Sims 4: Live Playthrough at Gamescom 2014

Peter Moore (COO of Electronic Arts) and Rachel Franklin (Executive Producer of The Sims 4) presented a live demonstration of The Sims 4 at Gamescom in Cologne, Germany.

Sims 4 Angela Merkel

Using the power of the Create A Sim tool, they designed a Sim based off of Angela Merkel, the chancellor of Germany. She looks close enough for the most part, just with a bit more volume to her hair.

Sims 4 Peeter Moore

Next, they showed off Peter Moore’s Sim and made him extremely muscular since he’s been training for marathons. His Sim had some funky body proportions, made even more awkward when he switched into his ‘executive’ outfit. Certainly, you can just click on a body part and shrink those bulging muscles right away.

Sims 4 Build Mode

They proceeded to show off the Build Mode, where you can move an entire mansion just by dragging it across the screen. It wasn’t as snappy as it looked in the trailer videos, but to be fair, it was a complex house that may have needed some time to process moving all those rooms.

Willow Creek neighborhood 1

We even got a little bird’s-eye view of one of the neighborhoods in Willow Creek. Look closely at one of the houses designed to look like the Freezer Bunny.

Sims 4 Pancake bob

In this neighborhood, we get to meet Pancake Bob, whose current mood state made him depressed. Peter Moore’s Sim, in contrast, was generally happy, providing for some unique interactions between the two. Pancake Bob’s emotional interactions lets him complain to others about his problems or ask for advice from other Sims. Peter Moore, on the other hand, could cheer him up, or brighten his day to improve his outlook.

Sims 4 Cowplant

Lastly, we were treated to a special scene with the Cow Plant; which then proceeded to eat Peter Moore as soon as he grabbed the cake dangling from the plant’s tongue. A few moments later, the cow spat him right back out, immediately placing Peter in a bad mood.

Anyway, the major announcement at this event was for the Create A Sim demo which was released yesterday to the general public. I guess the timing of the conference was supposed to coincide with its release, but it appears this was a little too late.

Sims 4: Create A Sim Demo Now Available!

Sims 4 DemoGet an early start on creating your most memorable Sims by downloading the Sims 4: Create A Sim demo! You can download it for free at the Origin website, in the Betas and Demos section. Be sure to sign in with your Origin ID to launch the game. 

 

Sims 4 CAS Demo

The Sims 4: Create A Sim Demo

1.06GBs Required

 

 

Sims 4 Gamescon

Some big Sims 4 Gamescom information is coming soon! See you then!

The Sims 4: Gallery CAS Demo Overview

The Sims 4 CAS Demo Logo

We’ve reached the end of our three part The Sims 4 Create A Sim demo walkthrough. Now that we’ve formed our Sims’ personalities and created their looks, it’s time to share them with the world through the Gallery!

The Gallery window consists of three tabs: Home, Community, and My Library.

The Sims 4 Gallery Home

Home tells you how many players are online and the total number of households in the Gallery and your library. You may also find notifications regarding your uploaded households and a list of popular hashtags to the right.

 

The Sims 4 Gallery Community

Community is the heart of the Gallery. Here you’ll find all of the Sims 4 content players have uploaded. Lots and rooms will also be available on the Gallery in the full release, but for now we can only share Sim households. These can be sorted by the most recent uploads or by the most popular in terms  of downloads or favorites. A checkbox is included for hiding uploads containing any downloadable or expansion content for The Sims 4 that you don’t currently own. They can also be searched for by name, the Origin ID of the creator, or by hashtag.

 

The Sims 4 Gallery My Library

My Library contains all of your saved households, including any downloaded from the Gallery. The files are stored locally on your computer and can be found in the Tray folder.

Documents/Electronic Arts/The Sims 4 Create A Sim Demo/Tray

 

The Sims 4 Household Preview

Uploading a household to the Gallery is accomplished through the household preview window. A button can be found at the bottom left corner which when clicked will upload your household to the Gallery. Before doing this you may want to add a description, including any relevant hashtags if you wish.

The Sims 4 Gallery Upload Notice

After a short load your content will appear on the Gallery and a notification will pop up. Your uploads can be removed at any time by clicking the same button.

 

The Sims 4 Gallery Profile

You may also showcase one of your uploads prominently on your Gallery profile. Clicking your Origin ID at the top of the window will take your profile. Other players can follow you, leave comments, and view the full catalog of your uploaded creations from here.

 

The Sims 4 Gallery Household

Downloading content from the Gallery is just as simple. Clicking on another player’s household will bring up a familiar window. From here you can save the household to your library, favorite it, share it on Facebook, report it for inappropriate content, or bring it right into Create A Sim. The creator’s profile can be accessed by clicking on their name.

The Sims 4 Gallery Modified

If another player uses your creations in their own Gallery upload, you will receive credit as the original creator.

Interestingly, the Create A Sim demo installation includes a Mods folder. With the right tools you can already start making custom textures for your Sims to fashion. An official Sims blog entry posted this week elaborated on this. They’ll be adding a basic guide explaining the game’s file structure and how to work with the files for modding purposes within the next few weeks. The updated Sims forums currently in the works will also include a section for modding and custom content discussion.

The Sims 4 SimCitizens Staff

 

That wraps up our Create A Sim demo walkthrough.

 

Sims 4 Create A Sim Demo: Editing The Head and Body

The Sims 4 CAS Demo Logo

We’re back with part two of our The Sims 4 Create A Sim demo walkthrough. This time we’ll focus on editing our Sim’s appearance.

Editing the Head

head

When you move the cursor over your Sim, you’ll notice that individual parts of their body will become highlighted. This indicates which parts can be adjusted. These parts can be dragged with your mouse and molded as you wish. When you reach the limit in any given direction that a part can be adjusted, it will light up red.

 

highlight

While zoomed out you can adjust the overall size of the head. You’ll need to zoom in close to the face to access its individual features. These include the head shape, eyebrows, eyes, ears, cheeks, nose, mouth, chin, and jaw. Rotating your Sim will allow you to perform additional adjustments.

 

parts

You’ll notice than when you click on one of these body parts, a selection of different choices for that part will appear to the right. Each appears to be in some way unique and has its own limitations for adjustment. When you’re ready to start editing the finest details of your Sim’s face, double click on any part of the face or use the Detail Edit Mode button to the left. Now you can adjust things such as the nostrils, upper and lower lips, and even the size of the eye’s iris.

 

face buttons

To the right of your Sim’s head you will see six buttons.

Face will allow you to change your Sim’s skin tone and choose from preset faces spanning various ethnicities. You can also add additional skin details such as wrinkles, freckles, and beauty marks.

face details

Hair gives you access to a nice variety of different hairstyles. There are 18 hair colors to pick from. Each clothing category can have its own hairstyle. To make finding the perfect hairstyle easier, the game includes a Filter Panel containing filters for length and texture.

Facial Hair (males only) contains various beards, goatees, and moustaches. There is a checkbox in case you don’t want your Sim’s facial hair (or eyebrows) to match the color of their hairstyle.

The Sims 4 Facial Hair

Hats has several types of headgear to choose from. Like all clothing, it can be filtered by color, material, outfit category, and style. It can also be sorted by brimmed and baseball caps. One exciting new feature is that hats can be worn on any hairstyle.

The Sims 4 Hats

Accessories includes earrings, glasses, and necklaces. Each accessory type can be worn together. There are no options for wearing just one earring.

The Sims 4 Accessories

Makeup has the standard eye, cheek, and lip makeup. Unlike previous titles, males and females do not share the same makeup selection. Males are limited to black eyeliner and darker eyeshadow colors.

The Sims 4 Makeup

 

Editing the Body

The Sims 4 Body

To the left you’ll find two sliders for adjusting muscle and weight. Editing the body is mostly the same as the head, but there is no Detail Edit Mode or additional limb types to select from. Like the head, there are a series of buttons to the right.

body buttons

Body gives a selection of preset bodies and allows you to change your Sim’s skin tone.

tattoos

You can also add tattoos to your Sim, some of which can be recolored and most of which are gender specific.

Styled Looks contains stylish clothing combinations. These will be updated periodically after the game’s release.

The Sims 4 Styled Looks

Tops is where you’ll find various upper body wear. There is a wide variety of different types of clothing to choose from here, or your Sim can just go topless.

Full Body has unique top and bottom apparel combinations. These can’t be worn in conjunction with clothing from the Tops or Bottoms buttons.

Bottoms houses various lower body wear. Jeans, shorts, skirts, etc. can be found here.

Accessories for the body include bracelets, rings, and socks, as well as gloves and leggings for females.

The Sims 4 Body Accessories

Your Sim can wear rings on multiple fingers, and one bracelet can be worn per wrist.

Shoes has footwear for every occasion. Keep those toes free by having your Sim go barefoot if you’d like.

There are five clothing categories, including Everyday, Formal, Athletic, Sleep, and Party wear. In The Sims 4, your Sim has every piece of clothing available for each category. Your Sim can attend a formal party in their underwear or sleep fully clothed!

clothing categories

The third and final part of our walkthrough will detail The Gallery and any additional information not mentioned in this or the previous article.

Personality, Traits, Genetics in The Sims 4 CAS Demo

simcitizens staff

We here at SimCitizens got our hands on the Create A Sim demo and would like to give a detailed three part walkthrough of what we experienced. Keep in mind that this is an early demo and that many things may change for the final release.

cas initial

Here we have a preset Sim generated by the game. You may have seen these Sims in promotional material for the game. There’s a lot to cover here, so let’s take it step-by-step.

1.) Clicking the Plumbob will open the Personality settings.

personality

  1. Clicking here will bring up two text boxes for choosing your Sim’s first and last name.
  2. Your Sim’s gender can be switched with these two buttons.
  3. The life stages are shown here. For the demo, only the Young Adult stage is available.
  4. This opens a drop down menu with a selection of unique walk styles. There are nine available, including Default, Perky, Snooty, Swagger, Feminine, Tough, Goofy, Sluggish, and Bouncy. The latter two will not be included in the full release’s CAS. They will instead likely be temporary, emotion-based walk styles.
  5. There are three voices per gender to pick from. The pitch can be adjusted higher or lower to your liking. Male Sims can have a Clear, Warm, or Brash voice, while females can have a Sweet, Melodic, or Lilted voice.
  6. If you have more than one Sim in your household, a button for editing your currently active Sim’s relationships will appear. Two young adults may be roommates, siblings, or married.

aspirations

2.) Let’s move on to traits and aspirations. There are ten aspiration categories, each including one or more aspirations to choose from and a bonus trait. My Sim, for example, has the Computer Whiz aspiration. This is part of the Knowledge category, which also includes the Renaissance Sim and Nerd Brain aspirations. Having a Knowledge aspiration gives my Sim the Quick Learner bonus trait. With this he’ll be able to learn skills faster.

traits

There are 35 traits spanning four types: Emotional, Hobby, Lifestyle, and Social. As there are only three traits per Sim, you may want to choose wisely.

my traits

My Sim, for example, has the Geek, Lazy, and Creative traits.

The Geek trait allows him to find Collectibles more easily and Discuss Geek Things with Sims sharing the Geek trait. It also means that when playing video games or reading sci-fi novels, my Sim will become Happy. If he doesn’t play enough, he could become Tense.

The Lazy trait will give my Sim high Moodlets for napping, watching TV, or using comfortable furniture. However, it also makes my Sim become Fatigued faster when exercising and he will grow Tense when performing household chores.

Finally, with the Creative trait my Sim will have a high chance of becoming Inspired and can Share Creative Ideas with any other Sim. If he goes a certain amount of time without performing a creative task, he will become upset.

stepping out of logo

3.) From here you can access any Sims in your household by clicking on their portrait and add new Sims by clicking the Add a Sim button to the right. You can have up to eight Sims in a single household. 

genetics

You can also Play with Genetics. This allows you to create a new family member based on your Sim’s genetics. For the demo we could only create a sibling. These randomized siblings shared our Sim’s skin tone and tended to have the same eye color, hair color, hair texture, and facial hair in addition to similarly shaped faces and bodies.

4.) This area contains buttons for randomizing the appearance of your Sim and undoing or redoing changes made to it. A checklist feature for randomization has been added, which allows you to choose which parts of your Sim you want randomized.

5.) Starting over or saving your household can be done with these two buttons. Starting a new household will generate a random preset Sim and remove any Sims you were previously working on.

save household

When saving your Sim you can change the household name and add a description. The camera button will randomize the poses in the household portrait. At the bottom left there is a button for uploading your household to The Gallery and another for sharing your uploaded household on Facebook. Finalizing your save is done by clicking the lower right button. The household is saved to My Library.

6.) Here you’ll find buttons for saving your household, opening the gallery, the notification wall, and the options menu. Various notes about your online interactions will pop up on the Notification Wall. From the Options Menu you can access the game’s settings, find help on the EA site, view lessons that will teach you about various features in Create A Sim, and quit the game. As this demo only features Create A Sim, the settings are fairly limited.

The next part of our walkthrough will focus on customizing our Sim’s appearance.

The Sims 4: A Dynamic Score

The Sims 4 Piano
Music is the focus of today’s new entry on the official Sims blog.

The music of The Sims 4 changes dynamically depending on the level of detail you are currently focused on in Create A Sim and Build Mode. Each track in these modes has eight levels of intensity. The more detailed your focus, the simpler the track becomes.

The Sims 4 Night Out

You’ll find plenty of music in the game’s Live Mode as well, with the emotion-based gameplay having a significant impact. The small bits of music that accompanied many emotional moments throughout your Sims’ lives in past titles will return two-fold. A number of animations will also include musical scores.

The Sims 4 base game will include five music stations to choose from, including:

  • Pop
  • Electronica
  • Blues
  • Romance

The fifth music station was not named, but could very well be for custom tracks.

The sims 4 Dancing

The score for The Sims 4 was created by English composer Ilan Eshkeri with longtime EA audio engineer Robi Kauker. Musicians such as Emmy the Great, Tim Wheeler, and Andy Burrows are among those that have contributed to the score.

In addition, an exclusive mix of the Build Mode theme will be released tomorrow for free on the official Sims Soundcloud page.

Last Day to Signup for Sims 4 “Create A Sim” Early Access Demos!

New Sims 4 trailer released today showcasing some of the various emotions your Sim can experience throughout the game.

Emotions

  • Happy
  • Angry
  • Playful
  • Sad
  • Bored
  • Focused
  • Energized
  • Dazed
  • Flirty
  • Uncomfortable
  • Inspired
  • Tension
  • Confident
  • Embarrassed
  • and the list goes on.

Andre CAS Demo

Today will be the last day for everyone to sign up for early access to the Create A Sim demo. However, they still plan to release a Create A Sim demo to the general public sometime in August. Fear not, we here at Simcitizens also got our hands on the CAS demo, and will be previewing some of our creations some time soon! Catch you later!

Can My Computer Run The Sims 4? (Minimum Requirements)

ts4_le_left

Pre-Order The Sims 4

The Sims 4 Minimum Requirements

Operating System (Any of the following)

  • Windows XP (SP3)
  • Windows Vista (SP2)
  • Windows 7 (SP1)
  • Windows 8, or Windows 8.1

Processor (Any of the following)

  • 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
  • AMD Athlon 64 Dual-Core 4000+ or equivalent
  • (For computers using built-in graphics chipsets, the game requires 2.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.0 GHz AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-62 or equivalent)

Memory

  • At least 2 GB RAM

Video Cards (Any of the following)

  • 128 MB of Video RAM and support for Pixel Shader 3.0
  • NVIDIA GeForce 6600 or better
  • ATI Radeon X1300 or better
  • Intel GMA X4500 or better 

Sound

  • DirectX 9.0c Compatible

Internet Connection

  • Required for first time activation only.
  • Once activated, an internet connection is not required.

Origin Account

  • Required to activate The Sims 4.

 

Need help determining whether your PC can run the game? Comment below!

The Sims 4: Exclusive Objects in Each World

A new official Sims blog entry was posted today.

It appears that traveling between different worlds in The Sims 4 will play a large role in your Sims’ lives. Some objects are exclusive to certain worlds. You may not be able to find a particular food ingredient in one world and must travel to another to obtain it.

The Sims 4 Club
Like Willow Creek, Oasis Springs will consist of five neighborhoods. Two of these neighborhoods will start out with a selection of venues for your Sims to visit, but you can turn any lot in any of these neighborhoods into a home or venue.

Moodlets and Emotion Based Interactions: The Sims 4 Live Mode

Magnolia Blossom Park Sims 4

Afternoon Simmers! Today we got an extended look at Live Mode footage from The Sims 4. Producers Ryan Vaughan and Graham Nardone presented a live walkthrough of how emotional states change your Sim’s behavior.

SIms 4 Very Angry

Ryan and Graham loaded up their Sims at Magnolia Blossom Park in Willow Creek. Ryan Vaughan, an active Sim with the Bro trait, was feeling “Very Angry” from a previous altercation. The emotional states your Sim receives are driven by the various moodlets that appear based on their personality, and the effects of the interactions they had. Ryan’s “Steaming Mad” moodlet kept him in an angry state. This unlocked further interactions that allowed him to perform “Peeved Push Ups” and “Sit Ups of Fury.”

Now he can channel all his anger into performing exercises that build his athletic skill faster than if he was in a good mood.

Energized Sims 4
Energized Sims get tired less and are better at physical activities.

Graham, another Sim with the Bro trait, instead felt “Energized!” This was due to both his “Brisk Shower” moodlet, as well as his Bro personality trait which activated the “Hangin’ with Bros” moodlet.

With his energized emotional state, he can do unique interactions like “Give Pep Talk” or “Hip Bump.” When he shifted over into the “Happy” emotional state, he could “Brighten [the] Day” of another Sim or give a “Heartfelt Compliment.”

The Sims 4 Sad

One neat thing is how you can see their emotional states through their expressions and animations without clicking on them. A Sim who’s sad will walk slouched over with their head hanging low, clearly signifying that something is wrong.

Personality based Sims 4

So far we’ve talked about emotion based interactions, so let’s dabble into personality based interactions. For these kinds of interactions, a little icon depicting the Sim’s personality will display next to the name of the interaction. So for example, a geek Sim can “Debate Game Strategies” (controller icon), while a bro Sim could perform a “Bro Bump.” Sims can also perform interactions outside of their personality traits to Sims that have them. For example, Graham’s Sim, who is pretty much a computer nerd, could “Discuss Fitness Techniques” and “Show Off Muscles” to Ryan.

Sims 4 Travel Screen
Traveling is actually done through a world map menu.

Though it may appear like a menu system here, traveling to different locations is done via a world map menu.

Ryan and Graham traveled to the local Gym to see who could level up their fitness skill the fastest. But Ryan gained a bit of an advantage by calling over a Sim who has high fitness skill to mentor him during the workout.

Ryan fitness level up

A combination of Ryan’s angry emotional state, his physically active personality, and the mentorship his friend provided enabled Ryan to workout faster, building up his athletic skill in no time!

Sims 4 Don Lothario and Nancy Landgraab
Don Lothario and Nancy Landgraab seen training with a punching bag.

Well that’s the end of this article. Stay tuned for part two where we’ll talk about “The Gallery,” where you can upload and download Sims and more!