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The Sims 3

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The Sims 3
File:Sims3Cover-Art.jpg
The current pre-order cover art.[6]
Developer(s)EA Redwood Shores[7]
Publisher(s)Electronic Arts
Composer(s)Steve Jablonsky[8]
SeriesThe Sims
EngineRenderware [citation needed]
Platform(s)Windows, Mac OS X, iPhone OS and mobile devices[1]
Genre(s)Life simulation, Social Simulation
Mode(s)Single-player

The Sims 3 is an upcoming strategic life simulation computer game in the popular and critically acclaimed The Sims franchise, originally created by Maxis. It is scheduled to be released on June 2, 2009, (June 5, 2009 in UK). A collector's edition will also be available, which comes with a free sports car download, a sticker sheet, and a 2GB Plumbob shaped USB drive.[9] In contrast to the previous versions, the houses and neighborhoods will be seamless, allowing players to explore and interact with their neighborhood without loading time. The game is currently available for pre-order.

Gameplay

Sim houses and neighborhoods will be entirely in one continuous map, and the developers state that "What you do outside your home now matters as much as what you do within." All the Sims in the neighborhoods age and live out their lives simultaneously, no matter where the player is in the game.

Of the eight needs of The Sims 1 & 2, only six—hunger, bladder, energy, social, hygiene, and fun—remain (removing comfort and environment). These will be represented by moodlets—attributes which are acquired special events, such as minor events like tooth brushing and major ones like a wedding, and affect the Sims' behavior. The needs will also have only 3 stages—red (extremely low), yellow (moderate) and green (completely full.) Several minor features from The Sims 2 expansion packs appear in the original The Sims 3, such as the "young adult" life stage and mobile phones (University). Private cars, personal inventories and restaurants (Nightlife), fishing and gardening (Seasons), jewelry and beaches (Bon Voyage), toothbrushing and ceilings (Apartment Life)[10][11] will be included, but none of the main features from expansion packs such as a Sim going to college (University) will be available yet.

As in previous games, Sims can paint, but paintings will now be more unique to each Sim based on their traits. Other new features are set difficulty levels for each family. There are also hospitals where pregnant Sims may give birth, and bicycles for riding around the neighborhood.[11]

Careers

Many careers are available to pursue and each has a workplace building in the neighborhood which Sims travel to for their shifts. Sims can also apply for jobs within these buildings. Though Sims are hidden inside buildings during the workday, the player can control their behavior at work to a certain extent. Like previous Sims games, the job yields "opportunities"—tasks that could be finished for a reward. There are also part-time jobs. Sims can also take actions to increase their productivity while not at work, such as bringing work home or working overtime. Each career has several rewards, instead of only one as in The Sims 2. Careers can also branch into several possible promotions. Each career branches off into different jobs that branch off as well. For example, if there were two Sims in the Business career track, they may not end up with the same jobs or duties even if they were on the same level in their careers. Nonetheless, a Sim who reaches the peak of a respective career can still receive raises, rewards, and additional payment if he or she keeps performing well at work.[12]

Features

Create-A-Sim

File:Sims3CreateSim.jpg
An image showing the new Sims 3 Create-A-Sim Mode.

Create-a-Sim is the character (Sim) builder, where the polygon 3-D models of Sims can be modified by changing a wider variety of properties than what was available in previous installments. This opens the door to creating completely unique Sims with regard to weight, fitness, hair, and clothing, etc. Footwear and headwear can now be chosen individually. Players can customize nearly everything in the game, including furniture, clothes and shoes. Rod Humble described the new interface in Create-A-Sim as "drastically different". Prominent birthmarks such as freckles can also be added to Sims. Also, a preview tour of The Sims 3 with Ben Bell, showed that players could create their own eye color with the color wheel (As used with Create-a-Style tool.)

File:Thesims3-18.jpg
The gradual increase in weight on a Sim in The Sims 3.

Individual fitness bars have been added to adjust the Sims' obesity and muscularity between extreme levels. Arms and legs are separate so players can create Sims with fat bodies and thin arms or thin legs with muscular arms. In The Sims 2, there were only three body types—fat, normal and fit. As in The Sims 2, body shape varies with diet and exercise, so that Sims created as overweight can become slim by exercising and Sims created thin may become fat by eating too much and not exercising. Skin color is also continuous, instead of the four colors of The Sims 2. When customizing hair, the player is shown a circle with all shades and hues of colors, and able to choose the base hair color, tips, roots, and even highlights. Texture for clothing follows a similar formatting scheme. Players will also be able to adjust the pitch of their Sim's voices.

According to those who attended the Creators' Camp event held, a "Create-a-Twin" feature has also been added, allowing players to create identical twins.[13]

Sims' personalities

Personality configuration for Sims has also been made more complex, with the original 'percentage bar'-style personality points replaced by a combination of traits, similar to those in the personals section of newspapers. Toddlers have two traits, and a new one is added for each new life stage, until they reach young adulthood—so they will have 3 as a child, 4 as a teen, then 5 as a young adult, which are the five traits they will stay with for the rest of their lives.

Create-A-Sim now features more than 70 unique traits to choose from.[14] It is not possible to give a Sim traits that contradict each other (such as Brave and Cowardly). The player can also edit a Sim's favorite color, music genre, and food.

Build and buy modes

The build and buy modes have been redone. The square outlines that appear on the ground (often referred to as a grid or tile) — apparent when entering build or buy mode — are now four times smaller to give the player more liberty to place objects where they want. The square grid allows the player to see where they can possibly place the objects in the game. There is now an option for experts to turn off the grid and rotate objects freely.[15] This feature will make objects easier to locate at the player's desired location instead of being restricted to a bigger tile. If a counter or connecting objects is placed on a diagonal wall, it will automatically snap into place. Certain pieces of furniture, such as chairs and tables, can easily be moved together. Also, many small objects can be put on a table very close together as long as they don't intersect each other.[citation needed]

The overall game has the option to "customize everything", choosing a color thorugh all 32-bits and use different patterns (the game has predefined samples for objects, etc).

The "auto-roof" function updates the roof when walls are rebuilt. Wide staircases can be built easily. Basements are also easier to build.[10] Also, the spray paint terrain feature returns from the Sims 2, but this time you are able to spray square floor tiles. A "wall drag" tool allows the player to grow or shrink a room, moving the furniture with it. A new “slot” system gives several choices where to place decorative objects on surfaces, such as tables and dressers. Most existing objects can be recoloured and re-textured.

Neighborhood exploration

On March 19, 2008, EA revealed a new feature to The Sims 3: neighborhood exploration. Sims can now explore the world outside their homes without having to face strenuous loading times. Every lot is now synced to the main neighborhood time, whereas before the time of day (and weather) was different in each lot and would continue off from the last time it was played. Players can also interact with every building in a neighborhood. So, for example, the player can enter their neighbor's house by "ringing their doorbell". Every Sim will live out their lives simultaneously: people will move in, move out, get married, etc., all as they play. Each job will have a specific building designated to it. Players will not be able to see inside but will be able to have limited control of their Sims—tell them to work overtime, laze around, listen to the boss and so on.[16]

Sims can easily move around the city with various transportation devices like cars, bicycles, or running, while letting the rest of the family stay independent at home—another change from The Sims 2, where if a Sim went to a community lot, nothing would change at their home.

Movie making tool

The official website has announced that there will be a movie making tool allowing players to create and edit their own movies. They will be able to upload their videos to the Sims 3 exchange.

Development

System requirements
Requirements
Mac OS X 10.5.7 Leopard or higher
CPU Intel Core Duo
Memory 2 GB
Free space At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space, with at least 1 GB additional space for custom content and saved games
Graphics hardware ATI X1600 or Nvidia 7300 GT with 128 MB of Video RAM, or Intel Integrated GMA X3100.
Windows[17]
CPU Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent
2.0GHz (XP)
2.4GHz (Vista)
Memory 1 GB (XP)
1.5GB (Vista)
Free space 6.5GB of free space and 1GB for additional content
Graphics hardware DirectX 9.0c compliant card with 128 MB RAM (NVIDIA FX 5900/ATI 9500 or better) and support for Pixel Shader 2.0
Sound hardware 100% DirectX 9.0c compliant card
Windows (using Built-in Graphics Chipset)
CPU Intel Pentium D 2.6GHz, 1.8GHz Core 2 Duo, or equivalent
Memory 1.5GB (XP)
2GB (Vista)

Electronic Arts first announced Sims 3 on the 19th March, 2008[18]. The game was developed at their studio in Redwood Shores, California[7], whose other titles include Dead Space and The Simpsons Game.

On January 15, 2009, EA invited "some of the best" custom content creators to their campus at Redwood Shores where they were hosting a Creator’s Camp. Creators have been invited to spend the week exploring and creating content like Sims, houses and customized content. The Creators' work will be used to pre-populate The Sims 3 Exchange when the game is released.[19]

Audio

The music to The Sims 3 was written by composer Steve Jablonsky, who recorded the score with the Hollywood Studio Symphony at the Newman Scoring Stage at 20th Century Fox.[20]

Software copy protection

Some of EA's other recent PC titles, such as, Spore and Dead Space have used a SecuRom copy protection scheme that requires online and offline authentication and limits the number of times a user can install the game to five. While it was speculated that The Sims 3 would use the same system, on March 26, executive producer Rod Humble revealed that The Sims 3 will use traditional disk-based copy protection as Sims 2 did, and not require online authentication to install. [21]

Release

The game will be released as both a standard edition and a Collector's Edition. The standard edition contains the first release of the core game, while the Collector's Edition includes the Sims 3 core game, a 2GB The Sims Plumbob™ USB drive with matching Green Carabiner, an exclusive Italian-styled/Vintage Sports Car download for in-game, a Prima Tips and Hints Guide (not the actual Sims3 Prima Guide), Plumbob stickers, The Sims 3 Neighborhood Poster, and a quick start reference guide.[22][23] It is still unknown which countries will be able to purchase the Collectors' Edition. A preview CD with more information about The Sims 3, such as music samples, family descriptions, and career information, was also released. The preview CD does not include the actual game.[citation needed]

In the seventh expansion pack for The Sims 2, The Sims 2: FreeTime, an event occurs in which a Sim-version of Rod Humble, the head of The Sims franchise, gives the player's Sim family an unopened gift box. When opened, the family gets a computer with The Sims 3 on it. The Sims 3 game cannot be bought in the catalog. Sims can then play The Sims 3 on their computers or console systems. Like all the other games that Sims can play in The Sims 2, The Sims 3 is a looping gameplay video shown on the player's Sim's computer screens when played by a Sim. On July 15, 2008 the first video preview of The Sims 3 appeared on the official website as did seven new screenshots and five Create-A-Sim screens. Four screenshots that appeared on the website and were then taken down soon after, leaked onto the internet by a member of the community.

Copies of the video game Spore also came packaged with fliers advertising the game, with information stating whole-neighborhood accessibility and endless possibilities on character creation. On October 31, 2008, two teaser trailers were released by Electronic Arts featuring a comical view on the 2008 presidential election in the United States. Candidates John McCain and Barack Obama were included along with John McCain's running mate Sarah Palin, and Barack Obama's running mate Joe Biden.[24] In the eighth expansion pack of The Sims 2, The Sims 2: Apartment Life, new objects were added including logo posters and framed screenshots. The game was shipped with a code and an internet address, where the player could download clothing with The Sims 3 logo on it. Another developer walkthrough was released on November 6, 2008, featuring in-depth previews of the neighborhood and Create-A-Sim.

On March 23, 2009, the look and feel of The Sims 3 was seamlessly threaded throughout the storyline of an all new episode of The CW series One Tree Hill. On screen, the episode opens in an idealized Sims version of One Tree Hill and then transitions into the real Tree Hill. As this episode plays out, Sims versions of popular One Tree Hill characters are introduced and then morph into the real-life characters, including Dan (Paul Johansson), Lucas (Chad Michael Murray) and Peyton (Hilarie Burton).[25][26]. The Sims 3 versions of the characters are available for download via CW's official website.[26]

On April 19, 2009, Target exclusively released a promotional disc of The Sims 3 that features a Ladytron Band poster, The Sims 3 theme song music download, and a $5 off coupon. The main menu includes screensaver downloads, videos, Create-A-Sim, Create-A-House, and much more. There is no actual gameplay involved, but it describes what playing feels like.

Delay

On February 3, 2009, it was announced that the release date of The Sims 3 would be delayed from February 20, 2009 to June 2, 2009 in the US and later dates worldwide. John Riccitiello, CEO of EA Redwood Shores, said "In the case of Sims 3, we’re moving this title to June 2 to give us additional time to build the worldwide marketing campaign a title like this deserves"[27]. Grant Rodiek, Associate Producer of The Sims 3 said:

The Sims 3 June launch gives more time for tuning and polish and the ability to launch the game on PC and Mac platforms simultaneously. This is a key EA franchise and title and it deserves a bigger bet on the best Sims game EA has made. These last few months will give us a little more time to tune, tweak, and polish the game. Our players have been waiting for something awesome and that’s exactly what we intend to give them.[28]

Marketing

EA Singapore will be launching The Sims 3 with a launch party[29] to be held on 2 June, 2009 at the new shopping mall Iluma. Local Sims fans will gather to redeem their pre-ordered Collector's Edition game. Early birds to the event will also receive exclusive The Sims 3 T-shirts and a few extra surprises. Pre-order bonuses include unlock codes for a Vintage Sports Car, and a free The Sims 2 Expansion Pack download.

References

  1. ^ a b c "The Sims 3 – News". Electronic Arts. 2008-03-19. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  2. ^ "Release Summary". GameSpot. Retrieved 2009-02-12.
  3. ^ "The Sims 3 – News". Electronic Arts. 2008-03-19. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  4. ^ "Release Summary". GameSpot. Retrieved 2009-02-12.
  5. ^ http://thesims3.ea.com/view/pages/home.jsp?languageCode=uk
  6. ^ "Sims 3 cover art". Game.co.uk. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  7. ^ a b "The Sims 3 Tech Info on". GameSpot. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  8. ^ "The Sims Label Announces Steve Jablonsky as Mastermind Behind the Creative Sound of Sims 3". IGN. 2008-10-23. Retrieved 2008-10-24.
  9. ^ "Official Press Release". Electronic Arts. 2008-08-20. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  10. ^ a b Bonham, Steve (2008-07-18). "The Sims 3: First Preview". The Sims Resource. Retrieved 2008-11-28.
  11. ^ a b mogway (2008-11-04). "Sims 3 preview". Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  12. ^ Mazza, Ray (2008-11-16). "Careers and Opportunities". Electronic Arts. Retrieved 2008-11-28.
  13. ^ B., Steve (2009-01-13). "TS3 Creator's Camp: Day 2, 10:30". The Sims Resource. Retrieved 2009-02-07.
  14. ^ "All of The Sims 3's Character Traits and Lifetime Wish Goals" from GameSpot
  15. ^ Cite error: The named reference Build and Buy Blog was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  16. ^ Ocampo, Jason (2008-03-19). "IGN: The Sims 3 Preview". IGN. Retrieved 2008-11-28.
  17. ^ "Windows XP/Vista Requirements". Electronic Arts. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  18. ^ Paul, Ure (2008-03-19). "The Sims 3 Announced" (html). Action Trip.com. Retrieved 2009-04-05.
  19. ^ "The Sims 3 – Blog". Electronic Arts. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  20. ^ Goldwasser, Dan (2008-11-02). "Steve Jablonsky scores The Sims 3". Scoring Sessions. Retrieved 2008-11-02.
  21. ^ The Sims 3 Copy Protection, The Sims 3 official website
  22. ^ "About The Sims 3". Electronic Arts. 2008-03-19. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  23. ^ "The Sims 3 in stores February 20th, 2009". Electronic Arts. 2009-01-29. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  24. ^ "GameSpy: The Sims 3 Trailer, Videos and Movies". GameSpy. Retrieved 2008-11-28.
  25. ^ The Sims 3 visits One Tree Hill on The CW Tonight! from TheSims2.com
  26. ^ a b The Sims 3 One Tree Hill Downloads page from CWTV.com
  27. ^ The Sims 3 delayed. EA lost money. What happened?
  28. ^ http://www.gameplanet.co.nz/features/132872.20090220.The-Sims-3-Q-A-session/
  29. ^ The Sims 3 Pre-order & Launch Party site for Singapore


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