It wouldn't really make sense to me to have Pets in the basegame, maybe weather but not pets.

It would be interesting,however, if they did throw us a curveball and released pets or weather as the very first expansion pack.

It would be a good first expansion yes, especially weather. The two things can easily be combined into one farm expansion though.

I'd be happy as long as the first expansion really makes the game a lot more fun and feel more complete right away. With sims 3 it took several expansions before it gained momentum.
Something that improves every day life further instead of adding very easy adventures without any sense of danger or mystery.

I don't care about weather per se, but since Seasons came out, I liked to set up life stages length, jobs and such so that I have "years" and anniversaries, even if it was mostly LARPing. I knew that they'll never add to the base game something that can be sold as an expansion later, still I'm a bit sad about it.

I may be in the minority but I'm someone who doesn't play with pets. I love my two dogs, I love animals in the real world, but I don't want them in my game so I'd prefer they end up in an EP that I can just ignore. This all stems from some deep primal annoyance I had with Unleashed for the original Sims. That turned me off animals in my game forever.

Weather, OTOH, I think should go in the base game. Seasons was my favorite EP for Sims 2 because it added sooooo much - the gardening, the juices, the garden club, the wishing well, fishing, seasonal bonuses (increased social gains in summer, increased work/school gains in fall, etc.), the first new group of careers since the base game, plantsims, our first brand-new base hood since the base game (downtown and bluewater were subhoods) and of course awesome weather. And yet I didn't really like Seasons for 3. It took me a while to figure out why. And the reason was because pretty much the only new thing about it was the weather. Gardening and fishing were in the base game and the weather in Seasons actually killed gardening for me without a greenhouse. There were no juices, no seasonal bonuses, no new jobs, no new hood. Instead we got aliens - which were pretty cool but did not belong in a Seasons EP - and I think online dating (whoop-dee-doo!) and maybe the attraction system. I have no idea which EP that came from, but it doesn't matter because it sucks ass in any case. Oh and we got seasonal festivals, which I find pretty boring.

So apart from the WTF inclusion of aliens and some nice new objects that were too large to fit on a home lot (and were from the original Sims or Sims2 anyway) all we got was weather. And if EA is going to be so skimpy about their 'Seasons' pack for Sims4, I say put the damn weather in the base game. With gardening. And a functioning greenhouse.

Il be honest here. I actually don't mind seasons or pets not being in the base game. Even though I was one of those ridiculous fans when it came to TS3 seasons, mainly because The Sims 2 seasons was my favorite expansion pack. TS3 seasons was extremely disappointing for me. I find myself turning the seasons off rather then playing with them. It was personally a waste of 40 dollars just to get WEATHER. Sure they added other things like the crappy attraction system which again I turned off with mods because it was poorly implemented. They also added different party options which in a way I did like but then again the sims take so ******* long to do something that by the time they served the food for the feast party it was OVER so it was pretty pointless. Sims 2 seasons had greenhouses which I personally used often. Sims 3 had a greenhouse, yes a greenhouse on their store which costs 20-30 dollars more and came riddled with glitches. but at the end of the day both of these things CAN be in the base game. You would just have limited content instead of a fully fledged expansion pack and im sure the last thing EA wants to think about right now is how simmers are going to be able to make a pet with the new CAS tool.

When you think of it, sims expansions are quite lacking in content when you look at what some other games have done with expansions. They could have some more content to them considering that they are more expensive than a normal expansion for other games.

The sims model of expansions/extra content has become depressing for me as a customer, especially with the addition of the store. It seems designed to screw more and more money out of the customer. Thinking about it, I can see, for myself, that this is potentially the end of the Sims and me. I do not want to buy a skeleton game where I have to spend more and more money to build it up into a 'complete' playable game. There are plenty of other games I play and all of those are complete in themselves. Where there is extra dlc or expansions, they are properly 'extra' - extending the experience of playing the game with new storylines. Optional extras. Buying a greenhouse from the store for $20-30 - well, you can fuck right off EA.

Very much true.

Best thing that can happen to the sims series at this point is some serious competition. A game that actually gives content appropriate to the money spend on it, and forces EA to actually put effort in the sims so they won't lose their customers to the competition.

While I see where people might feel ripped off or feel like Pets and Seasons are basic components of the game, I'm not too upset about it. Sure, it would be nice to have had it already included and not have to keep spending more and more money later on for these add ons. But, people will buy them and people want them, so it's going to be how it happens. I might not buy them, who knows. Seasons messes up my computer sometimes anyways, and I've often had to turn off winter so my game doesn't crash.

As long as we get a good, complete, stable game, I'm fine (:

I'd gues of those three things, good is the most realistic expectation.

Stable on release, sure.. but will they keep it stable once ten expansions have been added? and complete... well they certainly wont stop gouging us with the sims store, not as long as they are making a huge profit on that.
Not as long as people just keep bending over and take it.

Can we at least have rain?

I'm okay with not having weather and/or pets in the base game. Hell, I don't want pets ever, anyway! Weather will come in an EP (and so will Pets). That is the way it has been from the beginning. Why does everyone (well, almost everyone; a majority, anyway) expect something different?

Maybe because we bought those games at least twice in the past (three times with pets) and maybe we'd like to see something different instead of paying once more for the same old. Besides, just because they did it that way before doesn't mean they have to do it that way again. It's not sacred writ.

As long as people buy the base game, no matter how basic it is, EA will continue to put all the relevant and anticipated features in EPs. That's how they make money, and it's not going to change.

With luck they put those relevant and anticipated features in expansion packs and not overpriced DLC. The expansion packs are overpriced as well by the way, while offering less content than expansion packs of other games which are cheaper.

If EA wants my money then this is what I need to see on release.

They need to have a beta testing of the base game to make sure a lot of the bugs are fixed before launch.
(What I hate with Sims 3 is the stuck Sim bug that EA refuses to fix.)

I'm still on the fence about 4 and for me to buy Sims 4 on release these are what I would like to see.

1. No bugs like we had in Sims 3.
2. 4 seasons with rain and snow in base game. (All other option that came with Sims 2 and Sims 3 Seasons can be put in or combine with other EP's.)
3. Rabbit holes for main careers and schools only. Restaurant and stores need to be like it was in Sims 2.
4. In-game world editor.
5. Bring back the Wants, Fears, and Memories UI we had in TS2 with some of TS3 thrown in.
6. Sims 2 style genetics.

When Pets EP comes out I want to be able to disable the animals from coming onto the lots I am playing. Wild animals need to stay in the wild areas of the hoods and not come into town. (If I want to see the animals then I can send my Sims out to the wild areas.)

I think that the base game should include rain and lightning, as usually the base game is very tame and it kind of adds some spice to the play. I don't think that it needs the whole Seasons expansion but an occasional lightning strike and some rain to put it out would be fun. Small pets like you get with Collection Helper could come out when it does if it does. I found it odd that you could have the perfect Aquarium and not collect all the little pets. It would raise interest in the rest of the Pets package if it finally added more flexibility to the home zoo Besides there is chickens and cows not so Pets/Farm could be combined. Another thing that would be fun with base game is a robotic dog, or cat that would hype for the Ambition type EP. Breaks so it helps build handy but is somewhat social for Bonehilda to dote on BTW I wanted to rave about the Supernatural EP. I love, love love it, It is so much more fun than Sims 2 that I cant stop playing it. It has all the fun stuff and none of the secret to hard to enable or find stuff. I would be much happier if Vampires came out with that one too so they feel much less like a town takeover.

look in my opinion its basic business and people might not want it so people can choose if they want to get it.

I'm fine with no pets because, IMHO, there are at least some players who don't like to play with pets and might not appreciate that feature being forced upon them. I have yet to find any person who wouldn't want to have seasons (or at least weather) in the base game.

Yeah, personally, I like the *idea* of pets in the sims, but I always end up getting annoyed with them before too long. Routing issues, glitches, queue interruptions, holes in my yard... ugh. Unless I'm playing a household that is focused on a pet owner and their animals, I don't really play with the pets all that much. Even when I make that choice, all the neighbors like to get pets through story progression and bog down the neighborhood (if I don't stop them, which I do!). I can see why the option to *not* have pets installed would be better.

Weather, though.. it seems ridiculous to not at least have the occasional rain shower or cloudy day. It's such a basic and integral part of the environment that leaving it out seems as silly as excluding nighttime, bodies of water, or stands of trees.

Of course they won't; it would be more profitable to include them in EPs. I heard somewhere that weather was going to be a part of TS2 base game but there was a coding error or something and it had to be eliminated at the last minute.

Pets I can live without, If they only existed as "pets" I would give it a yes, but the whole over-populations of horses, dogs and cats annoy me ... lol, As for seasons .. I Cannot live without it!, 3 days of spring, summer, autumn and the rest winter = awesome!

My feelings on the topic: ={ I really want weather.

Why?! I think we deserve it....right?!

They just want as much money as possible. With ten million exp packs for this that and the other thing. But still really!? I really love my sim fix. If I didn't I wouldn't put up with them