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The Sims 3: Generations
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Graphics & Sound:
It has been a few years since I have picked up the crack that is The Sims and even more years since I played one on the PC. Although I have looked at buying The Sims 3, I just never managed to find time until I got in The Sims 3: Generations to review. After finally figuring out how to make it run happily on one of my four PCs, I am pleased to say that I have an addiction again, one that will keep me entertained for hours on end!
Over the years, The Sims have become more realistic and fluid. The characters have gotten more detailed facial features, hair styles, body shapes and size, and a lot more clothing. The Generations expansion pack has added quite a few clothing styles, shoes and accessories. It seems to me like the majority of the new clothes are geared towards teens and young adults. There is also a "Costume Chest" that you can purchase for kids to dress up like a prince or princess (both genders can choose both options so your son can be a princess if you want) or a T-Rex or an astronaut. There are different colors for all of these choices as well.
The Sims still don't speak English, but they do speak Simlish. You can even choose what pitch to make your characters speak in so that you can make them sound like you want. There are a lot of background sounds and music to entertain you as well, which is what you would expect considering you've got an entire town to play in. I don't think that the Generations expansion pack adds any new buildings though, at least I haven't found any yet. |
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Gameplay:
The Sims 3: Generations, like all Sims games, isn't so much a game as it is directing a life, and maybe that's part of the massive appeal of it. I would venture to say that everyone who plays The Sims has at some point put themselves, their significant others and/or their families into the game. Since they make it so easy to create your characters exactly as you want them, it's quite simple to put yourself in there. I'm guessing that we all give ourselves only our good traits though! Anyway, once you start a game, you can choose to play with a pre-made family or customize your Sims. You can then buy a pre-built house or you can even take the time and patience to build your own from the ground up.
There are not many new building structures, but new lights, small appliances, accents and more. There are specifically a lot of new kids' items, especially beds, toys and décor. There are also a few things for the older generations, but mostly the lives of the Sims up to their adulthood have been enhanced. If you're having trouble finding time to test out all the new features because your kids are growing up too quickly or elders are dying too quickly, simply increase the length of time that your Sims stay in each life stage. Then you'll have more time for pranks, imaginary friends, and everything else that you want to test out! Some of the things are random and some are triggered when you want them to. For example, the imaginary friend shows up as a random package in the mail sometimes. There are bachelor/bachelorette parties that you can choose to throw when you get engaged. You don't have to have one if you don't want to, though. Not everything is fun, however. Mood swings and midlife crises can really be a pain to get your characters through. Don't forget that any memory, good or bad, that you want to share can be sent directly to your Facebook!
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Difficulty:
Obviously the more characters you have to work with, the more difficult the game is going to be, so really you can make your game as easy or as difficult as you want. Of course, you're going to have to have your Sims have kids to keep your families going, unless you just keep changing the active family every time you need new characters to play with. Speeding up and slowing down the game can also make it easier or harder. You'll probably want to keep the game on fast speed while everyone is at work or asleep, but usually once they're home, you're going to want to slow things down so that you can instruct each Sim. They'll somewhat take care of themselves if you ignore them, but they won't fulfill their own wishes or advance their own careers or anything like that.
The hardest thing I found with The Sims 3: Generations expansion was the chemistry creations. You can buy your Sims a chemistry set for anyone from childhood on up to create potions with. The thing is that they have to first discover a potion before they can specifically choose to create it. Sometimes it can take several tries to discover a potion and unless your logic skill is really high, they take a while to discover. If you fail, your Sim is singed. Personally, I find the singed Sims funny, but you'll have to bathe them until they are clean before trying to discover a potion again. This means that if you accept a wish for your Sim to make a specific potion that they haven't already discovered, then you could be working on it for a while. Of course, some of the potions do have positive aspects as well if you drink them, so they're worth taking the time to create. |
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Game Mechanics:
The Sims 3: Generations plays exactly like all of the previous Sims games before it. You select a character to direct and click on the things that you want to interact with. When you click on them, it will give you the options that you have for interactions. If you've played The Sims 3, then you already know how to play The Sims 3: Generations. The one thing that I have noticed that is different are the "punishments" that have been added. When you're a teen, you're pretty obviously going to get in trouble playing pranks, egging houses, skipping school, and many other things. If you get caught, the adult in charge of you will punish you. The only problem with this is that if you have events queued up for any of the characters involved, the punisher and the punishee, when the punishment is triggered all of those queued events are cancelled. This can be a bit annoying when you're playing with 5 or 6 characters and don't remember exactly who you had doing what or what they needed to be doing. I do wish that the punishment would just be put at the front of their queues.
On the bad side, I have had more trouble making The Sims 3: Generations run than I have on any game ever. I still have not managed to make it run on my Windows 7 64-bit machines. But even having said that, I will either keep trying or keep my XP machine around simply because The Sims 3: Generations is that addictive! I really like the new content added as it just makes the experience more complete. Now you want the kids to spend a long time being a kid just to see what all fun they can have. If you're looking for an addictive game that will make time pass very quickly and possibly make you feel like you have some control over life, check out The Sims 3: Generations today!
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-Cyn, GameVortex Communications AKA Sara Earl |
Minimum System Requirements:
OS: XP SP2/Vista SP1/Windows 7, CPU: For XP 2.0 GHx P4 or equivalent/For Vista and 7 2.4 GHz P4 or equivalent, RAM: For XP 1 GB/For Vista and 7 1.5 GB RAM, 2.5 GB with 1 GB additional space for saves, Graphics: 128 MB Video Card with Pixel Shader 2.0 Support |
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Test System:
OS: Windows XP Service Pack 3, Processor: 2.4 GHx, Memory: 2 GB, Hard Drive: 10 GB free, Graphics: 128 MB nVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M, Sound: DirectX 9.0c (Failed Test System is the same other than 4 GB RAM and running Windows 7 64-bit) |
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