The Sims 3 (In Comparison)

[Tomkat]

Hi Everyone,
So with the release of TS3 pending, Im sure plenty of you guys are foaming at the mouth with anticipation. This post will be about making an informed decision on whether you're really interested in this game, or just going along with it because its a new "evolution" of Sims. Or like me, not interested.

While my personal opinion is of great weight here, and the reason for posting here (I wont deny it), see this as your soap box too, by all means. Have your say.

First off, Ill start by showing a few screenshots of TS3, some you have probably seen.





Looks pretty doesn't it? Look at the guy painting...now look at the other two painting...isn't it awesome? They paint scenery. All new actions. The mind boggles. Oh wait...thats also available in TS2...? my bad...
And Dad's shave? amazing... must have been done with some serious waxing.
And whats that? new furniture? WOW!! look at that end table...the fence on the balcony...the little flowerpot, mom's hair...and little Timmy's stool! All new? This is amazing! Great job! Good show! Loving the palm trees too. Doesn't look anything at all like something we've seen before...



OMG. Look at the pretty painterly eyes on this chap. Its like...looking at a real person. I almost died. Right there. Its uncanny! Dead ringer for that guy in Shrek 1. Now if only they started mass producing this as a doll. Im sure barbie wont mind Boho-guy. He has painted on eyes...just like her. At least Mr Boho-Bellhop has some sizzling threads...and some narly eyebrows that redeem him.

OKAY> Moving on now.
Since this is a comparison I guess you wanna see what else I have on my mind. Some more screenie-goodness. Right ahead.

These are from Oblivion. As 1 or 2 people may or may not know that game has some similarities to The Sims, with some more action. Create a custom character ala The Sims, level up, survive. Want a new outfit? buy one. or kill someone and take the clothes off their backs. Build a relationship with someone high enough and they might just help you out. Buy a horse and wander endlessly through the countryside. Get into magics, and cast some pretty spells.
Okay, I hear you, enough Oblivion talk. Thats not the point. Look at these screenshots:







Cozy fireplace... nice looking chapel... and lush greenery.. Pretty. BUT...is it better than TS3 graphic wise? Keep in mind that this game was released in March 2006. Thats 2-3 years before TS3 is due. Now scroll up... look at the TS3 screenshots again. Compare.

Another one for good measure. Just...because. Its no secret that Im a HUGE Tomb Raider fan. Im even biased towards it. This is from the upcoming Tomb Raider: Underworld.



Look at the shadows...Teeth. Hair texture. Sweat. Skin Bump mapping. Compare the eyes to Boho-Bellhop's. This game is to be released mid->late November THIS year.

I used to be a firm believer in The Sims, and I justified and defended all the bugs, all the mediocrity. But The Sims 3? Not getting my vote. Not this time.
Im sorry. But do you need more proof?

Im not saying that you SHOULDN'T buy TS3, just think carefully about it. Are you really worth the sub-effort and mediocrity? Doesnt TS2 already afford you that? Keeping in mind that TS3 doesnt feature custom content by talented community members. Only stuff you'll get from the official website. And we ALL know how helpful and self-reflecting they are:

"I have a problem with my game crashing..."
RE: "Thread closed. The game is perfect. Its your PC."

Wonderful.
Use your discretion with TS3.

Getting off the soap box now. Please, if you disagree/agree with any of this, post here. Get your words and wisdom out in the world. Prove me wrong. Post more screenshots. Do whatever you feel like doing. Discuss!

[Tenshii~Akari]

Heck, even the windows are new!   :laugh:

I've always had a problem with the eyes on those sims... hey, I like "cartoony"-looking eyes, but those eyes just don't fit with the whole spectrum of the new sim design IMHO.  :pale:

Oh yeah... and Little Timmy could use a better barber there.  That haircut he has freaks me out a bit.  :shock:  Maybe it looks better from a different angle, but it looks odd around the back of his neck.  :?

[Theraven]

guess you have a point. They could at least have put some much better graphics in sims3. And a lot of new stuff. It' really needed. I at least hope the child, toddler and infant ages are better covered. We've barely seen the children in the screenshots. The clothes don't look extremely much better either. Maxis still kept those 60-80's style and colours... *shudders*... they really need to visit a couple of fashion stores or something...

sims3 graphics seems slightly better than sims2 - but I'm not sure whether it's worth filling up my computer with (maybe wait until sims4? - but by then, I'm probably tired of the entire game...). if you're going to make a new version of a popular game, you really should make it a LOT better, so that people wants to by it - NOT make a slightly better copy! Looks like Maxis didn't even try hard.

(the woods in that screenshot looks so real! I want that in my sims game!!!!)

[Trepie22]

To me Sims 3 looks like it should be called Sims 1.5. I don't think it looks as realistic as Sims 2, and that's saying something considering Sims 2 is hardly realistic. In fact I'd say Sims 3 might be considered a step backwards [as is obvious by the fact that numbers don't go 0, 1, 2, 1.5, unless there's some new cool way of counting I haven't been told about].

Also, yea! That guy DOES look like any male character from Shrek [not including Donkey, Shrek, or the short prince guy, but like the angry townsfolk]

I agree that Sims 3 should look a lot better than this;
Oblivion: amazing, love it. Tomb Raider: same. But Sims 3 - it doesn't even look like they really tried.

That being said, I know I'm gonna get sucked in to Sims 3, but I'm gonna hate myself :s

[X-Phile]

I told people to look at pictures from Oblivion and Sims 3.
Oblivion looks beter than Sims 3. And Oblivion is from 2006.
But people just don't want to see that.
So I believe that Sims 3 won't be the best game of 2009, because there will be games that look beter and there graphics much more improved.

[MaryH]

If you want to just go by the pretty pictures, the game doesn't exceed Sims 2. If you want to talk about how it plays, we won't know the details until they release it-and from what little I've heard, it doesn't sound promising.
More like Sim Societies, from what descriptions I've read. I could be wrong, true..but EA has not been very forthcoming with those details about the game play so far.
Also there is a little problem with the DRM and the possibility of a 3 installs limit. That's enough to make me exceedingly cautious with even thinking about buying it.

[jamesabrown1]

I would have thought that the step up from Sims2 to Sims3 would be as dramatic as from Sims1 to Sims2 (I still play 1 every now and again), but it appears that is not the case. I've so much loaded for 2 that I will likely let the Sims3 dog lie and sleep for a while until it has gotten a good shake-down from experienced simmers and then decide whether or not to invest in it. Pretty graphics is a real plus for a game, but ever improving content and play experience is just as important.

[Tenshii~Akari]

Pretty graphics is a real plus for a game, but ever improving content and play experience is just as important.

Amen.  Looks aren't what make the game, it's the gameplay.  (...don't take this wrong, though.  I'm not defending EA at all... just the proven fact itself)  You can have the ugliest little stick figures running around the screen for all I care... as long as the game is fun, it's worth it, right?  

But, contradicting myself right now, I'm still not impressed with some of the looks after seeing those Oblivion shots, though.  One does expect a little bit more than what they have, considering some of the older games out there that do have better graphics and run fairly well on older PCs and graphics cards.  :dontknow:  But then again, Sims is not Oblivion, and Oblivion isn't sims.  (...kinda wish there was a way to mix both the graphic (Oblivion... moreso in textures/lighting than style) and gameplay (Sims) elements in though... that'd be pretty cool, though probably not as cartoony.)  

[jamesabrown1]

And amen to that, Tenshii. I have been hoping that, given the ever-growing computer power, the games and the graphics would steadily improve. Oh well. Some of the older games are being re-done with good results. For example, an old Sid Meier game "Colonization" is being re-written with upgraded graphics and made available free. It is being written in JAVA, of all things. It can be found at freecol.org. I've added that to my laptop, as well. It was one of my favorite games. Long on play, strategy, etc., kinda lacking in the graphics department, though.

[ancienthighway]

Those are some pretty awesome pictures from Oblivion and Tomb Raider.  Just going on the pictures alone...well, let's look behind the pictures a bit.

That chapel/room in Oblivion, was it player created with all those objects that can be moved and or interacted with, or is it a fixed backdrop that the avatars just walk through?  Same with that forest castle scene; player built or developer built and you as the player get no options to customize it to your likeing?

Isn't Lara Croft a fixed avatar with limited options, if any for customization?  As would be the NPCs she deals with, all pretty much "what we give you is what you get?"

It's one thing to develop a game where the player experience is limited to within limited boundaries that you, the developer, establish.  You can focus more on the background pretties and not have to worry about creating custom objects for a custom cottage in a custom land with custom landscape.  Custom here is refering to the way players could customize the game with what you've provided them, not specifically custom content.  A bookcase is just an image along with the rest of the backdrop with a MOB on top of it for the one book containing the one clue you need.

I think the comparison you've made is like comparing apples and oranges.  In one, TS2/3, or 1.5 if you want to call it that, you have freedom to interact with whatever you want.  In RPGs you generally have to follow a given story line with limited options along the way.  Simulations only end when you decide to end it.  RPGs end once you defeat the Big Boss; you win.

The sarcastic comments about TS2 objects in TS3, after cutting through the sarcasim, are more valid.  But let's take another popular game and see how it evolved, Sid Meier's Civilization.  The original Civilization was basically just a board war game, ala Avalon Hill, SPI and OSG, converted to computers.  Each subsequent version of Civilization improved on the graphics and added a little more in gameplay, but what was used in the previous version was improved upon, not tossed out the window completely.

With TS3's time going continuously for all families and townies, a massive rework of the game engine had to have been done.  The game went from "turn-based"  to "real-time" action.  That is major!  Sure to save development time and costs, things were ported from TS2 to TS3.  Makes sense to do so rather than reinventing the wheel each time.  I'm sure there's some new objects in there too.  And in keeping with the Sims marketing, give a taste now, then release an add on with more for more profits.  Nothing new in that either.  Call of Duty, Star Wars, Battlefield 1942, Delta Force.  They've all done it too.  MMORGs aren't immune either.

MaryH hit my biggest fear of the game.  Just as SimCities was dumbed down to make Sim Societies, I fear TS3 may be a dumbed down game intended for console play and ported over to PC.

[loversim]

well now that u ask; i guess ome of it has to do with the evelution of the game...but there are some features in ts3 that i have been looking for and dont wanna miss; which is not to say i'll never play ts2 again. due to the amt of money and time ive spent trying to perfect my sims2 games thats not gonna happen. but i am very interested in breaking in ts3 and seeing whats new and hott in it.

[Pierre]

Hello

i know that in my case i will buy the sims 3 because i know that i am going to like the game. and its going to be intressing to see witch familys will be in the Game.

[Islasim]

I don't know if any of you know the game CRYSIS but it is completely moddable and has AMAZING graphics.

crysis screenshot

If sims got to this level I would quit my real life and be like a matrix character...I think.

Still looking forward to sims 3 and especially what the modders end up doing with it, because I think in a way the modders are the reason that maxis is so lazy, they know they don't HAVE TO make cool and exciting stuff and pay for it, they just sell the game and the lovely modders come and do their job.

SO thankyou modders for being awesome and cool and no thankyou maxis for being complacent leeches. Sorry that I sond so scathing but I think this is the reason for it. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[TehJarl]

Right, not trying to destroy EA's reputation, but it seems a lot of gamers I know hate EA. Lately, EA hasn't been going the right way.

[astroth]

Actually I find this comparsion to a waste of space.  The reason being is until the game is released any and all comparsion's between it and any current game is a joke as we don't know for sure how the game will look and what the developers actaully have in mind.

Also I have more faith in a video clip showing the game then a still photo, as almost every still shot is enhanced to get you think thats the actual quality of the game.

I'm not blaming Tomkat for making this topic as the questions actually raised could be valid just as easy as they might not be, but a comparsion between two unreleased games at the time of Tomkat opening post and one that is released don't do anything to impress me either way.

Now I'm still not sure if I'll get it or not but still have somewhere between 6 months to a year to make a informed choice though I'll most likely get it.

Again read reports, watch videos and know what your system is able to do and what would be needed to get the most fun of whatever version of The Sims you plan on playing but figure over time the custom content for the older versions will become less and less