Sims 3

I got the Sims 3 several months ago, along with some friends, and after some very thorough gameplay, here is what we think...

Sims 3 is a game in which, just like it's predecessors, you take on the task of creating a simulated person, or a simulated family, and from there the game is up to you. You can kill them, keep them alive for as long as possible, let them age, make them some simulated friends, and even (with dlc) get them simulated pets.

This game boasts a lot of features, open towns in which you may roam without loading screens, clothing which has up to four color channels so that you can customize them to your wishes, fishing, swimming, several slots for clothing (including formal, and sleepwear), and many activities and jobs.

With all of this you might be wondering what couldn't you like about a game with this much features and activities? Well, it's unfortunate, but there are a few things. There could be more clothing included in the base game, but there are downloadable clothes, and modding clothes in is just as easy as creating a few files.

There could be more furniture, though you can simulate variety with the several color channels by changing material and color of objects. The game has problems on lower end computers, but mid-end to high-end computers run the game well. There are few hairstyles but there again modding is simple and the community is very helpful.

These are the main features and complaints, but if you are curious for more I would check the website. Below are a list of websites which can be really helpful:

https://www.game-debate.com/ (This website is really good for checking games against your computer, you are not required to create an account, but it helps as it saves your computer stats)

https://www.thesims3.com/ (This is the official website)

https://www.modthesims.info/ (This website is really helpful for beginning modders, find a mod, go under instal instructions, and there will be several tutorials)

https://www.thesimsresource.com/ (Another really good mod website)

Driver: San Francisco

We over here at CatchallRat Studios love to play a wide variety of games, so we are now running a blog to show what we like/dislike about the ones we own/play.

Driver: San Francisco is a driving game, but is also more than that. You can race, chase down suspects as a member of the police force, drive quick as you run from the police in a high stakes all or nothing police chase, or just go for a ride. This is all done by an interesting concept called shifting. You can shift out of your character's body and into any other characters as long as they are driving a land vehicle. These vehicles can include anything from cars to trucks to buses (trains and motorcycles are not included in the game). You are not able to run over any pedestrians or (unless on Wii) use guns. But in lieu of that you do have a variety of things to do mission-wise. There are side missions (known as city missions), and story missions. You are able to use more than one car in some missions (i.e. destroy a car using oncoming traffic, targeting the motor of the car rather than the rear) and are well adjusted to where you are in the game.

There are a few things I can say I didn't  like. I really could have used more vehicles, maybe even an expansion pack or two. It would have been interesting to use boats or maybe even helicopters, but there again it's a game based around driving cars so it doesn't really matter that there weren't any. I would've liked a bit of an epilogue (spoiler: The game just ends and kicks you back to the world in shift mode). Multiplayer could've used it's own kind of story mode.

All in all it is a good game, especially if you are looking for a game that is good in both single-player or split-screen. I really have enjoyed playing, with very few missions that I had to retry several times. I can honestly say that it is a pretty good game.