The Sims Blog Tasks

Audience

Read this App Store description and the customer reviews for The Sims FreePlay and answer the following questions:  

1) What game information is provided on this page? Pick out three elements you think are important in terms of making the game appeal to an audience.

• "The Sims™ FreePlay lets you create, customize, design and build to your heart’s content on mobile!"

• "Play in real time and control your virtual world! Life can be altered for each of your Sims as they progress over time."

• "Choose every aspect of your Sims lives: careers, appearance, personality and more! Then, watch as their stories unfold! Love and romance, or drama and breakups - the choice is always yours."

2) How does the game information on this page reflect the strong element of participatory culture in The Sims?

The game information CONSTANTLY tells you about the various ways you can control your Sims and the customisations you can make to them.

3) Read a few of the user reviews. What do they suggest about the audience pleasures of the game?

The variety of things to do and the gameplay values.

Participatory culture

Read this academic journal article - The Sims: A Participatory Culture 14 Years On. Answer the following questions:

1) What did The Sims designer Will Wright describe the game as?

Will Wright describes as akin to ‘a train set or a doll’s house where each person comes to it with their own interest and picks their own goals’.

2) Why was development company Maxis initially not interested in The Sims?

When Wright pitched his latest game concept to development company Maxis, using the descriptor of ‘doll house’, he was met with little enthusiasm. The board of directors thought that ‘doll houses were for girls, and girls didn’t play video games’.

3) What is ‘modding’?

This enabled a form of participatory culture to grow up around the game, a culture wherein players were able to modify game assets by manipulating the game code (a practice called ‘modding’) with the sanction of the rights owners, and to share their new creations via personal websites and online for a – or even on the official Sims page, where an exchange centre was set up.

4) How does ‘modding’ link to Henry Jenkins’ idea of ‘textual poaching’?

‘Participatory culture’, as first posited in Henry’s Jenkins’ seminal book on fan culture, Textual Poachers (1992 [2013]), describes an aspect of fandom we are all familiar with today the contribution of consumers and audiences to a product or a franchise, through activities ranging from writing fanfiction to drawing fanart, from cosplaying to even penning simple gaming reviews.

Participatory culture is inherently social, feeding on the affordances of Web 2.0 and social media, allowing individuals to come together around shifting interests to create digital communities that are ‘held together through the mutual production and reciprocal exchange of knowledge’.

5) Look specifically at p136. Note down key quotes from Jenkins, Pearce and Wright on this page.

‘Participatory culture’, as first posited in Henry’s Jenkins’ seminal book on fan culture, Textual Poachers (1992 [2013]), describes an aspect of fandom we are all familiar with today the contribution of consumers and audiences to a product or a franchise, through activities ranging from writing fanfiction to drawing fanart, from cosplaying to even penning simple gaming reviews.

Participatory culture is inherently social, feeding on the affordances of Web 2.0 and social media, allowing individuals to come together around shifting interests to create digital communities that are ‘held together through the mutual production and reciprocal exchange of knowledge’.

Wright: ‘We were probably responsible for the first million or so units sold but

it was the community which really brought it to the next level’.

As Pearce has noted, ‘The original Sims series has the most vibrant emergent fan culture of a

single-player game in history’.

6) What examples of intertextuality are discussed in relation to The Sims? (Look for “replicating works from popular culture”)

Fans could play out the simulated lives of their favourite characters in this digital sandbox, they could toy with the possibility that Luke Skywalker had turned to the Dark Side, or had even engaged in an incestuous relationship with Princess Leia. Even crossovers were a possibility, allowing one lot to house Marvel Universe characters and another to house DC Universe characters – the two sets of characters could interact and even build relationships and their own life stories. 

7) What is ‘transmedia storytelling’ and how does The Sims allow players to create it?

In other words, what The Sims offered was a form of transmedia storytelling, a process wherein the primary text encoded in an official commercial product could be dispersed over multiple media, both digital and analogue in form.

8) How have Sims online communities developed over the last 20 years?

Gee & Hayes, Sihvonen and other scholars such as Rebecca Black (2008) have celebrated the ways in which modding for The Sims (and other forms of fanwork such as fanfiction) create opportunities for peer-led and teacher-moderated learning, rather than more teacher-directed forms. The former permits students to learn new skills through interaction and negotiation with their classmates, rather than being ‘relegated to skill and drill and remedial

tasks’; in these spaces of digital mentorship, all group members are potential resources with different skill sets, and there is ‘a wide range of expertise and many forms of knowledge that are valued; thus, the roles of ‘expert’ and ‘novice’ are highly variable and contingent on activity and context at any given moment’. This highlights one of the ways in which cohesion is achieved within the Sims-playing community; and the aforementioned scholars have made much of the idea that these informal learning structures may aid in the development of what have been termed transferable skills – skills that can be taken out of the gaming space (or, indeed, the participatory culture around it) and into the wider world of work.

9) Why have conflicts sometimes developed within The Sims online communities?

But this marriage of the social and the functional is effective only for as long as its participants stick around, and sometimes the relations between fans of The Sims can be fraught with mistrust and in-fighting as Sihvonen notes: ‘Various internet spaces, also in the context of The Sims, can be regarded as repositories of collective cultural memory and important leisure places as well as areas in which power relations are put to the test. And: ‘The Sims players do not constitute an easily definable or concise online community [...]The Sims modding scene is divided on the basis of its members’ individual preferences and practices of play’

10) What does the writer suggest The Sims will be remembered for?

But what it will be remembered for, I think, is for the cult following that it engendered well beyond the usual lifespan of a popular computer game; and also for the culture of digital production it helped to pioneer, one that remains such a staple of fan and game modding communities today.

Read this Henry Jenkins interview with James Paul Gee, writer of Woman as Gamers: The Sims and 21st Century Learning (2010).

1) How is ‘modding’ used in The Sims?

Modding the Sims to create challenges and game play that is simultaneously in the game world, in the real world, and in writing things like graphic novels. Such modding is the force that sustains a passionate affinity space that builds artistic, technical, social, and emotional skills.

2) Why does James Paul Gee see The Sims as an important game?

because it is a game that is meant to take people beyond gaming.

3) What does the designer of The Sims, Will Wright, want players to do with the game?

Will Wright is doing in an extreme way what lots of game designers want to do: empower people to think like designers, to organize themselves around the game to become learn new skills that extend beyond the game, and to express their own creativity.

4) Do you agree with the view that The Sims is not a game – but something else entirely?

I slightly disagree with this, as at it's deepest core, The Sims is just another example of the "Point n' Click" genre of games.

5) How do you see the future of gaming? Do you agree with James Paul Gee that all games in the future will have the flexibility and interactivity of The Sims?

I heavily agree with this. The prime example being Fortnite's collaboration with Unreal Engine to create UEFN, a subsidiary to the base game that allows anyone to create their own games inside Fortnite through the Unreal Editor engine.

Industries

Regulation – PEGI

Research the following using the VSC website PEGI page - look at the videos and Q&A section.

1) How does the VSC and PEGI ratings system work and how does it link to UK law?

Game ratings help parents decide whether a game is suitable for their children to play. Games can feature a wide range of content, including violence, horror, sex and drugs. It's important for parents to have a trusted source of information about whether they should let their children play a particular game.

In the UK, PEGI 12, 16 and 18 rated games supplied in physical form, such as on discs and cartridges, are legally enforceable and cannot be sold or rented to anyone under those ages. The Games Rating Authority is appointed by government as the body that issues these age ratings.

Every PEGI 12, 16 and 18 game is assessed by an examiner who also writes detailed information for parents about what the game contains. This additional information is available on the Games Rating Authority website and PEGI app.

2) Click on the PEGI Rating tab in the top menu. What are the age ratings and what content guidance do they include?

In the UK, PEGI 12, 16 and 18 rated games supplied in physical form, such as on discs and cartridges, are legally enforceable and cannot be sold or rented to anyone under those ages. The Games Rating Authority is appointed by government as the body that issues these age ratings.

Every PEGI 12, 16 and 18 game is assessed by an examiner who also writes detailed information for parents about what the game contains. This additional information is available on the Games Rating Authority website and PEGI app.

3) What is the PEGI process for rating a game? 

Every PEGI 12, 16 and 18 game is assessed by an examiner who also writes detailed information for parents about what the game contains. This additional information is available on the Games Rating Authority website and PEGI app.

The ‘Freemium’ gaming model

Read this Lifewire feature on freemium gaming and answer the following questions:

1) How does the freemium model work? 

Free-to-play is a successful revenue model for app developers. Typically, the developers give away an app's core functionality for free and offer upgrades to add certain features. For example, the app may contain ads, and you can pay to disable them. Or, a game app might allow you to purchase additional game currency to advance more easily through the game.

The idea behind the freemium revenue model is that free apps are downloaded more than paid ones. When users like the app, they want to continue to use it and some of them are willing to pay for upgrades. Others continue to use it for free but the number of in-app purchases exceeds what could be earned by making people pay to download

2) Why do some gamers believe freemium is ruining games?

Players become frustrated when it seems like the developers of these games are trying to nickel-and-dime them to death. It's even worse when a good game such as the Dungeon Hunter series becomes freemium and implements the worst aspects of it. An initially bad game is aggravating but a good one turned bad is even more so. 

Additionally, many players have become accustomed to downloading a game for free, making it harder to convince them to pay for those downloads. Thus, more developers are using the free-to-play model, sometimes with disappointing results.

3) What are the positives of the freemium model for gaming?

Even given the negative aspects of free-to-play, there are a lot of good ones as well. The ability to download and try a game for free is great. And, when developers do freemium right, players can alternatively earn the premium content by working through the game and building up in-game currency. So they don't have to feel like there's no way to advance past a certain point in the game without paying.

This model also places emphasis on longevity, which players like. That is, a popular game with an existing fan base can continue to add premium content to keep the game fresh and keep those loyal players. This approach is in opposition to earlier stages of gaming during which a game might get a couple of patches but any bugs left after that were left for good.

Now read this Business Insider feature on freemium gaming and multiplayer games. Answer the following questions:

1) Note the key statistics in the first paragraph.

From Candy Crush Saga to Clash of Clans, “freemium” games and their in-app purchases account for about 70-80% of the $10 billion or more in iOS revenue each year.

2) Why does the freemium model incentivise game developers to create better and longer games?

In multiplayer games, the goal is to create a game that brings players back for hundreds of hours of gameplay, says Plott. If developers don't have a strong monetary incentive, it's difficult for them to constantly improve the game experience. With freemium games, players are continuously spending money on the game, as opposed to paying once and forgetting about it. Developers are then incentivized to put that stream of revenue directly back into the game to improve it.

"If people are playing your game and there is something they are frustrated with, the developers can fix it and make the players happy, and the players will continue to stay on the product," says Plott.

3) What does the article suggest regarding the possibilities and risks to the freemium model in future?

Freemium games have generated most of their criticism over the mobile gaming experience. Last year, South Park famously skewered the concept as a money grab that preys on addicts and leads to boring games. The singer of the Sex Pistols, John Lyndon, claimed last year that he spent over $15,000 on iPad apps.

In 2013, Apple settled a class-action lawsuit for parents who alleged that Apple didn’t make it clear that free apps could charge money.

The “freemium” model has proven itself to be incredibly profitable. The question now is how game developers use it to grow without alienating a large share of the gaming community.

Read this New York Times feature on freemium gaming and answer the following questions:

1) Why did Temple Run use the freemium model?

In September, the couple began offering Temple Run free and promoted it through Free App a Day, a Web site that features free games. The game immediately had a spike in downloads and quickly soared in popularity. To date it has topped 40 million downloads, and about 13 million people play it at least once a day, Ms. Luckyanova said.

2) The bigger gaming studios like Electronic Arts used to avoid the freemium model. Why are they now embracing it?

Flurry, a mobile-software analytics company, estimates that 65 percent of all revenue generated in the App Store — roughly $2 billion — has come from free games that charge for extra goods. Peter Farago, vice president for marketing at Flurry, said that was partly because Apple had made it easy for people to buy goods within apps and charge them to a credit card on file with Apple.

3) Why does Peter Farago suggest independent game makers benefit more from the freemium model than the major publishers like EA?

But in general, Mr. Farago said, independent game makers should benefit more from freemium than major publishers like Electronic Arts, Nintendo and Microsoft. He said that the big companies had always relied on charging for games and that it would be difficult for them to change their makeup.

When creating a free game with an online store associated with it, Mr. Farago added, game companies must devote staff and resources to maintaining it because it is a live service. Smaller companies are in a better position than the major ones to start from zero and focus on releasing and maintaining freemium products, he said.

Electronic Arts

Read this Pocket Gamer interview with EA’s Amanda Schofield, Senior Producer on The Sims FreePlay at EA's Melbourne-based Firemonkeys studio. Answer the following questions:

1) How has The Sims FreePlay evolved since launch?

We started out with a game where you could control 16 Sims, have a pet dog and a career and that was most of the game.

We hadn’t yet introduced getting married, much less having children, and now it’s this rich world which covers every aspect of the Sims’ lives.

Pets range from puppies and kittens to dragons and fairies and the world is full of interesting places for Sims to go, mountains of fashion and near infinite ways to design and decorate homes.

When we started out, we never thought we could achieve so much, and that hundreds of millions of people would have played and continue to play five years later.

2) Why does Amanda Schofield suggest ‘games aren’t products any more’?

Partnerships are built between them and the player.

3) What does she say about The Sims gaming community?

We need to understand when they are struggling with something new we’ve put in or if they’re absolutely loving some one-off thing we tried.

We don’t always get it exactly right, but by having the voices of our players in the rooms when we’re designing and building, we can always learn from our mistakes and get better and better at delivering exactly what our players want to see.

4) How has EA kept the game fresh and maintained the active player base?

We’ve not had to do much more than listen and build to keep the players engaged.

5) How many times has the game been installed and how much game time in years have players spent playing the game? These could be great introductory statistics in an exam essay on this topic.

(THE SITE IS SHUT DOWN PERMANENTLY FOR ME)

Finally, read this blog on how EA is ruining the franchise (or not) due to its downloadable content. Answer the following questions:

1) What audience pleasures for The Sims are discussed at the beginning of the blog?

“The Sims” games center on the players’ ability to create “Sims” — virtual humans with personalities and ambitions — and take complete control of their lives. Players can also use the game to experiment with architecture, decoration and landscaping. Traditionally, each main series entry begins with a base game containing a large portion of the content, but not the entire package.

2) What examples of downloadable content are presented?

As the lifespan of the game progresses, various “expansion packs” are sold to add new gameplay features, while “stuff packs” add items, such as new clothing or furniture options, without expanding on the game mechanics. These all fall under the umbrella term “downloadable content.”

Whether you play “The Sims” or not, you’ve probably heard of downloadable content, also known as “DLC.” A magnet for controversy in the past several years, DLC is simply new content for a game that is purchased or downloaded for free as a separate add-on. To many irate gamers, a more suitable definition would be “things that should’ve been in the game in the first place.”

3) How did Electronic Arts enrage The Sims online communities with expansion packs and DLC?

EA is no stranger to being on the receiving end of public backlash. Late last year, the now-infamous developers came under fire for locking several iconic characters and powerful multiplayer abilities behind DLC in “Star Wars Battlefront II.”

That’s why, on March 6, 2018, longtime fans of “The Sims” franchise — myself included — were stunned by EA’s nerve. They had outdone themselves. As true industry innovators, EA created, possibly, the first DLC for your DLC: meet “The Sims 4: My First Pet Stuff.”

As noted by many frustrated gamers, several of the furniture items seemed as though they were removed from a set included in the aforementioned expansion. Players suspected that the complete set of bedroom furniture was supposed to be included in “The Sims 4: Cats and Dogs” and a few items were extracted and offered as paid DLC, so EA could make some extra cash.

Fans made online petitions for the pack to be free DLC, called for others’ refusal to purchase it and requested that the $9.99 DLC fee be donated to a local animal shelter, instead. In addition, some popular Sims video creators on YouTube expressed their disappointment in the pack and the development team.

4) What innovations have appeared in various versions of The Sims over the years?

Every addition to the series has been innovative. The original carved out the niche for “life simulation” gaming. In the next cycle, “The Sims 2” refined the virtual families, allowing players to create multi-generational legacies. Following this feat, the developers gave players full access to every inch of a hyper-realistic world in “The Sims 3.”

5) In your opinion, do expansion packs like these exploit a loyal audience or is it simply EA responding to customer demand?

In my opinion it is simply EA responding to customer demand. The only way they could make a profit on what they made is through transactions. And what better way to do that than through customer demand.