Hello all, I know I do not post very often but have been a member of the sims /1/2/3 community since about 2005.
Anyway, I had a chance to speak to an actual project developer today who works on the sims 3 team at EA. We basically shot the bull for a few and I told him about the "pudding heads" and we both got a laugh. We also both admitted to playing sims games in our spare time, he admitted that EA is working on a significant way to address this issue.
I prodded a bit and he finally confided that they are going to really upgrade CAS, get rid of the pure pudding and add around a dozen more sliders as well as more looks customization. Me being a businessman myself began to think to myself that sales must be in the toilet.. at least for a mega company like EA and a mega brand game title like the Sims franchise.
Hope this little morsel of information gives some hope to fellow fans on the Sims.