The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Do you ever get tired of being yourself? Do you just have days when you wish you could get out of your life and be somewhere else? We all do, and for the last few years it has been possible playing the video game called The Sims from EA. The Sims comes from a long line of computer games created by a single company. EA originally created games such as SimCity which allowed gamers to build the infrastructure of a city and watch as it grew under great management, or shrunk to become a ghost town if you were not a skilled builder. But in this game, you had no control over the people who lived in your city, it was all about building the city and letting people choose to move into it or not. The Sims changed all of that. With this game, it's all about people. In this game, you set up a character, give them a personality, a job, buy a house, and live their life. Interesting game, but what truly sent it on to become the number one selling PC game of all time is when The Sims went online. In December of 2002, EA began selling subscriptions for $9.99 U.S. a month to people interested in bringing their Sims onto the Internet where they could live and interact with other people from around the globe doing the same thing. In the first year, over 500,000 people purchased accounts and have taken their Sims online. Players are allowed to have three different characters under their control, but are allowed to only use one of them at a time. EA has created 10 different cities for the Sims to live in, and players can choose between one of the rapidly expanding urban areas, or one of the smaller villages, each having their own personality. Once set up in one of these places, your Sims need to find a job or set up a business catering to other players in order to earn money. With the money they have earned, new furniture can be bought for the house, you can go out to be entertained, go on a date, have a house party, etc. There are no limits. A quick search for The Sims on Google shows all sorts of activities going on in the different cities. Inventive characters have set up radio stations broadcasting throughout the cities, newspapers are available outlining some of the events at the clubs around the various towns as well as the main news stories. Even brothels can be found in a few of the cities where players can go to burn their hard earned virtual dollars which are called simoleans. Over the few years this game has been released, it has gotten hotter and hotter instead of fading out as most games do. EA has kept it hot by regularly releasing expansion packs enabling players to buy a pet, live like a movie star, go on dates, throw parties, or the latest expansion pack which allows characters to learn magic spells. This game has become a huge money maker for EA, a company known traditionally for its production of sports games. Now that the game has proven its popularity, EA is about to realize a further windfall from companies like McDonald's who are the first to have signed a contract to begin placing advertising in the Sims' different cities. Advertising in a virtual world for a real product. EA is also apparently close to striking deals with a few other companies so this experiment will be watched closely for its success or failure. ([email protected])
