A Brief Insight into How EA Ruined The Sims

It goes without saying that The Sims is one of the most popular and best selling computer games of all time, but it saddens me to finally admit that the franchise is falling and falling hard. In 2009, some time after The Sims 3 was released in the same year, I noticed a significant decline in quality. In the subsequent years leading up to the present, I noticed a vast increase in nonsensical occurrences and overall unnecessary horse manure. In the beginning, it was a brilliant game, but as any Sims fan would admit, there was something horribly wrong.

The answer isn't obvious, unfortunately. It took some people a bit of time and a bit of digging to figure out what it was. It was about a year later that people on the official website's forums and several fan websites posted their discovery; The Sims 3 was not developed by Maxis, the original group of geniuses and designing Gods. Instead, The Sims 3 was developed by The Sims Studio, which is a cloaked division of Electronic Arts. Now the plot thickens.

In 2006, according to various sources, Electronic Arts had transferred all development responsibilities from Maxis to their newly created division. Rod Humble, however, was selected to lead this new team as the studio head, while Maxis refocused their attention to their newest project, Spore, something that not a lot of people cared about. In light of this, The Sims franchise took a critical hit. Even though Rod Humble, one of the geniuses behind The Sims 2, was involved in the development of The Sims 3, the game still lacks the magic, the feel, and the overall sensation that the previous games give fans and gamers alike.

In lieu of this information, it becomes increasingly evident why The Sims 3 has become a bit of a dead horse in the series--everything had been done before, there wasn't much in the way of innovation, the game had more issues than Vogue magazine, and the overall experience was more annoying than enjoyable. High and low, there are players of The Sims 3 who have at least eight problems with the game, and they're all usually the same or at least connected to problems others are experiencing. For example, since the release of the umpteenth expansion pack, The Sims 3: Pets, players have been experiencing freezing that occurs every 5 or so in-game minutes (which in the real world is 5 seconds), thus rendering the game practically unplayable.

I'm sure by now you're wondering what Electronic Arts has done to address the plethora of issues that players are experiencing and complaining about day in and day out. While those who know what Electronic Arts is like, this will come as no surprise. EA's response: release more overpriced and low quality expansion packs. In addition, you can download a new patch for the game nearly every week that fixes a "problem" or two that no one seems to have, but screws up a lot more. I and plenty others are considering completely uninstalling the game and installed expansions, reinstall the base game, and ignore any patches/updates. Why? As surprising as this may sound, the base game had slim to no issues at all. Electronic Arts isn't my favourite of all companies, nor is it my least; however, it's as equally on my sh*t list as Activision.

I think I'm going to make a point of personally and independently protesting the purchase of any more Sims products. In layman's terms, just stop playing the games and purchasing any additional content, expansions, or base games, since I'm sure they plan on going until they hit The Sims 9. It's a damn shame when a developer who's been there from go, crafted The Sims into what it is and made it brilliant is kicked off the scene and taken over by an egotistical company who thinks they can replicate brilliance. In my opinion, EA needs to only develop what they can succeed at and stick to publishing in areas they can't. Evidently, losing the license for James Bond games haven't taught them anything.

[thereapersson]

I'd say the same thing about ActiBlizz and their mishandling of Diablo III.

Horse manure!