I can't seem to shake whatever I've come down with, so I just chilled and played the game yesterday, and didn't feel like typing a lot. I still don't, but I also don't want you to have written all of this in vain, sooo ...
See, I totally get where both of you are coming from, I'm just also very conflicted about the real influence social media have on our behavior. And I'm not saying they don't affect it at all, but we've always presented the best sides of ourselves in public, even when public life was largely offline because that's just what people do. Sure, I may talk a lot to myself, but I'm not about to broadcast this to the world while standing by myself in a supermarket, conversing with .. myself ... about my thoughts and feelings. I'm sure lots of people do this, but I don't see any of them doing it publicly either.
In a sense, for me, social media are just an extension of that very tendency to present what we don't consider weird or embarrassing about ourselves and omit the rest. And frankly, I'm sorta glad about it too, because I really wouldn't want everyone to constantly share their toilet habits and depressive thoughts with me 24/7. I just don't care enough about most people I have on Facebook to want to read that stuff about their lives. And I'm pretty sure they feel the same way about mine. We're all struggling, yes sure, but us not sharing those struggles on the internet with our acquaintances, family and coworkers really isn't that strange to me. And it also doesn't necessarily cheapen the way we relate to each other offline, because real friends - the ones who'd actually know about our struggles - are rare and they don't need Facebook to know how we're doing. Those friendships haven't disappeared in the 21st century. Social media hasn't destroyed them, and although it surely influences society in a lot of different ways, as a philosophy and psych enthusiast/major myself (;)) I also think that its negative impacts are often exaggerated, especially in those instances where we forget to mention the positive ones.
See, this forum could be considered a form of social media. Just like YouTube, Reddit, Discord. Without those places - even if none of the people here or there know me - I'd feel less connected. Cause I simply don't have any real life friends who enjoy every single thing I'm into, and the internet has managed to bridge those gaps. And yes, maybe in some instances it feels like social media / internet are destroying real debate, but I'm sure there are many instances that would perfectly contradict that statement as weell. Because it's never that simple - and I don't think public debates were any more honest when we had no keyboards to hide behind.
You know, sometimes I think I'm becoming too old for many things, and maybe that's a feeling many of us share... but, in the end, social media and technology are here to stay, and leaving out how they've come to shape society, jobs, and everyday life, especially in a game like the sims, would simply be wrong. It needs to be there. And with things like YouTubers and freelance marketers/writers/photographers, etc. being real, valid career choices for many people, yeah, I think that this needs to be reflected in the game. This is our reality now, and it's going to stay. For me, personally, that's all the article implied. That when you look at which features to include or not, you can't just look at how things were when you made TS1. You need to look at where society is at now and where it's going in the future .... and who better to tell you that than those who are young? You can be against it, you can criticize it, you can even think that what's influential today isn't as good as whatever we think we had in "the good old days"... but none of that matters. The sims team doesn't shape reality, but they have to take it into account.
[Apologies if none of this made sense. Feel free to tell me, and I'll try again when I'm healthy again ]
@SimTrippy Thank you for responding, and I'm sorry to hear you're ill.
I actually do agree with a lot of your points, because there is always a positive and negative side to everything. I most certainly use social media myself, it has reconnected me with estranged family members and helps me to keep in touch on a regular basis with friends who live out of state. I actually love youtube because I can get just about any information that I need on there from Victorian hair updos to the workings of a complicated heating system in my house. And of course, I love these forums because I genuinely enjoy these conversations with the people here. Even the people I debate with because it expands perspectives and gives food for thought. I respect everyone here whether we agree or disagree and I like the way the forums are moderated (despite a little bit of excessive word banning ) because it keeps everyone civil. Most other forums I've found to be too toxic to engage.
I think that when I see EA talk about following trends though, and how that pertains to how they choose to represent life online, it makes me apprehensive because the term "trends" is usually associated with hype. As in, "whatever people are hyped about is where our focus is going". And when you look at social media, instagram and such, there is a certain level of superficiality that comes with it. Always excited, always happy, always hyped. Much the way the game plays now. I mean, "cancel culture" is also sort of trending, but I don't think that's in the game, is it? (I've only dabbled in the social media activities and they seem kind of repetitive to me.) It might be interesting to have your Sim make a post and suddenly your followers are outraged and your reputation takes a dive and you have to work to repair the damage while your Sim has a meltdown.
So my main issue remains that it's not so much the evolution of our lifestyles and technology being represented, it's how EA chooses to represent them and the limitations that come with it. It's choosing superficiality over reality. Following a narrow path of perspective that's more of the same excessive happiness without the challenge of realistic risks and representation. But I admit, I could be reading too much into it and making assumptions. It's just what I predict from the statements and from what I see and know of the current game. Obviously, I have no true idea of what the future has in store.
Also to add, I think that tech-based gameplay is honestly really boring in general and I don't think it's because I don't relate to it, (maybe it's because I do ?) I just think that watching my Sim do basically the exact same thing I'm doing at the time in real life is dull and I'd rather have more interesting things for Sims to do. I'd like to see all tech be optional. Especially being able to at least turn off the cell phones so Sims don't use them at all. That would be more inclusive to all lifestyles and expand the ability for player challenges.
Anyway, thanks for the conversation and I hope you're feeling yourself again soon.
Yeah that I think has been the biggest downfall of the Sims 4 is that it is too dependent on trends rather than consultant experts in emotions. That is why the emotions feel so shallow and superficial and the gameplay does too. Not going to lie that it felt like it was going that way with the Sims 3. I never liked the mood system. It turned the Sims into MMO style with the buff system. I miss the personality points that actually gave Sims personality and wasn't dependent on the environment around them.
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.” –Helen Keller
Yeah that I think has been the biggest downfall of the Sims 4 is that it is too dependent on trends rather than consultant experts in emotions. That is why the emotions feel so shallow and superficial and the gameplay does too. Not going to lie that it felt like it was going that way with the Sims 3. I never liked the mood system. It turned the Sims into MMO style with the buff system. I miss the personality points that actually gave Sims personality and wasn't dependent on the environment around them.
Exactly. I'm sure everyone remembers the thread by EmberDahl regarding "emotions" in sims 4.....
And you summed it up well. The emotions are dependent on the enviroment, and more-so the "objects" around them. The other sims around them generally mean nothing aside from some bit of conversation.
Unfortunate that Maxis is driving a political correctness campaign for their future endeavours (if true, need this source web link). Trends come and go, but what doesn't come and go is what life is, this game is a life simulator. the developers need to respect that and stop hiding the aspects they don't like to include for their young audience and adding silly little things that doesn't matter at all.
If no one is going to tell them to stop travelling down this path and relent, they'll keep going and before you know it, sarcasm or not, this game will be so dumbed down, so inaccurate with what life is in order for children to play it, that it intentionally gives the wrong idea of what a life simulator is.
It's already dumbed down too much. That's why we use so many mods.
I think that people are conflating the fact that the world of 2000 is different than that of 2014 or 2020 with the game not having features they would prefer. Is it your stance that The Sims 4 is inferior because of the gender patch, a reflection of the decline of print media, or an increase of dark skin tones; or is it your stance that The Sims 4 is inferior because it doesn't have the gameplay features you seek? I think the pearl clutching over "PC" is misplaced.
Classics last forever, trends do not. Too many trends make it look dated.
The way the internet generations are evolving (or devolving when it comes to social honesty, self-representation and emotional stamina and behaviors), if the game continues to emulate the sheltered lifestyle of falsehoods on social media, there's going to be no gameplay left whatsoever. The Sims 5 will literally be a virtual young adult Barbie dream house of superficiality with selective inclusivity, claiming to be diverse while catering to the immaturity of childish ideals.
It's not that I'm exactly psyched about them focusing more on younger generations - even though it's not exactly hard to see why they do it, cause they do need to reel in new players over and over again, and it's arguably questionable how often we'll pay for exactly the same game and packs (1, 2, 3 .. 5 sims games?), but that's a different matter - but ... I'm also not fond of calling "internet generations" lacking compared to us. Isn't that, technically, what all "older" generations think about the young? And ... aren't we on the internet as well, typing here on this forum instead of, you know, out there socializing with like-minded people?
I'm not trying to be contrarian or annoying, and I have my fair share of disappointments with this game, but I wouldn't underestimate younger generations just because they're young and doing things we may not always understand. People definitely didn't always understand us either, and most of us turned out just fine.
I definitely get what you're saying and it's a fair point. I wasn't trying to trash a whole young generation, however, so my wording was probably too hasty and incorrect. I'll try to clarify without going on about it too much, but I don't know if I can explain it well. But I was referencing this quote from @fullspiral :
"This game forces the social aspect of these sims which is a false dichotomy of the real world we live in as it is lived on line through the computer. People aren't actually social in the real world. And the lives they present on line on their simstagrams are mostly fake stories. I guess maybe that's why these sims seem so fake and shallow...."
When I responded, I meant to refer to how online trends integrate with the false perceptions that people (of all ages) portray of themselves, not just "all of those darn kids", lol. That's why I used "generations" in the plural. I was trying to reference the illusion of the self on social media; for example, how people generally misrepresent themselves to make everything in their lives seem stellar and enviable when in reality, they might be struggling with finances or depression or any other life obstacle. I was also trying to reference social internet-based trends (which are indeed usually led by younger generations) where a virtual playground of social media sites dictate what's socially acceptable, and where disagreement or debate is often dramatized as hateful or malicious (and sometimes it is, surely, but often it's just discussion of an alternate perspective.) I feel that a company like EA, who when they say they cater to current "trends", it means including pandering to those types of illusions and close-mindedness in the name of representation, to gain social points with the online crowd, yet in gameplay terms, it also means moving away from some of the honest depictions of life, in the challenges, humor and obstacles that we used to have in previous games. Maybe that's looking too deep into a simple interview, but that's just what I see.
My stance is, I absolutely support the continuing inclusion of races, cultures, and sexual identities, etc. in the future of the franchise. This is a given. And I understand (but may not necessarily like) updating fashion trends and the evolution of society and technology, although I would prefer options for playing retro households. But what I fear for the future of the game is having EA force my gameplay into a socio-political trend that feeds into the ideals of a focus group and strays from the honesty and relatability of life outside of the internet. I know, it sounds dramatic, lol. But it really isn't. I just feel that a game that wants to represent trends of life in modern times isn't going to be that interesting or entertaining in general because, from an outside perspective, the people aren't either.
Apologies for my late, late response, but I can't seem to shake whatever I've come down with, so I just chilled and played the game yesterday, and didn't feel like typing a lot. I still don't, but I also don't want you to have written all of this in vain, sooo ...
See, I totally get where both of you are coming from, I'm just also very conflicted about the real influence social media have on our behavior. And I'm not saying they don't affect it at all, but we've always presented the best sides of ourselves in public, even when public life was largely offline because that's just what people do. Sure, I may talk a lot to myself, but I'm not about to broadcast this to the world while standing by myself in a supermarket, conversing with .. myself ... about my thoughts and feelings. I'm sure lots of people do this, but I don't see any of them doing it publicly either.
In a sense, for me, social media are just an extension of that very tendency to present what we don't consider weird or embarrassing about ourselves and omit the rest. And frankly, I'm sorta glad about it too, because I really wouldn't want everyone to constantly share their toilet habits and depressive thoughts with me 24/7. I just don't care enough about most people I have on Facebook to want to read that stuff about their lives. And I'm pretty sure they feel the same way about mine. We're all struggling, yes sure, but us not sharing those struggles on the internet with our acquaintances, family and coworkers really isn't that strange to me. And it also doesn't necessarily cheapen the way we relate to each other offline, because real friends - the ones who'd actually know about our struggles - are rare and they don't need Facebook to know how we're doing. Those friendships haven't disappeared in the 21st century. Social media hasn't destroyed them, and although it surely influences society in a lot of different ways, as a philosophy and psych enthusiast/major myself (;)) I also think that its negative impacts are often exaggerated, especially in those instances where we forget to mention the positive ones.
See, this forum could be considered a form of social media. Just like YouTube, Reddit, Discord. Without those places - even if none of the people here or there know me - I'd feel less connected. Cause I simply don't have any real life friends who enjoy every single thing I'm into, and the internet has managed to bridge those gaps. And yes, maybe in some instances it feels like social media / internet are destroying real debate, but I'm sure there are many instances that would perfectly contradict that statement as weell. Because it's never that simple - and I don't think public debates were any more honest when we had no keyboards to hide behind.
You know, sometimes I think I'm becoming too old for many things, and maybe that's a feeling many of us share... but, in the end, social media and technology are here to stay, and leaving out how they've come to shape society, jobs, and everyday life, especially in a game like the sims, would simply be wrong. It needs to be there. And with things like YouTubers and freelance marketers/writers/photographers, etc. being real, valid career choices for many people, yeah, I think that this needs to be reflected in the game. This is our reality now, and it's going to stay. For me, personally, that's all the article implied. That when you look at which features to include or not, you can't just look at how things were when you made TS1. You need to look at where society is at now and where it's going in the future .... and who better to tell you that than those who are young? You can be against it, you can criticize it, you can even think that what's influential today isn't as good as whatever we think we had in "the good old days"... but none of that matters. The sims team doesn't shape reality, but they have to take it into account.
[Apologies if none of this made sense. Feel free to tell me, and I'll try again when I'm healthy again ]
This actually made a lot of sense you explained it nicely. 👌
Yeah that I think has been the biggest downfall of the Sims 4 is that it is too dependent on trends rather than consultant experts in emotions. That is why the emotions feel so shallow and superficial and the gameplay does too. Not going to lie that it felt like it was going that way with the Sims 3. I never liked the mood system. It turned the Sims into MMO style with the buff system. I miss the personality points that actually gave Sims personality and wasn't dependent on the environment around them.
Exactly. I'm sure everyone remembers the thread by EmberDahl regarding "emotions" in sims 4.....
And you summed it up well. The emotions are dependent on the enviroment, and more-so the "objects" around them. The other sims around them generally mean nothing aside from some bit of conversation.
The first post in that thread you linked by emberdahl killed me 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
And it was even funnier because of how true it is. I had a very frustraitingly similar experience myself but the way he or she put it together.......🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I make a lot of evil sims so I related to this so much.
Yeah that I think has been the biggest downfall of the Sims 4 is that it is too dependent on trends rather than consultant experts in emotions. That is why the emotions feel so shallow and superficial and the gameplay does too. Not going to lie that it felt like it was going that way with the Sims 3. I never liked the mood system. It turned the Sims into MMO style with the buff system. I miss the personality points that actually gave Sims personality and wasn't dependent on the environment around them.
Exactly. I'm sure everyone remembers the thread by EmberDahl regarding "emotions" in sims 4.....
And you summed it up well. The emotions are dependent on the enviroment, and more-so the "objects" around them. The other sims around them generally mean nothing aside from some bit of conversation.
The first post in that thread you linked by emberdahl killed me 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
And it was even funnier because of how true it is. I had a very frustraitingly similar experience myself but the way he or she put it together.......🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I make a lot of evil sims so I related to this so much.
I would love for the cellphone to be an actual object in a sim's inventory, and for it to be removed from the interface if a sim doesn't have it in their inventory (because it was lost, damaged, forgotten to take with them, stolen, confiscated at school or by a parent, or for a sim to just not own and use a cellphone).
I am ALWAYS forgetting to charge my cellphone or bring it with me IRL. I would love, love, love this feature.
I have been playing The Sims since 2001, when Livin Large came out. My avatar deliberately looks like Chris Roomies from TS1.
@LiELF once again everything you said in this thread is everything I feel exactly but nicely expressed lol 😅 and superficial is the perfect word to describe how social media and today's trends are. I really felt that deeply when I was searching for sims 3 family poses vs sims 4 family poses and showing it to my mom. Many poses of course are made by people reflecting modern trends. It's hard for me to explain but the only word I can think to label a lot of poses from sims 4 was very "superficial" and what I call self centered.
Even the way family is shown has changed greatly.
I personally just try to ignore those things because there is nothing I can do to change it but when it starts seeping in the game I play to get away from all of that and into my own world it's just annoying.
This is life. Whether you like it or not, influencers are a part of life. Cell phones are a part of life. Tech is a part of life. The LGBT community is now able to be more open without fear, unlike 20 years ago when the game was first released.
The game has simply evolved and is now a reflection of modern life.
TS2 was a reflection of early 00s life, with the introduction of cell phones (which weren't so common) and MP3 players, and terrible fashion.
TS3 was a reflection of the 00-10s life, with the introduction of being able to take selfies, and again, the clothing. Technology became more important in the game as well.
TS4 has a lot of issues, I admit that, and I want to see it fixed, but to call it a trend simulator is disingenuous.
I didn't call TS4 a trend simulator. I was referring to a possible future Sims game becoming one. But honestly, I don't think it's disingenuous at all to use in reference to Sims 4. Throughout Sims 4's development, the devs have always talked about what's trending and putting trends into the game and promoting it as such. It's not like it's been a secret. I would even go so far to say that trends take priority over more important development decisions. My opinion, yes, but I'll stand by it. It doesn't mean I don't find enjoyment in the game overall, but I do have some strong opinions on things that I feel have been ignored in development for too long in favor of trend fluff.
As for the rest of your post, I agree. As life progresses, it can be expected that the game will reflect that. Many changes have been good ones. But I also think it's a slippery slope because this iteration has more people claiming boredom than any other game has. If there's one word I don't think I've ever heard used to describe Sims 1, 2, or 3, it's "boring". But I see posts here all the time of people asking for suggestions on how to enjoy the Sims 4. And I think part of that is because modern, tech-obsessed society is kind of boring. There's only so many times I can find interest in watching my Sims stare at screens and do what I'm doing in the present, lol.
As a final attempt to engage, I think you're wrong about the assertion that things like dark skin tones and newspapsers -- what the article was about -- take precedence over the open world and personality matrix. What I read said that The Sims series evolves with its times, and I doubt that things like more dark skin tones are taking the place of the things that you want in the game. I don't think that what you want is fluff. I don't think things like the gender patch is fluff. And, in the end, I don't think that framing games development as a struggle between features and inclusivity is a useful dichotomy.
I think you're making too many assumptions of what exactly you think I'm referencing, so I'll try to clarify a little. I can tell you that I am not an advocate of open world, so that is way off.
When I refer to things I think are important, I'm talking mainly about what I see as things that were incomplete in the base game upon release, things that feel abandoned or unfinished, things that in previous games were consistently expanded throughout the series and things that leave noticeable gaps. For instance, the emotion system, the main focus of behaviors in the game, has no Fear emotion. Grant, the lead producer, even admitted on Twitter that they had dropped the ball by omitting it. So why was it never worked on and patched in, or at least some other kind of Fear system? Another, Sim Traits, aren't all equal in how effective they are. Some hardly do anything at all and feel as if time ran out during development so they slapped on some moodlets and threw them into the game. People have been leaving feedback about this for years. Then there's the incomplete whims system that was suddenly dropped and remains outdated. Whims used to be specific to Sim personalities and changed and expanded as development went on, but now they don't even get updated with packs. CAS remains limited in familial and relationship choices.
These things and more just seem to me to be things that were the result of a hurried premature base game release. You may disagree, and that's certainly your right, but I feel that at least some of these things should have been a priority to fix before piling packs on top and complicating the development process.
Now when I refer to "trendy fluff", I'm not referencing the gender patch (something I've wanted since Sims 2) or diverse skin tones or culture. Representation on a worldwide scale is something that should definitely exist in a game like this. But I don't consider LGBT issues trendy. I don't consider world cultures trendy. Or diversity. These things exist in humanity and always have.
I feel like there's all of this dev talk about "what's hot now" (Stranger Things TV show, tiny homes, streaming celebrities, environmental concerns, social politics, internet hype, "brands" and images, etc.) and how to incorporate hyped topics into packs instead of finding a way to fill out the core of the gameplay that players have concerns about and have been leaving a lot of feedback on. I mean, I would pay for a Fear emotion. I don't think I should, but I would, because I understand that development costs money. I'd pay for more Traits, I'd pay for Sim memories, I'd pay for preferences or flaws or something that would make the Sims feel developed and the game feel balanced.
Yes, in the article they referenced skin tones and inclusivity. That is not what I have an issue with. It's the focus on trends that I don't like, and some of the social online behaviors that are associated with trends. I know this is all subjective of course, but that's the point of discussion, yes? To share opinions and perspectives.
So, do you feel that the reason that we have systems that you don't care for are because we have cellular phones, gender patches and dark skin tones instead? Do you feel it is because devs are looking at what careers might look like in the next decade? I ask this because those things are what the article is about.
This is what I am talking about when I refer to inserted subtext.
I think that just because those specific things were mentioned in the article, it doesn't mean that the article was exclusively referring to those things and those things only, which is what you seem to be implying. Here are some comments that stood out to me:
"People are still mad that Sims don't have newspapers delivered every day," Rodiek said. "I can't honestly say whether we're right or not right for not doing it. If a big part of our brand and our goal is to let you have the choices to do stuff, I mean, theoretically we could just say, 'Fine, if you want to still subscribe to the physical New York Times, your Sims can do that too.'"
The above statement is referring to something they know a lot of people want in the game. And he is pointing out that it's a part of their brand to let players choose how they want to play, and it's an acknowledgement of developer choice whether to fulfill these player requests or not. Many times I've heard/seen statements from Maxis saying that they have to make choices, and if they put one thing in, another gets cancelled. So yes, some features that I see as important and needed core game features have most likely been pushed to the wayside many times for something "trendier". Because even the article states this:
Right or wrong, The Sims 4 has hewed tightly to trends, including trends in technology. (And they go on to pursue the the topic of technology.)
So this statement by the author of the article is indeed addressing Sims 4's general intent to stick to trends, which is what we're discussing. It's not subtext. It's text right there in the article. The next statement by the author is also broad:
The Sims 4 is not a perfect model of life, and still struggles with some aspects of what being a person is in the year 2020. Beyond the fact that the game only got gaming laptops with the last expansion, there are still limitations to what kinds of curly hair are present in the game, the ways it expresses gender, and it still only has a smattering of darker skin tones.
This quote goes from laptops to hair but the sentiment is still there; that the game "struggles with some aspects of what being a person is in the year 2020." Is it not fair to include human character traits in that summary? Don't all humans still feel fear in 2020? Or worry? From what I perceive, high anxiety is on the rise and more prominent than ever due to tech-heavy lifestyles, yet it's nowhere in the emotional spectrum of the game. Maybe if fear and worry were considered "trendy", they would be incorporated.
Though The Sims 4 contains a worrisome portent about the continued stability of the media industry, Rodiek and the other game designers must also stay on the cutting edge of trends.
Finally, this statement in the article is followed by an example of how the team researched job trends to understand how "young people" think of them. But it's there again. "Stay on the cutting edge of trends." Not balance of player wishes, but trends.
I don't think anyone needs to look for subtext in the article, especially if you also pay attention to the whole picture, which includes dev public statements as well as the CEO's quarterly reports. There's an intended direction, and if specific content isn't a quick stop along the road to trends, that content gets left at the wayside.
You put a lot of effort here, and we're approaching the end of my rule of three, but I wanted to at least acknowledge your effort. I think you're doing what I said above: conflating the absence of things that you care about -- the emotion system being better balanced in a way that reflects more negative results -- with the presence of things that you don't care very much about -- tech-heavy lifestyles. Again, I don't think they're related, and attempting to link them is inserting a subtext that you claim isn't being inserted, but I think is pretty clearly the case above.
So, that's that. I don't think we'll agree, and any further discussion is not likely to be fruitful.
I can agree with this. Trends happen, last for a little while, and then disappear. How is that fun? They're in the game forever at that point, when the trend has become "old news".
I definitely don't prefer trendiness in The Sims.
Do you react with disgust when seeing the MP3 player in The Sims 2? I don't. The Sims 2 is a product of its time, as all games are.
Good thing I've never played TS2, I guess? My comment isn't regarding a specific iteration, anyway.
My opinion is my opinion. 😉 You don't have to agree. I like TS4— I think I can still dislike certain aspects of it. I'm not "disgusted" by anything.
Then how about in The Sims 3? The point is that the MP3 player had a pretty short lifespan, and by 2014 the SmartPhone had eclipsed it. So it wasn't included; only earbuds were. That's a reflection of our time, which is what the article was about.
Landlines are STILL used. Newspaper boxes that you can buy papers from are STILL used. These are the kinds of details that are missing from the game. I LOVE the new gender inclusivity, not for myself, but for the other players who have been asking for it since the original Sims came out, back in 2000, not 2005. I LOVE the fact that you can more easily see the FACES of dark skinned characters now, I have been wanting that since the original game came out. Focusing on TRENDS like selfies and being constantly phone-addicted are what I could do without. I HATE all the "trendy" narcissism that is in Sims 4. I would much prefer the phones to be in inventory, rather than being permanently stuck to the Sim. In Sims 2, mp3 players were INVENTORY objects, which means the player could OPT OUT of them. Yes, in Sims 3 there was a phone also permanently stuck to each Sim. But at least they weren't CONSTANTLY taking **** selfies. Also, I think there was too much personal bias stuck in the game - men especially are adverse to expression of fear, and men were developing this game. Also, Grant admitted he omitted doghouses from the game because he thought they are cruel. However, just because there is a doghouse in the yard for a dog to take shelter in during the summer from the heat while the dog's humans are at work, doesn't mean that the dog doesn't come indoors at night or during the winter.
If more bias were added to the game, cats would probably be indoor-only, and NEVER go outside. I wish our cat that passed away last night had never gone outside - when the door was opened for him to go outside, it literally opened the door to FIV, which in the end killed him.
I have been playing The Sims since 2001, when Livin Large came out. My avatar deliberately looks like Chris Roomies from TS1.
Comments
Wow. I couldn't get newspapers delivered here if I wanted them. Does anyone use the red phone boxes?
All the time. One is positioned across from the village pub, the other is across from the social club, both next to bus stops (one of which doubles as a school bus stop) so they see a lot of use. Saves data/credit. Good for calling a taxi/takeout on or after a night out.
I could be over thinking it. I just didn't like where the direction of this game is headed according to my understanding of the article.
I love the gender update, I'm glad everyone feels included and I love making diverse sims.
But I feel like the "little things" are being sacrificed for the new cooler trendy things. And it's the little things that mean the most to me in this game.
The telescope is the perfect example. They could have just given us a little perfectly normal telescope but probably decided that was too outdated. So they gave us this super cool trendy giant modern looking thing that everybody hates. I never used it and never will.
I just want my mom sim to play cute little games with her toddler. Peekaboo is just one example. But instead she has to throw her up into the air and on her back and swing her around wildly because it seems more flashy and modern. Peekaboo is probably considered boring and outdated.
And all the time they are spending on thinking and researching the latest trends, could go to adding sweet memorable details.
But anyway, I'm not complaining. There is enough complaining about this game that I don't plan to add to it. I was Just expressing my Dissapointment. I love all things sim regardless 🙂 I think the team works hard and does a great job according to what they are working with.
And I know it's impossible to please everyone.
> (Quote)
>
> Here's where we differ. Humans are quite capable of maneuvering through life without the tech of today. Back in the day, we had MAPS. And the ability to ask directions. Reliance on tech isn't necessarily a good thing. It makes people stupid and unable to problem-solve and reliant.
>
> Perhaps the game should reflect some of the pitfalls of tech reliance that is occurring in the real world.
By-and-by, I'm a fence sitter on this subject. I remember when there was only one or two people who owned cell phones because the landline was already there, or that there was maybe one computer in a set of ten or twenty houses. I learned how to read a map (and I can still read it better than googlemaps). But, yes for some this has help them stay connected with the world better.
Truly, they should consider giving the simmers who wish to play without technology a way of turning off tech use other than being a technophobe or hitting the cancel option all the time. I do know they have an off the grid building option but I do not know if it also include the sim being off the grid.
This puts us in a conundrum as to whether they show add such a feature. I'd advise to appeal to the creators and techs for another expansion that gives such options.
http://modthesims.info/t/510461
Keep doing you and if someone tells you not to be disappointed in a thread clearly labeled with the word, then joke is on them for not reading.
I got my first cellphone last year. No data on it. Everyone in my city gets newspapers delivered 2x a week (unless you call them and ask for it to stop but it's a free automatic service). And there are still payphones here but not too many. There was one where I work until last year but then it broke and the phone company decided not to replace it.
I wouldn't consider either of these things the fault of trends. Peekaboo and normal-sized telescopes are still very much relevant to the modern day. I'd say the culprit here is TS4's more exaggerated style, where everything has to be bolder and wackier.
Apologies for my late, late response, but I can't seem to shake whatever I've come down with, so I just chilled and played the game yesterday, and didn't feel like typing a lot. I still don't, but I also don't want you to have written all of this in vain, sooo ...
See, I totally get where both of you are coming from, I'm just also very conflicted about the real influence social media have on our behavior. And I'm not saying they don't affect it at all, but we've always presented the best sides of ourselves in public, even when public life was largely offline because that's just what people do. Sure, I may talk a lot to myself, but I'm not about to broadcast this to the world while standing by myself in a supermarket, conversing with .. myself ... about my thoughts and feelings. I'm sure lots of people do this, but I don't see any of them doing it publicly either.
In a sense, for me, social media are just an extension of that very tendency to present what we don't consider weird or embarrassing about ourselves and omit the rest. And frankly, I'm sorta glad about it too, because I really wouldn't want everyone to constantly share their toilet habits and depressive thoughts with me 24/7. I just don't care enough about most people I have on Facebook to want to read that stuff about their lives. And I'm pretty sure they feel the same way about mine. We're all struggling, yes sure, but us not sharing those struggles on the internet with our acquaintances, family and coworkers really isn't that strange to me. And it also doesn't necessarily cheapen the way we relate to each other offline, because real friends - the ones who'd actually know about our struggles - are rare and they don't need Facebook to know how we're doing. Those friendships haven't disappeared in the 21st century. Social media hasn't destroyed them, and although it surely influences society in a lot of different ways, as a philosophy and psych enthusiast/major myself (;)) I also think that its negative impacts are often exaggerated, especially in those instances where we forget to mention the positive ones.
See, this forum could be considered a form of social media. Just like YouTube, Reddit, Discord. Without those places - even if none of the people here or there know me - I'd feel less connected. Cause I simply don't have any real life friends who enjoy every single thing I'm into, and the internet has managed to bridge those gaps. And yes, maybe in some instances it feels like social media / internet are destroying real debate, but I'm sure there are many instances that would perfectly contradict that statement as weell. Because it's never that simple - and I don't think public debates were any more honest when we had no keyboards to hide behind.
You know, sometimes I think I'm becoming too old for many things, and maybe that's a feeling many of us share... but, in the end, social media and technology are here to stay, and leaving out how they've come to shape society, jobs, and everyday life, especially in a game like the sims, would simply be wrong. It needs to be there. And with things like YouTubers and freelance marketers/writers/photographers, etc. being real, valid career choices for many people, yeah, I think that this needs to be reflected in the game. This is our reality now, and it's going to stay. For me, personally, that's all the article implied. That when you look at which features to include or not, you can't just look at how things were when you made TS1. You need to look at where society is at now and where it's going in the future .... and who better to tell you that than those who are young? You can be against it, you can criticize it, you can even think that what's influential today isn't as good as whatever we think we had in "the good old days"... but none of that matters. The sims team doesn't shape reality, but they have to take it into account.
[Apologies if none of this made sense. Feel free to tell me, and I'll try again when I'm healthy again
Those red phone boxes are only in those touristy villages with posh influential inhabitants We lowly city dwellers here in my UK city have to suffer the 3 sided glass ones which are drafty at the bottom! To prevent homeless people sheltering in them I presume. None of my newsagents offer home delivery either. I love my mobile but still have the landline. Each one to complain to the other service about the other when the other isn't working! When you're getting old the mobile is a lifeline by the side of your bed. All old people should have one.
@SimTrippy Thank you for responding, and I'm sorry to hear you're ill.
I actually do agree with a lot of your points, because there is always a positive and negative side to everything. I most certainly use social media myself, it has reconnected me with estranged family members and helps me to keep in touch on a regular basis with friends who live out of state. I actually love youtube because I can get just about any information that I need on there from Victorian hair updos to the workings of a complicated heating system in my house. And of course, I love these forums because I genuinely enjoy these conversations with the people here. Even the people I debate with because it expands perspectives and gives food for thought. I respect everyone here whether we agree or disagree and I like the way the forums are moderated (despite a little bit of excessive word banning
I think that when I see EA talk about following trends though, and how that pertains to how they choose to represent life online, it makes me apprehensive because the term "trends" is usually associated with hype. As in, "whatever people are hyped about is where our focus is going". And when you look at social media, instagram and such, there is a certain level of superficiality that comes with it. Always excited, always happy, always hyped. Much the way the game plays now. I mean, "cancel culture" is also sort of trending, but I don't think that's in the game, is it? (I've only dabbled in the social media activities and they seem kind of repetitive to me.) It might be interesting to have your Sim make a post and suddenly your followers are outraged and your reputation takes a dive and you have to work to repair the damage while your Sim has a meltdown.
So my main issue remains that it's not so much the evolution of our lifestyles and technology being represented, it's how EA chooses to represent them and the limitations that come with it. It's choosing superficiality over reality. Following a narrow path of perspective that's more of the same excessive happiness without the challenge of realistic risks and representation. But I admit, I could be reading too much into it and making assumptions. It's just what I predict from the statements and from what I see and know of the current game. Obviously, I have no true idea of what the future has in store.
Also to add, I think that tech-based gameplay is honestly really boring in general and I don't think it's because I don't relate to it, (maybe it's because I do ?) I just think that watching my Sim do basically the exact same thing I'm doing at the time in real life is dull and I'd rather have more interesting things for Sims to do. I'd like to see all tech be optional. Especially being able to at least turn off the cell phones so Sims don't use them at all. That would be more inclusive to all lifestyles and expand the ability for player challenges.
Anyway, thanks for the conversation and I hope you're feeling yourself again soon.
Exactly. I'm sure everyone remembers the thread by EmberDahl regarding "emotions" in sims 4.....
https://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/817854/an-obnoxious-psychosausage-tests-the-boundaries-of-the-sims-4-emotions/p1
And you summed it up well. The emotions are dependent on the enviroment, and more-so the "objects" around them. The other sims around them generally mean nothing aside from some bit of conversation.
It's already dumbed down too much. That's why we use so many mods.
Classics last forever, trends do not. Too many trends make it look dated.
This actually made a lot of sense you explained it nicely. 👌
The first post in that thread you linked by emberdahl killed me 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
And it was even funnier because of how true it is. I had a very frustraitingly similar experience myself but the way he or she put it together.......🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I make a lot of evil sims so I related to this so much.
The one with the fire is even more hilarious!
I am ALWAYS forgetting to charge my cellphone or bring it with me IRL. I would love, love, love this feature.
Even the way family is shown has changed greatly.
I personally just try to ignore those things because there is nothing I can do to change it but when it starts seeping in the game I play to get away from all of that and into my own world it's just annoying.
Landlines are STILL used. Newspaper boxes that you can buy papers from are STILL used. These are the kinds of details that are missing from the game. I LOVE the new gender inclusivity, not for myself, but for the other players who have been asking for it since the original Sims came out, back in 2000, not 2005. I LOVE the fact that you can more easily see the FACES of dark skinned characters now, I have been wanting that since the original game came out. Focusing on TRENDS like selfies and being constantly phone-addicted are what I could do without. I HATE all the "trendy" narcissism that is in Sims 4. I would much prefer the phones to be in inventory, rather than being permanently stuck to the Sim. In Sims 2, mp3 players were INVENTORY objects, which means the player could OPT OUT of them. Yes, in Sims 3 there was a phone also permanently stuck to each Sim. But at least they weren't CONSTANTLY taking **** selfies. Also, I think there was too much personal bias stuck in the game - men especially are adverse to expression of fear, and men were developing this game. Also, Grant admitted he omitted doghouses from the game because he thought they are cruel. However, just because there is a doghouse in the yard for a dog to take shelter in during the summer from the heat while the dog's humans are at work, doesn't mean that the dog doesn't come indoors at night or during the winter.
If more bias were added to the game, cats would probably be indoor-only, and NEVER go outside. I wish our cat that passed away last night had never gone outside - when the door was opened for him to go outside, it literally opened the door to FIV, which in the end killed him.