The Sims: Livin' Large

"Sigh...Maxis screws up again..."

Introduction-
So, this is the expansion pack to the “game” The Sims. I’m disappointed. I always thought an expansion pack was supposed to improve a game. Oh well, what do I know. I do know that this isn’t a giant leap for The Sims. It’s more like a tiny step. Now you get to find out why.

Graphics- 7 out of 10
The graphics are no better in Livin’ Large than in the original Sims. They’re OK, but nothing special. In fact, nearly all of the games for Nintendo 64 and Playstaion have better graphics than this. Plus if you want the game to run more than 1frame per 3 seconds you have to lower the resolution of the graphics which makes them even worse. Also, things are all choppy and most of the time it’s hard to tell what certain items are.

Sound- 4 out of 10
The Sims has average sound quality as far as music and sound effects go. The music is okay, but doesn’t ever change unless you change modes, and just drawls on and on and on. The good part is the computer has a volume control so you can shut it up. Plus, the music doesn’t seem to have anything to do with where it is played at. Throughout the game there is always and I men always elevator music playing. And the sound effects though are just downright dumb. When people talk it’s just gibberish, and the little thought bubbles above their heads aren’t very much of a help either because the symbols in them could mean multiple things. Also the sound effects that an object makes aren’t very good either. Like when a Sim turns on a lamp, the sound is a “BOING!”

Play Control- 3 out of 10
The play control is terrible. The cursor moves slowly, and you have to move the cursor to the edge of the screen to get it to move (the screen). And people move very slowly unless you put the game on hyper speed, which an hour in the game goes bye in half of a second, and if someone is in a bad mood, and you tell them to do something, they won’t and they just stay where they are. Also, to get a Sim to use an item, all you have to do is click on the thing you want them to use. Sounds easy, right? Wrong. If anything is in the path of the object, it will think you re talking about the blocking one instead. So getting someone to use something can be, and is hard. So all in all the play control is pathetic and to get Livin’ Large to run at a medium speed you need to make all of the graphics, sound quality, and many other things very poor.

Game Design- 3 out of 10
OK, so the idea of a game based on real life is original, so what? Harvest Moon, which is a much better game, does that too, only on a farm. And Maxis calls this an expansion pack just because they added a few items. Other than that, Livin’ Large is no different than the first Sims game. Also, real life isn’t much like this either. I mean, who has a job, and gets picked up in a piece-of-garbage car for a carpool every day to get to work? Obviously these people do. Aside from that, The Sims takes up around 500 Megabytes of space, that’s half a Gigabyte, which is a lot, just so you non-computery people know. I had to buy a 20-Gigabyte expansion for my computer when I got the first The Sims game and it was a waste of money because I went and returned it. For all that space, this game sure is a waste of time. I still can’t figure out how it uses it all. Now I bought the expansion pack to warn more people not to buy the game, and it’s identical to the first except the few new items they added. And if you have an old or small computer, The Sims runs *VERY* slowly. It also takes about 10 minutes to load up too (Literally!).

Replay Value- 1 out of 10
After at the most four hours you’ll be sick of it. As I said before, all the expansion pack has is a few new items, which you can buy, and those don’t make The Sims any more fun than it was to begin with. The only way you’ll enjoy it is if you like doing the exact same thing over and over and over… Even with hundreds of downloads, every cheat, and a family of any size you want, the fun won’t last long. Maxis is well known for games that will keep you entertained for a long time, but they made a HUGE mistake with The Sims.

Overall- 3 out of 10
Overall The Sims is a game, that is hyped up even though it’s terrible (just like Pokemon). It won the “Game of the Year Award” and now they have another expansion pack coming out called House Party. I’ll probably get it just so I can write a review to warn people to turn back instead of wasting their money. From the makers of Simcity, such as the genius, Will Wright, comes the first ever bad Maxis game (second if you call the expansion pack a game). It seems the other reviewers didn’t play for that long, or else the scores would be lower on all of The Sims games. I hope I have convinced you NOT to buy this game, but if you have and can’t return it, it makes a great Frisbee or hockey puck and if you get the expansion pack you can have both. It’s also rated “T” for Teen, so at least some people might not have to suffer from the wrath of this bad game. And if you’re out shopping for a birthday or Christmas or something, don’t buy this unless you want to give someone a bad gift at a terrible price.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 05/28/01, Updated 01/18/02