In some ways, The Sims peaked early as a dollhouse franchise. From the beginning, players could create a Sim, trap it in a tiny cage of walls, and watch it die in a mess of its own starving filth. Really, how much higher could Wil Wright's quirky creation-station reach from there?
It's a weird example of Sims brutality, but it's also an old-hat example of the series after so many years, which leads us to the feeling we've had for too long: Sims games have been stuck in old mechanics. Instead of broadening the gameplay in significant ways, The Sims has mostly expanded over the years by way of endless, optional content packs—decorations, pets, Katy Perry hairstyles, etc.
That's all catnip for diehard fans, but anybody who has fallen out of Sims favor has been waiting for something along the lines of The Sims 4, which seeks to shake up the series' core without disrupting its addictive qualities. In some ways, this iteration steps closer to the personality-centric dollhouse stuff you'd expect from a rival like Nintendo.
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