THE HORROR: The REAL TS3 Scoop As It Unfolds

[Papercut]

at any rate it's clear that it's probably no longer possible to have sims that are good at absolutely everything.

Yes, this is one of the positives that really struck me - skilling and expertise seems far less generic and more sim-specific than in TS2.

I really like the trait system too, more for its open-endedness than its effect on gameplay (I've not played long enough to really suss out the full effects). I imagine it would be quite easy for EAxis to add new traits in each EP, much more preferable than the aspiration and personality points regime.

I'm still not sure on the moodlets though. Already I'm finding the basic ones annoyingly repetitive ... Squeaky clean! Hurrah! ... I mean, having a nice shower sometimes puts me into a good mood, but not every bloody day.

The rabbit holes are less crap than I expected, but I hope they make an OFBish EP eventually and open up some more community lots. I want my seedy bars and overpriced knick-knack shops, dammit!

Playing around in CAS, I was able to make some passable sims (as someone mentioned before, sliding head width to max left seems to help). I don't dislike the way the sims look, but there does seem to be problems with the way features are blended on born-in-game sims. Also the skins are atrocious. They're like something out of Second Life (shudder).

I'm not enjoying the collectibles much. Just knowing there is stuff lurking out there that I should be collecting annoys me. But I knew it would, so no surprises there. Ooh, and I fuckin' hate the opportunities. Goal-orientated gameplay has a short shelf life for me, and so far TS3 feels very goal-ish to me.

Overall I think there's good potential, but it all rests on having an unborked story progression toggle. Without that, it's just a demo.

[J. M. Pescado]

The flaw in Goal-oriented gameplay is apparent in how BV turned out. THe FIRST time you play, it's a novelty to collect all the milestones. When it starts to turn into a speedrun, and then becomes so tedious you just quit...

[jriggs]

Same with University.  Who has the patience to do that with each sim?

[DigiGekko]

Has anyone bought the Ambrosa recipe and successfully made it yet? I'm interested to know what's so special about a $12,000 dish.

[Soggy Fox]

I used to cheat with uni and make maxmotives, and master everything before going home - could usually start normal play with a little extra money.  If I did do a second generation sim, they usually had every skill maxed by the time they were ready for uni anyway.

And the triangular floor tile is in Sims 2 - not sure which expansion though.

[Beehoosis]

I am curious about the traits Evil, Mean, and Grumpy.  Did they all make it into the game?  If so, are they actually different from one another, or is EAxis just using them to pad out the list of traits?

I guess while I'm at it, I'll also ask if there are any other sets of traits that are all basically the same.

[rufio]

Uni really depends on the sim - the ones who keep wanting to flirt with random people and join Greek houses and things are generally a lot more interesting than the ones that just continually roll wants to write term papers and skill.  I generally let them on free will most of the time, actually, unless they've rolled a big want that I want to fulfill.  It's basically the only time my sims get much free will; they generally spend most of it woohooing (due to ACR) and fighting with the evil mascot.  It really helps to have the mod that shortens time in Uni to two days, instead of three.  If they go to both of their classes and do nothing else, they just barely squeak by the semester; alternatively, if they decide they really just want to write term papers and do assignments all the time, they can get a 4.0 but don't have time for much else.

What's really boring is getting ticket businesses to level 10 (unless they're on the home lot and require no legwork whatsoever).  I've wound up putting the business owner on Power Idle on speed three and let him do whatever while I go off to make dinner.

Beehoosis - Grumpy and Evil are definitely in there, and have pretty different descriptions.  I don't think I saw Mean, though.

[mistyk]

Beehoosis - Grumpy and Evil are definitely in there, and have pretty different descriptions.  I don't think I saw Mean, though.

I saw evil also, didn't notice mean or grumpy. There is also loves outdoors, hates children, and insane that I noticed

Hmm I think I will make a sim that is evil, insane and hates kids and see what happens..lol

[Zarifeke]

There is a Mean-Spirited trait, and yes there is Grumpy and Evil. I haven't checked any of them out yet though; I like nice sims >.>

On the other hand I like the crazy/weird traits, like inappropriate and neurotic. They just give so much strange character flavor, and good story ideas. That could just be me though!

All in all I really like the trait system, and like someone said, I could see them easily adding more in expansions and whatnot.

[brownlustgirl]

Mean is not showing as a trait, but in talking to someone, you can chat in a mean way. I made my sims friendly, but they are in law enforcement, sometimes they have to get mean in questioning townies and neighbors. Being nice gets them no intel, and their job performance suffers. If I had known that was a part of the job, nice would not be a trait. Will change it when I get the points for the change traits reward.

My poor sim now wants to befriend the ones he made snitch on others...

I don't remember that trait, but I like evil more than mean. I will try that out when my sims age up, birthday coming soon.

[Mikka]

I had a sim that was... Evil, Grumpy, and Mean-spirited or something like that.  (I think I then topped it off with Ambitious and Lucky, but I can't remember- she started spawning clones when I tried another family and I don't feel like actually checking on her.)

Evil options were fairly 'bwhahaha I'm EEEVALLL lolz!' type: my sim would have a FIENDISH shower, sleep FIENDISHLY, eat quick meals FIENDISHly... yadda, yadda.  The only real evil option I saw was the donating to undermine charities thing; all other fiendish options were basically the same.  She also could gloat about her evil masterminding plan, or some such: most other Sims seemed to find it boring.  (Wankers.)  She also would take great glee in declaring other sims her nemesis-es, though.  Ah, now that I'm thinking: it also added a moodlet whenever she saw another Sim suffering (usually by low mood) and made her want to steal candy from her daughter.

Grumpy, I don't even remember what it did.  I think it just made it harder for other Sims to win her over, and she got a bit more enjoyment in complaining... maybe a few more options?  She also tended to throw shit-fits over minor things: lots more 'angry' on her mood meter, and less 'tense' or 'sad'.  More stomping feet and less throwing arms in a sigh when the toilet got clogged and such.

Mean-spirited, I believe, gave some more mocking/insulting options... but mostly, it meant that whenever she saw one of her enemies, she got a happy moodlet.

All three were fun, but I think my favorite is neurotic: the random freak out the Sim has amuses me, as does the 'must check sink' deal.

[hooptytrib]

Yet another deal-breaking implementation flaw is discovered:  "troll internet forum" does not decrease writing skill.

[Insanity Prelude]

One of my neurotic Sims rolled "wash hands 3 times." OCD ahoy!

Cowardly Sims don't really seem to have a huge problem with being sent into the graveyard to collect rocks at night. Well, okay, Jocasta did faint when she saw a ghost, but then went right on to happily chat with him about her fishing exploits. 

[brownlustgirl]

LOL, I forgot about the "internet trolling". Have to try that too. My sim has only been writing books and improving his writing skill. After that he is too tired to do much else, his sleep clock kicks in.  Why did I have to make him a book worm?

[IAmTheRad]

[raptureswild]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i2Ts-zyPtq_1NOZV49oeN7ZvY4RgD98BBEMG0

Edit again! (deleted most of the original post)  Sorry this is a double post; I guess somewhere between working at 8 AM and now on three hours' sleep I missed reading a whole page of the thread.  I will, however, note that they do call it a "buggy, pre-final" release of the game, which to me indicates that they are talking about more than just leaving out Riverview.  But I can't wait for the PR shitstorm if this ends up being another lie.

[coltraz]

Found some sims protesting outside of City Hall. Looks like they're tired of buggy games as well.

LOLZ!

I don't know if I've just been lucky, but I have yet to have any Sims I've not wanted to reproduce reproduce without my knowledge.

I've had story progression on and then off. Probably about 50/50 since I began playing.

[Anarius]

Has anyone bought the Ambrosa recipe and successfully made it yet? I'm interested to know what's so special about a $12,000 dish.

it gives a 7 day mood perk that adds 45 or 75, can't remember which, and extends the sims life. I think it brings the age to the youngest it can possibly be in the bracket, not completely sure though since I was only 1/3 through a Young Adult epic lifespan when I made and ate a plate of it and got sent back to 270 days until aging to adult.

[mistyk]

EA's statement about the leak should have been something like, "We leaked it ourselves, because we knew it would get pirated, then we could have free testers to find all the bugs for us, and make fixes faster than we can. Now that we know what is borked we can take our time making a patch"

[coltraz]

Is there any thread for discussing TS3 modding? I dont know if anyone is working in a nocensor patch. But if the old way (with a package) doesnt work, maybe it could be done messing with the dx calls.

There is this supersecret "Armoire of Invincibility" subforum (that freak language you use is hard to understand for noobs and foreign people, and i am both), but of course i cant read it.

Just another question: anyone know how previously nocensor worked? Did it add a new 'censor mesh' invisible? Then that mesh is in the game files, and not created in the fly...

btw, if anyone hasnt seen a naked body...


Of course not a working patch, just working in things...

So has someone made a no censor patch? Is that what I am to judge from this picture? Or is that just a bug? Or... what?

I know it says "not a working patch" beneath it, but the next four words just confuse me.

[Jaclyn]

Is anyone else finding the graphics less than great?
All setting are on high, I have a NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT.
I've tried so many things, changing the graphic card setting, playing around with in game settings,
yet everything is so SHARP. And the faces are terribly undetailed in game, they look nothing like the screen shots others have provided.
Maybe my computers just bad...
Getting a ASUS G17G next week so hopefully that will make a difference!

[brownlustgirl]

I am planning to buy the 9800GT with 1GB RAM, hope it works better. If not, my sims 2 game will be nice.

[DigiGekko]

Captain Planet, he's a hero, going to take pollution down to zero...

[coltraz]

The graphics aren't amazing but they're okay. A bit jagged at times, a bit jagged...

The problem I have with my graphics is hairstyles with lots of white speckles in them, when viewed from a distance. Zooming in close, the speckles disappear. It's only certain hairstyles that have this problem.

Am I the only one?

(I asked this earlier and no one responded... which makes me think I probably am the only one. But I don't understand why... :\)

[Gigi]

Born in Game, I have the same problem with the speckles in The Sims 2. The first time I noticed it was when I got my new video card (HD4830). I haven't played TS3 yet, but I'm sure it'll be the same for me.