The time, OH GOD THE TIME!
Cheencheela:
I've always been bugged about the time in The Sims.
Yeah, sure, I understand that to progress the time needs to be quite fast to keep the pace. But unlike real life, it doesn't take 23 minutes to wash your hands. Neither does it take an hour and a half to shower. My sim has to get up at around 5:30 every morning to cook breakfast (Often something as simple as a salad), shower and pee. And in a total I barely, just barely can squeeze this in for the little (Huge) time until the Carpool comes.
Waffles are impossible to eat, so I often go for a salad or a quick meal, which surprisingly fills up the whole bar.
None the less, so I've been thinking. Now with The Sims 3 that is a bit more 'free'-ish, I'd love if you were able to slow time down a bit. Like... 2 seconds are 1 minute instead of a 1-1 ratio like it is now.
Imagine how much more realistic it would be.
Of course, some things will get messed up, like work performance. But that could somehow be halved and it's fixed. You'd be able to actually make use of some cheap beds instead of sleeping in a double-luxury mega bed.
I'm not sure what kind of modding capabilities you can do (yet). But it sure would be a huge step into more freedom and less restriction and non-awesomeness.
What would you think of The Sims 3, if the time was halved? Would it be good? Bad? Crap-tastic? Share your thoughts, lads! Don't be shy!
McCrea:
I'm just winging it:
I agree with your impression. However, I don't have a big problem with it after I accept that I do know a sizable minority of people who get up before 6 am to get to work at 9. [I don't believe in reality, and in fact I insist that reality have no place in either video games or the real world.] These people could be considered fully fed, showered and peed, but then again maybe not. They are going to have to eat again in 3 more hours, so they really couldn't have been fully fed sims style. Most will pee in 2 hours, and many will poop. I do believe many Americans prefer to poop on company time. So real people aren't fully peed, either. Showering is different. Showering clearly takes too long. Some real people certainly are fully showered before going to work. The norm is also to brush them teeths too, after eating (snacking). But in game terms, if you stopped eating and peeing in the morning, you would have time to shower and brush.
What I feel the largest problem is that walking is too slow compared to the ticking time. Fairly often we have to head outside 20 minutes early. A 40 minute shower is only made worse when it takes 10 minutes to walk to the shower, and 10 minutes to back to whatever you were doing before. Pez made this more realistic with his AlwaysRun in sims2, IIRC. It's surprising that you can often run to the car in 4 minutes when walking would have taken 20. (unless there are stairs: run moar on the stairs, ya tard) However: I didn't find always running aesthetically pleasing.
I would almost happily like to try a slow-ticking (longer day) mod. Yet actually, I don't need to waste more time than I already do. But I think only the walking time is significant. If we want to shower faster, it's maybe easier just to turn the shower's hygiene level up to 30. But is the need really to address "23 minutes to wash your hands"? or is it "time until the Carpool comes." For the later, one solution that occurred to me is that I'd be happy if my sim awoke 90 minutes before the car pool rather than 60.
My strongest "No" point is that which I opened with. I do know people that get up 2 and a half hours early for work. If we changed it so that so that sims could get everything done in one hour, then how would the early birds benefit? They wouldn't (currently): there would be no reason to get up early. I think having the early bird aspect adds to my enjoyment. Currently: It is a hassle to get up early enough to get ready for work. That is just like real life, for me.
Again I do like the idea, but I'd rather have the gigantic list of specific changes to consider rather than the general "longer day". *Walking time is unrealistic. *Not enough time before work. *Not enough to do before work. (Changing the speed of time changes an infinite number of things, and now I won't be able to stop talking until I detail the rest of infinity.) Now it has occurred to me that I want more to do before work, and I'm forming the specifics required for a mod, but then I look at the topic and say "what the fuck am I posting in a wet-dream thread for anyway" ;D
Edit: One EA selling point was that "bladders last longer -- you'll only have to use the bathroom once or twice a day." That made me mad, because it is less realistic. The urologist said peeing 7 times a day is normal. I hate EA, and realism.
Drakron:
The issue of giving time would have a similar effect to giving more days.
Play on Epic and your Sim will raise to the top of the career and max a few skills before leaving the Young Adult age.
Also only Energy, Hygiene and Fun really matter, Sims can take of the rest in work themselves and I do not think TS3 job performance works as it did before, even a tired stressed Sim will not get fired immediate, they matter more because of the moodlet system if you want to use the "work hard" option.
Oh and there are more quick meal options that do not require preparation so its possible for a Sim to wake up 1 hour before work, go take a shower and eat something before missing the ride, also there is the option in case we did missed it to go to work.
Sagana:
And the car pool is still happy to wait a full hour for you. When the 'go to work' thing comes up, click it off and click on the car to add it to the end of the queue. Don't cancel the action out unless there's only 15 min or less to time for work and even then if you miss it, you just go to work auto because it's in your queue and your sim and the game doesn't even notice.
Angelo:
There are certain compromises you have to do when designing a game, in regards to realism. The most popular one, is "Lives". Another one is time advancing faster. In a game like The Sims, the more time advancing reaches closer to realtime levels, the more boring the game would be. Sure you would have enough time to do all the preparations before heading off to work, but if it takes 1-2 hours to max all your needs, what about the rest of the day? Are you going to keep reading a book even though your fun is already at max? Are you gonna visit a community lot? Watching your Sim do certain activities, like reading a book or talking with another, is not as interesting as doing it yourself in the real world. Also, in the real world we have so many different day filling activities to engage in, that it would take EAxis 20 expansions to add them all in. Lastly, there's technical issues. A feature like this would require the addition of more, faster game speeds, something that only a few powerful PCs would be able to handle.
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