As addictive as Civilization II

While school was still in, I overheard some friends talking about "The Sims", a game I had heard of recently. Snippets include, "Yeah, my character died! I left him in a room with a fire" and "This game is SO hard!" I was intrigued. I wanted to play it sometime, but never had my money when I went to Electronics Boutique or other stores. Eventually, I bought it while buying a new ink cartridge. I couldn't wait to get home to play it!

Tutorial

The game starts up for the first time, and asks you "Would you like to play the tutorial to learn how to play the game?" I chose yes, because I wouldn't read the manual (a rule of mine, actually the manual is extremely helpful). It starts you out in a very small house (comparatively speaking), with a kitchen, a bedroom, and a bathroom. There are two inhabitants of this household: Bob and Betty Newbie. Both of them are unemployed, Aquarius (important in this game), and a bit on the sloppy side.

Personality and Skills

The personality list is a list of characteristics that the character has. The five points are Neat, Outgoing, Active, Playful, and Nice. You get 25 points to divide up between those five characteristics. If one has a low Neat point, they are sloppy. A low Nice point, they are mean, etc. This controls how your character reacts to certain situations. A neat Sim will flush, clean up his mess, make his bed, and go to work without needing to be told to. A lazy Sim (not active) will pick the TV over the exercise machine.

Skills are acquired during the game. There are six: Cooking, Mechanical, Charisma, Body, Logic, Creativity. These six skills are useful in two ways: around-the-house chores and job advancement. They are upped by practicing in many ways:

Cooking: reading a cookbook
Mechanical: reading a book on mechanics
Charisma: looking in a mirror
Body: exercise machine/pool
Logic: playing chess (by yourself or with another)
Creativity: playing the piano, painting (the paintings can be sold for small amounts of money, I think it gets larger each time.)

Cooking and mechanical are required if you want to have a self-sufficient household. If one has a low cooking point, a fire could start. If a Sim has a low mechanical point, and they try to fix plumbing, it can get worse. If they try to fix the TV, they will die. That's covered under Death later.

Job paths

Path: starting job: needed skills.

Business: Mailroom: Body, Charisma, Repair.
Entertainment: Waiter/Waitress: Body, Charisma, Cooking.
Law Enforcement: Security Guard: Body, Cooking. This is a job with strange hours.
Life of Crime: Pickpocket: Body, Charisma, Creativity.
Medicine: Medical Technician: Logic, Repair.
Military: Recruit: Body, Cooking, Repair.
Politics: Body, Creativity, Logic.
Pro Athlete: Team Mascot: Body, Repair.
Science: Test Subject:: Body, Logic.
X-Treme: Daredevil: Body, Creativity, Charisma

There are ten stops in each path before the top job. If you miss work one day, you will not be fired. In fact, you can miss work every other day if you feel bad (covered under "The Eight-fold path" later) and have no repercussions (except loss of pay for that day). But don't miss two days consecutively. No matter where your character is in the job line, they will be fired and will have to start his/her career over.

Death

There are three ways to die: electrocution, fire, and starvation (don't try it, it takes many days). If your Sims are dead, you can always reload. However, if other people come over and die also, they will die if you save it. Another bad state to be in (not AS bad as death) is low bladder. If the Sims have low bladder, they will... urinate on the floor, wherever they happen to be.

"The Eight-fold path" (apologies to Buddhism)

There are eight bars on the bottom of the screen that one needs to keep as high as possible to achieve ultimate happiness. They are:

Bladder (achieved by using the toilet or floor)
Fun (achieved by having fun, e.g.: reading, watching TV)
Room (achieved by windows, lamps)
Hunger (achieved by eating)
Comfort (achieved by sitting on comfortable objects, taking a bath, napping)
Hygiene (achieved by showers, baths, brushing teeth, washing hands)
Energy (achieved by drinking coffee or espresso, sleeping/napping)
Social (achieved by interaction with other Sims)

If these eight bars are green, your Sim will be happy, and their overall attitude will be better. If their overall attitude is better, they have better actions. They interact better with other Sims and are more willing to do things to improve themselves, which both lead to happiness through job.

Shift Happens

Three bad things can happen to your household, one which can result in death. Floods, fires (deadly), and burglars. Floods happen when the plumbing isn't fixed when needed, or fixed by an idiot plumber (your non-mechanical Sim) Call a repairman. Fires happen when things are too near the fireplace or a Sim who has little or no cooking skill tries to cook. Not a good thing, so get a fire alarm. Burglars steal things: anything they can! Be sure to buy burglar alarms for every room.

General strategy

When building a house, make sure you have enough money for goodies. The belief in this game is not of an Eastern religion (material possessions are useless), more of a grab everything you can to be happy. Attempt to match up your couple, with correct astrological signs. Yes, unlike in the real world, they matter. This may take a few families to get correct, but it is worth it. Keep you characters home if they are sad, they could get demoted if they go.

Gameplay issues

Programmers are a lazy breed (I have found this, I am training to be one). They do as little work as possible to get the work done. In this case, they worked hard, but couldn't do a few things that many have complained about. Some include:

You can't go to another house.
You can't visit your place of employment.
The TV has one picture per channel, and 4 channels.
The radio is limited.
There is no weather, time is not measured by a calendar, and there are no weekends or holidays.
The Sims don't speak in English.
Kids don't become adults, adults don't die from old age.

When people complain about things such as these, I just say, "Man, it's a game! Try putting those things in yourself!" These issues are this way because of an amazing amount of hard drive space would be needed. Forget these issues, have fun, and rise your family from the $3500 lot to the $50000 house. It will be challenging, it will be frustrating, but it will be fun.