#24: Play The Sims

I just looked up when the first the Sims game came out – it was the year 2000. That means that when I first started playing the Sims, I was just 13, and I have been playing the Sims, intermittently, for TWELVE YEARS.

I remember the early years – back when all you could really do was build a boring boxy house, get a bland job in politics, and when Sims could only die if you removed all the doors to the room they were in and let them starve and pee themselves to death. 

In 2004, The Sims 2 came out, and shortly after all its fancy expansion packs with luxuries like Christmas trees and goatee beards came out too. By this time, my neighbourhood friend and I would hang out after school and play the Sims together on separate computers in the same room. Between us, we had Sims with pets, with magic, with vacations, and different seasons. We were like gods!  

Still,  I spent most of my time building the coolest house, and crafting the most attractive Sims – but I’d get bored with them all before they even had the chance to woohoo in the hot tub.

By the time the Sims 3 made it to stores, negating all the money spent on expansion packs for the Sims 2, I was kind of over it all. I still bought the game, and while I enjoyed new perks like collecting bugs and gems in the game for a while, I got bored. That was back in 2009.

The common theme here is that I keep going back to the Sims, even though I know I will get bored after controlling a few families for a while. The time has come again for me to circle back.

But not without some obstacles! It was actually quite an ordeal to try and play the Sims again, which only served to make me want to play more. First - my old CD was so scratched up due to multiple moves, it was unusable - so I had to buy a new version and download it online. But then my crappy laptop couldn’t handle the graphics, and would blue screen of death on me after about 20 minutes of playing – just about enough time to pick the snazzy hairstyles and favourite food for a couple Sims. But eventually, I figured out how to fix the problem (go me! Graduated with a PhD in ‘Googling-it’) and got into some serious sociopathery. 

I’ve got two or three families on the go, and yes I completely intend for them to hook up and have a big combined soap opera family. Miss Noodles, meet Mr. Funyun, your future brother. (I mostly name my Sims after food.) Woohoo!