By: Maxis

This whole Sim franchise is getting a little out of hand. SimCity, SimEarth, SimThemePark... before you know it, SimDanish will hit the shelves at a store near you. But until then, EA's latest offering, The Sims, is more than enough to keep you busy.

GAMEPLAY
In The Sims, you literally control the daily lives of a household of people. Everything from designing a house to making friends and getting married is possible in this game. You choose the color of the carpet, wallpaper, furniture, etc. To advance in the game, you forge relationships with your neighbors and get promotions from your jobs. It may all seem a little overwhelming at first, but playing The Sims is simplified greatly by an incredibly intuitive interface. A stupid monkey could figure it out.

Who ever thought a game like this could be fun? Not me. But was I ever wrong... it's actually hard to stop playing. Each day is pretty much the same as the last, but for some reason you care about these people. You want to make them happy, and get that promotion, and work that charisma, and get that pinball machine, and...

With a game that intends to mimic daily life, there are a few limitations to the scope of The Sims. For example, you can't leave your lot in the game. This would have made the game a lot more complicated, but would have been an amazing feature to implement.

GRAPHICS AND SOUND
The graphics in The Sims are clean, crisp and serve the game well. Every item is distinguishable and well animated. The character animations are very expressive and are often hilarious.

The sound is also perfect for this game. All the Sims speak in a bizarre gibberish that is strangely amusing. All the sounds of a regular house are ported directly into the game, including the barking dog TV commercial (yah, you know the one). It won't be long before you'll be humming the catchier tunes to yourself.

If you're asking yourself whether or not to get The Sims, I ask you this: Who doesn't want to control the lives of other people? I mean, c'mon?

ASY
Queen

MastaCSG		It's fun, but it gets monotonous after a while.
Ten

DroopyMcC		I agree with the above. I cannot stand the loading and saving times.
Jack