The Sims 4 Won't Have Pools, Toddlers

[Racecarlock]

So in other words, there is literally no reason or advantage other than "All new emotions" (whatever the fuck that means) over just buying a complete version of any of the 3 previous sims games. Even the graphics look the same as the sims 3.

Brilliant fuckin' job there, guys. I wonder why you keep losing profits and people hate you so badly.

 

[RatRace123]

That's a lot of words for "We're deliberately holding it for future DLC."

 

[Headsprouter]

"Sorry, can't."

Yes you can. You just don't want to, at least not right now. In a sequel you don't omit well-loved features. You omit bad ones, or at least improve upon them. Why does EA hate it's costumers so damn much?

 

[Bruenin]

I'm pretty sure what he meant to say was that they'll be excluding pools and toddlers until the DLC packs.

I accidentally read excluding as exploding and I don't regret it one bit.

OT:

I actually like the Sims and the constant atrophy of the series makes me really disappointed. I guess I'll just go back to playing the Sims 2 and the Urbz on my game boy advance.

 

[Nurb]

It's really nice of EA to make pirates feel no guilt when downloading their stuff... because they're the ones who don't have to worry about all this bullshit, only the people stupid enough to still give EA money.

 

[Dr.Awkward]

Sounds like they didn't keep their programmers from the last two Sims games, and didn't bother to keep and/or manage a code repository, and had very poor documentation regarding the technical aspects of the last several of Maxis' games.

And now that decision not to keep those programmers (or at least keep them satisfied enough to stay) and not to manage their code repository (if they even have one) has come around to bite them in the ass hard with what sounds like inept, inexperienced programmers trying to make games that are way more complex than they can comprehend. This is no more apparent than in Sim City's launch condition...

 

[LegendaryVKickr]

Since I'm that into the game I've been following the news real closely. And believe, a lot of simmers are really whiny about these exclusions. I'm not btw.

See, that's what I don't understand. I saw this elsewhere today as well. How come it's perceived as "whining"? Do you really WANT to spend another several hundred dollars on a game when it's so openly ripping you off from the get-go? Just send them your credit card info, get it over with quick like tearing off a band-aid.

It's not, to me at least, about the exclusions anyways. It's EA treating the consumers like idiots, hoping we'll keep throwing money at them while they can get away with giving us a less than adequate game. I'd honestly respect them more if they just said "We're not doing pools because fuck you. Give us money". At least it would be honest.

I consider it whining since I've seen ALL the time ever since the announcement of the game. It's extremely tiring. I'm following The Sims on Facebook and every single time they post a shot from the game people are gripping about stuff. Always! I think the game looks amazing. I can't wait to try it out!
You see, The Sims is really the only game I've ever enjoyed so I can deal with the high cost. I don't buy things in the sims store and I don't use mods. My only stuff packs were either real cheap or given to me. But you see, since I'm not buying things from the store, and all my expansions have a CD my actual annual cost is pretty low. And considering I spend a lots of hours with the game, it's worth it.

I a simmer, that's what I am. And everything I seen in the game looks gorgeous. The only thing I would miss if it's not in the base game is the possibility to have your own company (like author, painter and so on) and even then, I could make do anyway. Some gamers wait like crazy for Zelda, CoD, Super Mario, Assassins Creed and all those other titles. No one calls them stupid. No one thinks they are weird even when the game didn't turnout exactly how they liked it and still buying it.
I've been playing The Sims for 14 ys. One year and half ago I started thinking "The Sims 4 should be coming soon", and just a little while later, it was official. So is it really >that< weird I'm existed. Just two more month and I can finally do everything myself instead of scanning the net in search for even the tiniest news? This is my hobby. It's allowed to cost a bit. Most of my other hobbies are quite cheap after all.

And really, all that hating and whining because there are no pools? Geez, grow up people. They will come. In the meantime they should enjoy this brand new game and try out all the crazy stuff.

Hey man, it's your money. If you wanna lay down some of your hard earned cash for Electronic Arts to take away to give you half-baked content with a fresh coat of paint, go for it. It sounds like you're hard up for money, so maybe at least reconsider the pre-order. The games not gonna pull a Bella Goth and disappear on you.

 

[Lilani]

Not possible to include every single feature from the previous games? I was under the impression adding an endless list of features was the business model of the Sims.

Let's just hope that when they inevitably add these features back into the game as buyable DLC packs, they don't add them at the same time. A "Toddlers and Pools" DLC pack might send some undesirable mixed messages.

 

[kasperbbs]

Ha! We wont add basic content so that we could release a shitload of expensive expansion packs later!
It's not like this game has any kind of story to speak of so they need to save up some items for future DLC and there will be a lot of them. Sure am glad that i find this game boring as hell.

 

[Littaly]

This is partially why I've lost interest in The Sims over the years :-/

It seems that since it's more aimed at a casual market less used to the dirty tricks of the industry, EA thinks that they can get away with the kind of BS that they otherwise wouldn't.

It feels like The Sims has become worse and worse in that regard. Now we're four games into the series, and not only do they keep releasing the same expansion packs for every iteration (how many times have they made the pet-expansion? Shouldn't that be a core feature by now?), not only do they sell items that used to be part of the expansion packs separately, but they've started to omit things from the core game that have been there since the very first release?

Also,

So what I've learned these past few weeks is that women and pools are expensive game assets to make.

Imagine what Team Ninja's budget for Dead or Alive: Extreme Beach Vollyeball was like!

Touché

 

[Atmos Duality]

Why give it to us when you can sell it to us, just be honest.

They do sell everything. They always have.
The better way to look at it, is whether the content is worth the hiked price or not.

Given what I've seen of the Sims 3 on SALE, I imagine The Sims 4 will either make EA a great sum of money...or crash and burn spectacularly.

They've reached the limit where providing the consumer with more value or at least more interesting stuff is feasible. From now on, their only option going forward will be marketing and deception; to fool the customer into buying the same product again, at a higher price. AAA games are becoming more and more fungible every year, and it will be their undoing.

 

[Rozalia1]

EA as ever know how to extract more capital from less, you can see why they are the big dog of the yard.
Last game I played of theirs was Dead Space 2 that I got for free (PSN+ to avoid any unfortunate assumptions), and the most enjoyable was likely Future Cop: LAPD many many years ago so I couldn't care less how much they squeeze people.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

you should know that we're building an incredibly strong foundation that is capable of fulfilling every one of your desires in the years to come

That is one strong market research, heading ahead of what we want for "years to come"...

 

[Something Amyss]

Sounds more like "We are purposefully excluding these features, that everyone would expect because they've been in all the other games, which are also extremely easy to add-in and take almost no resources at all, so that we can release a $40 expansion pack 6 months after launch that will add pools and toddlers... we'll call it 'The Water-birth expansion pack'"

This sounds far more accurate. And in the first post.

I'd give them more of a benefit of the doubt, but it's becoming a pattern.

 

[MrBaskerville]

Slightly less cynical, but maybe they are running out of time and they made a business decision that they'd rather exclude these features than delay the game.

Yeah, you kinda have to draw a line somewhere unless you want to end in a Final Fantasy XV situation where they just keep expanding forever. It sounds silly that they didn't have time to make pools, but maybe they spnd their time on something more important?

I can't believe i'm defending EA, but it doesn't seem like the most devastating omission.

 

[Silverbane7]

someone said earlier (a page or so back) about how they stopped buying expansions for s3 because of needing origin.
i havent installed origin and i have most of the packs now.
the trick is to have the original first edition of the sims3.

if you bought the newer one from last year, that one will insist on installing origin, and no way no how. it wont budge.
i have most of the expacs, but i buy them ether on sale (my local sainsburys had a couple of them for a tenner last year)
or i get them from my local indipendant /CEX / charity shop.

yeah thats right. they end up in the charity shops (thrift stores, for you USA users)
sims 1 packs started turning up near the middle of sims2 lifespan, and now even the sims 3 packs are appearing in them (tho few and rare, the sims 2 ones are starting to appear a LOT more now)

i stopped at seasons, mainly because i wasnt sure about the origin requirement. im going to wait for anything new to appear in the shops on the cheap, and then try it. not wasting cash on new.
(if you are wondering, you start with telling it not to install the EADM (the old version of origin) and then when it gets to the packs that say install origin, you say the same thing, no ' DO NOT WANT '
its worked for me so far, with a bit of help from the noCD mod i just tells the game not to look for the disk, nothing more lol) and having no access to the net on that pc, and making a shortcut to the .exe so i can bypass the launcher. you dont need it at all unless you want to install sims3pack files. then you just grab patches you might have missed from the patches scrolls...those are usualy early ones like for world adventures and the one that came out right after that)


sims 4 is going to still make them a critt-ton of money. why? because of the sheeple.
those people that spend tons of cash on the EAstore stuff (ya know, all that stuff that they ripped out of each expansion to feed you a drop at a time)
they wont use any custom content but EAs (and maybe the sims resource lmao at the stuf they have) and likely never even consider using free CC thats fan made
(the best place for fan stuff that is free, is mod the sims, hands down. fixes and patches and hell, they even came up with posebox's for storytellers. a lot of stuff that ended up in sims 2 and 3 expansion packs were ahem, *inspired* by the mods there. echo's farmable crops...the spiral staircases...)

and yeah, we will see the toddlers again, but in the sims4 version of generations (so glad i never bought that, like i need some invisible friend stalker in my game) which adds lots of interactions for your kids. and the pools, well they will be back in the sun and fun type pack, where they give you hot-tubs back again....but not swimming in the sea, thats for the holiday themed expac, where you get sunburn and spontaniously combusting sims (again lol).
we will probably also see one supernatural type race choice per pack, maybe we will see plantsims back again....and of course the vamps and the werewolfs casue we got to have the little tween's fave boys again....

yeah, i will still stick to sims 1,2 and 3....and mine are more fun becasue of free CC....my s1 has multiple past time hoods (roman and medievil and old japanese are my faves) and my s2 is half zombie apocolypse (get a special mod set from mod the sims to help you simulate it better lol) and half medievil/roman too. if you like past time stuff, check out the medievil smithy site, such wonders they have ^^ even a full greek party set for your own recreation of 300

 

[Duskflamer]

See: We know you suckers will buy it later anyway. Stay tuned after Sims 4 to see what features we're removing to sell later for Sims 5.

Tired of your sim being lonely in his small cramped house? Never fear! This Summer 2022, look forward to these Sims 5 Expansions!

Mansion Life ($20) - At last, you can build past the small boundaries we were unfortunately required to include into the base game. Marvel as the total build-able area increases to 125% once you purchase this pack!

Sims Roommates ($30) - That's not some salesman knocking at the door, it's your sim's new roommate! We've finally managed to get past the technical limitation that required sims to live alone up until now, enjoy a whole new sort of sims excitement with up to 2 sims per household!

Romantic Getaway ($60) - Your sim still lonely even with that roommate living with him? Never fear, with this content pack your sim can finally go visit the lovely ladies of simtown and enjoy a romantic time out with them. NOTE: We're unable to include a marriage system at this time, please look forward to our Marriage DLC this Christmas.

 

[MCerberus]

Oh, in case any of you missed it with Poolgate:

EA has "Apologized" for Dungeon Keeper mobile... by saying that their price points were messed up. Yah, they go the route that pretty much goes 'well the young people are used to being fleeced because we keep fleecing them'. And the guy takes about 6 paragraphs to say this and says nothing about shady reviewing practices.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-06-25-will-ea-learn-from-the-terrible-dungeon-keeper-mobile-game