The Sims

[giza]

I loaded up The Sims the other day and did a little social experiment. I created a one-room apartment that was 20x10 squares, with a couch, TV, 3 beds, toilet, shower, fridge, and cappuccino machine. I put a few light fixtures in there, too. Then I created a family of 4 guys, all with the exact same attributes, moved them in, and watched the fun unfold.

Over the course of about 2 weeks, this is what I observed:

• The mess. Trash was left everywhere, despite me giving them several trashcans and a compacter. There were piles of it in the living space and even outside the house!
• To try and keep the trash level down, I hired a maid to clean up. Should regularly showed up every day, dutifully moved the piles of trash around, and left after charging 10 Simolians. I'm not sure what was up with that.
• The TV was left on constantly.
• The beds that I provided apparently weren't good enough for them. After a few days, I actually saw Sims get in the bed, then get back out again! However, they had no problems with napping on the couch or passing out on the floor.
• A few times, they seemed to forget where the bathroom was and pissed their pants. Maybe all the caffeine they consumed had something to do with that.
• After some time, two of the Sims became extremely angsty and hated everyone else living there. Fights broke out frequently.
• Both of the affected Sims finally left the family in a huff.
• The two Sims who were left became VERY close friends. Sadly, the relationship appeared to be platonic.

I have come to the conclusion that the people who designed The Sims were most likely male college students that were also confused about their sexual orientation, with 1 or 2 starving artists in the mix as well.

Comments

[tgeller.livejournal.com]

You'll piss your own pants laughing at this.

[mindslide.livejournal.com]

That is a great link, fyi. ^_^

[colifox.livejournal.com]

Hilarious link! :D

As for Giza's experiment....sounds like my dorm in the first year :D LoL!

Possible explanation.

[cjthomas.livejournal.com]

Most of these effects actually sound like pathfinding problems (with goal-achievement being a superset of the pathfinding problem). The hosers were having trouble finding garbage cans in easy reach, or deciding to use the compacter if the cans filled up, and the maid just didn't know what to do with all of that mess. Similarly, figuring out how to get to the bathroom while drunk and in the middle of a trash-strewn apartment was apparently too much for some of the characters.

The cause could be something completely different, but intelligent goal-planning is surprisingly hard to implement robustly in simulations like this.

[quentincoyote.livejournal.com]

Was this sims 1 or 2?

[slyphox.livejournal.com]

hahahahahahahahaha... nice.. i want the sims so bad >.< i want to make a house out of bricks with no windows and no doors
a 10x10 house and put 6 people in it and a TV

[gravecat.livejournal.com]

Ahh, they don't deserve a TV. Just put a lamp in the middle of the room, for their entertainment.

Lamp goes on, lamp goes off. Lamp goes on, lamp goes off. Hours of fun.

[furahi.livejournal.com]

Sounds like Homer Simson kinda fun

[doco.livejournal.com]

Sadly, I don't own The Sims yet, but I have Sim City 4 Deluxe (with the U-Drive-It car missions).

Now, whenever I move a Sim into a house in my city, then kill them on purpose (like using the Fire or Lightning tool on the house), then click on the U-Drive-It panel, I get a hearse mission telling me to "get the dearly departed to the funeral" which keeps sending me to the ruins of the exact same house I nuked a moment ago. O.o

*That* is what I call lack of deference! :D

Oh boy...

[colugino.livejournal.com]

Dood, lol, The SIMS??????? That is sooooooo 1980's and shit :-D Anyway, what I have found in my SIMs experience (I haven't played for years, ok days, ok, hours....), guys are goddamned slobs! Even in real life (kinda torn here with the gay thing since I like guys but at the same time I hate slobs!!!!). Fun is creating a house, putting in a fireplace, inviting everyone for a party. Take out all the windows and doors, keep inviting till every neighbor and housemate is in there, then start a fire. Watch all the bastards burn. Me? I dream that they are just stupid customers!

On that note, coffee makes them take a leak every 2 seconds. I never put cappuccino makers in my Sims cribs anymore cuz I was tired of cleaning up piss, even though I would hook my house up with a bathroom in every freakin room of the house.

Anyone that knows how to get the Sims to be friends in freakin Sims Unleashed on Gamecube will have my undying gratitude!

[amelitatwinstar.livejournal.com]

That's hilarious!

I was playing the Sims by trying to make everyone ecstatic all the time, and with the cheat code for money, that wasn't too hard. But I got bored with giving the Sims every little thing they wanted and an unlimited budget.

So, I made a poor family in a terrible house (no floor even) with not enough amenities, just to see what would happen if I didn't tell them what to do. I didn't guide the people at all, though I did change a couple of pieces of furntiture in the game (which didn't really help).

Well, here's the short story: the mom was so unhappy she left; the boy got sent off to military school 'cause he didn't go to school; the father died basically because he was too lazy to turn off the TV so he could get some sleep, and when he died, his urn blocked the way so that the daughter couldn't get out of bed! She repeatedly sat up in bed, saw the urn, pointed and squealed and lay back down. This depressive, traumatized behavior went on and on day after day until I moved the urn. Then she finally got out of bed and promptly died on the spot.

The whole place was littered with garbage and swarming with roaches, and the repo company came and took their toilet (among other things).

Say, does anyone remember that someone threw a Sims sex party a while back?

[silverscalenaga.livejournal.com]

my understanding of the social programming is that gay interactions will /not/ occur in the sims unless you instruct them to do so. and then you also must manually mantain it.