2024 used to be an eventful yr for The Sims 4, if most effective as a result of we were given affirmation that The Sims 5 isn’t coming. As an alternative, we’ve been promised a perpetual, live-service-esque model of the sport we’ve identified and cherished for a decade. This yr, we additionally were given a brand new death-themed enlargement, which is ironic seeing as all this stay carrier stuff is killing my love for the sport.
I’ve been a Sims fan lengthy sufficient to have noticed the franchise at its worst. I’m an apologist for the entire peculiar console spinoffs, together with The Urbz and The Sims 2 Castaway. I’ve been round lengthy sufficient to grasp that, when The Sims 4 got here out, it felt like a hole model of its former self, with its maximum detailed customization options gutted, reputedly within the identify of promoting (one way or the other) much more expansions.
EA hasn’t ever hidden its extra money-hungry behavior. Oddly sufficient, regardless that, the worst factor about this new generation of always-online updates has been the freebies. In Would possibly 2024, The Sims 4 presented the primary of a brand new collection of stay ‘occasions’. ‘Glad at House’ rewarded you with unfastened equipment, family gadgets, or even characteristics while you logged in persistently sufficient. Sounds neat, proper?
Reinforced by way of this primary run, The Sims 4 presented a moment tournament to our virtual dollhouses. Reaper’s Rewards used to be way more interactive than its predecessor, because it requested you to finish a sequence of small duties to free up some freebies. Catch some fish, plant a couple of bushes, and also you’ll earn some trad goth denims. Flirt with the Grim Reaper, and also you’ll free up a brand new tattoo. You get the image.
For me, occasions like those are fully antithetical to how and why I play The Sims. The tip objective used to be constantly to create, to not download.
I’m right here to design the fascinating indifferent three-bed of my goals and transfer in a Sim that appears precisely like me, most effective with get entry to to limitless cash. I’m right here to hand-rear the very best cult chief from start, then watch his group cave in a number of generations later after they flip to vampirism. I’m right here to maximise the productiveness of an formidable heart supervisor and notice how temporarily they may be able to succeed in the highest degree in their industry profession if they have got WooHoo each and every unmarried day.
Within the Sims, I’m grasp of my very own area. I’m the storyteller, the artist, and the internal clothier. I’ve general energy over lifestyles and dying, happiness and melancholy. I’m all-powerful.
So you’ll believe my dismay when an outdoor power became up and passed me a banal weekly tick list to accomplish.
Once I performed with dolls as a kid, my mom didn’t lean over my shoulder and inquire from me to make the ones dolls do laundry. Nobody else had the appropriate to micromanage my personal narratives – which is strictly what those fresh occasions are doing.
Alright, most of the prompt quests had been menial. Preventing to invite a neighbor about Ambrosia or cooking one thing other for dinner wouldn’t disrupt the cinematic universe I painstakingly created. I may just even make a choice to forget about the sport’s requests.
Aside from, if I did that, the sport by no means stopped reminding me. The tick list completely lived within the top-left nook of the display screen, in the similar position the place in-game occasions like Love Day and Lottery Day in most cases seem. Those seasonal actions will also be closed in the event you don’t need to participate, however this wasn’t a privilege that Reaper’s Rewards allowed. You’ll want to decrease the occasions field, however it by no means actually went away – and it could re-open itself any time you switched keep watch over to another Sim.
The development proved much more disruptive by way of introducing new system defects to the sport. Many gamers who if truth be told sought after to interact with Reaper’s Rewards reported that it used to be extraordinarily buggy. You couldn’t whole the quests in case your Sims existed on positive so much, as an example – which used to be by no means obviously communicated as a part of the development.
One Redditor shared an anecdote the place buyer beef up advisable that they begin a wholly new save if they would like to sign up for in with occasions like Reaper’s Rewards. That takes this new stay tournament from frustrating micromanaging to completely dictating the best way we play.
As somebody who selected to not have interaction with Reaper’s Rewards, I didn’t individually see its a large number of UI problems. I did see an build up in minor insects in the remainder of my recreation, on the other hand. Sims stretching to extraordinary heights, floating young children, all types of minor oddities that shouldn’t be.
Reaper’s Rewards mercifully ended on November 19, a couple of weeks after the Lifestyles and Demise enlargement pack used to be launched. Ultimately, I may just benefit from the Sims 4’s macabre new taste at my very own tempo. I may just dive deep into the smartly of Gothic internal design and discover new kooky profession paths, corresponding to enterprise or running as a literal Grim Reaper.
That peace lasted for 2 weeks. On December 3, a brand new Christmas-themed tournament kicked off. A contemporary replace to the sport presented a brand new, unavoidable tick list of festive busywork. System defects as soon as once more started to rear their unpleasant head.
I’m no longer so aggrieved with those new occasions that I’ll prevent enjoying the Sims 4 eternally. I’ve spent twenty years of my lifestyles with the franchise, and it’ll take some severely heinous adjustments to sever that bond. Alternatively, those occasions really feel like the primary rumbles of a hurricane but to return.
Login bonuses and reward-driven goals reek of the FOMO-driven industry fashion carried out by way of microtransaction-heavy free-to-play video games. The rewards stay unfastened for now, however they may simply be the carrot that comes ahead of the stick.
I take into account the early 2000s, when every replica of The Sims got here with a code that supposed it will most effective be downloaded as soon as, fighting enthusiasts from purchasing copies second-hand. I’m absolutely mindful that the present iteration of The Sims expects you to pay over $1,000 if you wish to get entry to all to be had expansions. I’ve such a lot love for The Sims, however I’ve by no means cherished the best way it’s monetized. I haven’t a lot religion that, in the longer term, those occasions will pan out within the participant’s prefer.
Whilst the Lifestyles and Demise enlargement could have introduced new lifestyles to The Sims 4’s industry fashion, I’m involved it might be the dying of my love for the sport. This Christmas, I’m asking Father Wintry weather for the optimism I don’t these days really feel. Please, be sure that this new way received’t be the alternate that pushes me over the brink.
