Sims Creator Explains Why Doom Creator "Rocks" [Gdc]

Will Wright, the fast-talking, rocket-loving man behind The Sims, took to the stage at last night’s Game Developers Choice Awards to present John Carmack, the fast-talking, rocket-loving man behind Doom, with a lifetime achievement award. Guess what he talked about? More

What Life As A Sim Might Look Like [Clips]

You’ve seen what it looks like to control The Sims, but have you ever wondered what it would be like to be a Sim? This graduate thesis project looks pretty close to us. The work of student Julia Yu Tsao, this is called “Curious Displays”, a network of “½ inch display blocks” that, if ever produced, would crawl around your house and, when you needed to be notified of something, form displays. Go here, pick this up, clean this, drink this, etc etc. So, yeah, just like being a Sim. Just note, if you see one saying “Climb in here while I brick this up and starve you to death”, best ignore it. Curious Displays from Julia Tsao on Vimeo . Curious Displays [Julia Y. Tsao, via Boing Boing ]

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What Life As A Sim Might Look Like [Clips]

Kotaku Talk Radio Celebrates A Decade of The Sims, Download It Now [Podcast]

Want to simulate listening to today’s episode of Kotaku Talk Radio with special guests from The Sims team in real time? Simply download the podcast in your format of choice, roll the clocks back and enjoy. At no point in today’s episode does the podcast switch to Simlish, making it easy for English speakers to enjoy special guests MJ Chun and Charles London, Sr. from The Sims team talking about ten years of the classic, ultra-popular life-simulating franchise. Hosts: Brian Crecente and Stephen Totilo Guest: MJ Chun and Charles London, Sr. Download the MP3 [Chat About It] Listen to it online [Chat About It] Subscribe via RSS [Chat About It] Download to your iPod or iPhone [iTunes] Subscribe to podcast on iTunes [iTunes] Download to your Zune [Zune]

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Kotaku Talk Radio Celebrates A Decade of The Sims, Download It Now [Podcast]

Kotaku Talk Radio Celebrates A Decade of The Sims, Download It Now [Podcast]

Want to simulate listening to today’s episode of Kotaku Talk Radio with special guests from The Sims team in real time? Simply download the podcast in your format of choice, roll the clocks back and enjoy. At no point in today’s episode does the podcast switch to Simlish, making it easy for English speakers to enjoy special guests MJ Chun and Charles London, Sr. from The Sims team talking about ten years of the classic, ultra-popular life-simulating franchise. Hosts: Brian Crecente and Stephen Totilo Guest: MJ Chun and Charles London, Sr. Download the MP3 [Chat About It] Listen to it online [Chat About It] Subscribe via RSS [Chat About It] Download to your iPod or iPhone [iTunes] Subscribe to podcast on iTunes [iTunes] Download to your Zune [Zune]

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Kotaku Talk Radio Celebrates A Decade of The Sims, Download It Now [Podcast]

Join Us For a Chat with Developers From The Sims on Kotaku Talk Radio Now [Podcast]

Join us live today on CBS Radio for our latest episode of Kotaku Talk Radio with two special guests from Electronic Arts’ Sims team. This week marks the tenth anniversary of a little game called The Sims . Our guests today are MJ Chun , associate producer of Sims 3, and Charles London, Sr. , art director for the franchise and creator of the now iconic plumbob. Chun was the producer on The Sims 2 and all of its expansion packs. She is now in charge of The Sims 3 store. Her experience runs the gamut from development director to feature producer. One of her best professional experiences, she says, was working as a Feature Producer on the MySims franchise. Call in now to talk to our guests and chat with us. The show kicks off at 11 a.m. MT, 1 p.m. ET. Want to be heard on Kotaku Talk Radio? Call us on the air LIVE at (877) CHAT-212 or use Skype to dial in! You can also pick up a nifty, and free, iPhone App to listen to the show live here .

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Join Us For a Chat with Developers From The Sims on Kotaku Talk Radio Now [Podcast]

Happy 10th Anniversary Sims [The Sims]

On Jan. 31 2000 Electronic Arts open the floodgates to another one of Will Wright’s off-kilter, but strangely addictive games. Over the next ten years the Sims franchise sold more than 100 million copies and became the best selling PC franchise of all time. You may not have been around when the first game hit, or maybe you haven’t stuck around through to The Sims 3 and expansion packs due for the title later this month, but chances are you’ve at least tried one of the games in the franchise. Here are a few fun facts for you Sim addicts and those new to the franchise. While creating Simlish , the fictional language spoken by Sims, the development team played around with using bits of Ukrainian and Tagalog. Wright suggested using Navajo. The currency of the Sims, Simoleans , were named after the slang term for the Sixpence (Simon) and a French gold coin called a Napolean. The Sims 3 official community site hosts 300 content downloads every minute on average. The most popular download over the years has been hair. The first object created for The Sims was the toilet. Satisfying one of Maslow’s most basic needs. In 2004, a Dutch family was selected by EA to live in a glass house for four days to promote The Sims 2. Will Wright, not content to sit back and let the Simoleans roll in, once introduced a nasty virus to the world of the Sims. The plague quickly spread throughout the virtual world before players finally tracked it back to pet guinea pigs. The French love The Sims almost as much as they love Jerry Lewis. They even created a postage stamp honoring the game. Make sure to swing by our podcast later today if you’d like to chat with some of the people behind the game live.

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Happy 10th Anniversary Sims [The Sims]

And The World’s Top-Selling PC Game Of 2009 Was… [PC]

The Sims 3 wasn’t just the biggest-selling game at US retail stores for 2009 . It was also, according to publisher Electronic Arts, the biggest-selling PC game in the world. Gathering data from North America and Europe, along with “internal EA estimates”, the publisher says this is the sixth time in ten years a Sims title has been the world’s top-selling PC game. While in the absence of a full chart or a disclosure of sales figures there’s reason to doubt EA’s claims, it must also be remembered that publishers have access to fairly accurate global sales figures (which we don’t, as that kind of data costs a ton ), for both their own games and those of their competitors. EA: The Sims 3 Top-Selling PC Game Worldwide In 2009 [Gamasutra]

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And The World’s Top-Selling PC Game Of 2009 Was… [PC]

The Sims Beat Warcraft for Top PC Seller of ‘09 [NpdGroup]

June’s release of The Sims 3 bested World of Warcraft for the crown of 2009’s best selling PC game, according to numbers released today by the NPD Group. Modern Warfare 2 , despite a November release, was a strong fifth. Dragon Age: Origins also saw a November release and also made the top 10, at No. 9. It was one of five games from 2009 to do so in a sector where titles have a longer sales lifespan than on consoles. Warcraft’s Wrath of the Lich King expansion was the second place finisher; the franchise’s Battle Chest remained a reliable seller at No. 4, and the five-year-old original version of the game is still No. 6. Sega’s Empire: Total War, at No. 10, was the only game not published by Activision or Electronic Arts to make the top 10. Overall, NPD reported that retail PC game revenues dropped 23 percent in 2009 from their 2008 totals. Michael Gallagher, the president of the Entertainment Software Assocation, countered that 2009 was the highest grossing sales year ever on record for the games industry. The top 10 PC selling games of 2009 were: 1. The Sims 3 2. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Expansion Pack 3. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe 4. World of Warcraft: Battle Chest 5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 6. World of Warcraft Blizzard Entertainment 7. The Sims 3: World Adventures Expansion Pack 8. Spore 9. Dragon Age: Origins 10. Empire: Total War

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The Sims Beat Warcraft for Top PC Seller of ‘09 [NpdGroup]

The Sims Beat Warcraft for Top PC Seller of ‘09 [NpdGroup]

June’s release of The Sims 3 bested World of Warcraft for the crown of 2009’s best selling PC game, according to numbers released today by the NPD Group. Modern Warfare 2 , despite a November release, was a strong fifth. Dragon Age: Origins also saw a November release and also made the top 10, at No. 9. It was one of five games from 2009 to do so in a sector where titles have a longer sales lifespan than on consoles. Warcraft’s Wrath of the Lich King expansion was the second place finisher; the franchise’s Battle Chest remained a reliable seller at No. 4, and the five-year-old original version of the game is still No. 6. Sega’s Empire: Total War, at No. 10, was the only game not published by Activision or Electronic Arts to make the top 10. Overall, NPD reported that retail PC game revenues dropped 23 percent in 2009 from their 2008 totals. Michael Gallagher, the president of the Entertainment Software Assocation, countered that 2009 was the highest grossing sales year ever on record for the games industry. The top 10 PC selling games of 2009 were: 1. The Sims 3 2. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Expansion Pack 3. The Sims 2 Double Deluxe 4. World of Warcraft: Battle Chest 5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 6. World of Warcraft Blizzard Entertainment 7. The Sims 3: World Adventures Expansion Pack 8. Spore 9. Dragon Age: Origins 10. Empire: Total War

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The Sims Beat Warcraft for Top PC Seller of ‘09 [NpdGroup]

The Sims 3 offers a mixed bag of new and old

There are many different Sims players out there buying this game from years of playing The Sims 2, and I think some of them will be impressed with The Sims 3, while others disappointed.

Create-A-Sim Players: 4/5
If you have an juiced up computer, the graphics are amazing. The customization you can give a sim is also very rewarding; you can now color customize the different parts of a sim’s outfit with virtually any color, and the pattern system they’ve created only increases the amount of customization you can give a sim’s clothing. A sim’s hair coloration is now broken up into four parts, all of which can be set to any color you wish. The only disadvantage I found is that there doesn’t seem to be as many ways to customize the face as there had been in Sims 2; there are some new, different ways though.

Want to know what other people think about The Sims 3? Read More Sims 3 Reviews

House Building Players: 5/5
Because of the new pattern system in the game, building houses now has a new level of customization, making it easier to customize a house’s color and texture to your liking. Another nice thing is that furniture can now be placed at angles, so you no longer have to worry about awkward placement of objects near angled walls. Just keep in mind that since this is the first game, with no expansions made yet, there is a limited amount of furniture you can use. Also, if you’re only interested in building houses, its not as easy as simply clicking on the lot you wish to build, once the game starts; you actually need to be playing your saved household and then exit your household for “Edit Town,” where you can then select a lot to build on.

Neighborhood Building Players: 1/5
If you were big on building neighborhoods in Sims 2, you’re going to very, very disappointed. You can no longer make your own neighborhoods; you are stuck with customizing Sunset Valley (the only neighborhood that comes with the game) or downloading another neighborhood from The Sims 3 website. There are no pre-made empty neighborhoods you can create and then customize and populate. Needless to say, there is no compatibility with SimCity 4 neighborhoods either. You’re stuck with Sunset Valley, and that’s that.

Movie/Story Players: 5/5
If you’re into making movies or stories there doesn’t seem to be big difference between Sims 2. Photo capture now seems to be similar to what the “Print Screen” button does on your keyboard. The quality is exactly what you see on the screen, and the size of the image is as big as your resolution for the game. Video capture options seem almost identical to Sims 2. And like Sims 2, the controls are still difficult to deal with if you’re trying to make smooth transitions. Also, there is no in-game Storytelling option anymore, storytelling is mostly focused online at The Sims 3 website, where there are some neat tools you can use for editing.

Single Family Players: 4/5
If you liked only playing one household in Sims 2 (like if you were into the Legacy Challenge) Sims 3 makes it even more interesting and more realistic with the fact that the entire neighborhood ages around your sim; no more childhood friends always being children, even when your sims have become adults; no more grandchildren out-aging their grandparents because they happen to be on different lots. And not only that, but you can now explore the rest of the world, expanding the possibilities for your sims.

Multi-Family/God Players: 2/5
If you liked jumping between many different houses and creating a complex story between many different households, you may be in for a big disappointment with Sims 3. You’ve ultimately been demoted from being god. You can no longer save individual households for later. Once you leave a household the sims there become NPCs (characters for the computer to control) and continue on their own lives and own story without your help. This may sound odd but Sims 3 is more of a game, and less of a device to tell a huge complex story.

The Sims 2 Console Players: 5/5
For people who loved The Sims 2 for PlayStation 2, X-Box, and GameCube, The Sims 3 plays very similar to those. In fact, The Sims 3 seems like a souped up version of the console Sims 2. For people who hated The Sims 2 console games, well . . . you may not like how The Sims 3 plays.

You’re liking of The Sims 3 is really going to depend on what you did and enjoyed in The Sims 2. And sadly, I have to say this game isn’t for everyone who loved The Sims 2.

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