The Sims 3

The Sims 3 is a confirmed next-generation simulation game. This was confirmed on November 2, 2006, by EA chief financial officer Warren Jenson who said, "Yes, there's a Sims 3 in development and it's likely to be a fiscal '09 title." In July 2007 AI researcher Richard Evans, who is part of the TS3 team, gave a talk at the annual AIIDE (Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment) conference in California, notes from which can be read here. The title has been announced to be released on February 20th 2009 according to the official Sims 3 website

In The Sims 2: FreeTime, a computer is delivered, to every household that a player plays, by Mr. Rod Humble. On it, Sims can play The Sims 3 game. A video of this can be seen on YouTube. It shows something towards a continuous, panning neighborhood, diagonal placings for objects, better lighting systems, and the ability to change shoes in the CAS, an ability previously limited to only console versions of The Sims. The preview only lasts about one minute, and has poor resolution.

The Sims 3 Official Site also reveals that players now have greater customization options. Such things like Personality, Create-A-Sim, and Build Mode have been expanded.

It has been confirmed that several expansion packs will ship periodically after the game's initial release.

The Neighborhood
The neighborhood is a beautiful setting with 97 lots full of characters.

Neighborhood Continuity
The neighborhood shipping in The Sims 3 is Sunset Valley. A second neighborhood will be available as a free download on The Sims Exchange when you register the game.

In an interview with producer Ben Bell and members from the EA forum in UK it's written "He said that the neighbourhood itself is set before the neighbourhood we see in The Sims, as if it's a prequel to the story we already know. He said the Goths are in the town, as their younger selves obviously as well as other familiar names and faces. Lots of new characters too."

Mrs. Crumplebottom will make an appearance as her younger self in the game and players will discover that the source of her crabbiness is due to the death of her husband who features as a ghost. Other families established in the game are the Landgraabs which are a very affluent family; the new Alto family, the Keaton household, the Wolff family, the Hart family and the Ursine household.

Since the neighborhood will be going back in time 25 years, the stories from The Sims 2 such as Cassandra's love-life and Bella's disappearance will not be answered.

Open Neighborhood
According to the games for windows magazine "The biggest change to The Sims 3 is that it takes place in a wide-open, constantly changing neighborhood -- a much bigger sandbox." It is confirmed that the game will be an open neighborhood by the official website (this probably means the game will have an Open World or Neighborhood similar to games like Grand Theft Auto, Bully, Need For Speed Carbon and Burnout Paradise).

The loading of lots during play and lot based playing will be history. Now every action will take place in a seamless living neighborhood. In that Neighborhood will be lots, colleges, parks, shops and other places Sims like to explore. All your Sims, and their Sim friends and family are in this Neighborhood. They can dine, visit, shop, and relax. Map Tags will help players navigate the neighborhood, find interesting places to visit, and locate their Sims.


 * Sims farther from the town center will spend more time commuting to work.
 * Sims can have parties at public pools
 * Sims have many more places to "public woohoo" and the chance of getting caught in their underwear.

Creatures
The Sims 3 will have Aliens and ghosts and possibly others. (Ghosts have been confirmed, as on the back of the Sunset Valley poster under the confirmed families there are the Crumplebottoms including Mrs. Crumplebottom and a ghost, possibly Mr. Robert Crumplebottom.)

Live Mode


The player has the ability to control one family at a time and easily switch from one family to another. Sim life continues in all families as you play. But players can pause age progression on a sim/family which stays on even when you are not playing the family.

Difficulty Levels
Families are rated by how difficult they are to play. Difficulty is based on Sim relations, traits and more... for example, surly grouchy Sims with wishes to have lots of friends will be hard to manage.

Interactions with other Sims
As Sims interact with other Sims, they learn about them. Past relationships and traits of a Sim your Sim is currently interacting with is displayed on the screen. 

Sims
Sims are more lifelike and have a much improved AI.

Create a Sim
Create a Sim will have more customizable options for your Sims than the CAS in Sims 2. You'll now have a larger selection of body types for your Sims, and will be able to create different hair styles for every Sim. It is also shown in The Sims 3 game previews that you'll now be able to pick shoes.

The player can choose the Sim's name, age, gender, skin tone, and weight.

A skin tone is chosen by using a slider from fair to dark. Body modifiers also use sliders that adjust weight from thin to obese and from flabby to muscular.

Five of over 70 personality traits can be chosen for each Young Adult Sim, with the chance to change them with a Lifetime Happiness reward. (Younger Sims have fewer traits. A Teen has 4 traits, Kids have 3 traits, and Toddler has 2 traits). One Lifetime Wish is also chosen.

Players will also be able to choose from three types of voices and a slider to choose the pitch of a Sim's voice.

Ages
Age types of Sims within the game are baby, toddler, child, teenager, young adult (- considered default age), adult (middle age) and elder.

Needs
Sims in The Sims 3 have six needs: Hunger, Bladder, Fun, Hygiene, Energy, and Social.

Sims will be able to take care of themselves, allowing the player to concentrate on what happens in their lives rather than taking care of them.

Traits
Traits are like atoms of personality that you can assign to your Sims. You combine them to create complex personalities. There are over 70 Traits to choose from. Some are: Nice, Workaholic, Athletic, Kleptomaniac, Flirty, Romantic, Lucky and much more. When you assign Traits to a Sim, that Sim will look and act the part. They’ll have unique behaviors, preferences and advantages.

A young adult Sim starts with 5 traits but can acquire more. In fact, they can acquire all traits that don't contradict each other.

Traits are genetic and what occurs during pregnancy can affect what traits are passed on. The parents also help pick the traits. For example, bad parents don't get to pick their own traits and will have randomly assigned ones, these are generally unfavourable.

Wishes
Wishes are a new system in The Sims 3 that provides you with a wide selection of requests that keep your Sims happy as well as working towards some short- and long-term goals and rewards. Wishes come from anywhere and everywhere, based on your Sims’ traits, their job, their skills, their friends or coworkers, where they are in town, or what they might be doing. You can choose to promise to help your Sims with a wish or you can throw it away. Satisfying a promised wish gives your Sim Lifetime Happiness Points and a feeling of fulfillment. You'll be able to use these Lifetime Happiness points to buy Achievement Traits for your Sims, and fulfillment keeps their mood up. You’re now free to pick or ignore your Sims’ wishes without fear of some sort of mental breakdown. Instead you really get to focus on telling the story and making decisions; your Sim just makes suggestions along the way. If you promise that you’ll help your Sim get married, then decide to throw that wish away, your Sim will be a little sad but otherwise it’s really all up to you.

Skills
Skills have been expanded on from previous versions adding skills that were Talent Badges in The Sims 2. They still have 10 levels of proficiency.

Examples:
 * Hardiness Skill
 * Fishing Skill
 * Writing Skill
 * Gardening Skill
 * Logic Skill
 * Cooking Skill
 * Guitar Skill

Sims with high levels in a skill will unlock new abilities, Ex. High level logic allows a Sim to tutor other Sims, Cooking unlocks recipes, Fishing unlocks bigger fish.

Build & Buy Modes
The Build & Buy Modes have been enhanced. Objects can be rotated without restraint - 360 degree rotation. Objects such as a table with chairs or a bed with end tables can "lock together" when being moved (moved jointly). The grid is more select giving you the options to place furniture where only imaginable on previous installments - has the option to be turned off therefore objects can be placed anywhere without restriction. The width of stairs can be altered. A 2 tiled TV can be placed in the middle viewpoint of a 3 tiled couch.

Wall Drag Tool
The wall drag tool will be introduced to The Sims 3. The "Wall Drag" tool will allow you to click and hold the wall and drag it to the desired size. All objects on the walls such as lights will move with the wall, as well as fill the spaces made with matching floor tiles.

Create a Style
This tool allows the player to customize clothing, furnishings, walls, and nearly anything else your Sims can interact with. Each item has between one and four customizable regions that can be modified. You can apply patterns to these areas. You can choose the colours within a pattern and choose from warm or cool colour palettes. The designs can be saved and used later on other objects.

Grabber/Hand
A new tool that can pick up stuff like plates, books, garbage, etc. It's meant to get rid of some of the boring tasks for your Sims, give them more time to do other things.

Clutter Objects
Clutter Objects are decorative objects, like hand towels, toilet paper, and perfume. The “slot” system gives the player several choices where to place decorative Objects on surfaces, such as Tables and Dressers. These small touches help personalize a house and give it a unique feel.

Careers
Many of the careers from The Sims 2 such as the Law Enforcement and Athletic tracks will be in The Sims 3. Of course, there will also be some new ones. Your Sims can look for these jobs in the newspaper or apply right at the building where they’d like to work. Sims will also be able to make a living at home selling paintings or growing fruit and vegetables to pull in a little extra cash on the side or get a part-time job at local shops.

Actions outside of work, such as schmoozing the boss or reading medical journals can have an impact on a Sim's job performance. Opportunities can still cause you to lose your job but may actually help you get a better job in another career track.

A new feature The Sims 3 offers is branching careers, and reaching the top of a career doesn't mean it’s not over if you keep excelling at your duties, you can rake in extra Simoleons through additional raises.


 * Every career has its own building in the Neighborhood.
 * Advancing in career is changed as it depends on skills, personality, relationship with colleagues/boss and even certain goals that have to be fulfilled. For example taking work home.
 * Confirmed careers are Chef, Science, Politics, Criminal, Entertainment, Musician, Medical and Military.
 * You can decide how hard they work; Like choose a less stressful day but gain less performance.

(Several of these points may change before the release)

Community Features
Producers claim that The Sims 3 Exchange will make it easier to create and share custom creations.

Features:
 * Better searching and browsing.
 * Make recommendations with an all-positive rating system.
 * Use the in-game Launcher see the latest news, browse and download featured game items that members have created and uploaded to the Exchange. Learn about fun community activities and promotions.
 * Link to favorite areas of the site directly from the Launcher.
 * Movie Mashup tool - upload your own video clips and screen shots and use them to make movies about your Sims. provide a library of video clips and images that you can use along with your own, as well as a music library with hundreds of tracks. The tool lets you choose transitions and effects to use on your clips and you can also use text captions to add narration and dialog.
 * Story tool - lets you create our own stories using uploaded and common screen shots.
 * Share anything you make - via email as well as by posting to other sites like Facebook and MySpace and embedding into blogs and fan sites.