August 2001

Superb, 3-Dimensional Life!
Posted Monday, August 27, 2:16 PM GMT by Silent Insomnia

In an (upcoming?) PC Magazine article, Author Mark Pesce describes the outlook on PC Gaming, virutal life, and it's effect on the family unit.

Here's a snippet from Mark's article, which also stems interest in his recent book, The Playful World: How Technology Is Transforming Our Imagination, published in paperback by Ballantine Books.

"Each character will have its own unique personality, reflecting its history, memory, and experiences in the virtual world, as well as whatever it learns from the actions and responses of the human controlling it through the computer. Each successive encounter with people will add personality to the characters. The more we interact with them, the more humanlike these simulations of intelligence will become."

Props to Mark for this incredible read and a book well worth the dime too!

You can read the entire article at PC Magazine, right now!!

"The Sims" Goes Platinum!
Posted Saturday, August 18, 3:20 PM GMT by Silent Insomnia

Maxis/EA doesn't always know or necessarily have all the time and resources to alert us of their accomplishments and recognition throughout the gaming community...but we're paying attention and have noticed some recent news released from the ELSPA, (European Leisure Software Publisher's Association).

ELSPA is responsible for creating the VSA, (Volume Sales Award), in 1999, and has since issued approximately 80 of these prestigous awards to entertainment software publishers worldwide.

Game publisher Electronic Arts has just been awarded the "Platinum" level award (300,000+ Units Sold) for "The Sims".

So...as they say in the record industry...."Congrats on your Platinum" Maxis!

Check the ELSPA website for more details.....

New "Spotlight" Store
Posted Sunday, August 12, 10:52 AM GMT by Silent Insomnia

This month's spotlight store here at the Mall of the Sims is "World Wrestling Shop World"! This fantastic store features the latest in an assortment of wrestling goodies....

Art and Video Games... Part 2!
Posted Thursday, August 9, 2:16 PM GMT by Silent Insomnia

In an article released this afternoon at Yahoo News, more details are emerging from the recent recognition from the Art community of artistic expression through video game art!

Here's a quote about one of our favorite llama lovers, Will Wright!

"Will Wright, the lead designer of the hugely successful SimCity and Sims game series, emphasized in the panel discussion that game designers need to think outside the box and stop trying to reproduce reality down to the last detail. He said that designers should create alternative worlds, and that in that sense the game industry had much to learn from the art world."

To catch the rest of this article, visit Yahoo News!

New Simsville Interview and Details
Posted Monday, August 6, 11:48 AM GMT by Silent Insomnia

PC Gameplay recently published an interview with Simsville's Associate Producer, Virginia McArthur and Executive Producer, Kana Ryan.

Here's an excerpt...

"PCG: Do you deal with the economy of the whole town? Say if you have a movie theater, that's got to mean you have a population of a few hundred at least. That's a lot of people to look after. Do you have to lay down 300 houses?
KR: Our scale is a little different than reality. So to have a movie theater, you might need more like 20 people. A lot of the stuff we're going to be struggling with when we're tuning this game is what is the balance between population and the facilities you can have.

There's a lot of things to manage. You have to manage relationships. You can get information about who they know, who they're friends with, who they're romantic with. You can also see a wedding happen. If the family is very happy they might actually want to have a baby, and then a stork will fly overhead and deliver the little bundle of joy. We have a lot of fun things that you couldn't do with The Sims because you were focused on one house."

You can read the rest of the article by heading on over to PC Gameplay!

HomeSims Calls it Quits
Posted Monday, August 6, 11:29 AM GMT by Silent Insomnia

We'd just like to bid farewell to one of our affiliate sites, HomeSims.com.

As well as providing an excellent choice of downloads for the community, HomeSims webmaster "Darin", provided excellent in-depth interviews with Maxis staff members, made outstanding contributions of hosting multiple sites, and provided a home for the "Sims Community News(SCN)", an organized collection of sites, dedicated to sharing news and site updates.

Special thanks to Darin for the hard work put into Homesims.com and good luck goes out to SCN's new hosts, SimsExtreme.com and German Sims fansite, www.simzone.de.

House Party Hits Mac!
Posted Wednesday, August 1, 3:50 PM GMT by Silent Insomnia

Aspyr Media has just announced the release of "The Sims: House Party" Expansion Pack for the Macintosh!

The $30 expansion pack features parties that can be thrown by the players' Sims, including a country barn dance, a tropical luau, or an underground rave. Additional objects and services, such as a mechanical bull or cake dancers, are also included.

More details on this breaking news can be found at MacNN.com.