Hi there! You are currently browsing as a guest. Why not create an account? Then you get less ads, can thank creators, post feedback, keep a list of your favourites, and more!
Lab Assistant
#51 Old 31st May 2014 at 1:03 PM
Quote: Originally posted by JackieSmith
The points system was pretty stupid and it hardly affected a sim's behavior.


I disagree. Upon closer inspection the point system seems to be loosely based on the Big Five personality traits: Shy/Outgoing (extraversion), Grouchy/Nice (agreeableness), Serious/Playful (conscientiousness), Sloppy/Neat (neuroticism), Lazy/Active (openness to expierence). In TS3, you can only give a sim five 'tags' (I refuse to call them traits since 'likes the cold' and 'great kisser' are hardly traits) when the previous games had the point system (a lot like sliders) and interests. You may feel like they hardly affected your sims' behaviour, but the theory was far more in depth than the one that inspired the trait system. In TS3, sims were a lot like flat-pack furniture: uninspired, mass produced and with the occasional screw missing.

↖ the one emotion TS4 better have
Advertisement
Forum Resident
#52 Old 31st May 2014 at 3:08 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Original_Sim
The Sims 2 sims didn't "lack" personality.

Having a huge selection of creatively worded "traits" means jack if the execution is poor. The Sims 3 just gives the player an illusion that they're creating well-rounded characters when they're really just picking different variations of the same personality trait (e.g. mean-spirited and Evil are not different enough from each other).


I never said that the Sims 2 sims did lack personality.

As I said the Sims 3 sims lacked personality. I think traits are quite a good thing though if they are used properly and a combination of personality points, zodiac signs and traits would be a good mixture.
Scholar
#53 Old 31st May 2014 at 4:20 PM
Actually, now that they are mentioned, I do have to say it bothered me a bit that the point system automatically made their Zodiac. I found that dumb, not every outgoing person is a Leo, nor is every active person a Scorpio. I dunno about Cancers like me, I seemed to get that when I made "balanced" Sims, but I can tell you that not all Cancers are balanced. If a point system, I'd like one that lets me put in my points and then simply pick my Zodiac with no influence in any way on the points or vice versa.

C-A
Alchemist
Original Poster
#54 Old 31st May 2014 at 4:22 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Mr_Valentine90
I never said that the Sims 2 sims did lack personality.

As I said the Sims 3 sims lacked personality. I think traits are quite a good thing though if they are used properly and a combination of personality points, zodiac signs and traits would be a good mixture.

You're absolutely right. I stand corrected on that one.
Field Researcher
#55 Old 31st May 2014 at 4:36 PM
Quote: Originally posted by summerstruck
I disagree. Upon closer inspection the point system seems to be loosely based on the Big Five personality traits: Shy/Outgoing (extraversion), Grouchy/Nice (agreeableness), Serious/Playful (conscientiousness), Sloppy/Neat (neuroticism), Lazy/Active (openness to expierence). In TS3, you can only give a sim five 'tags' (I refuse to call them traits since 'likes the cold' and 'great kisser' are hardly traits) when the previous games had the point system (a lot like sliders) and interests. You may feel like they hardly affected your sims' behaviour, but the theory was far more in depth than the one that inspired the trait system. In TS3, sims were a lot like flat-pack furniture: uninspired, mass produced and with the occasional screw missing.


Yeah well "theory" doesn't really interest me.

Look, let's agree to disagree that both systems are hardly perfect, or even good for that matter. But what I know at the end of the day is that I'd rather at least have the illusion that each of my sims have unique personalities, and with the Sims 2 personality levels that's not really possible.
Alchemist
Original Poster
#56 Old 31st May 2014 at 5:02 PM
Quote: Originally posted by JackieSmith
Yeah well "theory" doesn't really interest me.

Look, let's agree to disagree that both systems are hardly perfect, or even good for that matter. But what I know at the end of the day is that I'd rather at least have the illusion that each of my sims have unique personalities, and with the Sims 2 personality levels that's not really possible.

Her theory is based on psychology, which makes sense since this is a life simulation game. It doesn't matter whether it interests you or not.

What is the Sims 3 trait system based on? Broscience?
Field Researcher
#57 Old 31st May 2014 at 5:12 PM
It would be nice if the points actually affected the degree in which the personality trait is expressed (8/10 "niceness" would not be as strong as 10/10 "niceness") but that's not how TS2 worked. I still don't think this argument should be about points vs traits; it really should be "do you like how personality is expressed in TS2 or TS3 better?" because the points system is irrelevant if the 10 points are divided into only 3 categories (left, right, neither, which is essentially the same thing as choosing between conflicting traits in TS3) :X I like the larger variety of personalities in TS3 but the smaller variety of personalities in TS2 were implemented better. I do feel like TS3 sims are more unique from each other simply because there are so many more options, even if some traits are useless or not implemented as well as I'd like. Whatever the system is for TS4, I hope it is an improvement over TS3. Unless they are going to implement something where it actually scales based on how many points you have, then implementing a points system like TS2 is useless, all it would do is limit the amount of different personalities rather than improve personalities. Might as well keep with something like traits and just improve the traits to be better than in TS3 if it wont scale based on degree.
Field Researcher
#58 Old 31st May 2014 at 8:53 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Original_Sim
Her theory is based on psychology, which makes sense since this is a life simulation game. It doesn't matter whether it interests you or not.


Psychology or not what f***ing good is it if it doesn't work in practice ._. Christ.

Quote: Originally posted by Original_Sim
What is the Sims 3 trait system based on? Broscience?


Well clearly not on fanboy opinion, thank God.
Forum Resident
#59 Old 31st May 2014 at 11:54 PM
I'm going to admit up front that I'm not exactly picking a side in this post, just kind of talking my way through some ideas, so please bear with me.

Many people seem to agree that a lot of the "traits" from TS3 weren't really personality traits, just... details? Quirks? Preferences? Whatever you want to call them. The ones that really strike me as personality traits (like Shy, Friendly, or Neat, to name a few) are really just a different presentation of the TS2 personalities.

So let's say we had the TS2 points system for those 5 personality aspects, and let's say we gave them preferences (likes AND dislikes) to capture all the TS3 stuff that wouldn't fit into that framework, such as Likes the Cold, Dislikes Children, or even Bookworm. Is there anything left from TS3 that wouldn't be taken care of?

Well, I think the Genius and Absent-Minded traits might be good candidates to create an intelligence scale in addition to the 5 scales that TS2 presented, but what do to about something like Loner? It's not really the same thing as Shy, but in the TS2 method, I'm not sure they could come out as distinct. Ditto for Couch Potato and Clumsy; they're not both captured by the Active<-->Lazy scale, are they?

I'm also thinking that stuff like Insane, Brooding, and Childish don't fit well into either a personality scale or a "preferences" list. Hm.

Thoughts, everyone?
Instructor
#60 Old 1st Jun 2014 at 3:03 AM
Personally, I like the 'traits' system much more but I'd love to see the two systems combined where you can select just how 'evil' you want someone or how neat they should be. That would be fantastic.
Scholar
#61 Old 1st Jun 2014 at 3:47 AM
The problem with traits was that many traits were interests, and that the age limiting for some traits sometimes made little sense ("Born" Salesman and Natural "Born" Performer are not birth traits, while Couch Potato and Loves the Outdoors are). Some trait conflicts also weren't realistic. We couldn't have a lazy technophobe, for example, because the Couch Potato trait that is used to represent lazier Sims comes with a love of TV and therefore a love of technology.

A hybrid system would be best. At birth, all we get are the personality points (and traits that represent natural talents if you're lucky). The personality point system should be more granular - for example, a ten neatness Sim would complain about unmade beds, while a seven neatness Sim would not mind (but would still enjoy cleaning the house more than less neat Sims).

Personality points should interact. For example, low active and playful scores would represent someone who would enjoy a desk job, while low active and high playful scores would represent someone who flat-out hates work.

But if we must have a purely trait-based system, the least we can do is to have more good and bad moodlets from things (and the AI encouraging or discouraging the Sim to do these things). For example, Snobs and Natural Chefs could get a bad moodlet from eating poorly-prepared food.

1/8/2016: New avatar! Pre-censored for EA's approval.
3/19/2015: Teens are too close to YAs. EA needs to either shorten the teens, or add preteens and make YAs look older.
Lab Assistant
#62 Old 1st Jun 2014 at 8:22 AM
I'll stick by the point system as the better system (even if it wasn't executed to its full potential) but I do like the idea of combining the two. On the one hand the points, to define the underlying character or base personality, whatever you want to call it, and the trait system to highlight certain aspects of that personality. So you might have:

Neuroticism (how well your sims cope with stress and emotions), Extraversion, Conscientiousness (do they prefer order or chaos?), Openness to Experience (couch-potato vs. adventurer but also related to (cultural) intelligence) and Agreeableness.

Now say your sim has high neuroticism but also a high conscientiousness, when faced with a messy house, this sim will probably get stressed out and try to tidy up. But say this sim is at the house of an acquaintance, and the place is absolutely filthy; a sim with low extraversion might not feel comfortable complaining, so they keep their emotions bottled up, try their best to find a spot on the sofa that doesn't stick and wait it out. A sim who is more extroverted might comment on the mess to ease his tension a bit and maybe motivate the host to clean up.

All those variables would probably be hard to implement with the ten points per trait, but if reduced to a scale of five or even three, you could get similar situations. The current trait system could enhance this one with preferences of activities (athletic/bookworm/computer whiz etc.), natural abilities (virtuoso/genius/green thumbs etc.) and lifestyle choices (workaholic/family orientated/afraid of commitment etc). Add an aspiration to that and you could end up with a mean-spirited, shy, cultured sim, who suffers from rage blackouts when his books aren't alphabetized, who has an affinity for playing the guitar and leaving sims at the altar, but all he ever really wanted was for the world to love him.

Oh, and he loves waffles.

↖ the one emotion TS4 better have
Forum Resident
#63 Old 1st Jun 2014 at 3:33 PM Last edited by parrot999 : 1st Jun 2014 at 3:46 PM.
This is a tough question... I think that both have their pros and cons... I like the points system because traits are variable... Some people are more kind than others, others are more outgoing than others... It isn't black and white, so having those variables adds a bit of depth...

However, the traits system has the advantage of not being stuck to the same five spectrums for everyone, and adding a lot more personality quirks when you pick the right traits...

Ideally, I'd like to see the two combined. You select a trait spectrum, like "luckiness", or "tech literacy" and then allocate points to the traits spectrums you've selected to decide if the person is, for example, very lucky, lucky, kinda lucky, kinda unlucky, etc...

Maybe have the five base personality spectrums on top of that for even more variety...
Test Subject
#64 Old 3rd Jun 2014 at 5:15 PM
I think the trait system had more potential, but was dragged down by there being too many boring or pointless traits.

A mix with the basic personality being set out with points and then traits adding details could be good
Alchemist
Original Poster
#65 Old 3rd Jun 2014 at 5:16 PM
They should separate "likes" and "dislikes" from traits. I like guys, but "gay" is not a personality trait of mine.
Scholar
#66 Old 3rd Jun 2014 at 7:02 PM
I like both trails and personality system. The personality point system was very dynamic for your sims. The trait system was a pretty neat concept too. On the other hand, some of the traits were meaningless like heavy/light sleeper and never nude. While the Personality system is excellent, it felt into black or white in a limited zodiac territory without choosing your own zodiac in the Sims 3. I just wish that it could be combined into one system in addition they should bring back Sims turn ons,turn offs and topic interests. This is what made most Sims unique.
Page 3 of 3
Back to top