Playing Virtual God

The Sims in the San Francisco Chronicle ... "The Sims lets control freaks run characters' everyday lives."

San Francisco Chronicle

Playing Virtual God

The Sims lets control freaks run characters' everyday lives
Neva Chonin, Chronicle Staff Critic

You're having an affair with the handsome married guy down the block. While your husband is napping, you invite lover-boy over for a tryst. Hubby unexpectedly wakes up and joins the party. You slip away for two tiny minutes to freshen up, and when you return, Hubby and boyfriend are in each other's arms with Tchaikovsky's love theme from ``Romeo and Juliet'' blaring in accompaniment. A new daytime melodrama? No, a new video game. Correction: the most addictive video game to come along since Everquest turned thousands of Net heads into digital junkies. There are already a slew of Web sites honoring the Sims, and it only reached stores yesterday.

The Sims, a "domestic strategy" game from SimCity creator Will Wright is set to become one of the year's biggest hits, not by focusing on hyperfantasy but by simulating the vagaries of our own so-called lives. In the Sims, the player plays God over a neighborhood of jabbering little people, guiding them through their careers, setting up their families and circles of friends, instigating romances and generally making them as crazed or wholesome as he or she wishes. You can't change the world around the Sims -- the newspaper arrives every day and bills must be paid -- but you control how effectively the characters cope.

Sounds fun, sure. But sometimes playing God can bring out the worst in a player: In three games -- each individual household in the Sims neighborhood constitutes a game -- this reviewer toasted three family members in a grease fire, then evicted the surviving member and bulldozed the house; inspired a character's nervous breakdown; and had two kids taken away by child welfare authorities. Yes, responsible omnipotence takes practice. Fortu nately, in the Sims, there are many opportunities to get it right. Players can either choose existing Sims characters or create their own. Savvy gamers can even download images of their own family and friends to use as character "skins." Sims are assigned points in five categories (neat, outgoing, active, playful and nice -- 1 point for neat and you've created a slob, 10 a clean freak) to determine their personalities. The options are more varied than they sound, and in combination can create anything from an anti-social bachelor who works as a lab test subject to a family of eight ranging from schoolkids to astronauts and thieves. There are 10 career paths from which to choose. Daily life in Sims land is much like that in the real world. First characters have to deal with hassles such as bills and cleaning. Then, as they learn a few things and clamber up the career ladder, they can hire maids and gardeners to look after some of the mundane details while they devote themselves to buying more merchandise, adding onto the house (or buying a new one) and enjoying new friendships and relationships. These are all maneuvers the player decides for them, unless the "free will" toggle is used. But where's the fun in letting them make their own choices? The game has a point-and-click interface in which players click on a newspaper to find a job, click the refrigerator to grab a snack and so forth. Action is viewed from several zoomed-in perspectives.

There are a couple of technical downers. The game has 2-D, tile-based graphics that are functional but visually dull and encour age claustrophobia after 10 hours inside one household. Sadly, characters leave home only to go to work and can't go out and play. Friends come to them and are summoned by telephone. And as in the non-Sim world, nasty stuff can happen. Fires and fights break out. Thieves steal televisions. Wrong numbers wake up the household at 3 a.m. Spouses have affairs with other spouses. Kids go bad. Such is life. Some tips for a smoother game:

• Pay bills promptly, or those precious possessions will be repossessed.
• If the baby cries, feed it fast. Child welfare agencies repossess, too.
• The more material possessions Sims have, the happier they are. Blow the nest egg and buy the household a TV and a stereo. For a quick mood fix and a great way to make friends, splurge on a hot tub.
• Always flush the toilet. Plumbing clogs easily, and things get mighty ugly mighty fast.
• Be sure to provide Sims with fun things to do that complement their personalities. A quiet egghead will probably appreciate a well-stocked bookshelf more than a basketball hoop.
• There are no weekends in this game, but days off from work are fine as long as they don't happen two days in a row. A final word of caution: The power to control and shape the lives of virtual beings is a heady thing. When you find yourself inadvertently trying to click on your co-workers to make them take a bath, it's time to put aside the Sims for a while and take up something less habit-forming, like television.

This article appeared on page B - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle.