The Sims 3

The Sims 3 is the third-generation game and a partial reboot to the series. 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 was to be released on February 20, 2009 according to the official Sims 3 website, but was delayed worldwide to June 2, 2009. Electronic Arts cites the reason for the delay was to "create awareness for The Sims 3".

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 game will have disc-based copy protection – there is a Serial Code just like The Sims 2. To play the game there will not be any online authentication needed.

Will Wright, the creator of the original The Sims, is not involved in the production of The Sims 3.

Maxis is also not involved in the production of The Sims 3, but instead Visceral Games (developers of Dead Space) and EA Black Box (developers of Need For Speed Series).

The Sims 3 is the last game developed by EA Black Box.

System Specs
The Sims 3 requires at least the following:

FOR WINDOWS XP
 * 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
 * 1 GB RAM
 * A 128 MB Video Card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
 * The latest version of DirectX 9.0c
 * Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2
 * At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space with at least 1 GB of additional space for custom content and saved games

FOR WINDOWS VISTA
 * 2.4 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
 * 1.5 GB RAM
 * A 128 MB Video Card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
 * Microsoft Windows Vista Service Pack 1
 * At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space with at least 1 GB of additional space for custom content and saved games

For computers using built-in graphics chipsets under Windows, the game requires at least:


 * Intel Integrated Chipset, GMA 3-Series or above
 * 2.6 GHz Pentium D CPU, or 1.8 GHz Core 2 Duo, or equivalent
 * 0.5 GB additional RAM

FOR MAC OS X
 * Mac OS X 10.5.7 Leopard or higher
 * Intel Core Duo Processor
 * 2 GB RAM
 * ATI X1600 or Nvidia 7300 GT with 128 MB of Video RAM, or
 * Intel Integrated GMA X3100.
 * At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space, with at least 1 GB additional space for custom content and saved games
 * This game will not run on PowerPC (G3/G4/G5) based Mac systems, or the GMA 950 class of integrated video cards.

Windows Supported Video Cards - NVIDIA GeForce series FX 5900, FX 5950 6200, 6500, 6600, 6800 7200, 7300, 7600, 7800, 7900, 7950 8400, 8500, 8600, 8800 9300, 9400, 9500, 9600, 9800 G100, GT 120, GT 130, GTS 150 GTS 250, GTX 260, GTX 280, GTX 285, GTX 295

ATI Radeon™ series 9500, 9600, 9800 X300, X600, X700, X800, X850 X1300, X1600, X1800, X1900, X1950 2400, 2600, 2900 3450, 3650, 3850, 3870 4850, 4870

Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA) GMA 3-Series, GMA 4-Series

Laptop versions of these chipsets may work, but may run comparatively slower. Standalone cards that are installed in vanilla PCI slots (not PCIe or PCIx or AGP), such as some GeForce FX variants, will perform poorly.

MAC OS X Supported Video Cards - NVIDIA GeForce series 7300, 7600 8600, 8800 9400M, 9600M GT GT 120, GT 130

ATI Radeon+G22™ series X1600, X1900 2400, 2600 3870, 4850, 4870

Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA) GMA 3-Series

The Neighborhood
"Before Pleasantview, there was Sunset Valley, founded by the Goths and built up by the Landgraabs to be a quiet, peaceful town. But when the Altos arrive with uptown ideals, will the townsfolk feel the need to choose sides?"

The neighborhood is a beautiful setting with 97 lots full of characters. Sunset Valley has been built before Pleasantview, founded by the Goth Family. Each household has a difficulty rating.

Neighborhood Continuity
The neighborhood shipping in The Sims 3 is Sunset Valley. A second neighborhood named Riverview 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 Family, the Wolff Family, the Hart Family and the Ursine Family.

The story of the neighborhood will have an alternate timeline story and takes place before The Sims.

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 eliminated. 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.

Also, on the map, icons for buildings are different colours. It looks as if red are career buildings, darkish blue are public places, light blue is where one of your Sims are, orange are for other Sims homes and green is your Sims house.


 * 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.
 * The area of the town where your Sims choose to live now depend on income. For example, Summer Hill is a more expensive residential.

There will also be new public events in The Sims 3, such as music concerts, movie premieres, pool parties, barbecues, sporting events, outdoor fishing, and the most civic-minded public activity in a Sims game to date, attending a public protest at SimCity Hall, where your Sims can voice their discontent with the administration's legal mumbo jumbo by angrily shouting their own nonsensical "Simlish" mumbo jumbo.

When a teen Sim finishes school there's a chance they may bring a friend home, there's also a chance your teen Sim may get invited over to a friends house. You have the option to decline. You can then follow your teen Sim to their friends house. Depending on how good of friends they are, your Sim can 'request to stay over' If the friend accepts, they'll say 'sure make yourself at home'.

Buy mode

 * There are only 4 TV Channels: Sports, Kids, Action, and Romance.
 * There is no diving board for the swimming pools yet.
 * When a sim opens a fridge, you could see the cold air coming out.
 * The fire alarm is lower, and changed to able to hang a wall lamp above it.
 * On the easel, there are three sizes of paintings.
 * If you tinker on some objects, you can get upgrades like, fireproof, self cleaning and unbreakable.
 * You can buy a Rubber Ducky for your bathtub.
 * On a computer, you can find coupons, browse the web, play chess, play computer games, tinker, and get a job. Computer Whiz Sims can also hack and overclock. Evil Sims will be able to troll the internet.
 * There are 10 different buyable cars in the base game.
 * There is now a new "Clutter" Section, which includes, but is not limited to, a rubber duck (mentioned above), along with a roll of toilet paper (possibly increases a sims' hygiene while on the toilet).

Build Mode

 * There is a button that lets you choose to buy houses furnished or unfurnished.
 * The sledge hammer tool has been enhanced, you can now drag an area to delete multiple objects.
 * When placing objects against a diagonal wall the object will snap into place perfectly.
 * There’s a roof height slider.
 * The biggest lot size is 64x64 (same as a 5x5).
 * There is an option for Auto-Roofs. So, while you build, the roof automatically appears.
 * There’s a button that paints / carpets the entire room (instead of holding Shift).
 * You can set light colours and brightness levels (both indoor and out).
 * There is now a square terrain paint brush. Imagine using it to paint a sidewalk.
 * You can change the floor / walls of a pool.
 * The maximum width of a set of stairs is 8 tiles.
 * There are single tile doors, double tile doors, single tile doors that center on double tiles, and even three tile doors.
 * There are ceilings under ANY floortile placed. At this time, you cannot recolour the ceiling.
 * According to sources the maximum number of floors is 5. Although some screenshots display constructions with more than 5 floors.
 * There are no 1/2 walls yet.
 * You cannot move objects up and down on walls.
 * Sims 2's one tile equals Sims 3 four tiles. 45 and 90 degree rotation come with the game. Holding the ALT key is free placing and rotation.
 * You cannot import patterns into the game yet.
 * You can move the mailbox anywhere you'd like on your lot. Whatever door is closest to the mailbox is considered the front door.
 * Fences rise with terrains.
 * There is a tool that allows you to push walls in or out without the wall and objects

Creatures
In The Sims 3 ghosts have been confirmed. Ghosts can be turned back into playable characters and can also have babies. Then the Ghost will be added to your household, like a family member. Ghosts whisper all the time and can become invisible and move your furniture. To have a playable ghost, you should resurrect a dead Sim by taking the urn to the science lab. If you decide to have a baby with a ghost, it will be a ghost baby. Mrs. Crumplebottom appears to be haunted by the ghost of her husband in the promo pictures and it is possible that he has been resurrected. No other creatures have been seen or confirmed for the base game.

Live Mode


The player has the ability to control one family at a time and easily switch from one family to another. All the Sims of the city evolve together, but if you want you can stop the aging or the story progression. In this way Sims that you don't control won't get married or evolve.

Aging and Story progression are different settings. You can have aging on while story progression is off, both of them turned off, or both of them turned on. Both of these options affect the entire neighborhood and not individual houses.

Free will can still be turned on and off, but also now has varying levels. It now has high, medium, low, and off settings. Free will only affects the house you are playing, and not the entire neighborhood.

The player can choose the length of a Sims life, from 25 Sim days to 1000 Sim days.

Difficulty Levels
Families are rated by how difficult they are to play. Difficulty is based on Sim relations, traits and more... for example, surely 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 your Sim has had with the Sim they are currently interacting with and their traits are displayed on the screen. 

Sims
Improvements to Sims include more customization options, a trait system that creates unique personalities, Sims that take care of themselves, and wishes that allow the player to set short- and long-term goals.

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 your Sim's shoes.

There are a total of 22 hairstyles for female Sims and 17 hairstyles for male Sims. There's a variety of hats and hair accessories that you have an option to use, but they all come with set hairstyles. But each of the hats and accessories can have their colours and textures altered.

Everything has so much detail, you can change just about everything. If you just want to change the nose you can, but you can use the 'dot' system to go into more dept, i.e. change nostril definition, nose tip scale, bridge height, etc.

Accessories will also be added (gloves, socks, eyeglasses, bracelets, earrings, shoes...) can be customized with Create a Style tool. There are more styles for hair than before. Changing hair/clothing/face is easy: All clothes can be customised. You cannot choose layers, but if the clothes already have layers then you can alter the colours and texture of both parts. You can just click on them and the CAS takes you directly to the right menu for editing whatever you selected. There is an eyelash length slider bar. Socks and shoes are also fully customizable. They are chosen separately per outfit as well.

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

A skin tone is chosen by using a color wheel along with a slider from fair to dark. The slider that is used to change the color of the skin tone is great. Lots of selection of tones. The Blues and Green can be altered from light to dark, and also light pink to dark red.

Body modifiers also use sliders that adjust weight from thin to obese and from flabby to muscular. Height still can not be changed. Even in neighbourhood view you can to see the different sizes of Sims.

Players can now create twins in Create-A-Sim using a button.

Five of over 60 personality traits can be chosen for each Young Adult Sim and above, 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 toddlers have 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 (confirmed default age). Adult (middle age) and elder. The lifespan of Sim can also be edited, making it any number of days between 25 and 970


 * Short (25 Sim days)
 * Medium (50 Sim days),
 * Normal (90 Sim days)
 * Long (190 Sim days)
 * Epic (970 Sim days).

The whole town will age at the same time, but there will be an option (cheat) to turn off aging. You won't be able to turn off aging on an individual Sim or a household though.

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

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. Sims now have wishes which you can fulfill or you can choose to ignore, which makes controlling a Sims life a bit easier because you are more in control. Wishes are part of the needs but are not necessary.

During gameplay, if a sim is sleeping you can hover over the bed icon (which the sim is currently doing) and it will tell you the time that the sim will be fully rested. And if you allowed them to sleep until they were fully rested, they would receive a positive moodlet.

Pregnancy
Pregnancy in The Sims 3 is similar to pregnancy in The Sims 2. Pregnant Sims experience the same mood swings and belly expansion, though in The Sims 3 the expansion is gradual. Sims can now read books about pregnancy and get medical advice at the hospital. Your Sims can also announce they're pregnant to their husband/lover, family, and friends. It has been confirmed that pregnancy lasts 6 days. Sims can give birth at home or they can be driven to the hospital. There is a chance that Sims may give birth to twins or triplets. Both Young Adult and Adult women can get pregnant, but Young Adults are more fertile.

Death
Sims in The Sims 3 can die of old age, drowning, electrocution, fire, and other ways. Once dead, you can keep the grave or move it to a cemetary. Two new features of The Sims 3 are the automatic transfer of all inventory belongings of the deceased to the family inventory, and the ability of the player to throw a funeral party. When Sims die they become Ghosts. Rumor says you can resurrect a Sim by taking their urn to the science lab. There is also a Sunset Valley Cemetery in Sunset Valley where your Sims can rest for eternity.

Traits

 * See also List of Traits.

Traits are like atoms of personality that you can assign to your Sims. You combine them to create complex personalities. There are about 65 Traits to choose from. When you assign Traits to a Sim, that Sim will look and act the part. Toddlers, Children and Teens get a new trait at their birthday. If children had a good childhood, then you can choose a trait. If not, the game will give them a random one. They’ll have unique behaviours, preferences and advantages. Some traits give you special abilities. They can be useful to improve skills (Artistic and Athletic traits, for example) and to get special interactions (Childish Sims can play with toys. Mooch Sims can ask for food.)

Young Adults and up have 5 traits, Teens have 4 traits, Kids have 3 traits, Toddlers have 2 traits. The less traits a Sim has, the less complex that Sim's personality will be. For example, giving a Sim the Kleptomaniac trait only will result in him constantly stealing while giving a Sim 5 traits will result in more balance. A Sim can acquire more traits also. 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.

The Lifetime Reward "Midlife Crisis", costing 20 000 points, allows the player to re-choose a Sim's traits.

Wishes

 * See also List of Lifetime 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 promise to help your Sims with a wish or you can throw it away. Satisfying these basic tasks will unlock minor rewards and increase your Sim's overall morale with a "moodlet"--a minor condition that contributes to your characters' overall mood. Evil Sim just stole candy from a baby? Ahh, that's a good moodlet: +15. Having to listen to the annoying sound of the crying baby? Ugh, that's a bad moodlet: -15. Working toward your lifetime wish will win your Sims "lifetime happiness points" that can be spent on extremely powerful items.

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.

Lifetime Rewards

Points gained from Wishes may be spent on rewards, either in the form of an object or a permanent change in the Sim.

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:
 * Handiness
 * Fishing
 * Writing
 * Charisma
 * Gardening
 * Logic
 * Cooking
 * Guitar
 * Athletic
 * Painting
 * Photography

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

Sims get a Power Study moodlet if they study at the Library.

You do not see the skill in your bar until you unlock the first point. You can then view the skill journal. For example, in the Athletic skill journal you have your statistics: hours of cardio workout, hours of strength workout, distance jogged.

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 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 Business, Criminal, Culinary, Education, Entertainment, Journalism, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Musician, Political, Science, and Sport.
 * You can decide how hard they work while on the job. You have options as to what kind of performance you want to give: Business as Usual, Work Hard, Take it Easy, Meet Coworkers, Hang Out with Coworkers, Suck Up to Boss, or Practice a Skill.
 * There are part-time jobs for teens, adults and elders, including such positions Bookstore Clerk, Grocery Store Clerk, Spa Receptionist, Spa Specialist, and Burial Specialist.
 * If you are a rockstar, other people recognize you and react. The same if you are at the top of other careers, like the military one: people will use the military greeting with you and there will be some banners showing you.
 * Jobs pay hourly, not daily.
 * You can become business partners with community businesses. Once you own the company you can rename it, fire the staff, and make use of its facilities for free.

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

Features:
 * Better searching and browsing.
 * The ability to make recommendations with an all-positive rating system.
 * The ability to run the in-game Launcher and see the latest news.
 * The ability to use the in-game Launcher to browse and download featured game items that members have created.
 * The ability to "favorite" areas of the site directly from the Launcher.
 * The ability to utilize the "Movie Mashup Tool" and upload your own video clips and screen shots and use them to make movies about your Sims. It provides 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.
 * The Story Tool lets you create your own stories using uploaded and common screen shots.
 * The ability to share anything you make via email or blog post to sites like Facebook and MySpace and through blogs and fan sites.

The Sims 3 Store
The Sims 3 Store will launch globally at the same time as The Sims 3 and offer exclusive content that can only be found at The Sims 3 store. The Sims 3 Store will have ongoing, regular releases of new content that is only available through The Store. When you purchase an item from The Store, it automatically gets added into your game Launcher when you click “Download Now.” From the game Launcher, you can then install the item into your game with a single click.

SimPoints
SimPoints are the virtual currency used on The Sims 3 Store. Players may buy SimPoints in bundles of 500, 1000 or 2000 SimPoints using international credit cards including Visa, MasterCard, American Express, national credit cards including Carte Bleu, Carte Si, Dankort, Maestro, Solo and Delta, cash cards (North America), or PayPal. The Sims 3 Store accepts a number of currencies for the purchase of SimPoints including USD, GBP, EUR, BRL, SEK, DKK, AUD, NZD and ZAR. With SimPoints players can buy in-game items from The Sims 3 Store.

Registering the game on line will give the person $10 worth of SimPoints to start customizing their game.

Leak
On May 19, 2009, about 2 weeks before the release of The Sims 3, The Sims 3 was leaked on the internet on the pirated website Pirate Bay. But, Maxis revealed that more than half the game is missing and that it can cause damage to your computer. However, this is unlikely as the "second half" of the game is simply downloadable content, and the bugs are minor and is easily fixed.

New Updates

 * The Sims 3 Hands-On Events: Post your questions here!
 * The Sims 3 Hands-On Event: Day 1