The Sims 4: What the $!%# Do You Mean There's No Toddlers??

I haven't talked about The Sims 4 for months because honestly, there hasn't been much to talk about. The Sims Team has been repeating the same "highlights" for months: intuitive facial molding, quick building, and...emotions! With the arrival of E3, fans were certain this meant new news and were full of excitement.

I for one have been playing the game since 2000, the year it first came out, when I was 9 years old. Since then, I've bought every base game, expansion pack, and stuff pack on the day of its release to complete my collection. With all of the latest Sims 4 news, you'd think I'd be jumping up and down ready for September. Instead, every piece of the latest news has been about constant disappointments of what's not in the game or has been removed.

It all started with the custom design color wheel and patterns. I loved this aspect in The Sims 3 but when it was announced that it wouldn't be in The Sims 4, I made my peace with it. It wasn't the *most* important thing to have in the game and in all honesty, it would probably make Create-a-Sim less glitchy.

Next, it was announced that the public spaces will not be able to be edited. This is disappointing as while you can still have community lots and venues, the public spaces are supposedly where all the action occurs. I can't say I was ecstatic when they announced the loading screens between locations either, but again, I decided to believe the game will work better and faster than The Sims 3 for this reason.

Last year, EB World sent subscribers and email referencing the ability to create apartments in The Sims 4. As of June 14th, it was confirmed that apartments will not be in the base game either. Honestly, as much as I'd like apartments, I didn't expect them to be in the base game.

Two of the next announcements made me mad. Last year, The Sims Official Magazine announced the ability for sims to finally buy their clothes. During the latest trend however of nixing ideas, that one got nixed as well. The Sims team also announced the Woohoo skill last year. It sounded hilarious and awesome but alas, has also been removed.

All of these things have added up and dwindled my excitement for the new game. However, none of them compare to yesterday's news. And I'm not talking about the "no pools, no swimwear", which does suck because that's been in the game since the original.

I'm talking about no toddlers. Okay, I get it. In the original sims, toddlers didn't exist either...but that's why The Sims 2 came out. The life stages. Families could finally grow. You could raise your sim from a baby to a toddler, to a child, to a teenager, to an adult. As the most popular reason behind the game, this was of course carried over into The Sims 3. If anything, fans were hoping for more life stages, not less. As a game that's focused on its life-like gameplay, removing a life stage is a huge step back. By the cryptic SimGuru twitter comments, we can only assume they plan to add toddlers in during a future expansion pack just to get more money out of the fans.

"@SimGuruGraham: There's nothing preventing adding additional ages as the game evolves. CASt is a good example of a feature that is not technically feasible to add post launch."

I'd buy the expansion pack for other reasons but I will not buy it for something that should've been in the base game.

The Sims 3: Toddler

Maybe some fans out there don't care. I don't know. But a lot of the community is in an uproar. Some of my favorite gaming moments of the Sims are raising the adorable toddlers. Teaching them to walk, talk, and the adorable father-daughter cuddle photos that cover my Sim's living room wall. I love putting my toddler on the playground ride and my toddler refusing to get off. I love my sim holding her toddler in the water at the beach, while splashing and playing. I love when my toddler's older sibling sits on the ground for a game of peek-a-boo or a hug. And I love when my sim reads to her little toddler on the floor. The amount of cuteness and joy the toddlers bring to the game has actually been incredible. To remove such an important life stage is baffling.

The Sims 3: Toddler and Parent

I would consider myself a long standing fan of the Sims series. However, with this latest toddler news, I'm incredibly angry. This will probably be the first time in my life that I don't get the new game. It feels weird. This game has been a part of my life for so long. Buying it on the day of release has even been a tradition. But that's it. They've announced far too many disappointing things for the game and no toddlers takes the cake.

A tip for EA: Try announcing some good news, instead of just the same news, bad news, or saying "we can't discuss that yet". It might save a few fans...if there are any left.