The Sims 4 Reviews
Sims are always entertaining, but they're not living life to its fullest in The Sims 4.
Superficially, The Sims 4 is the upgrade everyone wanted. It's prettier, rife with the possibilities only the fourth entry in a longstanding simulation series can provide.
The Sims 4 could easily have been a nominee for one of our editor's choice awards, but it's woefully incomplete, despite being unexpectedly solid and entertaining in its current state.
The Sims 4 is basically The Sims 3, but shrunken and sterile. While some tweaks and enhancements are nice, none of them can offset the overall lack of engagement provided, and the looming promise of DLC is no compromise.
The Sims 4 is a fun experience that certainly takes great steps in improving the core mechanics of the series. The Create-A-Sim and Build Mode systems are much more accessible yet offer a lot of depth for those that desire it. Sims are smart, can multitask, and interact in lots of nifty ways. However, there are still plenty of missing core items while the existing set of options are limited, to say the least, no doubt to ensure that the upcoming expansions bring lots of highly desirable things.
At the end of the day, The Sims 4 is a core game, pure and simple. It is made specifically so that more content can be pumped into it via DLC. The overall functionality of the game is fine, with no real breakthroughs, just a little simplification and minor tweaks. Nothing groundbreaking here. It wasn't entirely unenjoyable, even for someone like me who doesn't really play The Sims normally. But it didn't convert me either. The Sims 4 is certainly not deserving of the fan backlash it's currently receiving on the internet, but it's not the revolutionary leap forward you would expect from a game that has had years to develop.
The Sims 4 is a beefy update for the series. The core game feels more smooth, more powerful, and more dynamic than its predecessors, if occasionally buggy.
The Sims 4 is still fun with plenty of cool tweaks, but it feels somewhat empty without much innovation
The new generation of Sims begins with what feels like a bare-bones starter kit. It packs top-of-the-line Sims creation and house building tools, but styling options and activities are distinctly lacking. Add the contents of its first expansion, and Sims 4 will probably feel like the game it should be right now.
Maybe one day a game like The Sims will be something of a great responsibility
The Sims 4 may not feel complete in some aspects, and those coming from The Sims 3 may not feel at home with some of the gameplay elements, but The Sims 4 is still a decent game on its own.
A new emotions system and improved graphics finally bring The Sims into the current decade.
The Sims 4 is a visual and mechanical upgrade, but it's missing many of the things Sims fans are used to.
The Sims 4 is undoubtedly a major step forward for the series that improves on many aspects that plagued past titles. However, with the improvements also comes an unusual disappearance of features from past games which result in less control and customization. Even with the missing content, The Sims 4 delivers a gameplay experience that is highly-entertaining and addictive for both series veterans and newcomers.
Despite what's been left out, The Sims 4 feels like it's heading in the right direction.
While there are certainly some things to like about The Sims 4 such as building a custom mansion, or being visited by the Grim Reaper, the entire experience feels like a starter kit for bigger things in the future. If you had The Sims 3 and its multiple expansions, The Sims 4 will feel stripped down. If you have never played a Sims game, it might be a better option to hold off until The Sims 4 flourishes into a more complete package.
The Sims 4 is both fresh and yet also predictable, pleasant, comfortable and rarely overstimulating. It's wobbly, and you can still see some of its joins, or hear the creaks as new parts settle into place. It's not likely to win over any new players, but it will satisfy a lot of its old ones. For many of its fans, it will feel like moving into a new home. They'll settle.
The Sims team needs to do some heavy duty work on the automation side of things, but otherwise they've created a good place to build from.
The Sims 4 is beautiful and charming, but its constricted structure makes it disappointingly limited.
The Sims 4 will be worth it. Right now, it's too hamstrung by EA's need to make those expansions worthwhile to be a solid standalone title.