I stopped by the EA booth today at E3 to check out the newest expansion for The Sims 3. This one is all about pets. This release is hardly shocking, considering The Sims 2 also had a pets expansion, though the presentation left me wondering why they waited so long after the release of The Sims 3 to introduce it. The EA representative at our presentation eagerly spoke about how Pets was the most requested expansion from fans.
It’s not a shock, of course, we all love pets, so why shouldn’t our virtual sims have some virtual pets to love as well? In this expansion, there are over 1,000 breeds of dogs and cats to choose from. In true Sims form, you have a huge range of control over how your pet looks: change his fur style, texture, and color (you can pick virtually any color; in our demo, we had a dog with bright blue spots on his face). You can change proportions, too; our dog had an unfortunately tiny head. It seemed our presenter was attempting to make the most hideous dog imaginable, so if you’re into creating ugly dogs, The Sims 3: Pets has all the tools you need. If you like cute things, like me, all those tools are there as well.
What’s different about this expansion is you can control your pets as though they are real sims. In Sims 2, you couldn’t do this. You had to attempt to control your pet through your sims, which, admittedly is much more like real-life. Your pets can grow from puppies and kittens to adults and then elderly pets. They can interact with other pets to form friendships and romantic relationships (where did you think puppies came from?) If you hate virtual people, you can now play The Sims 3 completely from the point-of-view of your favorite furry friend.
They highlighted a few other new additions. With the Xbox 360 version of the game, if you have a Kinect you can now control your Sims through voice commands. That’s right, if playing The Sims wasn’t enough like playing God for you already, you can now stand in front of your Xbox and proclaim “Sim, I command thee to eat mac-and-cheese!”
They also mentioned the game would be available for Nintendo 3DS, and that you’d be able to play the game completely from the point-of-view of your dog or cat. This sounds eerily similar to Nintendogs, which I already own, so I’m not sure I’ll be picking that version up.
There’s also a new “mystery” element to the game, which was mentioned briefly during our presentation. You’ll be able to solve mysteries using the help of your pets. Our presenter hardly talked about it, though, so I can’t tell you how exciting it’ll be. I can just make implications based on the fact that he… hardly mentioned it.
Oh, and, with the addition of pets to the game, they have also added a new Sims trait: a fur allergy. That should provide hours of fun for you Sim-torturing types out there.
The Sims 3: Pets will be released this fall for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Nintendo 3DS, and PC.
8 Comments
He talked about the mysteries more when I saw the demo. The ones I remember are searching for pirate treasure, and stopping the local cats’ evil schemes to take over the world. He said other games have appealed to the explorer types of gamers and the micromanaging types, and this mystery mode will appeal to the goal-oriented gamers. He’s got a point — I’ve never been able to play Sims for more than a few minutes at a time without getting bored, but I perked up a bit when he mentioned that mode.
The other thing he talked about was how the Sim pets can help their Sim owners. He showed us a story with “Tiger Dog” and his owner “Tiger Boy”. Tiger Boy was very lonely and hanging out in a bar all alone (how… pathetic?), so Tiger Dog comes in and charms a lady into coming over and talking to Tiger Boy. Voila, love!
Yeah, we saw Tiger Boy. He was… a grown man wearing tiger facepaint. So, that explains why he was in the bar alone. I believe the Tiger Dog was a special pet that was only available on the Xbox version.
Do you happen to know if the fur allergy causes things like sneezing/coughing/etc. or does it just create a negative moodlet? thank you 🙂
do you have to have sims3 for pc to play sims 3 pets