PC Format Magazine - Interview with Tim LeTourneau

ManagerJosh · Jul 17, 2003

PC Format Magazine - Interview with Tim LeTourneau

Courtesy of The Sims 2 Station

Tim LeTourneau: "Initially, The Sims 2 is about going back into the house, and we have to take the gameplay to the next generation. There is certainly more of a variety of things available at the household level, but this is about the house, rather than adding new areas. This is a brand new game."

Concerning the 3D element, Tim LeTourneau said: "The 3D card is the primary required equipment - right now we're targeting the GeForce and Radeon series. The Sims 2 is a fully 3D world - it's more state of the art in that respect, and it has to be, because the gameplay makes a generational leap."

"...facial animation...something at which The Sims 2 almost rivals Half-Life 2."
Rather than inertly waiting for your attentions, your Sim physically reacts to the presence of another person - they flash smiles at friends and scowls at disliked peers.
Locations also look more believable - if you wasted hours of your life picking wallpaper in the last game, wait until you get to play with the full 3D lighting in The Sims 2.

- "Create-A-Sim will be released for free before the game is launched, so look out for it on a future coverdisc."
The Create-A-Sim technology creates the Sim at all ages, and 'rather than letting your hormonal teenager play the field and go through the ups and downs of 21st century romance, you can switch families and groom the neighbours so that one day they may produce a kid that would become the perfect spouse for your original Sim.' The producer states: "The whole idea of playing as the neighbour gets greater in The Sims 2 because you need more families to build more relationships."

The producer, Tim, states also: "They actually progress from adult to geezers. Your career options change and you don't necessarily have to work. You build skills throughout your lifetime, starting from when you're a toddler, so you can get a jumpstart on the career ladder."

Also, on the next page, there's the interview with Will Wright. When asked how The Sims 2 was coming along, Will said it was going very well. That it was a complete rewrite of the game - they looked at things that the players wanted and they've done a lot of things that they've wanted to do in The Sims; things they couldn't do because of the technology. He said they wanted full 3D, more diverse characters, facial animation and a free-roaming camera. Then, Will said - I think this is pretty important - "...right now, you probably can't buy a PC that won't run it, so by the time it comes out, our target audience will be able to run it very well." That sounds like good news - hopefully we'd be all able to play it. Then, when asked if he felt that hey'd done everything they could with the original Sims, he said: "With that architecture, yeah. We made the first one expandable to a certain level, and we exploited that with all the expansion packs, but there are a lot of things we just couldn't do because of the limitations of the technology. That's what we looked at with The Sims 2 - what the characters could do..."
Then, when asked about the limitations in the first Sims, Will said that it had a lot to do with the dimensions of their emotions, how elaborate their relationships were, etc. he said that it took a whole house fire before the Sims in the first one noticed anything was wrong, whereas in Sims 2, if someone walks into a room, the Sims glance over and if they're a friend, they smile at them.

Another important bit - when asked if in an ideal world, and everyone had 3Ghz processors and a 256Mb 3D card, how far would he go? Will Wright: "The graphics stuff is already there, I don't feel as though that's holding us back....that's what we're really working on - how we can develop more believeable AI."
Click to expand...

simsamgrl16 · Jul 31, 2003

thanx josh cant wait for ts2

AddictedToTS2 · Jul 31, 2003

That is gonna go on the site and Joshy will get credit for finding the article. Thanks Josh.

simsamgrl16 · Jul 31, 2003

kewl more info for the site

mattho · Aug 1, 2003

The create-a-sim feature will be mad! I think it's a great medium for Maxis to whet our appetites while we wait another few months. I'm pretty sure the Sims you create with this tool will be able to be imported into the Sim2? Anyone can confirm that for me?

simsamgrl16 · Aug 1, 2003

n it will give us all great practice to master the work of making a sim n that is a good question but isnt it just a demo?

mattho · Aug 2, 2003

It could be - I just want to be able to export the Sims I will have created with it.

simsamgrl16 · Aug 2, 2003

u wont they said u cant

mattho · Aug 2, 2003

So basically that whole create-a-sim program is useless in it's own right - other than letting us 'cop a feel' of what will be identically replicated in the actual game??? What is this madness!

simsamgrl16 · Aug 3, 2003

lol i think its kewl the way it iz i dont think i'll wanna export my sims to the sims 2

mattho · Aug 3, 2003

But don't you wanna export the sims you make in 'create-a-sim' into the Sims 2?

simsamgrl16 · Aug 4, 2003

i dont

mattho · Aug 4, 2003

Alrighty then... Why not?

simsamgrl16 · Aug 5, 2003

cant my sims 1 sims r on my sisters computer not mine

mattho · Aug 6, 2003

Right... But doesn't the create-a-sims program make Sims for the Sims 2 and NOT the Sims 1?

simsamgrl16 · Aug 6, 2003

i unno

lilfaeriegirl078 · Aug 6, 2003

one would believe that

Jake · Aug 7, 2003

it would be extremely hard to port a 2d sim to a 3d game... hence why they aren't making it possible. besides, since you can edit practically every little detail when your make a sim in ts2, wouldn't you want to make a new one anyway? that way they could look exactly how you want them to look.

oh, and josh.. shouldn't this have been posted in the news area?

Jake · Aug 7, 2003

moving....moving....

simsamgrl16 · Aug 7, 2003

lol i don really want the sims1 sims in the sims 2 graphic wise it wuld mess the entire thing up imagine howe many patches wuld be included wit that n time

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