The Sims - The People Simulator from the Creator of SimCity

Amazon.com From Will Wright, the creator of SimCity, comes a strategy game that hits close to home. You are in charge of a neighborhood of Sims, and it is up to you to show them that they're living in your world now! Force them into a life of crime or help them live life in the fast lane. Build them a sprawling mansion or dump them into a dilapidated shack. Let them party like swinging singles or fall in love, get married, and raise a family. They can live out your wildest dreams or experience your worst nightmares. It is up to you to decide--their fate is in your hands. Product description The Sims is a strategic life-simulation computer game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts. It was created by game designer Will Wright, also known for developing SimCity. It is a simulation of the daily activities of one or more virtual persons ("Sims") in a suburban household near SimCity. Review Maxis' The Sims is about creating, managing, and controlling the lives of tiny computerized people who dwell in miniature homes. The game's excellent music and sound effects, detailed scenery, cleverly animated characters, and equally clever writing go a long way toward fulfilling this intriguing premise. Yet though you can exercise a considerable amount of control over your sims' behavior and lifestyles, The Sims' actual gameplay is rather limited in some respects - either by odd inconsistencies or by actual restrictions placed on your actions. But to the game's credit, the most objectionable thing about these occasional limits is how starkly they contrast with the otherwise tremendous freedom you have to lead your sims' lives. At a glance, The Sims looks fairly good, if plain. The game itself takes place entirely within a small suburb just outside SimCity, and the streets, houses, and fixtures are all colorful and detailed - and all in a style consistent with the SimCity games. At first, the fully polygonal characters might look no better than the scenery. But if you leave them alone for even a few minutes, your sims will do all sorts of things; they'll dance to the radio's music, hunker down in front of the TV, or strike up a conversation. And when your sims start doing anything, they'll do so with expressive animation that lends them a great deal of personality. When the music is playing, sims dance the Charleston together; TV-watching sims will lean forward and gaze intently at the screen or laugh out loud; and conversing sims will gesticulate appropriately as they chat, dish out insults, tell jokes, and more. Despite the fact that the actual dialogue among the game's inhabitants is made to sound like complete gibberish, The Sims sounds superb overall. You can't make out exactly what they're saying, but you can easily infer their intentions from the tone of their voices. Sims will speak, then pause and clear their throats while they're thinking of what to say next, yelp in pain when they cut themselves preparing a meal, or tell naughty limericks as jokes. Sims also interact with their surroundings, and everything from coffee makers to toilets sounds realistic, clear, and in some cases downright hilarious, like the slapstick noises of the TV cartoons. The Sims' music is also excellent; even though much of it consists of vapid easy-listening, those unassuming tunes provide a perfect ironic contrast in the background against whatever havoc your sims are wreaking on center stage. Your sims can get into all sorts of trouble depending on what choices you make in their design and actions. You can begin the game with a pre-generated family of sims or create your own using a number of different 3D models, more of which are constantly being made available on Maxis' web site. Each sim has five personality attributes (neat, outgoing, active, playful, and nice) which help determine the sim's personality and how compatible he'll be with other sims. Each sim also has six learnable skills (cooking, mechanical, charism