We all have a guilty pleasure, whether that be a tv show, a food, or hobby, I am sure we all can relate to that statement. While I do not feel particularly “guilty” about this pleasure, it is one that I have received both good and bad reactions from. Hi, my name is Molly and my guilty pleasure is playing The Sims 4.
If you have absolutely no idea what I am talking about, The Sims 4 is a life simulation game that is available to play on pc or console. I personally play my many hours on pc. The Sims first ever Sims game came out in 2000, the year I was born, so I obviously did not play the first few installments, but The Sims 4 came out in just 2014 and they have recently celebrated their 20th anniversary. The game starts by the player creating a sim, or a virtual avatar. You can customize the sim in almost every way possible including weight, muscle mass, skin color, eye/hair color, clothes, gender, and detailed features of the face. You chose the sims top ambition, whether that be a bodybuilder or a renaissance sim that strives to be good at as many things as possible. There are also three traits that you chose at the time of the sim creation that can range from being good to evil, a glutton or vegetarian, neat or sloppy, ambitious or lazy. One of the unique features that was introduced to The Sims 4 was the availability to customize the gender of the sim. If you claim your sim to be female, you can further customize the sim to be able to get other sims pregnant or get pregnant, to be able to breastfeed or not be able to, to have the ability to stand while going to the bathroom or not. Another new ability that has come to making sims is the new option to use the “story” feature where you answer a series of questions and based on those questions, the game generates a sims’ ambition, traits, and body. This feature is particularly helpful and efficient for creating new and unique sims if you find yourself creating the same “type” of sim.
After you have created your sim or sims, you move your created household into a new home. The standard funds given is 20,000 simoleons, which is the currency in the sim world. The house you typically place your new household in is called a “base game” home that has the generic necessities that a sim needs to fulfill their needs unless you decide to create an entirely new house and foundation. While I could go in-depth into the details of housing and what that is exactly, I am saving that for a later article.
Like many of these “guilty” pleasures so many of us partake in, we do it because we find escape in such things. I enjoy playing games such as The Sims because it gives me the simple joys that can sometimes be hard to find in life. I greatly enjoy writing and The Sims is a new way for me to create the stories I used to only just write on paper. While some may think it is childish, I see it as a way of an unstoppable imagination.