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Dear Sims team, do you want to take a break?
SimmerGeorge
Posts: 2,724 Member
This is a genuine suggestion of mine. I think you guys have blinders on right now. For a long time it seems you've been releasing and releasing content that is not really groundbreaking. Even the packs that were well-recieved could have been much more.
It seems like you release so much that you have stopped taking time to reflect, listen to the feedback, get inspired. You don't have to release so much DLC.
The game feels like a train that has taken the wrong route and someone needs to pull that emergency brake and steer it in the right direction. I would suggest you stop, get off social media, try to empathize and understand the customers, reflect on what went wrong and what went right in the past 6 years and then have a meeting to discuss the future of the franchise. Take the time.
And please do not misunderstand the fans and the criticism. Some Simmers in the community are bad at expressing it without being rude so I understand the frustration but I think you also need to understand that it all comes from a place of love for the game and the franchise and it's a way to tell you "We believe you have the ability to do better!". Sometimes it's not expressed in the nicest way but this is what it comes down to.
Also if you are looking for better feedback that is (many times) constructive then come to the forums. Get off twitter and Instagram. There is no better place to connect with us than the official fan forums you made for us.
I hope that you are well and healthy and I hope you can take the time to process everything that has happened this year, good and bad and make some sense out of it.
It seems like you release so much that you have stopped taking time to reflect, listen to the feedback, get inspired. You don't have to release so much DLC.
The game feels like a train that has taken the wrong route and someone needs to pull that emergency brake and steer it in the right direction. I would suggest you stop, get off social media, try to empathize and understand the customers, reflect on what went wrong and what went right in the past 6 years and then have a meeting to discuss the future of the franchise. Take the time.
And please do not misunderstand the fans and the criticism. Some Simmers in the community are bad at expressing it without being rude so I understand the frustration but I think you also need to understand that it all comes from a place of love for the game and the franchise and it's a way to tell you "We believe you have the ability to do better!". Sometimes it's not expressed in the nicest way but this is what it comes down to.
Also if you are looking for better feedback that is (many times) constructive then come to the forums. Get off twitter and Instagram. There is no better place to connect with us than the official fan forums you made for us.
I hope that you are well and healthy and I hope you can take the time to process everything that has happened this year, good and bad and make some sense out of it.
Where's my Sims 5 squad at?
Post edited by EA_Rtas on
76
Comments
I am worried that they are trying too much to make the game into something else. If you want to make this game into a trend simulator, an adventure simulator a story teller tool...then you have to make sure that the game can support it, otherwise we are going to end up with a game that is just lacking in everything.
So many games go down because they try to be everything instead of doing the thing that they know how to do well.
I don't know what truly goes on at Maxis/EA, so I can't play armchair know-it-all and tell them what they need to do. All I know is I'm disappointed things aren't as they used to be.
It's normal though if they feel out of it and uninspired/impassioned, for both new and old employees.
I wouldn't mind putting a pause to the mediocre packs being pumped out (not like I've been buying any recently, last thing I got was Strangerville and I didn't even play it lol), but EA wouldn't approve that so, technically, yea it's not a solution.
They have a problem at Maxis, they just have to figure out what it is because the game's genuinely hollow and doesn't feel like a 'AAA' game or even a 'live-service'.
WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?
Yeah but I think with the Sims 2 and at least for a big chunk of The Sims 3 they had a clearer vision and were going in a good direction. When you release a game like the Sims 4 that got so much criticism, maybe you need to stop and think why are people reacting that way what happened here?
In short, "if it ain't broke don't fix it" but "if it broke then you better grab your tool bag, find the cause of the issue and make sure it doesn't happen again". How are you going to take a dump in a clogged toilet?
I am angry, and I am hurt. I’ve been playing the a Sims since I was a kid, I’ve been there for every base game launch, and nearly every expansion launch, I watched this game blow up into what it is today. I think I have the right to be sad and feel a little like the red headed step child.
Exactly. Pick a lane.
I think they try to innovate too much, they try to do the big and the unexpected too much and they end up missing the mark and alienating most of their audience. Sometimes its better to just do the more obvious packs which they already know people enjoy and build on what people already like.
The Sims 2 University, Open for business. The Sims 3 Ambitions, World adventures, Late night. The Sims 4 seasons.
I consider these groundbreaking or close to that because they either added something completely new and executed it flawlessly or took an older concept and evolved it into something spectacular.
But I want to close this here because this is not what the thread is supposed to be about.
for the sake of this, i’d say Eco Lifestyle was groundbreaking in some sense
Oh okay, it was mentioned in your second sentence in the OP so I thought it was part of the discussion. I see players say it sometimes but brush off some of the things I would consider groundbreaking, so I was genuinely curious.
I'll leave it at that and move along to respect your thread.
I think the "clearer version" stuff you're referring to is a problem that rooted in The Sims 4's original vision to be a multiplayer-focused game. TS3: University Life, (released IN 2013!!!) showed the infamous blue and green plumbob statue (with the description hinting it was a sign of what's to come) in B/B mode. The blue plumbob was a significant symbol of the original, multiplayer The Sims 4, and represented other players like you. So, if an item like that was thrown in on an expansion which released March of 2013, it tells us they were really rolling with the multiplayer plans possibly as late as ~1.5-2 years before The Sims 4 released late 2014.
Fragmented base game which was not helped one bit by lackluster future DLC releases. I'm not saying The Sims 4 is entirely bad, it's just clear why it still lags behind the momentum The Sims 2 and The Sims 3 were building for years.
Hopefully The Sims 5, from conception to release, is released by the devs with a concise and fun vision for the fans. Although, seeing Star Wars in The Sims as a whole DLC pack has certainly soured my hopes far more than before. I've just been casually watching what's going on with its competitor in development.
I think it's rooted in gameplay. We're still stuck in the same, redundant gameplay loop since 2005 (The Sims 2), which creates nothing more than fan demands for the same content they've received. I think their key will be to change the gameplay significantly with The Sims 5, without trekking into multiplayer or anti-life simulation gameplay. If they could get open world (or a world format close to it) with the creative tools of The Sims 3, I think that'll be a great start for many people.
In other words, it was their choice to make these packs. I don't think a break would make them get better ideas. The ideas from the fans are all there already. They just have to execute it.
I totally agree with that part. I'm sure if you're a team who has worked on the same game since the beginning it would definitely be hard to come up with fresh new ideas, but as you said, the fans have given fantastic ideas that would be something new to the series. For sure you will always have the people who want the same things (seasons, pets, university, generations, night life, occults, etc) but really people have made some really innovative ideas about game packs even to add what the functions and traits/skills would be.
So in my opinion, the devs really just need someone who keeps a log of the ideas and see if anything appeals to them.
In that same spirit, if you aren't enjoying the game we are getting, might I suggest the person who needs a break is, in fact, you?
The Sims 4 hasn't introduced a new musical instrument since 2017
Just because someone does not like a pack does not mean it's not groundbreaking. Some players might find that same pack groundbreaking.
Anyway, the Sims team will mostly have a 4 day weekend because of labor day.
When they come back I hope they fix some bugs.
It isn't much about getting new ideas as much about finally having thag depth and consistency in the content of DLCs. They've been lacking that since ever with this iteration.
WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?
I think they've been telling us for the last six years. People just aren't listening.
If that's the case they've been saying it's a hollowed out cash grab.