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1191. SimDay [Update]

Written on Thursday 8 July 2004 at 15:08 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

This week's SimDay is small compared to last week. There is a bit of news though. First of all, Maxis is still asking people to join the Focus Group 12 July, about The Sims on the consoles. See this page for more. Furthermore there's a Sims 2 piece about installing custom content to The Sims 2. It was included in Lucy's Email as well last Saturday, but you can now read it again on the official site. There's also a new preview of The Sims 2 by Yahoo! Games. It once again goes over all the new things like aspirations, genetics and graphics. Just read the preview for all the details.

On to the URBZ, Maxis has posted 8 shots of the game on the GBA. They've been seen here before though. Brand new are the 11 sketches that have been posted though. They show some objects and places in their very first stage of design. Finally, the blog this week is about the "First Playable" version that was talked about last week, but also about an upcoming annual event called "Camp EA". It will be held next week, 15 July, and Scot Amos will tell some more about it then. This is a bit of what he has to say about the game this week:

"On the game-side, we have three districts packed with new characters, new micro-game jobs, tons of new objects to play with, and stunning new social interactions with new in-game 'action cameras'; they make the game feel like you're in control of a living sitcom!"

You can find the screenshots, the sketches and of course the blog on the official URBZ Website.

[Update 18:25] By playing an online game, "Poppit!", between 20 and 30 July, you can win The Sims Mega Deluxe or any of the Sims expansion packs. You can find the game on EA Pogo. You need an EA.Com account to sign in.

1192. New Poll

Written on Thursday 8 July 2004 at 02:00 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Last week our poll was all about Don and his relations. We asked you if you thought it was right what Don did, and you responded a lot. 213 people voted, of which 38% don't know Don and the rest. Here are the results:

1. 38.03% - Don? Sarah? Dina? Who are those people?
2. 28.17% - I guess it's cool for a Sim to do, but it's no fun in real life.
3. 12.68% - Totally my style!
4. 9.39% - What?! He cheated?! The @$?%$!
5. 7.51% - I don't care about it at all. They're just Sims!
6. 4.23% - Not good, not good.

Our new poll is about the inferface for The Sims 2, which you may have seen in earlier screenshots, especially in those that came with Lucy's latest e-mail. Tell us what you think by voting on the right, or on the latest poll page. See the poll archive for more polls.

1193. No Competition for Sims 2 during Holiday Season

Written on Sunday 4 July 2004 at 01:04 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

This holiday season, analysts expect much competition in the gaming industry. EA is expected to lose 2-4 percent of its market share in the last quarter of this year, due to the heavy competition from other publishers who will release games like "GTA San Andreas" and "Halo 2", where EA has "Battlefield 2" and "GoldenEye" up for the hardcore gamers, all to be released around the same time. More games than ever before will be released in the last quarter of 2004, and the competition may cause underperformance to some extent, even for headline titles. Quality titles are coming out in practically every genre, except the people-simulation one. That means every game will have some competition, except The Sims 2. Read more about this at GamesIndustry.biz.

1194. Lucy interviewed at Warcry

Written on Saturday 3 July 2004 at 20:53 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

The Warcry News Network has posted an interview with Lucy Bradshaw about the Sims 2. Besides the Fame Aspiration track now being called "Popularity", Lucy doesn't tell us anything new about the gameplay itself. She does reveal a little bit of the way the Sims are animated in the new game though:

"We have a very talented group of animators who have created every single move that you see the Sims perform. Our animators will often video themselves or actors performing the actions that we want to make. They use this as reference, and often this is a process by which they try out different styles of acting a particular scene or interaction. These videos are really pretty funny to watch. But, like I said, these are then used as reference. Again, The Sims has some unique challenges. In the Sims, we do not predict the sequence of events. We need to make sure that the player is able to direct the Sim and that the Sims respond to the players instructions, so animations need to be broken down into elemental pieces that we then blend together to make them look fluid."

The biggest part of the interview is about the aspiration tracks and genetics, of which a lot has been said already in the past. If you need a little recap, read the interview. Part 2 of it is supposed to be posted at a later date.

1195. More Urbz GBA Shots and Movies

Written on Saturday 3 July 2004 at 20:41 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Games site IGN has posted 9 new screenshots and 5 new gameplay movies for the Urbz on the GBA. Although the movies are currently available to IGN Insiders only, everybody can see the screenshots, which are posted at the bottom of this post. If you're an Insider and want to see the videos, go to the video page. You can also find their list of screenshots on the screenshots index.

1196. Will and Lucy to talk about Sims

Written on Saturday 3 July 2004 at 15:34 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

In a couple of days, on 7 July, Maxis co-founder Will Wright, who designed the Sims and SimCity, and Lucy Bradshaw, producer of The Sims 2, will hold presentations about the history of Sims and The Sims 2. The IGDA, Internation Game Developers Association, organised the event which will be held at the EA Campus in Redwood City, California. It'll start 7pm with "Refreshments and socialization". At 7.30, Lucy will have her say about the Sims 2 for 30 minutes. After a 10-minute break, Will Wright will present the "History of the Sims", followed by a Q&A session. A limited amount of seats is available, and the event is open only to EA employees and IGDA members. Those people can still sign up for a seat. See the IGDA website for more information.

1197. Lucy's Mail: Custom Content and the puck

Written on Saturday 3 July 2004 at 04:51 by ChEeTaH - 5 comments.

Lucy has sent her weekly e-mail again, and this time she introduces Darren Futa, who talks about how custom content enters the Sims 2. In the new game, custom content will be much easier to find, as you can easily categorise it into several collections. You can give your collections a name and icon, and of course make as many as you like. Of course, as customisable as The Sims 2 will be, you can import custom icons for those collections. All custom content will be marked with a snowflake (as you can also see in the Body Shop), so you can easily distinct Maxis-made from user-made content. Also, you can download and install new content straight from within the game, so you can keep it running 24/7 and still get new stuff for your Sims. Although the information isn't really new since it was already talked about at The Sims 2 University, some of the graphics are. Darren doesn't mention the option to enlarge the catalog when buying stuff so you see more on each page, though that's probably still in the game. Finally there's also an extra artwork made for the 4th of July, which you can see below this bit (click the thumbnail to enlarge). The other graphics have been put between the text so you know what they're talking about exactly. The text can be found in the "Read More" bit or below.

Read More!

1198. Chat Transcripts

Written on Saturday 3 July 2004 at 03:07 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

The chat with Neil Young, the new General Manager of Maxis since March, was quite a success. It's over though, and many questions have been answered. A few interesting things are that the first expansion for The Sims 2 will be released early next year, and there are currently 5 designs for expansion packs, with one being released approximately every 6 months. When the game itself is released in September, you can get it in either a 4 CD(!) version, or all on one DVD. The current plan is that the DVD will be for pre-order customers only, which means it won't be available in regular stores. However, that's subject to change, and of course we hope it'll be a stayer. About the release date: as everybody knows it should be in stores 17 September almost worldwide, but it may be a little earlier in some countries, depending on their usual release days for games. The release date for the Mac version of The Sims 2 has not yet been announced, but there definitely will be a Mac version. MySim pages on the official site will be enhanced for The Sims 2. New tools to create custom content will also be released, but most likely only after the release of the game itself. Something that should definitely be highlighted is that in some way we can expect multiplayer options to come to The Sims 2 next year, which will probably mean in the second expansion pack. It's not sure how that will work out exactly, though it's said it won't be a "Persistant World" (PSW) like The Sims Online is. Unfortunately that's all there's being said about it, but we should get more info about that next year.

About the Urbz, there's the news that it's currently planned to be released 16 November. Very interesting was the news that Maxis is planning to make Sims games (possibly the URBZ) for PlayStation Portable (PSP) and the Nintendo Dual Screen (DS). Finally there's some talking about SimCity 5, which is supposed to "go back to its roots" and Will's upcoming game. We'll probably hear the first official word about that game early next year, or at least "after the holiday season". You can read the entire transcripts, with also some personal information about Neil Young, on the Sims 2 site or the Sims 1 site.

1199. Urbz News and Screenshots

Written on Saturday 3 July 2004 at 01:51 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

As our affiliate SimsZone.de reports, Maxis has made the name "The Urbz" the final name for the new console Sims game. That means it's no longer a working title, but you'll see it in stores under that name. It's the first Sims game without "Sims" in the title, though the subtitle, "Sims in the City", is still there. The first name, "Urban Sims" won't be spread anymore. It's not been confirmed if the logo is final too or not. Furthermore, we have some brand new screenshots from the GBA version of the game for you. Watch and see how creating your Urb (Sim) works, what Darius has to tell you and what an urban basketball court looks like. Just click the thumbnails below for (slightly) bigger versions.

1200. Sims 2 Scoop: New Wallpapers

Written on Friday 2 July 2004 at 14:39 by ChEeTaH - 3 comments.

The monthly Sims 2 Scoop Newsletter has been sent again, this time with some fresh items. Besides Maxis linking to old videos and tonight's chat with Maxis General Manager Neil Young, there's a broken link to four brand new Sims 2 wallpapers for on your desktop. We've been able to track it down though. All four wallpapers show the Sims 2 bunch in the background, with in the foreground one or two Sims being highlighted and the new logo. They come in four resolutions each. You can find them all at this page.