User Reviews (1 - 11 of 31)

Show these reviews first:

Highest Rated
Lowest Rated Newest
Oldest Most Helpful
Least Helpful

A $75.00 chatroom with very little game elements.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 50 / 57
Date: December 22, 2002
Author: Amazon User

What a con. I bought a copy for myself and as a gift for my sister as I thought it would be a neat way to keep in touch.

I can begin to convey my disappointment after playing this for the last two days.
There is very little game content and the design is no better than some of the 3D Chat places that are available for free online.

I was expecting to see downtown areas. The advertising made it sound as if there were actual jobs and business and places of exploration.
This place is either geared for the under 21 set or for uncreative types because what I saw people do was childish and just plain crass.
I am disappointed that the developers of The Sims could release such a shallow, half hearted online version.

I should have tried the playtest because if I had, I wouldn't have made such a costly mistake. I just feel fortunate I was able to return my sister's.

This is a huge disappointment. How this can be considered an actual game is beyond me.
Maxis should have just developed an multiplayer version of The Sims where people could play with their friends and family.

TSO - Not the best MMORPG

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 29 / 34
Date: January 28, 2003
Author: Amazon User

TSO (The Sims Online) is a collection of cities which you choose from to create your alter-ego - a 3D avatar of yourself - and live out your life as a sim. Instead of being taken to work, you choose from a number of money lots scattered around the city and do real time work there, whilst at the same time chatting to the people in that lot.

You can also visit other types of lots to build up skills to earn more money, play a few games, and get involved in a little hanky panky in one of the romance lots. If you are feeling creative enough and have plenty of simoleans left over, you can even create your own dream home or commercial lot for other people to come round and visit.

Sadly this game evolves mostly around building up skills and finding the lots with the most people in them to earn more money. There's very little imagination put into the objects and it won't be long before repeating the same process over and over gets old. What's more the game is still under development and is missing half the interactions and items mentioned in the manual.

Overall this game has much potential once the beta testing period is over and becomes as advertised with all the interactions and items. At the moment it's nothing more than a 3D chat room with most of the players away from their computer. Users with less than DSL speeds will also find it difficult to play the game smoothly and will be faced with frequent updates that could take hours to install.

Its not worth the big expense

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 22 / 24
Date: January 04, 2003
Author: Amazon User

This isn't a real multiplayer online game.

After playing this game for far too many hour in order to try to progress somewhere with it, I have finally given up. I paid money to play an actual game and not just chat.

A multiplayer online game is supposed to have a balance of socialization and actual gameplay with real objectives along with chatting.

This is nothing but a shallow chatroom where you struggle to keep your Sims needs up, playing silly game objects, and teleport from place to place as there are no real downtown places to explore and you don't even have a real neighborhood to walk around in.

If you must see for yourself, by the less expensive one. Don't invest in this one unless you are absolutely ready to do it.

This game can mess up your real life...

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 27 / 32
Date: July 17, 2003
Author: Amazon User

If you have a life, be careful about buying The Sims Online. Don't let the bad reviews fool you, this is a good game. I almost did not buy The Sims Online because of it being called "A chat room that costs $10 a month." If it was boring as some say, would 100,000 people play this game? Nope.

This game will take away time from your real life. You might lose friends, your job and social life. My online friend is even trying to get The Sims Online just to chat with me!

Making your Sim is much easier than ever! No more of the boring clicking arrows to see all the outfits/heads. They are now thumbnails. You can make a human Sim or make a bear, (polar, brown, or black bear) alien, even a robot. Bears, aliens, and robots cannot do anything humans can't. Don't worry about bears mauling you! You cannot set any personality. After all, you are the one controlling everything he/she does. That is right, no more "free will." But don't worry, your Sim's moods drop three times slower.

This is not just a big animated chat room. You can build a house, skill center, or park, whatever you want! You do not have unlimited money, you must work for it. Your first instinct as a The Sims player is to look in the paper for a job. Say goodbye to carpools and then zooming off to work. You now have to skill (it takes several real life hours but good people make it fun) then make money on a job object. Some are easy but slow. Others, you must work with others. You can also find people looking for a maid or repairman. Anything you do for making money is fun. Almost.

There is now a "death" feature in the game. Your Sim can die from electrocution, drowning, and starving. Don't worry, you can get revived or stay a ghost. Being a ghost is fun for a while but gets boring after a while.

There are also clothing racks. You can now buy your Sim new clothes from daywear, PJ's, lingerie, swimwear, and formal outfits. Very fun when you get bored with your Sim's clothes.

There is a lack of economy in The Sims Online. Everywhere you go has free food, showers, even beds and hotel rooms at times. However, players are working on an economy. Another thing is a new program called "HUD" that allows people that have an extra [$$] lying around to get a size 8 lot. Making money is boring when everyone is away from the game. It is annoying when you are playing in the middle of the night or some other time for those outside of the US when the servers go down for maintenance. The Social meter is sometimes annoying if you are staying at your house waiting for people to come. Those are the only bad things about The Sims Online.

As for graphics, it is better than The Sims slightly. There is a new and better looking UCP (Universal Control Panel) and buy/build modes. Other than that, same graphics as the 3 year old game.

The sound is pretty good. It is sometimes funny when your Sim sings in the shower. I like the music but to others, it is repetitive and annoying. There is less of the famous gibberish that Sims make. There are user-made radios that some listen to.

As for the bonus stuff with the Charter Edition, you get a certificate, 2 more months free, a key chain, a magnet, and a soundtrack CD. The CD has some nice music on it. All of it from the game. The colored manual with hot keys is very convenient.

Overall, this game is very fun. Like I said, do not listen to the bad reviews. People that love the game would rather play than write a review. Maxis/EA is now offering a free 14 days to play. Before buying The Sims Online, you should go to ...(the official website) to download and play for 14 days free to see if you like it before you buy the game. It is better than paying [$$] for a game you don't like.

Addictive at 1st and then quickly becomes terribly boring

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 20 / 23
Date: February 08, 2003
Author: Amazon User

It WAS addictive at 1st. Slowly, it started to get very repetitive and the game SLOWED down tremendously even on the fastest computers when many sims were altogether. Chatting became lethargic. You always had to empty your bladder or eat or sleep and that really made it very frustrating. Save your money.

Attention Parents

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 21 / 25
Date: January 04, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Please consider very carefully before purchasing this game. Play it yourself before allowing your child to play...particularly anyone under the age of 18.

As a 'Founder' (beta-tester) for 3 months, &, after being slapped by a 9 year old because I wouldn't get into the 'love-bed' (simulated sex) with him, you couldn't get me back to this 'over-rated CHAT program for losers" with a team of wild horses!!! and...I will not allow my grandchildren to 'play'.

Should you decide to purchase this 'thing' anyway, I'd recommend a high amount of Parental Supervision. There is a lot of very 'sick' stuff going on & Maxis doesn't seem to have put in the proper controls. The only contribution this game makes is everything that we don't want our children absorb...

Please, spend a little time there yourself before agreeing to alow your child to play.

A badly developed game

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 14 / 14
Date: March 18, 2003
Author: Amazon User

In the beginning this game was a great idea but a greedy
game publishing company decided to release this in an incomplete state figuring The Sims name would sell it.

What could have been an exciting and fun game to play is bacially boring, pointless, and just not fun! The gameplay is tedious and extremely repetitive and some of the objects that were promised have not even been implemented in the game and some of the other playable elements are still grayed out, meaning you can't play them yet.

It took months before an item advertised in the box was even added to the game!!! They take forever to add anything and you're constantly greeted with half baked promises.

The game strict rules prevents any opportunity at being creative and literally destroys the fun. As of now, its merely a chat room with a few game objects/elements that you pay monthly for.

My friends and I had enough so we unsubscribed altogether because we were tired of feeling ... ..., so all I can say is buy this game at your own risk and be prepared to be bored, creatively stifled and harassed by alot of griefers as they need something to do since theres not much to do in this game.

Save yourself the agony, AVOID!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 17 / 20
Date: March 04, 2003
Author: Amazon User

I bought this piece of garbage and I can definitely say its
NOT worth it.

This doesn't feel like I was playing an actual game, it seemed more like a giant Sim Chatroom with a few game elements inside so it could be marketed accordingly. And the gameplay it does have was extremely boring.
The only objectives are to become the richest and most popular and after you achieved that there is simply nothing else to do except to chat. I buy games for the purpose of having fun. This is NOT a fun game. Its boring, tedious, and shallow. And many of the users are using it as an outlet to express themselves in rather obnxious and creepy ways.

Had this game had what it advertised and was more complete, my review would be more positive as I have nothing against games of this nature. What I don't like is being manipulated into believing that this game was something more than it actually is. The truth of the matter is they released this game way too early because they assumed we'd all be happy to play it despite its incomplete condition. I don't like feeling this cheated.

Save your money and send a message to the game developers that you won't by incomplete, substandard games.

Not A Game

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 15 / 17
Date: December 20, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If you are looking to expand or perhaps re-live the fun you had with the original Sims, this is not the answer. Though it looks like The Sims and has the same familiar controls, it definitely doesn't PLAY like The Sims. It plays more like ICQ. Chat. Meet virtual people and have shallow conversations. Logoff.

Strong possibility that EA can turn this "project" into a "game" with more time, but for now, this is little more than Internet Chat - for $... a month.

Play the lottery

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 12 / 13
Date: January 19, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Invest your [money] bucks or however much you want to toss away in the lottery, don't bother with TSO. Do you spend your day in a job that is not challenging, repetitive, and uninteresting except when you chat over the water cooler, copier or cubicle wall? Well, that is decidedly more interesting and fun than TSO and about as exciting. There is a design bias towards forced interaction. Due to individual object limits, creativity is limited. Skill takes extremely long to gain, and must be continously maintained. Needs restrict how much time you can spend doing anything before you have to 'green up'. These factors have been tweeked however are far from fixed. You can't walk your sim to another house, across the street or around the neighborhood. Sure, that is being 'worked on' in design, but do you really want to pay to play a less than beta version game while code is being written to make it live up to what it has been hyped to be? You start the game with [money] simoleons which you'll spend a third (at least) upon buying property which you then can't fully build upon due to lack of funds. If you choose to play alone without roommates, you will be penalized an exordinate extra cost in order to enlarge your lot. You can chat for free all over the net, why pay [money] a year to chat in a 3D enviornment? I played the Beta, am a founder and this is the worst game I've ever played.

Review Page: 1 2 3 4 Next 

Actions