The Sims Medieval - First Impressions

[Saltypaws]

She/he stands in the middle of the room or wherever she is and gets this glow around her.  That is why there is no bed, she will sleep in one though, but the wizards place is so small, I am glad she does not need one.

[Di987546432]

Another dumn question.  You say you kept hitting the "learn more" tab, but in that little information box, it says click on the green tab to learn more about the kingdom and click on add Monarch, or something to that effect.  I remember that box when I first started the game and I clicked on the green castle icon or kingdom, whichever it is and it took me to the place I needed to make my monarch.  Good luck though.

Thanks  I got it to continue now. I just had to move around a little to find the greed tab.
Now I'll try to play a little and hope I won't need to come back with more stupid questions 

[Saltypaws]

No problem, that is why we are here.  You can ask any question you want, have fun,

[Twinmum]

I got my game on Thursday (it's Saturday night now) but with one thing or another happening, I haven't had much time to play.

I had saved my game in during the tutorial.  I just went back to play it (finally, I have not had time since I bought it) and the learn more screen popped back up.  I have a feeling my first game is bugged and I am going to start a new one.  I will edit this post if it happens again.  Hopefully it won't.

Really, you could save it during the tutorial? That was one of my problems. I started the tutorial then had to go out part way through it, but when I tried to save, it said it couldn't save during the tutorial. Took me three attempts to finish the tutorial.  
As I said, I haven't played much at all, but I am enjoying it.

Norma

[Joria]

I couldn't save during the tutorial either but it wasn't a problem.  I just kept playing till the toothpicks holding my eyes open melted and I fell asleep.  lol

[Veldmuisie]

This game is so much fun, I have quite a conundrum with dividing up my playtime between this and practicing for the Sim 3 challenges.    The best part is that my husband (who is too er.. dignified to play Sims 3) is doing much better than I am in TSM and staying up late picking all the meanie options. 

[Slingsby]

I have never played an RPG, so I guess my views may be in a minority.  But after a few days play [or stumbling in the dark!!] I find it a bit ... hmmm.

The game tells you what to do, a lot of the time you disappear into a rabbit-hole to do it: I'm just not getting a feeling I'm in charge of what happens.  Perhaps that's the difference between an RPG and Sims?

[CarlaluvsSims]

The open-endedness (is that a word!?) of Sims 3 is a lot of fun, but The Sims Medieval is definitely a different game altogether. I enjoy the quests and the encouragement to try different things as well as the current "hero" meeting all the people in kingdom. It's very helpful to know all the characters in the realm. With Sims 3, I tend to stay more within my household and have to force myself to have the simmies interact in the hood. I also enjoy playing with only one or two sims at a time and the challenge of getting everything done in a timely manner while completing the current quest.

That said, I love both games for different reasons!   

[Metropolis Man]

I have never played an RPG, so I guess my views may be in a minority.  But after a few days play [or stumbling in the dark!!] I find it a bit ... hmmm.

The game tells you what to do, a lot of the time you disappear into a rabbit-hole to do it: I'm just not getting a feeling I'm in charge of what happens.

I hear you. I know Carl and I are a bit on the fence about the abundance of rabbit holes. The upside of course is that is greatly simplifies things for developers — think of how much larger the game world would need to be if you could actually go exploring on the sea or if the forest was a huge area. But, the downside is obvious — much less game play.

[Schipperke]

This game is a lot of fun, but as others have pointed out, it's much less open-ended than Sims3.  For me one of the attractions of regular Sims is the freedom the player has to create whatever sort of game they want.  But Sims Medieval is all about the quests.  The quests are a lot of fun to do the first time, and a lot of the quests can be done with different characters which gives variety, but I don't think I want to keep doing the same quest over.  Once the novelty is past, I think I'll be going back to Sims 3 because there are so many more things I can do in that game.  Just my opinion.

[Pam]

This game is a lot of fun, but as others have pointed out, it's much less open-ended than Sims3.  For me one of the attractions of regular Sims is the freedom the player has to create whatever sort of game they want.  But Sims Medieval is all about the quests.  The quests are a lot of fun to do the first time, and a lot of the quests can be done with different characters which gives variety, but I don't think I want to keep doing the same quest over.  Once the novelty is past, I think I'll be going back to Sims 3 because there are so many more things I can do in that game.  Just my opinion.

Once the novelty is passed, they will probably release an expansion.  Something I read on the EA site made me think that's the direction they will go with this game. 

[Anushka]

I have this game for 3 days now. And I tried playing it for maybe 3-4 hours. OK, I played an hour and was mad for not liking it, came here and read mostly good impressions, if not great, so went  back to see what am I missing, after another 2 hours of playing, same thing happen. Only thing I really like is CAS - new clothes and hairstyles. And some patterns are wonderfull and I love cauldrons. If I have a patience to get to the wizard, I might like that too. But overall, I'm not impressed.
First the intro. EA is capable of creating such an amazing videos, so when I saw those colorless drawings, I was disappointed.
Camera view, specially in castle - hard to get used to. Not very intuitive start as some also had problems. It's been a while since I had to guess what to do to actually start the game.
Too many rabbitholes. Sim is invisible while hunting and wood gathering, and doesn't get even close to the village shop.
Only 2 needs and only 3 tabs to care for (general info, relationships and inventory), but only 3 traits. My Sim now seem to lack the character. Game seem to be filled with tons of little quests, talk about this, talk about that go into rabbit hole, repeat.
Little action Sim is having is nice and funny, like sword spar or trowing egg, or hearing a plea etc but it is far too little amount of it.

My expectations were based on Sims Castaway, similar game as Medieval is now. There were no expansions for it, and I doubt it will be for Medieval too, but I might be wrong. Castaway had the most amazing graphic, gameplay was smooth, well adjust for a story, very interesting, with option for interesting free play during and after quests, and practically all quests included active thinking and clicking from a player, instead of just click and wait for Sim to show up. I also wasn't a fan of WOW or other RPG games, and games I play(ed) were all much more involving, deep, complicated but intuitive. And with EA, I expected much much better visual effects.
Maybe I will grow to love it as Joria and Katluvr said, but right now, I have only few hours per day (if lucky) and I rather play Sims3, or even with CAW than try to like this game. And for fantasy about fantasy worlds, I have other games that I really like from the very beginning.
Only problem is that I got it as a gift and now it is not easy to say I don't like the present

[Pam]

I understand what you're saying, Anushka.  The Sims in Medieval aren't as personal as the ones in Sims 3.  I think that's where you're feeling shorted with traits and such.  I don't feel the connection with my queen Carina that I felt for my founder Carina.  It's in large part because I didn't do very much to create her.  Even with the new gorgeous clothes, there's not much involved in creating a character for Sims Medieval.  The approach of the game is much different from Sims 3, that's for sure. 

I agree that the camera controls aren't as good, or maybe they're just different.  To me, the limited camera angles simple represent the limited Sim interaction of the game.  We sort of got spoiled with Sims 3 and being able to spin all around our Sim and get great close ups.  Part of the design of Sims 3 is so that we could make movies, so maybe that's why the camera is so flexible.

In my Medieval game, my queen is at level 4 and has a son.  She's taking the benevolent path in all of her ruling decisions, so I don't have many fights or much violence.  It's holding my interest, though, and I can see that I have a very long way until I get to the end.  There will be many things to do, no doubt.

[Anushka]

You're right Pam. Sim is not felt like mine, I feel like a stylist for my Queen, not even an counselor, since she rarely have any option to chose from. Both camera and yellowish color filter I see may add to an experience of old and limitations in Medieval period. I guess we are spoiled with Sims 3 (and some other great games), but still, if you watch action channel on Sims 3 TV, you'll see some scenes from Castaway (most of other channels are videos from Sims 2) They all seem so vivid comparing to Medieval. I'm shore they could come up with some more colorful effects that won't spoil Medieval experience.
I also chose security and other benevolence paths, but quest at the beginning lead me to fight with bandit and later trow egg on bully. When I get some more time I will give this game more chances as I see everyone are loving it or getting to love it, only at the moment, I'm eager to play Dynasty and my barefoot artists in casual game and with CAW.

[Joria]

Anushka there is a bit more you can do with your characters.  True, you never get that really close feeling with them.  How often have we cried over our Sims?  Well, probably no tears in Medieval, but lots of laughs.  When I first played I was really leaning more toward dislike.  I was pretty bummed out because this was a gift and how do you tell your loving husband you hate something he gave you with such glee?  But, I insisted to myself that I must give it a really strong fair trial.  Now, I really am enjoying it immensely.

Let's take your monarch.  First of all, lighten everything up in the castle and make it pretty.  You CAN do this and it gets to be a challenge to not use bad language when you want to move something just around the corner! lol  Really, the camera angle is a pain but after awhile you learn how to move just so to get to see what you want to see and move things around.  I shifted pretty much everything to get a castle I liked. 

Ok, so now you've got the castle you liked and you went into CAS via her treasure chest, (dresser), or whatever the character of choice is using and you've given him/her five really stunning outfits that you changed around be recoloring and using different fabrics.  Even some of the patterned fabrics can be recolored so you have a pretty good range of choices.

Your monarch wakes up, pees, (not really needed most of the time), bathes at least once just for the fun of it, (don't want green clouds around them unless they have the Unkempt trait), calls for food or makes it.  Does the two daily chores first so the day is left to do what you want.  You do not have to totally focus on the quest but can do other things.  Gather and discover flowers.  Go fishing.  Hunt.  Go for a stroll in the forest, (you find amazing things), go to the store and sell those weeds, (but keep the seeds for a heart breakfast dish!), and interact with the npc's. It's now night, go feed the monarch, tuck them in bed, maybe do one or two things for the quest first, and do it all over again the next day.  It really isn't boring because the interactions with the npc's can be very funny and going for a stroll often turns up either a battle or a wonderful discovery.  Tonight my queen found rare blue elves worshipping a crystal tree.  She had a choice of chop down the rare tree or watch the ceremony.  Since she's a sweetie she watched in hiding.  When the elves left she hugged the tree with tears in her eyes and was rewarded with magical stones.  As you grow in the game you get to put in new buildings and decorate them as well, (unless they are rabbit holds).   My Peteran church is lovely.  You also get to play new characters and STILL interact, though in a lesser way, with the older characters.  You don't control them if you are playing a new character but you still can talk with them and check to see how they are doing. 

Right now I have two games I'm playing.  One is on hold because I think my quest might be bugged.  Each of them have basically the same type of characters but different looks and VERY different characters.  The fatal flaws can often make it hilarious.  I have a very stinky, rude blacksmith who is solitary.  (Loner trait in S3)  He tries to talk to people but he is so rude he always offends them and even when he is nice his personal green fog makes them fidget and run away as soon as they can.  It's kind of funny to see the antics they go through trying to not offend him, (he is a huge blacksmith after all), but definitely trying to get downwind of him!  In my other game my blacksmith is handsome and a great guy and he can't get away from the ladies!

The action part of the game COULD be better.  Just look at all the Zelda games, and some of them have really great graphics, or the Final Fantasy games that are superb in their graphics.  But even with it's current flaws, and I do think there will be patches, updates and maybe store items and paks to buy, it is still more fun than I thought it would be.  I'm a fan.