I got no love rocket this year, in game or out.

Look who's blogging!

So it was Valentine's Day today as I'm sure anyone that dared to venture out onto the streets had noticed when every restaurant was full and there was an unusually large amount of men carrying someone else's purse. Since I'm currently in a long-distance relationship, I got to celebrate the holiday with my best friend celibacy. For some reason, OG Priest went to spend the evening as the third wheel at his married brother's house, so with the apartment to myself, I decided what better way to devote my solo night than with a take-out container of Thai curry and a two-day free trial of the Sims 4.

Though I had claimed my 48-hours of free Sims 4 access a few weeks ago, with all the raiding and garrison dailies, I hadn't gotten around to playing it until today. I'm only a couple hours of playtime in so far, and despite all of the flaws that players have bitched about and that I also took into consideration when I decided not to buy the game at release, I'm still having a pretty fun time while its free. Just look at how beautiful my Simself turned out; she's an adequately-endowed and clearer-skinned version of me who can walk in heels and wouldn't stop working on her novel unless her house was on fire. The game even had my exact clothes and rather realistic Asian eyes as opposed to what they would look like if I were an anime character.

She even has the smirk I do in pictures because I think my smile looks weird.

This is literally my Mon-Wedn-Fri look.

What I'm really enjoying is the new emotions system, which affects the Sim's behavior and wants and also changes the Sim's character portrait into a caricatural display of how s/he's feeling. Check out my Simself in various emotional states below. "Energized" Avia looks like she's ready to grab a wrench and build a bridge just because she has the impetus, and believe it or not, "Flirty" Avia acquired that emotion by taking a steamy shower... She must have a really nice showerhead in that cheap starter-house. The third image is apparently what "Inspired" Sim Avia looks like though it's pretty much the face I have IRL when I'm trying to figure out what I'm ordering at a coffee shop. "Fine" is what the game calls a neutral emotion state, and I'd say it's pretty accurate since Sim Avia rolled out of bed looking rather attractive and non-murderous in the morning. Yet, I have never felt more connected to my Simself than when she woke up "Sad" on another morning and proceeded to "Cry It Out" under the covers. Seriously uncanny.

Well, now that I have my character set up and working an impossibly high-paying job to afford my laughably small bills and spend the balance on things like cupcake machines, I might as well try to make sure at least Sim Avia gets some Valentine's Day action.

Swiggity swooty!

Don't look so eager, bitch! /facepalm

-Avia.

If real life were a video game, I'd still be broke.

While I'm not quite the 1% currency-wise in any of the games that I play, I'd say that compared to the Rockefellers bidding max on BMAH mounts and the few people I know who wouldn't be able to raid if their guilds weren't paying for repairs, I'm pretty middle-class. That's not to say "middle class" in a video game translates to "middle class" IRL, for it's so much easier to make money in WoW that not being ridiculously wealthy in it is actually a failure. Honestly, even with as much gold as I have, translated into the real world, I would be just as upper-middle-lower-class as I am in real life, and my in-game tactics for making money are just as inadequate as they are outside.

Unsurprisingly, the money-making lessons one can glean from gaming are pretty analogous to what we see outside of it. Sure, there's meritocracy, working hard so one can save and eventually become rich, both feasible and tantalizing mythical in either environment, for then there are the real methods of making gold/Simoleans/Neopoints/money en masse: stealing, cheating, wage slavery, etc. As much gold as one has, it's nothing compared to what Chinese farmers make teleporting to mining nodes and paying teenagers a few dollars a day to spam in trade. Nothing makes more Neopoints than running an auto-buying program, nothing is as quick and easy to earn Simoleans as good old "motherlode," and there's nothing that makes more money in the real world than organized crime, drug trafficking, and sex slavery.

It's a rather negative but realistic sentiment. I'm not promoting the use of bots nor suggesting that everyone smuggle heroin. In fact, the consequences of subversive activity can be just as harsh in-game when one equates the potential real life losses (assets, freedom, life) to the punishments for cheating (inventory, characters, life-long ban), and many people do equate them. However, it doesn't stop tons of players every day from taking those risks to get ahead, accumulate wealth, or pull themselves out of destitute situations, because for better or worse, in-game societies are a reflection of the ones in which we actually live and are full of the same stratification, inflation, and artificial prestige-laden consumerism that we experience in real life.

-Avia.

No one even says "grats" anymore.

Recently, I found a website (still in development) that tracks your achievements across multiple games in one place and then gives you achievements for them.

They're not very attractive looking badges so far.

... y0, dawg.

For a company, it doesn't sound like a terrible idea, as in no one has claimed it yet and sure it can make money. Yet, I still can't help rolling my eyes just a little bit. It's become an industry standard to include achievements in games that serve a myriad of purposes from increasing longevity of the content to pushing the player to explore the game in ways s/he never would have tried, and no one can resist that feeling of accomplishment when a ceremonious notice pops up accompanied by a cute little picture.

But all of this is getting so meta, I'm not even sure what isn't an achievement anymore. Did my Sim get an achievement for going to the grocery store or did I? Does it even count if only people who play the Sims can see my Sims-related achievements, or do I have to collect all of my Sims/WoW/Cut the Rope achieves in one place to share with the gaming community at large and preserve for posterity? Is there even a purpose to life without achievements? I just earned my bachelor's degree, but I didn't get a pop-up and a cute badge. What was all of that time and effort for?

New business idea: IRL achievement tracking. Look for it.

-Avia.

Sims 3 expansions were on sale.

An Overview of The Sims 3: Seasons

Winter:

Make an angel in the snow!

 Warm up with a delicious hot beverage!

 

 Show off your half-pipe tricks at the festival!

 Decorate your house with holiday lights and never take them down!

 Build romance by taking a date ice skating at the local pond!

 Get lucky in an igloo!

 Plan world domination with a snowman army!

 Spring, Summer, and Fall:

 

Rain.

-Avia.