Silly Sims

I think the sheer amount of content in the Sims 3 really started to take away from the heart of the game. I always end up with these robotic, dull Sims who just move from goal to goal. They have no social lives, no real hobbies, and they haven't had an interaction with their spouse since the wedding two weeks ago. I use cheats because I just don't get long enough to play the game right now, and so I pretty much remove the fun of the challenges. When I don't cheat, I get annoyed by how laggy the game is.

And then, every so often, my Sim will do something that just makes me laugh. The Sim below, Aurora Redwood, set off for University with high hopes of becoming an artist. She had a level 10 painting skill, and she had painted so many pieces in the past that she could fill a gallery. She was a dab hand at sculpting, too.

After she'd spent a few days attending parties and making new friends, Aurora pulled out her brand new sketch pad and asked her friend Natasha if she would pose for her. Tash was a wild young thing, and she was more than happy to whip off her clothes and oblige. Aurora spent a good while sketching away, studying Tash closely. Finally, the picture was completed.

I was excited to see the result. I didn't think it would be an actual nude Sim, but maybe the sihlouette of a body, or just a sketch of the face. Aurora turned the pad around to show the portrait to her subject. I laughed. It was awful.

Finally, gnomes. I always thought that they were creepy and annoying, but one of my houses ended up with a lot of them. I once found them all crowded outside the vegetable garden in various poses. I see the charm of them now, and they amuse me to no end. Still creepy, though.

Emma

Thoughts on Custom Content

During the later stages of the original Sims game, I discovered the wonders of third party custom content. My favourite site was aroundthesims. My game was soon filled with hundreds and hundreds of custom items: clothing, hair, furniture. I downloaded mods and generally turned my game into whatever I wanted it to be. It was pretty wonderful.

When Sims 2 arrived I was keen to get CC into the game right away. I barely remember anything about that game now, if I'm being honest, but I know I clogged it up. I remember spending hours scouring through the downloads folder, deleting everything I didn't want.

I've been much more careful with Sims 3. At first I did have quite a lot of CC in the game, but I moved house a couple of years back and got a new PC. I now have maybe 10 pieces of third party CC in my game, and half of those are mods to help the game run a little better.

Official content is a totally different story. I have been really guilty of throwing money at the Sims Store. I've probably paid for half of the content available on there. Some of it I use often, some of it not at all. And you know what? It clogs my game up just as much as third party CC. My computer is more than capable of running the game according to its specs, but I still have to deal with issues. It is super annoying, because I've pretty much paid for a worse experience.

The reason I pick official content over third party content is a simple one; I like my game to look like all the pieces belong together. I can't stand hair with a different texture, or clothes that look like the pattern is just a copy and paste from a Google search. By the way, the Diesel Stuff Pack totally does this. The clothes looks like "real" clothes and don't fit the game at all. So annoying.

This post was inspired by a comment I've seen thrown around a lot during Sims 4 bashing threads. People complain about the way the game looks (I love it, by the way), and one thing that I hear a LOT it a variation on "The hair looks less realistic than Sims 3".

Now, there is a reason for that. The entire game looks different. There is nothing more jarring to me than when someone posts a picture of their Sim, and everything about them is CC. The skin, the eyes, the hair, the clothes, the make-up. They looks like a cross between real people and creepy dolls, and they do not fit with their surroundings at all. Some people like that, I don't.

It is really important to me that the game looks consistent, which is why I keep away from third party custom content.

How about you? Do you have much CC in your game, or do you prefer to play vanilla?