Weekend Update

Another weekend has arrived and what will I do?

• DVD to watch: nothing special planned
• Book to read: “Illuminating Torchwood” by Andrew Ireland and others
• Game to play: “The Sims 3”

New pets for “The Sims 3”!

Weekend Update

Another weekend, half gone already, and another weekend update. I’m late this week, I know, but I was playing and forgetting about the update. Here we go:

• DVD to watch: nothing planned, will see
• Book to read: “Anno Dracula” by Kim Newman
• Game to play: “Edna and Harvey: Harvey’s New Eyes”

I’m also playing a bit “The Sims 3” this weekend. Ah, weekend…

Weekend Update

Yes, I know … I’m a day late, but I just forgot yesterday … I was playing “The Sims 3” again…

• DVD to watch: nothing special planned
• Book to read: a German one about our school system
• Game to play: “The Sims 3” again

This time, I’m actually getting the hang of that parenting thing in The Sims.

Weekend Update

We have a long weekend this weekend – it’s Pentecost over here, so the Monday is free, too. The weather isn’t as sunny and hot as it was before, but still very nice. So, what am I going to do this long weekend?

• DVD to watch: “Black Butler” Volume 4
• Book to read: nothing special planned, but I’ll find something
• Game to play: “Chloe’s Dream Resort”

I’ll probably also play “The Sims 3” for quite a bit. Ah, weekend!

Medieval Times

As I already pointed out in my Weekend Update, I have bought “The Sims Medieval” last week and have spent quite some time with it already. I have a thing for the “Sims” games, ever since the first one was released years ago. Yet, with the new game, there’s also a big change.

The first and obvious change in the game is, of course, the setting. A fantasy-infused medieval age (no realistic middle age, but ‘feeling’ of medieval times) with a kingdom, a monarch and a couple of heroes. And ‘heroes’ also marks one of the most important changes. The Sims has always been about leading a family through life, doing everyday stuff, keeping them happy, well-fed, socialized, clean and so on. But “The Sims Medieval” isn’t about everyday life in the middle ages. It’s about building a kingdom and leading heroes through quests.

During the course of the game, you create ten heroes: monarch, knight, two priests (two beliefs), wizard, doctor, blacksmith, bard, spy and merchant. Each of them can be male or female, you can design them as you wish. They only have two characteristics now (and the list has shrunken quite some) and one great weakness which they might try to overcome with time. The needs have been reduced to two: hunger and energy. Heroes still have an inventory, can gain friends or enemies, they can also marry, but they don’t build up abilities (they level up and get new abilities this way).

On the highest level, you expand your kingdom and add buildings of various kinds (such as the monastery, the cathedral, the knight’s tower, the wizard’s tower, the east tower [where the spy resides], the clinic, the marketplace, the tavern, the blacksmith, but also mill, lighthouse and suchlike). You also choose which quest to play next (you can only play one quest at a time, employing one to three heroes in it) or commence a quest you have started already. In addition, you can take a look at the political situation there (or in the throne room, once you’re in life mode), see how your relationship to the other countries around is.

In life mode, very much like in “The Sims 3” as well, you control one to three of your heroes, make sure they do what the quest demands, but also keep an eye on their everyday life – there’s two duties for each hero to complete each day, apart from the current task or tasks the quest demands. Your heroes level up, just like the heroes in an RPG, but it’s not all about battling enemies (even though some characters, such as monarch, knight or spy, know how to fight). You talk to people, you produce things, you go looking for objects, you perform tasks according to your hero’s class (recite a poem as a bard, preach as a priest, forge something as a blacksmith) and many more things.

To a certain degree, you can also change your hero’s home (castle for the monarch, knight’s tower for the knight, east tower for the spy, wizard’s tower for the wizard/witch, clinic for the doctor, monastery or cathedral for the priest, smithy for the blacksmith, tavern for the bard, marketplace for the merchant). You can’t build like in The Sims, but you can buy objects (furniture and decorations) or change their placement. Instead of the 360° view of the former games, however, you see the buildings very much like dollhouses (which makes playing more fun, actually).

The Sims Medieval is a very good mix of strategy (build your kingdom, work with other kingdoms around), RPG (the quests) and ‘classic’ Sims gameplay (lead a sim’s life). It is not just a ‘let’s put the Sims in another age’ spin-off.

The Sims late at night

This week (yesterday, to be more precise) the new “The Sims 3” add-on, “Late Night” (German title, but I guess it’s the same in English) has been released. I had waited for it, because I’m always eager for new add-ons, but I never expected that many changes in the gameplay.

The first visual difference I spotted after starting the game, once the add-on was installed, was a small symbol in the lower right corner of the saved games. Nice, little houses. I moved the mouse pointer over it and it told me this was a small town, great for families and people who planned having some. I started a new game and found a new neighbourhood with a different symbol. Some skyscrapers were lingering in the lower right corner of the picture of this neighbourhood. This is, because Bridgeport is a city with skyscrapers in the center, with combined public places and with loads of clubs (three types of them). The new city (that’s now town any more) also has something completely new (apartments have been around in “The Sims 2” with the last official add-on): Underground. This way, movements inside the city are much faster.

I won’t go into detail about the new clothes and hairstyles available with the add-on. There’s always quite a lot of those (and this time, most clothes are very hip, as they’re meant for clubbing) as well as of new furniture. But there are changes in the building mode (platforms for rooms, good for bands, fountains and indoor pools – meaning pools on upper floors). One big change is visible when you enter the “Build your Sim” mode. In addition to general weight and muscles, there are two more sliders around now (one for male characters): muscle definition (from ‘anything there?’ right up to ‘Wow, Mr. Schwarzenegger!’) and bust size (from ‘male or female?’ to ‘Pamela Anderson’).

When you reach the actual character generation (choosing characteristics, life wish and likes of your Sim), you’ll find that the zodiac signs are back (but they’re to determine who would fit with your Sim best as a love interest). There are a few new characteristics and there’s a great new feature: If you don’t like the five life wishes you normally can choose from, you can now open a little window by clicking on a sixth field and choose the wish you want from the list that appears. Great!

Once inside the game, I bought an apartment (cheaper than a house, so more money for real good furniture) and took a closer look around. There’s one more career (movie, ending up as a star director or star actor), there are new abilities (mixing drinks, three more instruments – bass, drums, keyboard/piano), but the most important changes are the clubs and the fame system – one wouldn’t work without the other.

A Sim can gather fame during his or her life. This way, he or she can become a star – there’s a rating from one star to five. A star rating has different effects on a Sim’s life. First of all, it virtually opens doors, those to the more exclusive clubs or VIP areas in a club. Some are open to all people, for some you need one, two, three, four or even five stars (but there’s a lifetime gift that will take care of that and open all doors for you even without the star rating). Gathering fame means impressing VIPs and befriending them. A career (high level, especially in the movie career) will also increase fame. The more famous a Sim becomes, the more people will recognize him or her – that means positive aspects (free meals, gifts from companies) as well as negative ones (Paparazzi, wrong accusations). Imagine dancing on a table in your underwear and the next morning the whole city knows, because you’ve been photographed and there’s an article in the newspaper. (By the way: Newspapers are really useful now, because they also tell you about the hot spots every day – the clubs were you’re most likely to meet stars and have a good time.)

Clubs come in three different varieties. The most simple one (where you can usually enter without any fame) is the bar. Bars are places where people come together after work to have a drink, maybe eat something, listen to a band (you can have one yourself, providing you find some other people playing instruments well), dance, play some games and talk. The next one up is the discotheque. They usually are partly open to the public (or people with low star rating), but all have their VIP areas where you can only enter once you’re famous enough. Discotheques usually don’t have an area for a band to play, instead they have a bigger dance floor and a good music system (and some special effects machines). The highest type of clubs around are lounges. Usually you don’t get in there unless you have a star rating or bribe the bouncer with a lot of money. They employ professional people to play music, have a good bar (every club has a professional bar where people can buy different drinks and some food and people with the mixing ability can work as barkeeper, too) and offer everything for a good time. There’s also a vampire lounge around – because vampires now enter the world of “The Sims 3” (after ghosts in the main game, mummies in the first add-on and robots in the second). The vampire lounge (“Plasma 51” in the German version) offers a basement with two special ‘beds’ for vampires, but upstairs also a nice place to drink (drinks with interesting names) and chat – even if you’re still a human.

Vampires in “The Sims 2” were a nasty lot – I never managed to befriend them. Vampires in “The Sims 3”, on the other hand, can be quite nice. They are ‘normal’ inhabitants of the city with jobs and a family. They drink blood plasma or eat special fruits to still their thirst (which replaces hunger after the change), but they can also drink from a human, if they are friends with him or her. They can change humans into vampires, too (either, because they decide, or, because the human asks them). In the list of relationships vampires are visible, because they have a red frame around their portrait. Apart from avoiding too much sunlight and garlic and sleeping on a very special ‘bed’ to rest, they lead pretty normal lives, but can move and learn faster at night and can read other people’s minds. Outside the list, vampires can be recognized by their red eyes and fangs that show when they talk … oh, and by the blood plasma they might be drinking, because they’re thirsty.

The new Sim I created to test the city and the new gameplay actually has a rather friendly vampire as a love interest.

There are many changes in the gameplay with the new add-on, but they are good on the whole. You don’t have to become a level-five star to have fun, you can stay a normal person (the bars are fun and open to everyone, so is at least some part of most discos around). But the options for a Sim’s life have skyrocketed with “Late Night”.