Note: This is part III of my write-up of EA Sims Bloggers Day. You can read Part I and Part II here.

We all love animals, right? Sure we do. Witness the success of all the various animal games out there. Neopets. Catz and Dogz. Nintendogs. Tamagotchis. Pokemon. If it’s cute and furry, then we want it. End of story.

So, the Sim franchise is the best selling franchise that EA have. It’s not that surprising. In the Sim world, you’re God. You can build - and you can destroy. That’s something that appears in every Sim game, from Sim City (unleash Godzilla, anyone?) to The Sims (I know you set one of your Sims on fire. Don’t lie to me.)

So what happens when you mix the Sims and animals together? You get SimAnimals, an upcoming EA game for the wii and DS that enables you to explore “the backyard and beyond”. Basically, you get given a plot of land and you’re supposed to get animals to move in and make friends with you. You manage to befriend the wildlife by treating them nicely - giving them food, shelter, water and all the rest of it, until they trust you. You can then use this trust to make them become friends with each other, leading to the unlikely scenerio of wolf cubs buddying up with squirrels. Eventually you get given more plots of land, each yours to look after.
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Note: This is part II of my write-up of EA Sims Bloggers Day. You can read Part I here.

If you’ve played the original MySims, you will know the characters already. Family-friendly, cute voiced, and stylised - the MySims took the super popular Sims franchise and gave it a Nintendo spin.

MySims Kingdom takes the core gameplay from MySims - that of building things - and uses it within an RPG-styled storyline. Unlike the original game, you follow a series of quests, meeting up with many recognisable faces and unlocking various new lands as you go. These lands are themed - one is a wild west frontier, another is a mystical fantasy land. Tim LeTourneau, the Executive Producer, compared the design to that of Disneyland.
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EA is the ‘big guy’ when it comes to game development. They have a string of successful franchises across a range of platforms and genres, and I don’t just mean success in terms of dollar bills - though they have plenty of that. Many of their franchises are routinely held up as ‘great games’ - most notably for me is SimCity and Command & Conquer. I’ve played most incarnations of these two series, and I love them.

So I was delighted to receive an invitation to EA Redwood Shores, CA to attend a Sims Bloggers Day. I would get to see several upcoming Sims game, talk with some designers, meet some other bloggers, and see just what’s it like at the HQ for the biggest name in gaming. I’d also get to spend 22 hours sitting in a plane, but such is the lot of the dedicated blogger.

First impressions count for a lot, and EA makes a good one. The building is huge, modern, and the lobby decorated with arcade machines, and a giant TV screen. There are gardens, a labyrinth, a nearby lagoon, an on site gym, a creche complete with playground, big lounges, and (of course) game rooms. No expense has been spared, which is perhaps not surprising given the furor that arose in 2004 over the work-life balance of EA employees. The developers may still have to work long hours, but at least they can see their children and get some exercise. Certainly none of the people we spoke to seemed to be unhappy, and the passion for the games they were creating came through in their presentations.

Ah yes. The games. As a Sims day, all the games were shown were part of the Sims franchise, but there was quite a wide variety in what we saw. One developer compared the MySims characters to the muppets - able to be plunged into any storyline or genre, whilst still retaining their muppetness (or Simness).

I’ll start at the beginning, with the soon-to-be-released SimCity Creator. In my next few posts I’ll move on to MySims Kingdom, SimAnimals and finish up with MySims PC. Finally I’m going to talk a bit about what the Sims franchise represents for gamers, and explore EA’s corporate culture a bit further. So stay tuned - we’ve got a lot to talk about.
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Ah Smash Brothers, the pinnacle of success every nintendo character aspires to. Where the best of the best can meet, greet, and beat the ever-loving snot out of each other. I love the series so much because it’s such a free-form way to play all my favorite characters. And most of them get serious upgrades in terms of the graphic quality I’m used to seeing them in. I also love it because the designers don’t monopolize the success of the series. They actually approached fans about which characters we would want in brawl and listened to other game directors who wanted a spotlight on their characters. Thus, Sonic and Solid Snake were born…to the world of smash brothers.

Speculation about the game abounded until it was released on the 31st in Japan. Since then I’ve been trying to get my grubby little hands on all the information and videos I can. I’m one of those people who wants to know everything about it, including what characters will be playable, even if I can’t yet play the game. Some of their character choices are, well, unfortunate, but others make me giddy in anticipation of being able to play them for myself.

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