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So, I Finally Give Up On This Game.
I'm sorry, I gave this game a chance. Bought it on June 17th 2016, gave up October 17th 2016.
So, why did I give up on this game after just 4 months?
Quite simply, it's because I don't have anything left to do. I've tried everything there is to try. The only things I enjoyed were the new face-moulding tools and the retail system in GTW. Everything else was just a checklist of "Click this fruit 5 times, and get an emotional boost".
However, even though that's what eventually drove me to go back to TS3, I'm still not sure what it is that Sims 4 does so badly that it bores me. In fact, no. It doesn't bore me, it just doesn't feel absorbing and fun. It just feels like a mindless time-killer rather than a game. I'm so annoyed though, because I can't put my finger on what the game does so wrong. I've pretty much concluded that there is one thing that kills the experience, but it's just impossible to find. I CAN'T work it out. I've listened to everyone else's reasons, and they're completely right that those reasons kill the quality of the game, but I don't think anyone has yet found what the draining factor is. And I use the word draining because that's exactly what it feels like when I play Sims 4. It feels draining.
Anyway, I'll likely still be active on the forums, but I definitely will no longer be playing Sims 4.
So, why did I give up on this game after just 4 months?
Quite simply, it's because I don't have anything left to do. I've tried everything there is to try. The only things I enjoyed were the new face-moulding tools and the retail system in GTW. Everything else was just a checklist of "Click this fruit 5 times, and get an emotional boost".
However, even though that's what eventually drove me to go back to TS3, I'm still not sure what it is that Sims 4 does so badly that it bores me. In fact, no. It doesn't bore me, it just doesn't feel absorbing and fun. It just feels like a mindless time-killer rather than a game. I'm so annoyed though, because I can't put my finger on what the game does so wrong. I've pretty much concluded that there is one thing that kills the experience, but it's just impossible to find. I CAN'T work it out. I've listened to everyone else's reasons, and they're completely right that those reasons kill the quality of the game, but I don't think anyone has yet found what the draining factor is. And I use the word draining because that's exactly what it feels like when I play Sims 4. It feels draining.
Anyway, I'll likely still be active on the forums, but I definitely will no longer be playing Sims 4.
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Comments
I think that what reduces TS4 to be much more a time-killer than a game which we can play for hours without feeling that we are just wasting and killing time are:
1. Building relationships in TS4 is trivialized much more than in the earlier games because it goes too fast and then the relationships just disappear again because the game now has culling and relationship decay.
2. The new emotions are meant for fast fun gameplay. But they become meaningless if we play for more than a few minutes.
3. The sims are simplified and don't really have personalities anymore.
4. Family play doesn't really work when relationships don't have a deeper meaning and when babies and teens are simplified while toddlers are completely omitted.
5. Interesting RPG gameplay like in World Adventures also still doesn't exist.
The 'draining factor' has already been described in great detail and you won't be able to discuss the subject within this forum due to the hostility toward intellectual discussion. In general, the problem is that the industry of origin is transforming and there is no longer common interest in the technological initiatives which were the primary sources of inspiration for 'electronic artists' over that past two decades. The problem is industry-wide and you'll see that the volume of content, functionality, and intellectual depth of all entertainment products have been reduced.
The Sims 4 isn't entertaining because there is no longer anything professional to simulate, and no sign of what was once considered human ambition within public media.
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For me it was the same with TS4. I bought it and played it for a few months (which is longer than it took me to stop playing many other games). I didn't feel any obligation to enjoy TS4 at all. But I wanted to because I liked especially TS2 and I tried until I gave up because TS4 took way too long time to play without being enjoyable at all. Instead it mainly just felt like a huge waste of time. So I decided to use all that time on something more enjoyable instead.
The power had been cut because she hadn't paid her bills. Did she care? No, not a bit. I discovered myself because the lights wouldn't go on, but my sim was walking around as if nothing was the matter. It's just so irritating for me somehow.
We're all different @Erpe. Maybe feeling obligated is too strong a word to use. I'm an avid reader and feel the same way about books that I purchase. I've purchased books that I looked forward to and then after realizing it was not quite what I thought had to force myself to keep turning the pages, waiting for that spark to kick in before realizing it's not going to happen.
Sums it up pretty nicely, actually. There are a myriad of reasons that contribute to this of course but in the end EA/Maxis is driving the game toward the RPG/Farmville App crowd where every month we've come to expect something new and shiny that holds our attention for about two weeks, leaves us vaguely discontented during the third week and frothing for something more to do in the fourth week, when there's usually a pack at hand. If not a pack at hand, watch out cause one or two weeks (days? lol) delay causes a postal level event on the forums and elsewhere as people demand to know what's going on and where the content is. AND- right at the crisis point (following hints, leaks, denials) a pack is announced AND (here's the best part for EA/Maxis) people are actually grateful and thanking a company for the opportunity to give them money. Falling all over themselves in wet pants glee that (FINALLY!) here's the pack that is going to do it for this game- just make it! Until two more weeks past and the whole thing starts all over again. It's built into the plan.
To feel obligated to play a game just because I bought it would be something I only would do if I had very little money and therefore couldn't afford to buy another game instead. But I have fortunately never been in that situation
And some people can't afford.
For me, it largely depends on how much the game cost vs 'obligation'. I once spent more than was sensible on an MMO (for the sake of peace and quiet I won't say what one but it cost somewhere around the £70 mark). Anyhow, I spent the first month (because it was one of the ones that initially were pay to play) trying to like it. I tried so hard, but I'd spent so much money on it that I felt I should play it. I put the hours in but I still couldn't get on with it. There was just something between me and that game that I couldn't get on with. I thought maybe it was just me. The company's forums were full of glee (along with some complaints about bugs and such) and there was me, who couldn't get on with this game. I paid for another month. Still couldn't get on with it. I gave up. I felt because it was such a great wad of money (or more than I ordinarily spend on a game) that I should play.
People do feel obliged sometimes. It happens.
For me the fundamental killer is the sheer lack of depth to the game, the simple fact that it IS mindless, whatever you do has little or no bearing, there's no threat or challenge and you can't become attached to the sims enough to care for their wellbeing because their all the same.
Playing The Sims 4 is exactly like playing a facebook game, there's just no real point.
I have always avoided games that need a monthly paid subscription because I fear that otherwise I could come in a situation where I felt obligated to just keep paying and playing because otherwise all the money that I had already paid would just be wasted. So I don't like monthly subscriptions for games at all.
But if I buy a game instead then I know that I always can play it again later if I should become interested in it again. So the money isn't necessarily wasted just because I stop playing such a game.
It's not all about the money for me though. I'm feeling the same sense of obligation about the book I'm currently trying to finish by one of my favorite authors that is now overdue and racking up fines at the library. I'm determined to finish it today.
Pond & Sea Water Overhaul (TS2)
Simblr (my TS2 CC)
MTS Profile
Pond & Sea Water Overhaul (TS2)
Simblr (my TS2 CC)
MTS Profile
I understand how you feel OP. My draining factor with the game is I cannot make it my own. Initially, I was very frustrated because I could only edit lots. I wanted to add nice kid parks and pools in each neighborhood so I did not have to load screen to the big park all the time or some other hangout spot. Even going back to the Sims 2 where you are stuck on a lot, you were still able to edit the world itself to your liking.
Anyway, I got over it and continued on with the game because at the very least I could create my stories and the sims themselves were my own. I was pretty happy with the game. I was on a 30 house rotation. Each Sim had their own story going on. Any sims I didn't want culled out were placed in a house and my stories were being told the way I want. Then the patch with relationship decay and culling hit. Well all the groups I made were decayed and some of them culled to where they had to reintroduce themselves. Married couples were decayed to zero, really married couples decay too?? After being informed this is working as intended, I was left with the same feeling of I can't make this game my own.
The marketing for this game is like salt in the wound. All the ads with "You RULE" is like a sick joke to me when the very reason I am not playing is because I can't "RULE." Then to hear that I, the customer, is not open to try anything new when you the developer never delivered on your "You Rule" promise. We can't even make our own apartments in City Living. I keep asking when am I going to be allowed to play the game the way I want to play it? The limitations with this game are absurd. Even those who are in the game just building can't even take advantage of this expansion pack by building apartments.
edit typo
Totally my thoughts and it's so frustrating because I am a fan of the sims , there are a lot of good stuffs in the sims 4 like the searching bar, the cas, the moo, you can make an objets bigger, the build mod especially the fact we can move a full room, dine out and the stunning graphics better than in sims 3 my apologizes for saying this, this game is too much empty.I think this game is more a plateform one.People complainted a lot about how heavy and how buggy the sims 3 was , so this time the gurus made it lighter to avoid serious troubles and everybody complains too.
Plus you can't sell it .The only wise advice I can tell you is wait and see.You can keep it for building and decorating houses and for creating if you know . A lot of players never play the game.They just decorate and create for.
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They went too far. They put too many limitations into the game, and watered down or completely removed too many things. If it had CASt and terrain tools, I could just create sims and build, especially if I also liked the art style (I don’t, too plastic). But I don’t have tools I want; if I liked the art style only, I could at the very least load the game to stare at it and take screenshots. I’m fine with limitations in TS2 (like no CASt), because I know it’s an old game; I still enjoy building there, because I know I will be playing there with my sims, as I really like TS2 gameplay. TS4 doesn’t have that, so there’s no point in trying to put up with limitations, and it’s even harder to do it while realising that it’s a 2014 game, not a 2004 one, and they just decided to go backwards instead of improve things that were wrong in older games.
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I was having this discussion in real life the other day. I used to be very interested in technology and followed all advancements in both machine and code avidly. For at least the last decade, my interest has been declining. For the last 5, it's been pretty much non-existent.
In the discussion, I was stating there used to be so much advancement that the market was exciting to follow and almost difficult to keep up with. The challenge and innovation was attractive to a person like me. I followed both PC and Mac, IOS and Android, along with everything Linux. Every time I turned around, there was something new and interesting to discuss and experiment with. Technology has stagnated over the years and it's becoming a glaring problem in an industry that used to be innovative.
In my opinion, as I stated that day, there is a strange coincidence following the decline of technological advancements, and I quite bluntly pointed my finger at social media. On the other hand, it could quite possibly be as simple as missed opportunities and business antics trying to make more for less while following trends that are commonly known (or less commonly) to become less interesting with over-usage. There are many variables, but there is little denial over the stagnation that has taken place for me. Since I care little for socializing and checking out what's trending or happening 'now,' I have very little interest in the overall 'advancements' technology has been focussing on for far too long. I'm more interested in 'tomorrow.'
I suppose that's where social media, trending, and profit all correlate in my mind. I'm just not interested in going backwards, and I'm less interested in being 'connected' to yesterday. Fresh meat tastes better to me. I'm also growing tired of being cashed in on like there is an endless flow coming from nowhere, but that's the way it goes. One monthly payment here, anothere there, etc... It all adds up and becomes tiresome after time. I miss the days of owning what I've purchased. There's that issue too. There's too much online advantage being taken now and it's unlikely to change.
Lately, I've been finding more reward in physically touching my paper, pens, and knives, and playing card and board games with a select few that I actually get along with. Maybe I'm just getting too old.
Having an intellectual debate rarely brings out hostiliy in my experience. Elevating oneself above others and disconnecting yourself is generally where the problem lies, FYI. Don't take it personally. People do and say things online they wouldn't normally do or say in real life. The main thing to remember is if you wouldn't do or say it to a real person face-to-face, saying it online won't win you any brownie points for the same reasons. Respect is a two-way street.
To the OP: There is no 'one' thing wrong with this game. There are many who enjoy it and many who don't. For me, the problem lies in all 'the little things.' I've grown tired of the declining effort in the name of profit, and that's pretty much the nature of the game (mind the pun).
Here's hoping something innovative will happen sometime in the near future to revive the interest.
You and me both. I have loaded this game three or four times in the last four months since June. I see what you posted when I do, I see my own Sims grinning as the same in your picture, no matter what happens, and I just turn it off. The video I did recently were not new videos or pictures but from last May and maybe some footage in June. That says I can't find anything to do to even tell a decent story that I haven't already done, six months ago. Unless I want to add pose boxes and hacks to manipulate poses and emotions. The natural flow of the game is so bad there isn't much left for me to capture if even wanted to continue a video story. Let alone actually play the game like I do the others.
It's like a bad penny I keep visiting to see if I can clean it up and make it shiny but it never seems to work and start to shine. ETA: And if I take screen shots, those, bowls, those bowls are more than I can take not just the jack the ripper grins.