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A really petty criticism I feel compelled to voice regardless
DeservedCriticism
Posts: 2,251 Member
You know my favorite part of the new trailer? The narrator. Or rather, the lack of the other narrator.
I'm sure she's a nice person and all and I have nothing against her actual voice or how it sounds, but the tone chosen for every trailer the Sims team has produced has reminded me of when I was like 6 and the teacher would read a story book to the class. The tone chosen for trailers has always been so pandering, it's just always off-putting when I as a 27 year old adult feel like I'm being spoken to like a child. I'm hardly this game's prime demographic seeing as I'm both male and in my late 20's, but man even if I were 16 or 14 I feel I wouldn't much care for the tone of past trailers, so I've never quite understood it. It just serves as this constant reminder that "maybe I shouldn't be playing this game since clearly I'm not their target demographic, I feel too old for this."
Her tone is forever ingrained in my mind. I can even write you a mock script of what the trailer would sound like if it was done with the traditional trailer style:
"Introducing the Sims 4 Vampires! In the Sims 4 Vampires, your Sims can live forever and live the nightlife to the fullest for a life of endless THRILLS AND CHILLS! Hungry for a snack? Just grab the nearest Sim and give them a bite! How about a Plasma fruit? MMMM, YUMMY! As your Sims practice their skills, they can become stronger and stronger vampires! But UH OH! your Sims gain new weaknesses as they become stronger and stronger vampires, too! BETTER PACK SOME SUNBLOCK! But watch out! The vampire hunters are on the prowl!"
WHHHHHYYYY am I capable of ad-libbing that? Oh right, because the tone of those trailers is truly one of my biggest pet peeves, even if it is a petty complaint. It's just always so happy and positive and pandering that even though it's so simple, I think it does a lot to imply the general tone of Sims content we've gotten: always, always ALWAYS happy and cheery, no failure states, no struggles, just oh boy, life sure is grand as every Sim marches down the street with this huge ear-to-ear grin talking about how wonderful life is, and seeing that tone resonate within the trailers itself just always gave me the impression the Sims team has no interest in conflicts or failure states...which has been true, up until now.
This past trailer though? Sounds like Vlad just telling us about vampirism. Awesome. For all I care you could release an expansion pack about knitting and playing with kittens and I'd still prefer Vlad's tone.
For a lot of people, Toddlers being released was symbolic of things changing for the better. Wanna know my symbolic request? Change the tone of trailers. I'm not even asking to replace the poor girl, just don't include such a campy, pandering tone and I'll be more than happy. Yes it's a tiny request, yes it's not a big deal for a lot of people, but yes, I do think that tone drives off customers such as myself.
The tone of a trailer absolutely has an effect on sales: that's the entire purpose of them. Here we are, we have a trailer that lacks that same old pandering tone, and this is probably one of the most anticipated GPs you guys have produced. CLEARLY sales and consumer demand continues even without talking to us like children, so can we please take this opportunity to change the tone of trailers, too.
Thank you for listening to my needlessly petty request. If you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go binge watch Lazytown so I can learn to eat my veggies so I can be big and strong like Sportacus.
I'm sure she's a nice person and all and I have nothing against her actual voice or how it sounds, but the tone chosen for every trailer the Sims team has produced has reminded me of when I was like 6 and the teacher would read a story book to the class. The tone chosen for trailers has always been so pandering, it's just always off-putting when I as a 27 year old adult feel like I'm being spoken to like a child. I'm hardly this game's prime demographic seeing as I'm both male and in my late 20's, but man even if I were 16 or 14 I feel I wouldn't much care for the tone of past trailers, so I've never quite understood it. It just serves as this constant reminder that "maybe I shouldn't be playing this game since clearly I'm not their target demographic, I feel too old for this."
Her tone is forever ingrained in my mind. I can even write you a mock script of what the trailer would sound like if it was done with the traditional trailer style:
"Introducing the Sims 4 Vampires! In the Sims 4 Vampires, your Sims can live forever and live the nightlife to the fullest for a life of endless THRILLS AND CHILLS! Hungry for a snack? Just grab the nearest Sim and give them a bite! How about a Plasma fruit? MMMM, YUMMY! As your Sims practice their skills, they can become stronger and stronger vampires! But UH OH! your Sims gain new weaknesses as they become stronger and stronger vampires, too! BETTER PACK SOME SUNBLOCK! But watch out! The vampire hunters are on the prowl!"
WHHHHHYYYY am I capable of ad-libbing that? Oh right, because the tone of those trailers is truly one of my biggest pet peeves, even if it is a petty complaint. It's just always so happy and positive and pandering that even though it's so simple, I think it does a lot to imply the general tone of Sims content we've gotten: always, always ALWAYS happy and cheery, no failure states, no struggles, just oh boy, life sure is grand as every Sim marches down the street with this huge ear-to-ear grin talking about how wonderful life is, and seeing that tone resonate within the trailers itself just always gave me the impression the Sims team has no interest in conflicts or failure states...which has been true, up until now.
This past trailer though? Sounds like Vlad just telling us about vampirism. Awesome. For all I care you could release an expansion pack about knitting and playing with kittens and I'd still prefer Vlad's tone.
For a lot of people, Toddlers being released was symbolic of things changing for the better. Wanna know my symbolic request? Change the tone of trailers. I'm not even asking to replace the poor girl, just don't include such a campy, pandering tone and I'll be more than happy. Yes it's a tiny request, yes it's not a big deal for a lot of people, but yes, I do think that tone drives off customers such as myself.
The tone of a trailer absolutely has an effect on sales: that's the entire purpose of them. Here we are, we have a trailer that lacks that same old pandering tone, and this is probably one of the most anticipated GPs you guys have produced. CLEARLY sales and consumer demand continues even without talking to us like children, so can we please take this opportunity to change the tone of trailers, too.
Thank you for listening to my needlessly petty request. If you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go binge watch Lazytown so I can learn to eat my veggies so I can be big and strong like Sportacus.
"Who are you, that do not know your history?"
22
Comments
Ideas on how to improve babies.
This one or the old ones? Old ones were female, this one sounds like a voice you'd expect from Vlad.
Couple things
1st things first the target demographic comment is something I agree with. Being a 22 y/o straight male, I have never really felt like the game's targeted audience but I mean im not upset about it. I actually could care less, I love the game, I love EP's and I love this GP. I think the dev's work hard and are good designers (and good people). Thats really all that matters. Just thought it was an interesting topic, one I had never really considered.
Anyways.......back on point. That ad-lib is pretty spot on kinda scary actually. But all in all the old voice actor was pleasant to listen too. It seemed like they always got the key features of the pack out, and then added some positivity on top of it. I quite liked it.
With that being said though I feel like the voice over for this pack was fitting with the overall theme. It fit the narrative and the world they were trying to build, so I think it worked out quite well.
Like a spooky one for "spooky packs" (vampire, witches, supernatural)
Or if they did a pack that involved celebrities or something, a trailer that seemed like you were watching TMZ or Enews. Kinda like how they treated Get To Work when they had those videos that seemed acted as movie trailers (and the game had movie posters for them)
Just wanna be clear I didn't mean "how DARE I not be the target demographic!!!" Nah, I expect that. I think this has been a game targeted more towards women since AT LEAST Sims 3, and I've been fine with that. My point was more that there is a limit to how much I can feel alienated before it crosses the line from "I'm not the target, of course I don't like this," to a tone of "clearly they don't really care about me, so should I expect to see features that suit my needs? Should I just stop buying since I probably won't see features I like be created?" The trailers and that City Living promotional interactive map in particular both did that for me. (the promotional map basically had that Jordan girl from the trailer commenting on everything with this "OH. EM. GEE" tone that sounded like some stereotypical gossipy high school girl as she of course loved every inch of the city; felt like if THAT'S supposed to be the character to represent the player then wow I'm a veeeeery long way from home)
And yeah as I said, it's not like her voice is obnoxious or anything, it's just the chosen tone. They could easily use her again, just change the script a bit and direct her differently so that I don't feel like mommy is reading me a bed time story.
Ideas on how to improve babies.
I think his voice, tone, and inflection is as smooth as it is gravelly. Such perfect opposites.
By the end I was going, "Yeah, man. Just bite me. Whatever you need. Sounds great. Let's do this."
Well, you know what happens when you say "bite me" to a vampire...
My Mood:
Good voicework often feels rather underappreciated or undervalued, but when it's present? It can make a good scene great and be very much appreciated.
Good voicework is why I'd say random videos such as this one can somehow end up with 2 million hits despite being relatively obscure in the grand scope of Youtube vids:
Youtube subtitle option work for these videos (the synchronicity is slightly off, but the text comes up).
Ideas on how to improve babies.
Wow I didn't realize the videos weren't captioned! I hope they can start doing this for all future trailers/livestreams/etc. They have made such good moves forward with things like gender inclusiveness, adding captions for people with hearing impairment seems vital. I'm actually very surprised this isnt already being done. All simmers should have access to official release materials.
Oh look, a fan of Sportaflop.
Still, I have to say that I agree with you. I might even say that you have a Number One critic.
Ideas on how to improve babies.
This is my issue with the videos too. I was very happy to see subtitles on the last video.
There's so much content that they haven't shown it all yet. That could hardly be said for CL.
But yeah nail on the head. The Vlad trailer was much more palatable than the previous ones. And the powers trailer too!
I'm so freaking stoked for the powers and weaknesses system. That's the kind of content I have literally been STARVED for in the sims. I play Skyrim and Fallout and WoW and Diablo, so this is VERY WELCOME for me. Even my husband who doesn't care for anything past the first generation of sims agrees that the vampires look neat.
Neither of them changes the feeling of targeting a younger demographic in my view, not that I really care XD.
But it's a good effort that they at least tried to customize these details when marketing, which I really appreciate.