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?

Sims 4 CAS Demo: Initial Thoughts (Part 2)

Following on from my previous post, I now want to share the second and third Sims I created during my first play with the demo.

My first Sim, Sophia, gave me a good idea of how the system worked. I wanted my second Sim to be a bit more work. A lot of my Sims in that game look suspiciously similar, so I wanted to do something a little different.

I took my time, tweaking features here and there, until Ana Zheng was born. I am pretty happy with how she turned out.

Whilst my experience with this demo is very limited so far, I have found that something very interesting happens to me when creating my Sims. As I shape their features, they start to form a personality in my mind. Ana started out very differently, but I tweaked her cheekbones and she suddenly went from sweet to fierce. The next thing I knew, she'd gone from an innocent, promising painter, to a sharp-tongued aspiring writer with purple hair.

And here lies another improvement on the Sims 3. It used to be that I would think up a Sim in my head, give them a back story and something to aspire to. I'd spend an hour or longer in CAS trying to make them look different to my other Sims, and then I'd stick them with a few traits that would help them achieve what I'd decided for them. But really, the traits barely mattered at all. I could pick any Sim and give them any goal and any "personality", and it wouldn't really make the blindest bit of difference. I could use the same Sim over and over with a different set of traits and a different make up story, and it would always feel fine. The two were not cohesive.

I look at Ana, and I look at the available traits and goals, and I think "No, she's not the kind of woman who's number one goal is to have a family - she wants to write and she wants to make a living out of it." I don't know how well this will translate into the game, but even just from CAS, it feels more believable.

An example of one of the existing sleepwear styles

Ana's eyebrows are a good way to illustrate what I meant in my earlier post. I'd rather have her brows a light, taupey brown. The only problems is, all of the lighter browns and the darker blondes are quite reddish. They don't suit this hair colour at all. The lighter blond is ok, but I don't think it looks right on Ana. An ashy light brown or darker blonde would be appreciated.

Ana may have purple hair and wear bold makeup, but she balances this out with her clothing. Her casual wear is very neutral, her formal wear is very toned down and elegant. She's got a wild side, but she knows how to be professional.

Formal Wear

I picked her sleepwear from one of the pre-styled looks. I think this one is very cute, and definitely belies a part of Ana's personality that she doesn't bare to the outside world.

I feel like Ana is a woman with many layers, and only the few people in her innermost circle really know her. Someone might assume one thing of her from the neck up, but then another from the neck down. Her party outfit is one of my favourites. The dress is pretty and classy, but edgy. She plays up the edgy side of the dress by pairing it with fishnets and boots, but then emphasises the classy, almost elegance of the dress by styling her hair in glamorous waves and adding a classic red lip alongside her signature blue liner.

Even though we no longer have CASt, I've found it pretty easy to make a look that fits together. With the exception of some of the makeup, I don't think I would be reaching for CASt at all if it was available.

Ana is definitely going to be in my very first Sim household. Creating her has made me even more excited for the launch of the game. I look forward to building her skills and watching her career take off. I want to see how she reacts in certain situations, and I want to see how she interacts with her friends and family.

One thing I am not at all crazy about in this game is the walk styles. I don't think I've seen anyone get excited over those. The Feminine walk is OK, but I'm not sold on the rest of them. They're pretty distracting. I think subtle variations on the normal walk would have been better. The walks themselves, as you'll have seen from videos, are very obvious. I think that they are too defining a feature to really put them to use. You might have a Sim who's a bit snooty, but once you give them the walk that matches that aspect of their personality you're pretty much overriding anything else that might be good about them. That snobby Sim might have a softer side to them, but once you have them walking around with their nose in the air, you won't see anything else.

Classy with an Edge

The voices you can choose for your Sims are much better than they were before. There are three types of voice to choose from, and you can adjust the pitch for each. I think all of them are useable, and each one does lend itself to your Sim's personality. I could never really tell the difference between them before, and rarely bothered changing the voice at all.

I'm very impressed with the way Ana turned out, and how easy she was to create. She definitely stirred the Sim Story-Teller within me, and I can't wait to play out her story. I get the feeling that this game is going to feel a lot less hollow, and maybe this time my decisions will be based around my Sim, and how they would react to the situations I put them in.



Emma

Sims 4 CAS Demo: Initial Thoughts (Part 1)

The Sims community has been going crazy over this for the past few days. Some lucky people got the demo, others didn't. There has been an awful lot of complaining about this, due to some people feeling hard done to because they preordered the game, play the Sims alot, etc.

I won't lie, I wanted to be chosen. I logged on to Origin on the 9th of July to check my games library, and it wasn't there. I wasn't surprised or even disappointed; after all, it'll be out to everyone in just a few weeks. I ended up buying Theme Hospital for £3.99 on Origin, and had a few hours of fun there. I've always loved that game, and I go back to it every few years. I last played it on my PS3, but I found it less enjoyable on a console.

Anyway, last night I logged into Origin to play the game (totally unaware that I didn't need to launch Origin to play), and the demo was just sitting there waiting for me. I honestly had to question whether I was actually awake. Once I was mostly sure that I wasn't dreaming, I downloaded the demo and set about playing.

The first thing I noticed was how much better this looks than the Sims 3 CAS. It is cleaner and brighter. It is easy to navigate and very intuitive.

I started to make a Sim. I wish I had thought to take a screenshot of what I started with, because within just a few minutes I had transformed a random Sim into someone completely different. Here she is, Sophia Webb:

Sophia after 10 minutes in CAS

I was able to visualise what I wanted her to look like, and I found it pretty easy to bring that to life on the screen.

You'll only find two sliders in CAS now, one for weight and one for muscle. You can push and pull on pretty much any part of your Sim's body to mould it to your liking, and you can take it to the extreme if you want to. I don't think there will be any need for mods in that respect.

One thing I was not expecting based on the video previews is how shaping your Sim feels. When you are fine tuning a feature on your Sim, it feels very heavy, like you're dragging the cursor through quicksand. I actually really like this, as it means that you don't need to use too delicate a hand when creating your Sim. If it was "looser", I imagine that people would be sitting there for ages moving their mouse back and forth trying to get something just right, because every movement drags something too far. I hope that made sense!

Sophia's Party Look

Overall, I am pleased with the different hairstyles available in the game. On the three Sims I made last night, I did tend to find that only a few styles suited each of them. That's mostly personal preference though. The colours are fine, but I think they need a couple more options. I'd add in a softer black rather than the super-shiny blue-black we have now. I'd like some cooler browns in there too.

Eyebrows also need some cooler tones in there. The browns and blonds are very warm, and look quite odd against the crazier hair colours. I don't like brows to be unnatural in colour, but the red tones in most of the brows mean that I either have to have a dark colour or the lightest blonde.

Clothing options are good too, and there are plenty of colours for each item. I would like to see more items added in when the game launches, especially in the Formal and Sleepwear categories, but I'm happy with what's available.

Casual Wear

 The eyeliner and eyeshadow options are pretty nice, but could do with extra colours. A lot of the eyeshadow is garish, and needs some toned-down options. The eyeliners are pretty good, but I think they need a darker brown.

I'm not a fan of the blush option. It's quite saturated, so the colours all look a bit much on pale skin. For darker skins, most of the colours are too light. Apart from the orangey blush, the rest look quite pastel to me.

The lipsticks are a bit of a letdown. The coloured squares looks fine, but they translate very differently on the lips. There is a mauve square, but the lipstick is actually bright pink. The lighter colours are WAY too light, but then the rest are too vivid. There isn't much of a middle ground.

The skintones seem good, but what you're seeing on this Sim is basically the lightest usable skintone. There are a couple of lighter options, but I found that they had an odd tinge to them and looked a little glowy and unnatural. They might grow on me, but I'd like to see a paler skintone without it looking like it belongs on a vampire.

Freckles are finally attractive. You can see that Sophia has a smattering of them across her nose, and they are super cute. There is also an option of having freckles all over the face, which I like as well. The only problem I have is that there are no freckle options for other parts of the body.

Sophia's Personality and Lifetime Wish

I have freckles on my face, mostly across my nose and cheeks. I also have freckles on my shoulders and arms. I think it looks a little bit unrealistic to use the second freckle option when you can't get them anywhere else.

I gave Sophia some tattoos. I really like the available options, especially the full sleeves. I'd like the option to layer tattoos, as there are many designs for the back that can only be selected one at a time, even though they would not actually overlap on the Sim. There is only one ankle tattoo, and nothing for feet or legs. I'd also like to see ones for the hips added.



This pretty much sums up my thoughts after my first 90 minutes on CAS. Stay tuned for more pictures and thoughts to come.


Emma.

Just a Gnome Enjoying the View

Gnomes are silly 

Sims 4 Musings

If you've been following the gradual reveal of the Sims 4, even remotely, then you will no doubt be aware of the recent controversies surrounding the game. You may even be one of the thousands of people who have expressed their outrage online.

I have tried to keep a largely open mind when it comes to this game. I understand why cuts have been made, even if I'd rather than they hadn't. Toddlers and Pools seem to be the two biggest gripes, but as long as they get included at a later date I don't really mind. I won't miss Create-A-Style either, as it seems that the Sims team have really put some effort into creating nice clothes this time. I like most of what I've seen, and there are plenty of options for everything. CASt was always something that I felt I HAD to use in order to make my Sims outfits and houses to look right, but it was a pain to use and I had to wait for ages for the different patterns to load. I'm almost glad to see the back of it.

My understanding is that the colour wheel will also not be included, but I made great use of this for hair and eye colours. I liked that none of my Sims had exactly the same shade of hair. However, I am sure that I will not lament its loss once I start to play.

Story Progression is the biggest one for me. For those of you who are not aware, there will be no "Story Progression" as we currently know it. You can't create a married couple, drop them into the town, and expect them to go about getting their own jobs or having kids whilst you play a different household. There will be a lot of micromanaging involved. I know that there will be people out there who like that style of gameplay, but I'd bet that there are more who do not.

In the Sims 3, I used to like creating a young family and building them a house next to another family of the same age. So if my family had a toddler, I'd move them in near to another family with a toddler. The families would grow up together, have more children, etc.

If I want that now, I have to switch households in order to ensure that the couple have another baby. If I want their grown son to leave the house and get a job, I have to do that too. Given the re-introduction of loading screens, this could turn out to be a hassle. It remains to be seen though, and whilst this change does not suit my style of play, I have no problem adapting if I have to.

If the studio are to be believed, all of these things have been cut in favour of a better game. Right now I am on their side; I think the game looks beautiful. I am hopeful that it will feel less hollow than previous games, and I can't wait to get my hands on a copy.


Until the next,

Emma

Hello and Welcome to Sim Shape!

With the launch of the Sims 4 approaching, I decided to start a blog dedicated to the game. 

I've been playing the franchise since it began all those years ago, fallen in and out of love with it a million times. I think we can mostly agree that the Sims 3 had its heart in the right place, but eventually became a bloated, laggy mess. 

I've tried to love the Sims 3 again recently, but I just can't get past how poorly it runs. I feel sick at the thought of how much money I've thrown at that game, only for each new piece of content to slow my game down that tiny bit more. 

I'm ready to put that all behind me and start afresh. I hope I've learned my lesson with regards to compulsively buying every piece of available content "just because". 

I know there has been a lot of backlash over the Sims 4 and the choices made with regards to what is in and what is out of the game, but I do not support any of that and I want to keep this space free of negativity. The Sims devs work hard, and spend their free time responding to fans, and I completely appreciate the job that they do. I will make no judgements on the game until I have played it. I'm not thrilled with some of the cuts made from the game, but I'm still very curious to see how it all works. 

This blog is mainly going to be showcasing my Sims and their houses, rather than providing a source of news or speculation. I will also provide review of the games and the content contained within them. 

One of my main aims will be creating Sims of real people. It seems possible to do that now, and it is something I've spent hours trying to do in the past. I came pretty close once, so maybe I'll share that soon. 

I anticipate that I will mostly be posting Sims 4 related content once the game becomes available, or following the general release of the CAS demo. I may post Sims 3 content in the meantime, however as mentioned I am sort of out of love with that game at the moment.

Feel free to vote on the Poll at the side of the page to select which Sim I will be attempting first. 

Watch this space for upcoming content! For now I'll leave you with one of my favourite Sims images, which I have chosen for my current Blog background. 

Until next time! 

Emma