At launch, The Sims 4 was highly criticized for lacking in-depth gameplay and certain aspects that characterized the franchise. Things like pools, ghosts, and basements weren’t included when the game first dropped, and were added in later through patches. In fact, the “toddler” life stage was notoriously missing until a patch in 2017, three years after the base game’s release, finally added them to the game. Many criticized the game as being half-finished upon release, but that hasn't stopped The Sims 4 from slowly becoming more "fully realized."
It’s been six years since the release of the base game, which has seen the release of ten expansion packs, nine game packs, and seventeen stuff packs. Some of these packs have not gone over well in the community, like The Sims 4—Star Wars: Journey to Batuu and the ill-received The Sims 4: My First Pet Stuff, while others have been crucial for more realistic gameplay, such as The Sims 4: Seasons. The Sims 4 base game has been highly critiqued for not including what many consider “core” gameplay aspects, so when The Sims 5 is eventually announced and released, it needs to be sure to have these features.
Color Wheel
The Sims 4 is no stranger to criticism, especially when it comes to the lack of customization available for players. If anything, The Sims 4 is a massive downgrade from the “Create-a-Style” introduced in The Sims 3, which allowed players to customize everything, from Create-a-Sim clothing and hairstyles to buy mode objects. Having swatches can work well for furniture, but ultimately stifles how easily players can make representative versions of themselves within the game.
The Sims 5 should bring back the color wheel specifically for Create-a-Sim mode in order to avoid the many skin tone controversies The Sims 4 has had. Color wheels help players find just the right skin tone for their Sims, but also the perfect hair color shade as well. It might even be beneficial to bring back the hair customization from The Sims 3, where players could customize highlights, lowlights, roots, and main hair color.
As for buy mode items, a color wheel is not necessarily mandatory. However, The Sims 4 has come under fire by players for not having matching swatches for the furniture, making some Sims builders very unhappy. This can easily be remedied by making sure that there are always matching swatches for different wood tones not only in The Sims 5 base game, but that subsequent expansions also include the same matching tones.
More Personality Traits and Slots
Another highly critiqued aspect of The Sims 4 lies in the almost bland personalities that many Sims have. This is largely attributed to the fact that Sims can only have three traits maximum when players create them. In The Sims 3, Sims could have up to five traits total, even unlocking a sixth once they graduated from University.
The traits included in The Sims 5 base game need to actually color the personalities of Sims. The traits chosen for a Sim should make them autonomously begin actions that line up with their traits—for example, a “Slob” Sim should not automatically clean up their dishes, and could even get a negative moodlet when forced to clean. The Sims 4 also lacks unique traits, like “Technophobe” featured in The Sims 3, so despite choosing players choosing different traits, most Sims act the same way. The Sims 5 can fix this by making sure that the lifestyles Sims autonomously lead are reflective of their traits.
Open World Hybrid
In previous Sims titles, players have been able to customize the world and neighborhood that their Sims live in, from freely placed lots to choosing what foliage they want to appear on the map. Additionally, The Sims 3 introduced a game that was devoid of loading screens because once the game was loaded, players could move around the map as freely as possible. However, players were always locked into one neighborhood for the entirety of their game, so The Sims 4 allowing travel between all neighborhoods was a diamond in the rough for the game.
The Sims 5 would do well to implement a mix of both open and closed world aspects. Allowing players to still travel freely between worlds is a nice touch that should not be lost in future installments, but if possible, each world could be an “open” one once the loading screen is complete. It would minimize how many loading screens players have to endure, but still has the potential to be a good balance between open and closed world aspects, like free-roaming and free-travel.
Seasons
Including seasons in the base game would be a unique approach to the gameplay, as there are no other Sims titles that have done this in the past. The Seasons pack has been a highly anticipated expansion for every iteration of the game, from The Sims 2 to The Sims 4. Adding weather and seasonal decorations/festivities better immerses players into the game, not to mention giving players some unique ways to kill their Sims off.
Having seasons in The Sims 5 right off the bat would give it an edge that no other Sims game has had to date. Though the Sims franchise doesn’t necessarily need to compete with the up-and-coming indie game Paralives, many players have expressed interest in the indie game’s release because the premise is so similar to The Sims and has more packed into the game right off the bat—including weather and seasons. The Sims 5 having weather and seasonal aspects in the base game would put it ahead of the other Sims base games and keep it on par with potential life-simulation competition.
While many players are content playing The Sims 4 as it is, there are others who assert that The Sims 5 needs to bring its A-game at launch to make up for what The Sims 4 has lacked. Though it’s been consistently patched and updated since its 2014 release, some say there are no excuses as to why it’s taken so long for some aspects to be introduced to The Sims 4–especially quality skin tone representation. If The Sims 5 added these key features to the base game, it would be lightyears ahead of any previous Sims game and have more depth at launch than its predecessor, The Sims 4.
The Sims 5 is in development.