The Sims: Online

Overview

The Sims online is a MMOG of the popular computer game The Sims that was released on December 17, 2002. The game allowed the users to play with other people, which was dissimilar from the original Sims. On March 2007 EA announced the game would be rebranded as EA Land. With this rebranding the game was now free of charge to play but the player had limited playability. Also the player was now allowed to create new custom content and buy properties. Prior to the rebranding The Sims Online was Pay-to-play. A year latter EA announced that they will be shutting down EA Land on August 1, 2008.

Gameplay

Starting the Game

The player creates an account in order to login to the game and is shown a login display and the game checks for updates when they begin the game. Then the player is shown a server select screen which the player can choose which server that they want to play on. After, the player chooses between three different of their created avatars who are Sims. If they don’t have any avatars on the game they can create one by clicking on one of the three vacant slots.

Avatar Select Screen

Avatar Creation

Avatar creation is very much like the Sim Creation screen from the Sims. The player can enter a bio of the sim and name. They can also choose their head, which can not be changed, and their clothing which can be changed. They also can choose the skin color and the gender. The personality points are not featured in this game.

Cities

There are thirteen cities in all in the game where the players reside. They are: Mount Fuji, Calvin's Creek, Interhogan, East Jerome, Fancy Fields, Test Center, Blazing Falls, Alphaville, Dan's Grove, Jolly Pines, Dragon's Cove, Betaville, EA-Land, and Test Center 3. Each city had there own populations, Alphaville and Blazing Falls were the most populated. Some cities even had there own particular rules. For example Dragon Cove was the “hardcore city”, the game’s objectives were much harder than the standard game.

City Selection

Skills and Employment/Money

Much like the original The Sims skills and employment are significant parts of the game. With more skills your avatar a can earn more money in a job and new interactions. Skill speed is the rate your avatar learns the skill and skill decay is when the skills start decaying. Unlike the sims skills go from 0 to 29.9.

Employment is different in the Sims Online, in this game you can actually follow your sims to there job. There are four official jobs: restaurant, robot factory, DJ, and dancing. These jobs don’t offer very large salaries; other alternatives to earn money are item shops and services.

Sim Life and Interaction

In the Sims Online the life of the sim is the same as the original The Sims. The Sims 6 needs are back, they are: hunger,

Skill Bulding

Closure

 After years of neglect, Luc Barthelet assembled a team to continue updates and development to the Sims Online. They later changed the name to EA Land, the player was now able to create custom content and buy properties which was similar to Second Life. Also the team announced that many changes were coming in the near future. Weeks later they announced that they would be closing down and that Maxis would be moving on to other projects.