They should have used Unity 3D instead of this limited engine that we have now
well the excuse for this was "blaming" the simmers, saying which the simmer community is compused by "poor peoples" which can't afford to buy a "average pc" and can only have outdated pcs, cuz have a "average pc" is on maxis gurus language "too difficult and expensive", probably they "telemetry" must saying which the majority of fans still using modem 28800 dial kbps for internet , since simmers are soo poor , i really feel so bad fo it
Apparently, there were screenshots of this video that were released earlier this year, but now we have the video and some more info. People on Twitter are getting information from the devs website.
I'm posting what they post below:
Chi Chan talked about the UI in the Sims 4 and revealed new information about the original Sims 4 game.
I bolded the important parts.
The design of the UI for the Sims 4 changed many times throughout production, as the type of game the Sims 4 would be was forever changing. Originally, the UI had to be the same for three different types of gameplay styles, which meant developing a design that felt easy to use, while easily displaying different types of gameplay modes in a clear way. The Sims 4 was originally a different title, with a Story Mode, Online Mode and Freeplay Mode. The Story Mode was similar to that of the earlier Sims consoles games, which required different icons that wouldn't be available in Online Mode and Freeplay Mode. Story Mode would show different menus and icons showing game progress and unlocked items. Some aspects of Story Mode remain in the final game, such as the interface for accessing secret areas (which was originally a Story Mode exclusive, but ended up as Hidden Lots in the final game) and unlocking objects as you progress through Careers (which originally was there to unlock items in Story Mode as you progressed). Online Mode allowed players to play in a way that was again unique, and allowed you to create a single Sim and move them into a home. You could choose your friends as Neighbors and clicking on a friends house would include a UI format of moving a friend via their online account. This was completely removed in the final game. Online Mode was more of a virtual chatroom, and you compete with friends in certain activities, such as racing to reach a certain milestone in game, or completing goals the quickest. This came entirely with it's own UI. The final mode, Freeplay Mode, was a more traditional experience, but was more streamlined than the previous titles, as it was more of an extra gameplay mode built from the Story and Online mode, rather than a gameplay mode built from scratch. This meant that several icons from the Story and Online Mode were present in the UI, but greyed out and unclickable. As changes were made, and the game was left with just a Freeplay mode, the UI was streamlined to be more simple and required less icons, which at first meant the removal of a top panel for other gameplay modes. However as final touches were made, some of the icons from the bottom panel were made for a much smaller top panel.
EDIT: EA seem to have told him to remove this information (as always) and he has made the page private on his website: http://www.chichan.org/
The page talking about the Sims 4 UI has been private, but SimCity and other Sims 4 stuff is still there.
This was a really cool post; thanks for sharing. I wish that EA would just split the franchise entirely and have 3 divisions releasing on their own schedules: freeplay/open world, story/plot based play, and online play (or just keep their Sims Freeplay). I hope going forward that they avoid the whole mobile-online/PC hybrid game entirely. PC players get cheated.
When players said the game was never built as a traditional sims game, and instead a single-sim experience they were right. Sounds like they were originally developing a console game.
Exactly. EA/Maxis biggest problem is their customers weren't born yesterday and know a lot more than suits the company.
It's not like Single Sim games aren't popular though. They made a trilogy with the "Stories" games, and each console game has a single player story mode (except 3) and they all sold really well. The console games for Sims 2 outsold the PC game.
As of March 2012, The Sims 2 had sold 13 million across all platforms and six million on PC
All versions of the Sims 2 have a story mode as the focus except the PC version. And the Sims 4 started development in 2012 apparently.
Maybe EA used this data, and then backtracked when they realised what PC players wanted? The console version outsold the PC version, and there was two main differences between them.
- Only Young Adults
- Story Mode focused
This article honestly fills in a lot of blanks for me.
I FINALLY know at least why they had secret worlds that seemed so random haha.
Told You. I said in 2011 on the TS3 site TS4 was being built for iPads. Granted I had to use a site that used the April Fool's description but I was trying to get it out there. LOL I got blasted by several for using the site as proof which in turn had used the 'joke' description of it, but I was just trying to get out there what I knew without exposing what I knew. That it was being built for iPad and an online game. I wasn't privy to the story mode features. I took the heat because I knew one day it would eventually get exposed and other employees of EA eventually leaked more in 2013 just like this Chan has. But they also got blasted of being crazy and dishonest.
TS4 is scraps of how many changes it has gone through. The original game was dropped in mid production it began in 2010 and opted for a PC single player game instead. But TS4 was never built from the ground up as a PC game in the true tradition of the series. Or continuing the series.
The plot thickens. A lot of what is in this game as 'future content' was already planned and almost completed, but having to be reworked.
I think the Sims 4 was a PC game though. It wasn't for iPads. The UI isn't touch screen friendly, even in the earliest days. Plus the engine is too powerful.
I think it was always a PC game. Just never a true sequel. I don't even think the new iPad Pro could handle the Sims 4?
No the iPad can't handle this game but it certainly could handle what they had planned in 2010. The UI has been reworked several times as you pointed out. Frank Gibeau has an article (over EA at the time) about how they were determined to move on to console and online games for the new iPads somewhere on the internet concerning EA as a whole. This game was never planned to be for PC.
It was confirmed ny a dev, that the PC version was the primary version, like all games. Patrick Kelly confirmed this:
Q: If your mockups were for PC, why did you refer to them as being for a mobile game at one time?
A: The game I worked on was designed to be delivered on many platforms, PC being the primary platform. The different versions are usually developed together and typically the User Interface is the same across all platforms so the terms for the delivery platforms are inter-changeable.
Yes a cross over concept so you can pick it up and play across different platforms. Clearly they didn't have the expertise to make it work well yet.
It was a fact by F.G. they dropped Olympus because of the backlash of SC. He said it. However, it was a 'rumor' (from past employees) it was dropped in 2012 because the online gameplay wasn't working out how they wanted it to work. But it was as you say to cross over to pick up and play from many different platforms.
Yes they love those trends and pushing it whether it's requested from the customers or not. I'd prefer they had a standalone online game. Not a hybrid that compromises quality in case someone wants to play online.
Amen. Because only just scraping stuff together for this series is why TS4 is so lack luster and missing so many things. And no doubt why it is so linear and not the sandbox play we know and love. It still holds the old concepts of the original ideas in a lot of ways. And why it should never had the 4 put in the title.
ETA: It would really be funny if someday someone leaks this new 'group/clubs' idea was part of the Olympus and or Icarus, lol, and how we would have played with others in the online version. I would bet money that is also a part of the earlier game. I mean they worked on it for three years, you know it had some sort of gameplay in it by then. lol And I bet groups were part of it. So, more recycling for this game. No wonder people aren't getting the EP they want, like Generations, Pets, Seasons, Restaurants, etc. They are getting what was already there. Bet me money. LOL (Just reworked)
I think you might be on to something in your ETA part. Just as you think clubs/groups might have been an idea in the Olympus part, I also think the GTW might have been part also. If you remember in TSO, not only could you make money by making jam and other skills, you could also go to a "regular job". I think it was a factory of some sorts and a restaurant or diner type thing, maybe a another job like those, its been so long i cant remember for sure. but if you think about it, these GTW jobs could have easily been the new jobs for Olympus.
i agree i think sims 4 will be receiving recycled Olympus parts for a long, long time.
> @PootLovato said: > I wish TS4 wasn't part of the sims series. It would have been better if it was a stand alone game like urbz or medieval. As a stand a lone game I am a bit disappointed with the franchise.
Yes i agree, It has a really different feel from the previous games But im still happy we have it!
@JoAnne65 Wow, thanks for that information. That is interesting. I completely see what he was saying. The grass in their demo would have caused a lot of lag for any computer, as well as trying to use dynamic lighting. Not sure why he had to word it as "the vast majority of our players would never see it as their machine specs are not high enough." That dev build would have been unplayable on even a high end machine given the population of ground cover in the example, and as he mentioned, the lighting update each frame.
User 'specs' is a little misleading, but (how the engine is rendering the dynamic lighting, and how much you-the designer- are tasking the scene with loading at the time, combined with the user computer) -- that is the whole picture. How many verts and tris at runtime and during each frame update, ect.. Which of course he wouldn't go into, but he can't really put the burden on 'most-users', as he was referring to the grasses and lighting, both of which are expensive on the user's computer.
So basically, just picking on his comment. Sorry, SimGuruMeatball.
@JoAnne65 Wow, thanks for that information. That is interesting. I completely see what he was saying. The grass in their demo would have caused a lot of lag for any computer, as well as trying to use dynamic lighting. Not sure why he had to word it as "the vast majority of our players would never see it as their machine specs are not high enough." That dev build would have been unplayable on even a high end machine given the population of ground cover in the example, and as he mentioned, the lighting update each frame.
User 'specs' is a little misleading, but (how the engine is rendering the dynamic lighting, and how much you-the designer- are tasking the scene with loading at the time, combined with the user computer) -- that is the whole picture. How many verts and tris at runtime and during each frame update, ect.. Which of course he wouldn't go into, but he can't really put the burden on 'most-users', as he was referring to the grasses and lighting, both of which are expensive on the user's computer.
So basically, just picking on his comment. Sorry, SimGuruMeatball.
The odd thing about some of that statement is that one of the gurus, might have been Lindsay, told us there would be dynamic lighting about a year before release. That was one of the things I was most excited about. I remember because when I actually saw the game in action, it was nothing like they said. The lighting is an upgrade from previous games, but it is nowhere near how she said it would be. I have to do a search and see if I can dig up her quote.
Actually, they were misleading about a lot of things.
And just because this irks me the most, they said this about the simulation. One of the gurus claimed to have seen an angry sim in a wedding dress storm across the park. He implied that she must have just been left at the alter. That was a factor in why I purchased the game. I thought...OK, the townies can propose on their own and go through the motions of throwing an actual wedding...and we'd be able to do that in the open space. Hurrah! But alas, none of that was even remotely true. What he saw was the bug in which townies wore ridiculous clothing all the time and bipolar emotions at play. Nothing more.
Than I wondered...has anyone that worked on this game actually played it? Because they were/still are clueless about it 99% of the time.
@JoAnne65 Wow, thanks for that information. That is interesting. I completely see what he was saying. The grass in their demo would have caused a lot of lag for any computer, as well as trying to use dynamic lighting. Not sure why he had to word it as "the vast majority of our players would never see it as their machine specs are not high enough." That dev build would have been unplayable on even a high end machine given the population of ground cover in the example, and as he mentioned, the lighting update each frame.
User 'specs' is a little misleading, but (how the engine is rendering the dynamic lighting, and how much you-the designer- are tasking the scene with loading at the time, combined with the user computer) -- that is the whole picture. How many verts and tris at runtime and during each frame update, ect.. Which of course he wouldn't go into, but he can't really put the burden on 'most-users', as he was referring to the grasses and lighting, both of which are expensive on the user's computer.
So basically, just picking on his comment. Sorry, SimGuruMeatball.
The odd thing about some of that statement is that one of the gurus, might have been Lindsay, told us there would be dynamic lighting about a year before release. That was one of the things I was most excited about. I remember because when I actually saw the game in action, it was nothing like they said. The lighting is an upgrade from previous games, but it is nowhere near how she said it would be. I have to do a search and see if I can dig up her quote.
Actually, they were misleading about a lot of things.
And just because this irks me the most, they said this about the simulation. One of the gurus claimed to have seen an angry sim in a wedding dress storm across the park. He implied that she must have just been left at the alter. That was a factor in why I purchased the game. I thought...OK, the townies can propose on their own and go through the motions of throwing an actual wedding...and we'd be able to do that in the open space. Hurrah! But alas, none of that was even remotely true. What he saw was the bug in which townies wore ridiculous clothing all the time and bipolar emotions at play. Nothing more.
Than I wondered...has anyone that worked on this game actually played it? Because they were/still are clueless about it 99% of the time.
The lighting is an upgrade in some departments, but a definite downgrade in others. Inside houses the lighting doesn't function properly on the sims. The sims are often too dark and when they do catch light they're kind of yellowish. The invisible lamp, my faithful companion in 3, is a disaster in 4.
Outside lighting is better. On the other hand... not always. Outside ligting in Sims 3 can be pretty amazing too. It's not so good in the middle of the day, but quite beautiful in the mornings and the evenings. And the lighting accompanying the types of weather often is amazing.
I prefer the lighting in sims 3 in most cases. The issue(s) I have with 4 is a lot of the lights don't light enough space even on max. Since the lighting "cast" is supposed to be realistic, i get it. Then the issue becomes that the invisible lights still do not work correctly and you end up with a bunch of saucer (or other) lights in an attempt to keep things from being so dark.
Maybe a reason some of your guys sims are looking yellow inside is because by default all, if not most lights default to "off white" and "yellow", i usually prefer to set mine to neutral , but sometimes that can make things look "dead", so it's "good" to have more than one light in a room and have the lights at different frequencies and colors. (more work than should be needed)
The lighting usually bothers me with furniture, (as opposed to sims) especially when you see the difference of outside and inside. I actually prefer the outside lighting in this game to its inside counterpart.
@JoAnne65 Wow, thanks for that information. That is interesting. I completely see what he was saying. The grass in their demo would have caused a lot of lag for any computer, as well as trying to use dynamic lighting. Not sure why he had to word it as "the vast majority of our players would never see it as their machine specs are not high enough." That dev build would have been unplayable on even a high end machine given the population of ground cover in the example, and as he mentioned, the lighting update each frame.
User 'specs' is a little misleading, but (how the engine is rendering the dynamic lighting, and how much you-the designer- are tasking the scene with loading at the time, combined with the user computer) -- that is the whole picture. How many verts and tris at runtime and during each frame update, ect.. Which of course he wouldn't go into, but he can't really put the burden on 'most-users', as he was referring to the grasses and lighting, both of which are expensive on the user's computer.
So basically, just picking on his comment. Sorry, SimGuruMeatball.
The odd thing about some of that statement is that one of the gurus, might have been Lindsay, told us there would be dynamic lighting about a year before release. That was one of the things I was most excited about. I remember because when I actually saw the game in action, it was nothing like they said. The lighting is an upgrade from previous games, but it is nowhere near how she said it would be. I have to do a search and see if I can dig up her quote.
Actually, they were misleading about a lot of things.
And just because this irks me the most, they said this about the simulation. One of the gurus claimed to have seen an angry sim in a wedding dress storm across the park. He implied that she must have just been left at the alter. That was a factor in why I purchased the game. I thought...OK, the townies can propose on their own and go through the motions of throwing an actual wedding...and we'd be able to do that in the open space. Hurrah! But alas, none of that was even remotely true. What he saw was the bug in which townies wore ridiculous clothing all the time and bipolar emotions at play. Nothing more.
Than I wondered...has anyone that worked on this game actually played it? Because they were/still are clueless about it 99% of the time.
The lighting is an upgrade in some departments, but a definite downgrade in others. Inside houses the lighting doesn't function properly on the sims. The sims are often too dark and when they do catch light they're kind of yellowish. The invisible lamp, my faithful companion in 3, is a disaster in 4.
Outside lighting is better. On the other hand... not always. Outside ligting in Sims 3 can be pretty amazing too. It's not so good in the middle of the day, but quite beautiful in the mornings and the evenings. And the lighting accompanying the types of weather often is amazing.
Oh, I agree. I really dislike the lighting inside. The only real upgrade to the whole system is how light can span multiple levels. That is the big upgrade for the whole series. Other than that, I think the lights are awful. I really hate the way it changes the color of furniture. Not to mention how it messes with the Sims face color.
I prefer the lighting in sims 3 in most cases. The issue(s) I have with 4 is a lot of the lights don't light enough space even on max. Since the lighting "cast" is supposed to be realistic, i get it. Then the issue becomes that the invisible lights still do not work correctly and you end up with a bunch of saucer (or other) lights in an attempt to keep things from being so dark.
Maybe a reason some of your guys sims are looking yellow inside is because by default all, if not most lights default to "off white" and "yellow", i usually prefer to set mine to neutral , but sometimes that can make things look "dead", so it's "good" to have more than one light in a room and have the lights at different frequencies and colors. (more work then should be needed)
The lighting usually bothers me with furniture, (as opposed to sims) especially when you see the difference of outside and inside. I actually prefer the outside lighting in this game to it's inside counterpart.
Thanks, I may try that. In Sims 3 I always change white into flame by the way. That light is a bit warmer but not too orange or yellow.
I prefer the lighting in sims 3 in most cases. The issue(s) I have with 4 is a lot of the lights don't light enough space even on max. Since the lighting "cast" is supposed to be realistic, i get it. Then the issue becomes that the invisible lights still do not work correctly and you end up with a bunch of saucer (or other) lights in an attempt to keep things from being so dark.
Maybe a reason some of your guys sims are looking yellow inside is because by default all, if not most lights default to "off white" and "yellow", i usually prefer to set mine to neutral , but sometimes that can make things look "dead", so it's "good" to have more than one light in a room and have the lights at different frequencies and colors. (more work then should be needed)
The lighting usually bothers me with furniture, (as opposed to sims) especially when you see the difference of outside and inside. I actually prefer the outside lighting in this game to it's inside counterpart.
Thanks, I may try that. In Sims 3 I always change white into flame by the way. That light is a bit warmer but not too orange or yellow.
Thanks for the sims 3 lighting tip. I don't tend to mind it in game play (i also use a brntwaffle lighting mod so maybe i've gotten used to some things) but, when taking sim pictures inside I do tend to set the invisible lights up like a studio. So, now that I think of it, I'll have to try the "flame" setting on the normal lights and see the difference it makes. Haven't really gotten around to finding my perfect settings there, so that'll help.
I prefer the lighting in sims 3 in most cases. The issue(s) I have with 4 is a lot of the lights don't light enough space even on max. Since the lighting "cast" is supposed to be realistic, i get it. Then the issue becomes that the invisible lights still do not work correctly and you end up with a bunch of saucer (or other) lights in an attempt to keep things from being so dark.
Maybe a reason some of your guys sims are looking yellow inside is because by default all, if not most lights default to "off white" and "yellow", i usually prefer to set mine to neutral , but sometimes that can make things look "dead", so it's "good" to have more than one light in a room and have the lights at different frequencies and colors. (more work then should be needed)
The lighting usually bothers me with furniture, (as opposed to sims) especially when you see the difference of outside and inside. I actually prefer the outside lighting in this game to it's inside counterpart.
Thanks, I may try that. In Sims 3 I always change white into flame by the way. That light is a bit warmer but not too orange or yellow.
Thanks for the sims 3 lighting tip. I don't tend to mind it in game play (i also use a brntwaffle lighting mod so maybe i've gotten used to some things) but, when taking sim pictures inside I do tend to set the invisible lights up like a studio. So, now that I think of it, I'll have to try the "flame" setting on the normal lights and see the difference it makes. Haven't really gotten around to finding my perfect settings there, so that'll help.
I don't mind while playing either, but for taking pictures it just looks better when you play with light a bit.
Yes, those invisible lights are really great. I hope they'll really succeed in improving that for 4. Lighting indoors already has improved btw. I really think it was worse in the beginning.
You might be satisfied with paying the price for AAA game that were not given an AAA game but many of us are not. As far as I'm concerned for a game to be called a life simulation game it has to include all stages of life like previous sims games.
If this is your opinion/vision about the game, I am fine with that. However to me TS4 already feels like a AAA title. Also I really do not care for toddlers at all, so nope, toddlers are not necessarily an element I consider a "core" feature for "my" (!) life sim. I am sure many people will disagree. No problem.
Funny. That's how I feel about young adults. I'd be perfectly fine if they took "young adult" out from the life stages and never included them again. I don't see the need for them and I'm glad Sims 2 stuck them to university (though the downside is they get a bad memory for not attending university; ugh!). Yet I'm pretty sure if the YA stage was taken out, people would be angry too. Oh, well. That's not my problem. I got mine. Everybody else can kick rocks.
Selfish, isn't it?
You want to play kids and wrinkled sims ?
Che cosa?! No! I meant only the young adult stage, not adulthood entirely!
In my game the young adults are the young attractive ones. When they become adult they get wrinkles. If I really had to choose I'd rather skip A and keep YA. But I don't, I think it's a good thing a 20 year old in the game doesn't look the same as a 50 year old. The leap between a YA and an elder would feel just as odd to me as the leap from baby to ten year old. I don't see a difference there.
the first 10 years of the Sims there was no YA full play life stage. We only got the YA life stage as an equal life stage in Sims 3. In Sims 2 YA's were only allowed in UNI and could not have kids, get married or do anything out side of Uni towns. So we actually only got used to them in Sims 3 and I still never let a Sims 3 YA have kids - they were just glorified teens in my game with the ability to focus on career and dating and just having fun. Maxis made the lifestage to represent 19- 32 year olds, so the Ads were 33 - the early 50's, not the wrinkly ages really, and the fact Sims could have babies up until 6 days before they turned elders - meant none of the Sim Ads were over 54/55 seeing they could have children. Maxis even added fertility treatments in Sims 3 to help those in their late 40's and early 50's to have a baby and did make it harder to impossible for any sims within their last few days of adult hood to conceive. They slack of course in Sims 4 - which is nutty to me, but was much more sensible in Sims 3 where we could also make the epic aging and extend it with slider. We often did request a middle age though, where sims did wrinkle, and had no ability to have kids period, as Sims adults are not supposed to be wrinkly and considered old - so you could say that is another life stage the game - for reality sakes could be served well to have added. We could use more life stages if anything - not less. As the Sims 4 elder stage actually looks like that stage I feel that is missing to represent the still very youthful, but wrinkling 55 - 70 year olds which again also should not have kids - at least the human females anyway. I suppose if one started with Sims 3 - they just assume the YA's were always in the game - when as I said they only were a full fledged sim in Sims 3 - so some of us playing for 15 years - still find it odd to think of them as the main sims stage - which to me always fell on the Sims Adults. Think of it this way a YA of 19 has a baby and 3 days later that baby is 10 and the YA is still 19. No wonder the game has incest - that is saying it is okay for a 9 year old to have a baby apparently. I am not comfortable with that - so Sims 3 and Sims 4 YA did not have babies in my game at least until they were at least half way through the YA age in Sims 3 and near the end of the ya stage in Sims 4. Even then, I only had one baby born in Sims 4 and totally got so freaked out by the 10 year coming out of the bassinet just like it freaked me out in Sims 1 - maybe worse seeing I grew used to having them turn to toddlers for 10 years - that I never tried playing with families since. LOL. It's just unnatural and no amount of reminding me it is just a game will change that. A lot about sims is unnatural - but none are as shocking as that.
I think I understand the confusion now, maybe it's the people who are used to Sims 2 who are having a problem with the concept of YA because they couldn't make the move to Sims 3? Because young adults look completely mature to me in the game and quite capable of raising kids. The adults look over 40 to me and I like it that way in my game. But of course I started playing this game with S3, so I never realized it wasn't like that always.
I prefer the way adulthood is divided in two in Sims 3 and 4. I remember reading a Sims 2 story once, where the father of the main character looked like a boy to me and I never really understood (having never played Sims 2 back then myself and my Sims 2 family now is still young). There just were no real adults (people over 40) in the game. There were teens, college students (called YA) and young adults (called adults).
Adulthood lasts from 20-60. I think that demands two life stages - and we're free what ages we like to put on those life stages - and I consider this an improvement in the franchise if it wasn't like that before. I honestly fail to see why we should need seperate life stages for 12-15 (preteens) and 15-19 (teens) but not for the adults. When I play a 45 year old woman, I want her to look like 45, not 20. I wouldn't mind if they'd give the stages other names if that would help (adult and middle-aged for instance, or Barney and Fred for all I care if it would help getting rid of the association from how things were in Sims 2), but two life stages in adulthood is something I'd most definitely defend under all circumstances. Because it literally adds depth to my game if I'm able to see whether I'm playing with a young man/woman or with a more mature man/woman. I'd miss adults/middle-aged sims just as much as I miss toddlers. And pre-teens in Sims 4 because teens don't look like teens.
Technically a pre-teen means before they turn teen - it is the small stage of life many kids enter early puberty - from age 10-12. Once a child reaches 13 - then they are considered teens. 13-18 is teen. Ya stage nowadays is considered 19- 32, adult is 33-48, middle age 49-63 )this has raised dramatically over the last 30 or so years as it used to be 40-52), golden agers 64 - 74, elders 75 -99, then centennials (Centenarians - depends on where you are from) 100 and up - at least in biology which of course has changed these terms several times over the last 200 years - lol - but also many of those ages are missing in the Sims. Adult in the sims are only considered through the early 50's seeing they make the females no longer able to bear children 6 days before turning elder - so could not be 64. I honestly have no inking of what it is in Sims 4 - as they really didn't say other than there was mention from I think it might have been Ryan or Grant about the child age starts at 10 as an answer to why there was no baby sitter needed in Sims 4 - as many thought the child looked 8 and I guess it was an issue. Of course that is making the infant turn to a pre-teen technically and even worse than it just being a child. If it could be worse anyway - just the fact a 10 year or even an 8 year old comes to existence in 3 days of life is ludicrous... to me anyway.
I'm always kind of struggling how to 'translate' the stages. For me it's:
I know that doesn't make sense when it comes to having kids for women but I decided to dismiss that as a detail
The perfect Sims game for me would be: baby (Freeplay style combined with Sims 2), toddler (doing stuff 5 year olds do), kids, pre-teens, teens, adults, middle-aged (no pregnancies for women anymore half way), elders.
The toddler can be 3-5 for me in Sims Freeplay. Preteens 11-14. Teens 15-17. I like this idea.
seen things like Sim hair and clothing designed with physics in TS4, in addition to that.
Dynamic clothing and hair is sadly a long way out still for games in general. There are very few games out there that even tries it, mostly on console and even then it's very very limited.
Are you kidding me? Dude, you seriously need to play more games. Practically all modern games feature dynamic hair, and clothing physics to some extent. The average game renders photorealistic gameplay at 60 frames per second on both console and PC. GTA 5, Batman:Arkham Knight, Dragon Age: inquisition, Alien: Isolation, Saints Row 4, Mad Max....you get the idea. The Sims franchise seems to be perpetually running 2 generations behind in all technical aspects, despite being one of EA's biggest sellers. Bethesda's Creation Engine is better suited for running a life simulation than Maxis's engine. This has easily been proven with mods that can replicate the vast majority of Sims gamplay, within the creation engine, with advanced physics, lighting, and still running the original Skyrim scripts.
I don't mean to come off as hostile, so excuse me, but the problem isn't the average gamers PC specs. It's poor engine design. Valve's Steam service frequently complies average gamer specs and they a far greater than the specs Sims 4 aimed for.
Post edited by tonicmole on
What's the deal with the creepy Sim in the yellow shirt, and glasses? The one right up there! I'm guessing what ever he is it starts with "serial".
seen things like Sim hair and clothing designed with physics in TS4, in addition to that.
Dynamic clothing and hair is sadly a long way out still for games in general. There are very few games out there that even tries it, mostly on console and even then it's very very limited.
Are you kidding me? Dude, you seriously need to play more games. Practically all modern games feature dynamic hair, and clothing physics to some extent. The average game renders photorealistic gameplay at 60 frames per second on both console and PC. GTA 5, Batman:Arkham Knight, Dragon Age: inquisition, Alien: Isolation, Saints Row 4, Mad Max....you get the idea. The Sims franchise seems to be perpetually running 2 generations behind in all technical aspects, despite being one of EA's biggest sellers. Bethesda's Creation Engine is better suited for running a life simulation than Maxis's engine. This has easily been proven with mods that can replicate the vast majority of Sims gamplay, within the creation engine, with advanced physics, lighting, and still running the original Skyrim scripts.
I don't mean to come off as hostile, so excuse me, but the problem isn't the average gamers PC specs. It's poor engine design. Valve's Steam service frequently complies average gamer specs and they a far greater than the specs Sims 4 aimed for.
yeah it's a sad truth, looks like really maxis develop team is clueless about game market and just keep doing the "old style job", making cheap games with poor excuses, even starcraft 2 have dinamic hairs and cloths(with microscopic characters).
One thing is when you have a game developer team working to make true games another is when you hve a bunch of peoples trying to make easy money from they "poor" fans which can be easy fooled by shine and cute things.
seen things like Sim hair and clothing designed with physics in TS4, in addition to that.
Dynamic clothing and hair is sadly a long way out still for games in general. There are very few games out there that even tries it, mostly on console and even then it's very very limited.
Are you kidding me? Dude, you seriously need to play more games. Practically all modern games feature dynamic hair, and clothing physics to some extent. The average game renders photorealistic gameplay at 60 frames per second on both console and PC. GTA 5, Batman:Arkham Knight, Dragon Age: inquisition, Alien: Isolation, Saints Row 4, Mad Max....you get the idea. The Sims franchise seems to be perpetually running 2 generations behind in all technical aspects, despite being one of EA's biggest sellers. Bethesda's Creation Engine is better suited for running a life simulation than Maxis's engine. This has easily been proven with mods that can replicate the vast majority of Sims gamplay, within the creation engine, with advanced physics, lighting, and still running the original Skyrim scripts.
I don't mean to come off as hostile, so excuse me, but the problem isn't the average gamers PC specs. It's poor engine design. Valve's Steam service frequently complies average gamer specs and they a far greater than the specs Sims 4 aimed for.
The problem probably really stems from the engine not being created for a traditional sims game and given the same sort of proper development time for this. Instead them wasting years on an online game then switching to salvage the engine on a very tight self imposed time limit for a slightly more traditional sims game to try to rescue it has probably significantly harmed the end product.
Sims 4 executable is 32bit.
It can't grab more than 4 Gb of RAM, and even that is questionable.
Fancy graphics in new games need more RAM, and that means 64bit exe. Those who know and those who don't, last year's Gamespot GOTY (Divinity: Original Sin) got it's EE version a few days back. With fancier graphics - but also 64bit only exe!
So yea, early Sims 4 builds probably used more details. But in the development process, someone decided the game has to sacrifice visuals for sakes of old machines. I?m sure I'll get some hate on me again for saying it, but Sims 4 feels like a game from past decade, not like a modern PC game.
Which is, IMO, sad.
PC games should look like PC games, not like tablet games.
The process didn't stop there. Another sad thing is that EA merged Sims with phone development. Even a newborn child could understand that you can't do a core game on phones - there will always be watering and dumbing down stuff there.
I really hope Sims 4 is not the last life sim game made by EA. But honestly, I don't (want to) buy phonegames on my PC.
@JoxerTM22 what's sad is TS2 was from a past decade and it has incredible depth and fun in comparison. Just because it used old tech doesn't mean it had to be so empty of features. That was all to do with releasing unfinished.
Totally with you on mobile/pc. I'm not interested in a mobile depth sims game for my PC. Yawn.
Comments
well the excuse for this was "blaming" the simmers, saying which the simmer community is compused by "poor peoples" which can't afford to buy a "average pc" and can only have outdated pcs, cuz have a "average pc" is on maxis gurus language "too difficult and expensive", probably they "telemetry" must saying which the majority of fans still using modem 28800 dial kbps for internet
This was a really cool post; thanks for sharing. I wish that EA would just split the franchise entirely and have 3 divisions releasing on their own schedules: freeplay/open world, story/plot based play, and online play (or just keep their Sims Freeplay). I hope going forward that they avoid the whole mobile-online/PC hybrid game entirely. PC players get cheated.
I think you might be on to something in your ETA part. Just as you think clubs/groups might have been an idea in the Olympus part, I also think the GTW might have been part also. If you remember in TSO, not only could you make money by making jam and other skills, you could also go to a "regular job". I think it was a factory of some sorts and a restaurant or diner type thing, maybe a another job like those, its been so long i cant remember for sure. but if you think about it, these GTW jobs could have easily been the new jobs for Olympus.
i agree i think sims 4 will be receiving recycled Olympus parts for a long, long time.
> I wish TS4 wasn't part of the sims series. It would have been better if it was a stand alone game like urbz or medieval. As a stand a lone game I am a bit disappointed with the franchise.
Yes i agree, It has a really different feel from the previous games
But im still happy we have it!
User 'specs' is a little misleading, but (how the engine is rendering the dynamic lighting, and how much you-the designer- are tasking the scene with loading at the time, combined with the user computer) -- that is the whole picture. How many verts and tris at runtime and during each frame update, ect.. Which of course he wouldn't go into, but he can't really put the burden on 'most-users', as he was referring to the grasses and lighting, both of which are expensive on the user's computer.
So basically, just picking on his comment. Sorry, SimGuruMeatball.
The odd thing about some of that statement is that one of the gurus, might have been Lindsay, told us there would be dynamic lighting about a year before release. That was one of the things I was most excited about. I remember because when I actually saw the game in action, it was nothing like they said. The lighting is an upgrade from previous games, but it is nowhere near how she said it would be. I have to do a search and see if I can dig up her quote.
Actually, they were misleading about a lot of things.
And just because this irks me the most, they said this about the simulation. One of the gurus claimed to have seen an angry sim in a wedding dress storm across the park. He implied that she must have just been left at the alter. That was a factor in why I purchased the game. I thought...OK, the townies can propose on their own and go through the motions of throwing an actual wedding...and we'd be able to do that in the open space. Hurrah! But alas, none of that was even remotely true. What he saw was the bug in which townies wore ridiculous clothing all the time and bipolar emotions at play. Nothing more.
Than I wondered...has anyone that worked on this game actually played it? Because they were/still are clueless about it 99% of the time.
Outside lighting is better. On the other hand... not always. Outside ligting in Sims 3 can be pretty amazing too. It's not so good in the middle of the day, but quite beautiful in the mornings and the evenings. And the lighting accompanying the types of weather often is amazing.
Maybe a reason some of your guys sims are looking yellow inside is because by default all, if not most lights default to "off white" and "yellow", i usually prefer to set mine to neutral , but sometimes that can make things look "dead", so it's "good" to have more than one light in a room and have the lights at different frequencies and colors. (more work than should be needed)
The lighting usually bothers me with furniture, (as opposed to sims) especially when you see the difference of outside and inside. I actually prefer the outside lighting in this game to its inside counterpart.
*There's nothing wrong with loving the Sims 4, there's also nothing wrong with seeking improvements.
A list of Mods I use.|My Sims 4 Mod and CC "Master" post. Helpful Links included.
Oh, I agree. I really dislike the lighting inside. The only real upgrade to the whole system is how light can span multiple levels. That is the big upgrade for the whole series. Other than that, I think the lights are awful. I really hate the way it changes the color of furniture. Not to mention how it messes with the Sims face color.
@SimGuruMeatball
About sims that are not affected by outside shadows?
Thanks for the sims 3 lighting tip. I don't tend to mind it in game play (i also use a brntwaffle lighting mod so maybe i've gotten used to some things) but, when taking sim pictures inside I do tend to set the invisible lights up like a studio. So, now that I think of it, I'll have to try the "flame" setting on the normal lights and see the difference it makes. Haven't really gotten around to finding my perfect settings there, so that'll help.
*There's nothing wrong with loving the Sims 4, there's also nothing wrong with seeking improvements.
A list of Mods I use.|My Sims 4 Mod and CC "Master" post. Helpful Links included.
Yes, those invisible lights are really great. I hope they'll really succeed in improving that for 4. Lighting indoors already has improved btw. I really think it was worse in the beginning.
The toddler can be 3-5 for me in Sims Freeplay. Preteens 11-14. Teens 15-17. I like this idea.
Are you kidding me? Dude, you seriously need to play more games. Practically all modern games feature dynamic hair, and clothing physics to some extent. The average game renders photorealistic gameplay at 60 frames per second on both console and PC. GTA 5, Batman:Arkham Knight, Dragon Age: inquisition, Alien: Isolation, Saints Row 4, Mad Max....you get the idea. The Sims franchise seems to be perpetually running 2 generations behind in all technical aspects, despite being one of EA's biggest sellers. Bethesda's Creation Engine is better suited for running a life simulation than Maxis's engine. This has easily been proven with mods that can replicate the vast majority of Sims gamplay, within the creation engine, with advanced physics, lighting, and still running the original Skyrim scripts.
I don't mean to come off as hostile, so excuse me, but the problem isn't the average gamers PC specs. It's poor engine design. Valve's Steam service frequently complies average gamer specs and they a far greater than the specs Sims 4 aimed for.
EA didn't. You'll find most things to do with Olympus in particular EA try to keep very quiet.
https://twitter.com/sparkfairy1
yeah it's a sad truth, looks like really maxis develop team is clueless about game market and just keep doing the "old style job", making cheap games with poor excuses, even starcraft 2 have dinamic hairs and cloths(with microscopic characters).
One thing is when you have a game developer team working to make true games another is when you hve a bunch of peoples trying to make easy money from they "poor" fans which can be easy fooled by shine and cute things.
The problem probably really stems from the engine not being created for a traditional sims game and given the same sort of proper development time for this. Instead them wasting years on an online game then switching to salvage the engine on a very tight self imposed time limit for a slightly more traditional sims game to try to rescue it has probably significantly harmed the end product.
https://twitter.com/sparkfairy1
It can't grab more than 4 Gb of RAM, and even that is questionable.
Fancy graphics in new games need more RAM, and that means 64bit exe. Those who know and those who don't, last year's Gamespot GOTY (Divinity: Original Sin) got it's EE version a few days back. With fancier graphics - but also 64bit only exe!
So yea, early Sims 4 builds probably used more details. But in the development process, someone decided the game has to sacrifice visuals for sakes of old machines. I?m sure I'll get some hate on me again for saying it, but Sims 4 feels like a game from past decade, not like a modern PC game.
Which is, IMO, sad.
PC games should look like PC games, not like tablet games.
The process didn't stop there. Another sad thing is that EA merged Sims with phone development. Even a newborn child could understand that you can't do a core game on phones - there will always be watering and dumbing down stuff there.
I really hope Sims 4 is not the last life sim game made by EA. But honestly, I don't (want to) buy phonegames on my PC.
Totally with you on mobile/pc. I'm not interested in a mobile depth sims game for my PC. Yawn.
https://twitter.com/sparkfairy1