Game Overview

Making a Sim

Creating a Sim involves choosing from skin color, gender, and a few body types - the people range from medium height and thin to medium height and not so thin. You assign your Sim characteristics, much like choosing attributes in a role-playing game - you can distribute points between five characteristics: neat, outgoing, active, playful, nice. Then, based on the characteristics you ascribe the Sim, they are assigned an Astrological sign, which the game instructs you to use to help find good matches for that personality. This is the first game I've seen using any astrology at all, let alone an astrological shorthand for every character in the game. I'm curious about how they came up with that! After studying interviews and documentation on The Sims, the only explanation I can find is that The Sims was developed in Northern California.

This computer got top marks on FiringSims.com

What the program doesn't understand is that I'm systematically denying my Sim pleasure

Housing

Housing your Sims is almost another entire game within a game. There's ample flexibility within the game's architectural tools, and the needs of your Sims will encourage you to experiment with layout. Every once in a while I found myself taking down the old wall paper and painting a whole room another color - because you spend your game sessions staring at the interior of the house, there's a lot of inspiration to redecorate.

Furnishings

Within the house are all the things that the Sims use. There's a chess board which increases logic and fun. There's a couch which increases energy, and can be used in conjunction with a TV to increase fun. There's a computer which can be used to look for a job. A refrigerator supplies food. A sink can be used to clean dishes or increase personal hygiene. It's a decidedly object based view of the world - you control your character by clicking on the items you want them to manipulate to their benefit. Most time playing the Sims consists of watching Sims live and sending them around the house to improve themselves and keep their mood up by using the right sequences of goods and even people.

This is the private hell of my first test case Sim

So much for Sim research

Careers

The life of work takes place in an unseen world outside of the house. Your success at work is determined by your practicing certain job-related skills and being "happy" - well fed, clean, entertained, related to, rested and comfortable. If they are happy/satisfied enough when they go off to work, they will begin to climb whichever career ladder they are on.

As they climb the ladder, most Sim careers will require of them that they have a certain number of family friends. As your game progresses, you'll find much of your time taken up by the management of neighborly relations. These neighbors come from the other houses in the ten house neighborhood. It will behoove you to create nine other houses and fill them with Sim families so that the opportunities for social networking can keep pace with the careers of your Sims. Of course, this is only important if you want them to rise to the top of their professions; an optional objective considering there is no stated way to win The Sims.