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The Sims 2 Castaway
The Sims 2 Castaway Stories (PC) vs Sims 2 Castaway (PSP) with a nod to Harvest Moon Innocent Life (PSP) I bought the Sims Castaway as an impulse buy while at a big box store on my way to Canada for a week. It was on sale for $20 and I thought a new game would help pass boredom. There was literally no other game on the rack that was interesting, so I grabbed this title, my first intro to the Sims series. I had no idea what to expect. I was skeptical at first, but when I started playing it, I was hooked. I loved the scavenging aspect, the way you have to go around and pick different fruits and vegetables, how you need to gather your resources, build a house, repair it after it rains, exploring different areas, cook meals, etc. I have logged countless hours with my characters and even experienced sadness and loss when a character died and regret when my character did something mean to another. What I really like about the game is how your goals are so basic and also how you don’t shoot anyone. The jungle sounds are also very, very nice. They reminded me of my years in Southeast Asia. I also liked the harvesting aspect, whether it is fruit or beachcombing what the sea gives up. In the same vein I loved the game Innocent Life Harvest Moon. All the farming and harvesting and roaming around in the forests was so fascinating to me. I loved the slow pace, the wonderful atmospherics and the back to basics goals. Yeah, the storyline in Harvest Moon Innocent Life is hokey, but who cares. The game is relaxing and fun. The PSP version of Castaway has some of those elements, and then some, like chopping wood so you can use it later to build things, and that’s why I am hooked on this game, months after first buying it. It’s Zen-like simplicity is a wonderful relaxing thing after a long day at work. For the PC, the Castaway Stories version is all about socializing. Missing are many of the charms of the PSP version, picking fruit, gathering resources, jungle sounds. You also are supposed to make yourself at home as much as possible with jukeboxes and wind generators. You can also never be alone. There are always other sims around. The graphics are better, and the game itself is as addictive as the handheld version. But there is something very different about the PC version when compared to the PSP version. In fact, as much fun as I have had playing the PC version, all those long hours of escapism, I wish it was the PSP version that was expanded for the PC. In fact, it would be nice to do a reverse port of the PSP version onto the PC. I have to clear up space on my computer hard drive and it is the Castaway Stories game that will give me the most room. I’ll miss the game. I don’t play it every night like I was doing when I first got into it. Then that is the way it always is with games. But the PSP version is still loaded on my device. I still pick it up for some escapism every now and then. I actually just picked it up after about three or four weeks of not playing and discovered three new areas that I never explored before, and have begun cooking with four different ingredients. And this after I thought I tapped out all that was new and exciting in the game. My hope is that a new version or a new game that brings back the fun wholesome aspects of the PSP version will make it to store shelves. Maybe something like exploring or surviving in the North Woods, or something like a early settler version or Viking or Middle Ages version. In fact, it can be adapted to many geographic locations, which is a nice thing. Same game engine, different landscapes and props. More escapism for me on these cold winter nights. . . . Further Video Game Development Potential: Okay, here is a twist on the game that I think would be fantastic. I hope a game developer can take this and run with it. How about learning a language while playing? How about having to interact with other characters or objects and at the same time learning the names in another language? It would make learning a language feel immersive and fun. You would play and not even realize you were learning a new language. A fun and immersive way to learn Chinese or Spanish or Swedish or Thai. Think about it. Imagine learning Khmer while wandering around the temple complexes of Angkor Wat, while you are on the subway or waiting at the airport or doing laundry. These devices and games are fun, but they have so much untapped potential. Tomb Raider Anniversary Game developers, please don't make games that have boss levels that are so insanely difficult that it halts game play. I like many others am stuck on the 2 centaurs. I just can't make it past this level. It is a shame too, because it was one of my favorite games to play. I loved the environments. Exploring all those places was so much fun. But since I can't get past that level, even with help from a walkthrough, then I had to stop playing. It was not fun anymore. And I probably won't by the next one, since I couldn't make it past the halfway point on this one... Homestead Simulation I want someone to develop: I have been waiting for an ideal specific simulation game to be made for a long time, ever since I had the pleasure of playing Innocent Life Harvest Moon on my PSP. My ideal game is a simple farming or homesteading simulation that imbues realism on a scale rarely seen in a video game. I think I will be waiting forever, and it is a shame because not all video game players want to play games where you kill people or deal with a lot of flashy gizmos and magic powers. Some of us would like something different, something simple, something that let's us experience living in an age gone by in the way things really used to be. I have been thinking about some of my favorite video games and why they are my favorites. For instance, Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell series is a favorite for it’s high drama, immersive environments and moments of blood pumping action. The old flight sim Apache Havoc and Comanche Hokum also had those elements but took me to the skies and let me feel some of what it is like to fly. It was also based in reality, with the game not having any weird game play elements or weapons. Instead you had to contend with weather and wind like any other adversary in order to keep the airframe in the sky. The new sim DCS Black Shark promises to offer the same with realism amped to the nth degree. You are basically going to have to learn how to fly really well and know what all those hundreds of buttons and controls in the cockpit do. I can’t wait for that game. My latest favorite game is The Sims 2 Castaway for the PSP and the PC. I previously wrote about how I prefer the PSP version of the game over the PC version because the PSP version feels more immersive and less focused on interacting with other characters. Interaction can be a good thing: I experienced acute feelings of loss and regret and sadness based on the actions of my characters in certain situations in the game. But my personality doesn’t tend to seek out interaction so that element is a bit of a turn off for me. I instead love the elements of gathering supplies, building and exploring in a beautiful environment where the sounds alone can make you feel as if you are transported there. I also want to mention the game Harvest Moon innocent Life. I didn’t know what to make of this game when I bought it, but after playing it, I was hooked on the slow pace and relaxing style of play. Who would have thought that farming crops and exploring the countryside for mushrooms and fruits would be so relaxing and tranquil? And to have seasons in the game! Fantastic! Another mention is Guild 2 Venice, which I didn't know what to make of in the beginning, but quickly got hooked on. Hooked until it became obvious it was too buggy to play. The developer really screwed up big time on that game, but the game play itself was nice. So what I want to ask video game developers is to create a game, a life simulation game that combines different aspects of games like Harvest Moon, Guild 2 and the Sims Castaway to make an immersive realistic real world environment where you are a homesteader or farmer. Develop the tasks so that when you want to do something, you need to plan out the details, pick the correct tools, trek out from the barn to your fields to clear the ground. But before you clear the fields, you have to cut down the tress and decide which ones to build with, which ones to use for firewood and which ones to sell for income. And before that you have to actually build your barn. Make each chore almost as laborious and authentic as the real task. Make it so that you can only carry so many things and the weights of things tire you out in different rates depending on your physical health. Make it so that logical steps are required. Like you can’t build a barn unless you have felled a certain number of trees of a certain species and size, and you have hewn them into usable wood or paid a sawyer for that task. Maybe some people thing that level of realism will be tedious, but I think it teaches logic, creativity and how to deal with what you have. Create immersive environments, maybe even based on real world lattitude and longitude coordinates, downloaded weather forecasts and season data, solar information and soil types. Allow users to download topographial maps that the game converts to playable areas. Imagine visiting a real place and thinking about how a homesteader would set up a farm there, then downloading the topology from GPS data and having the computer convert it to a forested tract of land for you to build on. You search the map, maybe roam the land, pick your spot and start chopping down trees for your camp. That's how it starts. And here is the kicker: make the game as realistic as possible: interactive with all trees and boulders and streams and whatever. And make it so that it is realistic to different time periods and different cultures. For instance, a homesteader in the late 1700’s in New England is going to have a different experience than in the late 1800s in the wild west, or in the 1950’s in Canada. Or a farmer in Scandinavia will have it differently than on a tropical island in Asia or in the Caribbean. I know this game will not be for everyone, but there are a lot of people out here who would find it incredibly fun to be a homesteader in colonial times. Or get lost in a world of northern forests. Or go deeper into tropical island survival than the fun social Sims Castaway titles. Or designing and building a log cabin on a small patch of land by a lake and whiling away hours fishing and designing their barn or the planting schedule of next years crops. Taking that last bit further, develop a mobile application for PDAs and smart phones that lets people play some parts of the game while on the go. Maybe ordering from the game’s seed catalog or tool catalog or building plans blueprints would be a fun way to while away the subway commute to and from work every day. Or how about a simple SketchUp tie-in where you can design and make things in SketchUp and import them into your game. Ever thought about how that dream cabin would look when you are walking around in it? Why not live in it virtually. To add an educational slant to the game, add history lessons as a sort of a living encyclopedia of history, farming, building trades or the like. Or learn a new language by having the names of everything be in another language and having to interact with locals in that new language. Have specialty modules for skills and trades like trapping or wine producing on your farm or construction for hire, where you can be hired out to build a barn on someone’s land. In real life you might pay someone to come and cut some of your trees for firewood, or you might make your living going around to people’s land cutting that firewood. The options should be there to explore both sides of a trade.
As for the environment, make it as immersive as possible, with photorealism where possible. Integrate real atmospheric sounds. Where the Sims Castaway shines is in its sounds. Hearing the sounds of the ocean or the jungle makes you feel like you are there. And that is a huge draw to this tenement apartment dweller in NYC. I never got interested in games like WOW because I am not that interested in casting spells or fighting monsters, or fighting in general. And I never had the opportunity to get involved in Second Life. Please developers, make this game stand-alone and network-able. Don’t force me to go on-line, but use it to add to some experiences. But I see the potential to develop large on-line communities and followers, people who spend large amounts of time living in the world of the game. I believe that there is a huge untapped market for other kinds of simulation games, such as this homesteading game, where people who may have been turned off or never hooked on games like WOW or SL would be interested. Anyone else think this kind of simulation game would be cool? [ Stavros1000 | Waterjets | Design | Otaku | Media | Home ] Send comments to me at stavros1000@pacific.net.sg This page last updated on 28 June 2009 All material on this page and in this site are Copyright © 2002-2009 Stavros1000, except where noted. All rights reserved.
Use sound and environmental effects like snow cover and wind and humidity to affect how the characters can live or work or interact with the environments. For instance, in the cold winter months, the characters will have to spend more time felling trees or working on building projects or indoor projects. They will also have to start planning for warmer months lie what seeds to purchase, where to plant, how much to plant, where the water will come from, etc.