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Gameplay and World Building


Playability and Performance[]

Getting Around[]

Road Layout[]

Pace & Flow[]

The flow of time from one lot to another is important to measure, and can convey part of a creator's story, for example, the Highway Diner in Riverblossom Hills is a long way out of town and it is very inconvenient for Sims who live in town to work there. This is a deliberate feature of the world, forcing players to either suffer inconvenience, or move out close to the diner where, unfortunately, they have a long way to travel to enjoy the more bustling town life. It forces a somewhat realistic gameplay choice onto players: town or country? EA has done a semi-similar thing by placing Juan Darer and the Curious family quite a way out of Twinbrook.

Creating a lot of travel time for Sims raises another important question though, from a gameplay perspective: What is it like to travel that distance. Creators need to get down into their world and do that journey by car or taxi, and think about how to make it interesting and provocative. What parts of town does it lead through? Industrial? Rural? Suburban? Whatever the choice, the roading and layout of a world should make some sense, and some carefully placed decorative items or lots can make all the difference to a boring drive. Decorating roadsides or empty landscape is an opportunity to tell players more about the world they are playing their game in.

Of course, some creators have deliberately limited travel options in their worlds for gameplay and thematic purposes, as with auntielynds and company's Castle Keep: A Medieval Fiefdom which keeps roading to a minimum and forces Sims to walk between most nearby lots. Bridgeport, in The Sims 3: Late Night offers up the excellent subway system too, which allows Sims to travel great distances very quickly. This is an excellent addition for large worlds, especially urban or space-age ones (creators just need to disguise the subways for the latter).

Lot Placement[]

Getting Routing Right[]

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