The Sims 4

Been itching to get back into the sims and decided to go with The Sims 4. Been playing for a bit and think 2 and 3 might be overall better games. The sims 4 has better smaller pieces like better vampires but 3 has a better world which is a bigger deal than I thought it would be. With 4 you are playing in a smaller box.

One of the interesting thing is I forgot how much the sims attracts new players and women. Lots of mods to change sims to have different body types and skin tones. So there is higher than average number of female POC doing youtube videos with sims that represent them. And the age range is all over the place. I would have thought the community might be mostly family friendly, it was for the original sims, now it is kind of adult.

Kind of funny now that I think about it. I have dropped many dudes for being overly vulgar on youtube. Maybe games just attract vulgar people in general to a higher degree than other things like cooking channels. It was funny seeing such a wide difference in people mostly unable to go two sentences without cussing or saying something sexual.

Back to the game itself. I'm happy to see the modding scene has open up. One of the reasons I stopped playing in the early days of three was because EA locked down the modding scene by not releasing modding tools. Even now there are more mods for 2 than 3 and 4 combined. However, you can do a lot more now than when I left. There are a endless number or clothes not just recolors of EA stuff. One young lady said she had close to 30 gigs in mods. hmmmm but now that I think about there are probable 30 gigs worth stuff from EA but that would cost hundreds of dollars. Kind of crazy the number of times I heard someone say they bought all the DLC. The whales for this game is probably huge. I think I recall this being one of the most profitable series of all time.

Anyway having fun but might drop it and go back to three.

If anything I need a good pose mod for portraits. I found many pose mods but none really good for portraits.

Hope you didn't pay too much for it, as The Sims 4 has went free on Origins for a limited time!

Bit broken right now if you go through the store page (only says send as gift), but if you add it to your wishlist then go to that it will let you add it to your library.

yep bad timing for me.

Never bad timing.

Sims 4 is amazing.

Hah! Apparently I own it, somehow, already. Who knew!?

A photography patch just came out and Moschino Stuff Pack will be released next week. One of the things it will add is a photographer career which is probably why the photo patch came out.

Funny thing of note. During the time the game was free seven million copies of the base game was sold. Which means EA is scum for not having something setup telling people it could be had for free.

Baron Of Hell wrote:

Funny thing of note. During the time the game was free seven million copies of the base game was sold. Which means EA is scum for not having something setup telling people it could be had for free.

Source for that? And are you sure that figure isn't just showing how many copies of the base game were "sold" for $0.00? Seven million sounds like an awfully large number of people to be fooled by that.

Another thing that doesn't make sense is the free offer was for PC-digital only. So if you wanted to nab a copy from Origin you wouldn't have been able to buy it anyway during the 7 days it was free.

Realms of Magic comes out next month. Harry Potter comes to the sims.

Aaaaaaand now I know what my youngest is gonna ask me for.

I've owned Sims 4 since it released, but didn't care for it as much as Sims 3. But watching my youngest play it makes me think its better now then when it first released.

Yeah, but how much do you have to spend to get it into that better state...? Seriously. It's been forever since I played the Sims (2, I think?). What's essential?

I started up a new Sims 3 game just a few days ago in Midnight Hollow, though the sim I created went directly to University so I haven't actually played her for more than 5 minutes *in* Midnight Hollow yet.

One really nice thing about Sims 4 is that it can be played on console and is not different from the vanilla PC version, so I have Sims 4 and some of the packs on the Xbox One.

There is no rule that states that we can only pick *one* sims version to play. We can choose to play all four!

(Yes, Sims 1 and 2 are permanently on my computer too!)

Robear wrote:

Yeah, but how much do you have to spend to get it into that better state...? Seriously. It's been forever since I played the Sims (2, I think?). What's essential?

Sims 4 is the only part that's essential. I mean, some of the expansions look like they'd add neat things, but not to the point where I feel my game is incomplete without them. It was a different story at launch as it didn't even have swimming pools or toddlers, but they've since been patched in and don't require any DLC to get.
Going from Sims 2 to Sims 4 should feel very natural, more so than going from Sims 3 to 4. Sims 3's standout feature was its open world that let you move seamlessly between places, but that did cause some performance issues. Sims 4 went back to being way more focused on your home lot, with loading screens required any time you want to move between lots. There are far fewer places you'd want to go, but also fewer reasons you'd want to (instead of needing to go to a bookstore or grocery store to buy books or seeds you simply order them through either your phone, computer, or even an item's interaction menu. It felt like a big step backwards, but it does mean Sims 4 does what it does do better than it was done in Sims 3.

Still having a lot of fun with the vampire neighborhood I'm creating. I had Caleb Vatore invite Kabir whatever his last name that I can't remember townie into the household and then had Kabir move into one of the other houses in the neighborhood. He's an elder by age and a lower level vampire, so he doesn't have much in the way of vampire skills, and it turns out he was also unemployed, so I put him into the secret agent track since he has an aspiration to collect things.

There is a townie lady vampire who I want him to marry at some point. She's another elder and they would be perfect together! Unfortunately, he doesn't yet know her so I don't have any way for him to contact her to build a relationship unless they randomly come across each other, so it may be a while.

In the meantime, I'm building his skills and finances since he has only about 200 simoleans left.

I have to decide soon when to age up Lilith Vatore's baby to toddler. I may also have her seduce Kabir so that she can have another baby with a different father than Vlad and I believe elder men are still fertile so it should be possible. Would do all of this before Kabir starts a relationship with the lady he doesn't yet know!

In a more far away future, I think the Vatore's will buy a place in San Myshuno (city neighborhood) and turn it into a vampire club (though they'll still live in their home in Forgotten Hollow), and Kabir and his wife-to-be will buy the remaining building next door to them and turn it into a museum. My original plan was for the Vatore's to have the museum, but considering the aspiration of Kabir, I think the museum is more fitting for him.

OMG Lilith Vatore just had TRIPLETS!

Definitely NOT expected. Going to have to rearrange the house again trying to fit them all in along with the toddler. Thank goodness she and her brother practically never have to sleep due to good vampire energy management.

So I hired a live-in butler to come into the house and help deal with all of these babies. Had to create a little suite for him in the basement, but he seems happy enough despite being right next door to a couple of coffins for any visiting vampires who might stay over.

Neat stories ! I always play Sims4 in the summer when I am at the camping site. My In-Laws are permanent resident there, but no internet.

I love reading stories ! Continue, or video ?!

Manach wrote:

Neat stories ! I always play Sims4 in the summer when I am at the camping site. My In-Laws are permanent resident there, but no internet.

I love reading stories ! Continue, or video ?! :)

I'd love to post some videos at some point, but not a lot of extra time right now!

At least the sims in the game seem to have a pretty good internet connection, at least whenever the computer isn't broken.

So last night I set up my alphabet legacy family in...hmm what is that neighborhood's name that is like Pleasantview. It's the suburban white picket fence type with a wealthy area and then another area with very small cheap houses, and the Goth family lives there.

Anyway, moved a couple I made from CAS into one of the smaller houses and named them Adam and Eve Spiritus since they will be the origin of my ghost legacy!

I think what I'm going to do is in my vampire neighborhood, I already have plans for turning the last remaining lot into a museum, and then I'll put in an underground catacombs beneath, and put all the urns of dead sims down there with the exception of any household lots where I want to have a ghost.

After getting the Spiritus house set up, got them both settled into jobs and started them on skils, I moved back over to Forgotten Hollow to Kabir's house and invited over the lady vampire he wants to marry (or at least that I want him to marry) and eventually got their friendship up enough so that she agreed to move in. Nothing very romantic going on between the two and they got angry when I tried to make them flirt, so it will be a while before they get married I think. My plan is for them to have the wedding at the nearest Romance Festival date to when they get engaged.

Other vampires kept knocking on the door hoping to socialize too. They're all a rather interesting bunch!

I've been playing in the Straud household most recently and making a lot of progress in skills, aspirations, and careers. Vlad just joined the Science career and it's really fun because you can choose to actually follow him to work and he'll be given a list of things to do such as take plant samples, analyze minerals, talk to co-workers about various things, and even construct inventions. I've been built him a small science lab in the basement under his house in the place where his coffin used to be.

In the other section, I'm building an entertainment area and installed a very large wall TV and Caleb Vatore seems to like to come over fairly regularly to go down there and use it. It's not like he doesn't have his own TV, but maybe he needs some time away from his sister's toddler and baby triplets.

Vlad's human boyfriend J has been slowly working his way up the Mixology career and just got promoted to "Prime Juicer" (or some title like that) and he usually spends his time between career related activities and working out, which he loves to just do on his own being an active sim.

It's getting very, very close to the winter season now and I will be very excited to see SNOW! (They've only hd a few flakes here and there so far.) I have to say that the thunderstorms in this game are pretty amazing!

Late last night, I was trying to do something with the large crystals that Vlad has been bringing home from work and ran into a problem. Most of the shelves in the game were too small to hold them, and the larger shelves had this weird "system" to them where they would only allow some of the spots for larger things (despite every shelf being the same size). Now if I wasn't also still working on game achievements, I could use a "move objects" cheat to get around this limitation (probably...I think it works on console too) but enabling that cheat would disable achievements, so I needed to find a way around the problem without using any cheats.

So what I ended up doing is building a whole new display *room* in the basement directly off from the science lab and then I lined each side of the passage with four large shelving units and then had eight shelving units back to back going down the middle.

So my plan is to load up the lower levels of the shelves with the larger crystals along the sides, frog tanks on the lower shelves in the middle, and then the smaller items on the top shelves. Most of the shelves are empty because I've only just started these collections, but I'm very pleased with how the room turned out so far despite all of the limitations.

The Tiny Homes stuff pack is coming out for consoles today! It has been getting some good reviews for PC as one of the better packs, and it even includes a death by murphy bed feature!

I may have to give this a go seeing as it's a PS Plus freebie. Hopefully it doesn't turn me into an addict, like seriously, as The Sims 3 did!

RnRClown wrote:

I may have to give this a go seeing as it's a PS Plus freebie. Hopefully it doesn't turn me into an addict, like seriously, as The Sims 3 did!

Sims 3 is a permanent part of my PC setup. I have practically everything ever made for it...worlds, expansions, stuff packs, store stuff (bought on daily deals and sales with sim points from "watching" ads)...even though I'm playing Sims 4 now because of console, I doubt that I'll ever give up Sims 3 with its wonderful open worlds...just spying on sims going about their day to day in the neighborhoods and in neighbor's houses is great!

How's the base Sims 4 experience? I saw thirty-something add-ons!

RnRClown wrote:

How's the base Sims 4 experience? I saw thirty-something add-ons!

I'm not really sure since I started playing Sims 4 relatively late. When it first came out and only for PC, it just didn't seem to compare at all to Sims 3. I figured I'd eventually get it, but only after it came down in price and had a few expansions. I hadn't expected it to come out on console, but when it did, and being that it was for the first time ever, the actual PC version on *console*, I started playing it on console, but even then, I bought it in one of the big Sims sales that included the base game plus a bunch of the other stuff, so I've never had the original base game experience.

What I would do is wait for a sale before buying too much of the extra stuff. Play the base game in order to set up households and get them started in preparation for some of the various things you know you will want fro the expansions/packs. It's definitely going to be a lot less than what you are used to in Sims 3 starting out that way, but could be very fun knowing that you're starting very basic and can then slowly introduce stuff and see new sim experiences through their eyes without just having everything all at once.

I don't have all of the expansions or add ons for Sims 4 myself yet. Just some of the ones that were on sale that I really wanted, but EA does have Sims sales for consoles periodically.

Sims 4 sales are never that great. $20 for an expansion is what I would expect the base price to be, not the sale price. The base Sims 4 experience has enough in it to keep you satisfied for quite awhile.

I just patched everything and started the game and noticed that some of the expansion packs are 50% off on Xbox, so might be the same for PS4!

I bought the Get Together expansion in the sale as I've been really wanting it for a while now. One of the big features of this expansion is the ability to form clubs with other sims and designate places for a club house and club activities. So the very first thing I did was create a Vampire Council for the ranking vampires living in Forgotten Hollow, and for now, their meeting place is Straud Manor.

One of the activities I designated was "drink plasma" but I eventually had to take it away because I noticed that they were just constantly pulling out plasma packs to drink whether or not they were really thirsty, so out of concern they would quickly become fat, I removed that club activity.

So currently, I have them agreeing to clean and repair things around the manor whenever it's needed, and socialize friendly with each other, and also to view art, and use their vampire powers.

Also, during gatherings, they aren't allowed to fight or be mean or tend gardens.

So far, I have 5 out of 8 maximum in the Council. Should any new vampires move into the neighborhood they will be invited up to the limit.

Winter has arrived in my sims world which means some of Vlad's plants have gone dormant, so what did I decide to do? Build a greenhouse of course! Although it has glass windows all around and the roof is made of glass, the "beams" and any portion of walls showing through are a bit darker than they would be in a neighborhood that is not primarily vampires.

Then I planted at least one of every type of seed that Vlad currently has.

On an almost completely different note, I love the Science career! It's so fun going to the science lab with my sim and inventing things and creating synthetic syrums and experimenting with the inventions. Vlad built a SimRay and so far, he can use it to freeze other sims and recently upgraded it to transform objects. He had to use a chisel to "crack open" the sim he froze haha. I can't wait to find out what else he gets to do there!

I've briefly switched to my alpha generation house since I need to really get those 26 generations started before too long, but it's slow going right now since Adam and Eve Spiritus are very poor and it is taking them a good while to really get established enough to have a baby. Currently, they have about 200 simoleans after playing their near 500 simolean bill, so it nearly wiped out their savings for the week.

Since it is winter everywhere in my sim world, Adam moved all the plants inside so they could continue growing off-season. I also went into their seasonal wardrobes and selected outfits for every category that I hadn't already. Now with the possible exception of game-selected work clothing (that sometimes looks super stupid and cannot be changed without cheats), they won't suddenly look ridiculous when changing into their athletic wear. (So no going into the swimming pool wearing a space helmet as just one example.)

I'll probably just play them through the weekend and then go back to Vlad's household so he can go back to the science lab on Monday morning! I just love going there!

Interesting thing happened last night when I was playing. It was nighttime in game with all the wonderful snow on the ground and Caleb Vatore called up Vlad and asked him if he wanted to hang out at the Ancient Ruins. Vlad accepted and then he and Caleb were at this snowy, cold place at night just surrounded by nothing but ruins and seemingly nothing else. Seemed like a weird place to go. THen two other vampires from the neighborhood showed up and they were just all standing around talking.

I moved the camera around the ruins and saw a bonfire! So I had Vlad light the bonfire and all four sims gathered around and started dancing around it, and then Vlad starts doing a FIRE DANCE! I really wish they were all wearing wolf headdresses or something like in Assassins Creed 2 (or was it Revelation) in ancient Roma.

So they all had a pretty good time after all, and as it neared morning, they all left to go home.

Had no idea Ancient Ruins even existed in the game, but apparently they are a part of the neighborhood that comes with the Get Together expansion that I'd just bought. Fun!