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List of big and small gameplay ideas by Lorna and cakeefeatured
March 3, 2020 at 8:35 am<div>This is a list of ideas Lorna@discord and I were discussing one day and would like to see in the game. So we decided to share them here 🙂
Vehicles and vehicle interactions
Being able to eat and talk/have conversations in a parked car anywhere in the world where there is a parking lot. If paras have a fight in a car they would upon the car stopping would get out slam the door.With conversations between paras in the car they could have animated reactions to conversations depending if it’s good or bad news.
Cars stopping for pedestrians and even stop lights.
Changing radio stations on the car radio. Maybe even having AC and heat during winter summer months.
Having multiple views with of the car’s interior and exterior, in the car to see your paras while traveling: backseat view, front/dashboard view, and windshield view.
Having babies in car seats where older paras would have to unbuckle them out of the car seats in the back and being able to have conversations with them while driving.
Paras being able to kiss in the car especially for dates!Cooking and Cleaning Ideas
Animations and actions for cleaning and cooking such as: mopping, having piles of dishes in the sink that are unwashed, sweeping floors with brooms, dusting, using vacuum cleaners, cleaning windows, and glass doors.
Having rooms become messy including unmade beds clothes on floor etc. and having to put clothes in hampers or back in drawers after they’re cleaned.
Para’s knowing when to do laundry without having to manually tell them.
Paras being able to take laundry in baskets when they both put them up to dry on clothes line/ or indoor drying rack and when they take them down after clothes have dried. Options for drying clothes could be: clothes line, indoor drying rack, being able to string lines of clothing wherever you wanted including outside of building windows.
Paras have the responsibility to stock up on household necessities while grocery shopping, so there would be a category for buying laundry detergents, toilet paper, paper towels, nappies for babies and toddlers,pull ups, baby formula, baby food, soap for paras to wash their bodies with. Some might not want this feature which we think would be a good option to toggle on or off but it’d be an interesting way to make game-play more of a challenge.
Having clothing,shoes,and accessories disappear from closets or from shelves, when a paras put the clothing on. So whatever a para wear items disappear and if a para notices something of their is missing from their closet that they don’t have on they’d freak out or confront the para who stole. Also clothing could eventually get dirty so you wouldn’t be able to war the same thing every day and would need to wash them.Business and Money Ideas
Having different brands of the same product would each have different qualities. For example a cheaper laundry detergent wouldn’t have a nice scent nor would clothing feel as good (or clean) whereas a better priced detergent would have a nice lingering scent and clothes would feel more comfortable.
Same would go for food so if you had veggies and fruit there would be pricey organic/local gardened which has better quality and generic mass produced vegetables which wouldn’t be as healthy because of pesticides. Also another example for cereals would be the cheaper cereal wouldn’t make you as full and could possibly make a para sick vs a higher priced cereal with better quality would make a para full and healthy.
Also having the ability to make your own baby food from fruits and veggies paras have at home and even be able to sell it.Simulation and Household items Ideas
Being able to pull out pots and pans from cabinets, pulling out silverware for eating food, when paras drink water they would grab a glass from the overhead cabinets, being able to set the table or asking children to set the table for dinner. Being able to assign paras placement at tables (weddings and events as well).
Newborns/babies being able to transition off milk and formula would then being to eat baby food instead. Also having the ability to make your own baby food from fruits and veggies paras have at home and even be able to sell it.
Having appliances such as: Blenders, crock pots, toasters, smoothie makers, etc.Realistic Dancing:
Ballet, ballroom, tango, salsa, club dancing, hip hop, belly dancing (non-sexualized but for exercise/competition for teens-elders only) etc.
Group and competition dancing for kids-elders, school dance teams
Ballet being for both girls and boys and there would be recitals and shows
Slow dancing for weddings and couples, children would be able to dance on their parents feet. Other dances like: salsaOther activities:
Art clubs for students
Sidewalk drawings
Once a month kids could bring their parents an arts and crafts items they made at school home
Art shows and fancy gallery shows
Being able to paint murals on buildings
Paras being able to sketch.draw.paint, do pottery, use marble, glass blowing
Paras being able to have collections and being able to collect rocks and shells from beaches and around the world that could be painted on and displayed
Poetry readings in cafes
Para being able to keep journals/diaries and would be able to write different types of journal entries such as: poetry,love letter, a memory,etc.
Maybe some music can make a para happy or sad depending on the songs or genre.Bookclubs and library memberships:
Paras and NPCs being able to borrow books from libraries and being fined if they’re late, having a wider selection of books at libraries than you would at home and some books wouldn’t be available to buy, some books at libraries would be able to help paras attain hidden skills that you couldn’t elsewhere, if a para becomes a successful author their books would appear in the libraries and stores as well. Teens and kids would be able to do their homework, get help from parents or libarians with their homework, parents helping children find books,students on computers. A libarian would shush paras if they’re being too loud or disrupting other paras and can even tell paras to get off the computer if they’re playing games too loud, libarians being able to tell paras to leave the library if they dont listen.If anyone has any more ideas/suggestions list them below!</div><div>
Lively NPCs Toggles for Open World
- Toggles
Move in/Move out (yes/no) – maybe this could also be set per season cycle when paras would move but not every day.
Create Businesses (yes/no)
Toggles for NPCs:
Change employment (yes/no)
Change/ buy cars (yes/no) – or limit it to a set number they can buy as a whole.
Build families (yes/no)
Commit crime (yes/no)
Procedural Aging (yes/no)
Obtaining pets (smaller only/all pets)- #of NPCs seen at different times of day (including lots, cars,walking around the world)
Maybe this could be set on a 0% 25% 50% 75% 100% per each time of day:
Morning
Noon
Afternoon
Night
Mid-nightWhere 0% would be the least amount of paras out and 100% would be max (most busy)
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34 Replies
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These are a lot of great ideas. I like the idea of Parafolk automatically taking care of household chores. It would be cool if they have specific ‘responsible’ or ‘neatfreak’ type of personality trait where it makes them clean more often.
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a variety of sports for children and teens would be sooo awesome. such as cheerleading, football, tennis, soccer, etc. and if paras could be “promoted” to higher status in said sports based on their performance (team captain, water boy, flyer…) like adult paras do with careers that would make it more interesting!
more family type interactions would make it more realistic as well. grounding children/teens from TV, leaving the house, phones, etc. parenting styles influencing how the children develop into young adults (for example, if the child grew up poorly they may have an automatic negative trait that can’t be changed, or they could “develop” similar traits to whichever parent they were closer with). setting curfews, chores lists, little details like that would make interacting with young sims more interesting. i LOOVE the idea above about shopping for house hold items and so on as well. yard sales would be a cool little add on too. lemonade stands. bake goods.
and calories playing a factor would be cool too! if a sim eats more junky food like chips, pizza, cereal they could gain weight faster than sims who eat foods like salads, veggies, and other balanced meals. 🙂
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Riding schools for both kids and adults. All ages (except maybe babies) being able to ride ponies and horses.
Kids and teens being able to walk the dog(s) as a chore.
Being able to walk more than one dog at a time. If there’s puppies, the puppies could follow the big dogs without a leash. If there’s no adult dog, the puppies should be on a leash.
Size sliders for all animals. -
I thought of a gameplay idea. Now, I’m prefacing this by saying that I already know that what I’m suggesting here won’t be in the base game. I realize that ‘s a lot and shouldn’t be a priority for now. But I think it’s good content if the devs decide to work on a pet related expansion or update after the initial release.
So first and foremost, I’d like for there to be activities to do with our pets. Of course, there are plenty of people in the world who only own pets as companions and don’t compete with them, but I think it would be really cool to have animal related competitions for our Parafolk to compete in.
For example, we could have pet shows to judge for conformation. Agility competitions to test their ability to get through an obstacle course. Obedience competitions to test their training. Lure coursing, disk competitions, horse racing, etc. I’m not suggesting we get all of these, but maybe 3 would be good to allow for a good range of activities to do with our animals.
Parafolk would have to work with their animals and train them to be fast, smart, and agile. The only exception would be conformation shows since those are based on how the animal fits their breed standard. Now, as for how conformation shows would work, I’m not too sure. I feel like it would work best if there were hidden ‘traits’ within their data to determine how well they’d rank in a competition and the results are based on that.
And of course, the winners should get big prizes. The higher your pet ranks, the more money a Para would be rewarded. And the pet could have ribbons or trophies that can be displayed around the house.
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It would be cool if Parafolks could have family photo albums that they keep through the generations and teach the young ones about their family history. Pictures that Parafolks take (even better if they take these pictures autonomously), they would put in the album. And also, having family photos around the house (e.g. on the mantle, on the desk, etc.) would add a charming, personal touch.
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Here’s an idea. instead of just one repairman/woman, you know that fixes everything with ease from clogged toilets to televisions. I thought it would be cool to see different kinds of repair workers.
one example would be something like a plumber, specifically for plumbing issues, maybe an electrician, one that deals with electronics. and an appliance repair worker, whatever that is called. that works on appliances only.
I also think if doors, windows, or even flooring and wallpaper can get ruined, it would be cool to see a carpenter.
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being a breeder and giving away puppies!! love that idea
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Something I’ve rarely seen discussed is how to deal with the basic needs. In the sims (typically) we see Energy, Hunger, Social, Fun, Hygiene, and Bladder. I think most people haven’t thought of anything because this is generally thought of as a good model, HOWEVER, we can do better.
I think nutrition/health could play a major role in the well-being of parafolk. Eating healthy foods, regular doctor visits, occasionally working out, etc. How I would do this is add a “health bar” in addition to these needs. Energy, social, fun, and hygiene would remain similar. Hunger would be changed to nutrition and would be influenced by the types of foods/drinks consumed. Healthy food will influence differently than unhealthy foods.
All of these needs will influence your overall health, which will affect the likelihood of contracting an illness, mood swings, weight, etc. We’re getting into real life situations ppl!!!
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Really love the idea of the vehicles. I was also thinking about traffic and how they will have to stop if a car is in front instead of passing right through and like CakeeFeat said, stopping when there is a red light. Also another idea i had is to actually get the car out of the parking lot instead of just clicking something on the car’s key and the car appearing from nowhere.
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this is an awesome idea! i love the health status. in similar games, they can just eat whatever they want. it might be tricky to implement but is so clever!
quote=7913]Something I’ve rarely seen discussed is how to deal with the basic needs. In the sims (typically) we see Energy, Hunger, Social, Fun, Hygiene, and Bladder. I think most people haven’t thought of anything because this is generally thought of as a good model, HOWEVER, we can do better.
I think nutrition/health could play a major role in the well-being of parafolk. Eating healthy foods, regular doctor visits, occasionally working out, etc. How I would do this is add a “health bar” in addition to these needs. Energy, social, fun, and hygiene would remain similar. Hunger would be changed to nutrition and would be influenced by the types of foods/drinks consumed. Healthy food will influence differently than unhealthy foods.
All of these needs will influence your overall health, which will affect the likelihood of contracting an illness, mood swings, weight, etc. We’re getting into real life situations ppl!!!
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[quote quote=7913]
All of these needs will influence your overall health, which will affect the likelihood of contracting an illness, mood swings, weight, etc. We’re getting into real life situations ppl!!!
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Honestly, i love your idea but i wish that it could be optional because i don’t want to be worrying about my parafolks getting fat or if they are eating healthy or not xD Honestly, i sometimes live with the stress of getting fat and not eating healthy stuff and i want my sims to eat and enjoy the food without any problem.
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I wanted to discuss this topic, but I didn’t see a thread already on this subject. So I decided to post it here since I wasn’t sure if it even needed its own thread.
I was wondering about the community’s thoughts on holidays, since Alex has already confirmed that some will be in the game. How do you think they should function in the game?
We’ve seen elements of Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years, and Halloween through early footage, though but I’m interested in knowing how they might work in the full game.
There’s another game I’d played previously with a system for holidays, but I honestly found the system a bit limiting in ways. Basically, you create a checklist of 4 or 5 things to do within the holiday and that determines how happy the person is by the end of the day. If they don’t do anything, they end the day sad, but if they do everything on the list, they go to bed happy. It’s also not specific on how many times you need to do this thing in order for it to count on the checklist. It honestly always felt like a grind to get everything done and a lot of times it wasn’t fun. I personally, hope Paralives takes a more open approach.
Quite personally, I think a nice, simple setup for holidays would be that you can select different traditions or activities that are typically done on the holiday, but they aren’t like a mandatory checklist. Basically if you end up doing them, your Para is happy in the moment, but if you don’t they remain neutral. So if you’re unable to do everything, they don’t end the day depressed if something else came up.
Another issue with the other game’s holiday system was that, for some reason that I can’t wrap my head around, it automatically chose who did and didn’t like a holiday tradition, and it was pretty much always based on age. I really would like to see Paralives allow players to choose what each Parafolk likes and doesn’t like and to certainly not limit it to age. Just as a random example, lets say one Para child could love eating turkey on Thanksgiving, but their twin brother likes pumpkin pie the most. Two Parafolk, same age, but different likes for the same holiday.
I’m hope by the time Alex and the team get around to talking about the holiday system he’ll let us know on what his plans are, and maybe ask the community for ideas as well.
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Alright, I want to briefly talk story progression. How far do you guys think story progression should effect the towns folks in the game?
Alex has stated that he would like to see Parafolk getting married, having kids, progressing through their jobs/getting new jobs and more all on their own. This of course sounds great and makes sense, and I’d like to see all of this personally. That said, there are some things I’d kind of prefer for them to not be able to do on their own.
For me the big one is the pets. I really wouldn’t like it if Parafolk could go out and get pets on their own. For one thing, I don’t want Parafolk living in suburban neighborhoods with average sized backyards or folks living on the beach going out and bringing home horses :p. It would really just break the immersion for me. Likewise, I don’t want a to be neighbors with a Para and then one day they go out a buy some loud barking dogs :/ I am quite a control freak, but I am open to folks being able to live their own lives and do their own thing. That said, I’d prefer for things to not get too crazy.
But, I was wondering how other people felt about this. Do you think Parafolk should be able to acquire pets on their own? Should there be a set of settings involved for pets, or for story progression in general? How do you think story progression should function as a whole?
I think maybe the simplest thing to do, would be creating settings to choose what Paras can and can’t do on their own. Whether that be getting pets, getting certain pets, changing their job, whatever it may be. But what does everyone else think about this?
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[quote quote=8570]Alright, I want to briefly talk story progression. How far do you guys think story progression should effect the towns folks in the game?
Alex has stated that he would like to see Parafolk getting married, having kids, progressing through their jobs/getting new jobs and more all on their own. This of course sounds great and makes sense, and I’d like to see all of this personally. That said, there are some things I’d kind of prefer for them to not be able to do on their own.
For me the big one is the pets. I really wouldn’t like it if Parafolk could go out and get pets on their own. For one thing, I don’t want Parafolk living in suburban neighborhoods with average sized backyards or folks living on the beach going out and bringing home horses :p. It would really just break the immersion for me. Likewise, I don’t want a to be neighbors with a Para and then one day they go out a buy some loud barking dogs :/ I am quite a control freak, but I am open to folks being able to live their own lives and do their own thing. That said, I’d prefer for things to not get too crazy.
But, I was wondering how other people felt about this. Do you think Parafolk should be able to acquire pets on their own? Should there be a set of settings involved for pets, or for story progression in general? How do you think story progression should function as a whole?
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I’ve been mentioning this a lot with story progression in my other ideas but I’d really love to see neighbors move away like they’re not living in the same place the entire life span of our paras active household, if that makes sense? It never really bothered me but I realized that’s also a part of real life people leave and don’t always stay in the same place as they age or for whatever reasons. If the paras are close they could feel sad, if they weren’t they can feel indifferently about it, and vice versa. Maybe even seeing them drive a new car, or wear new clothes everyday. That’d would be really nice to see for story progression with others around me.
I’d like to have other paras I can’t control be able to go out and get their own pets, back to what you mentioned though, yes definitely there needs to be a setting lol. I also ont want my para neighbors riding on horses around the neighborhood. If we have settings I think keeping it to small home friendly pets like:cats, dogs, birds, reptiles, gerbil, fish etc, should be considered small pets
Oh and replaying back on what you mentioned about holidays what if there was an option before we star the game to select to celebrate premade world holidays or not, then each household would have their own calendar to set holidays/events per week or season the families could celebrate?
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@Cakeefeatured On the topic of moving I totally agree. It would be cool to have Parafolk moving throughout the town. Then having to deal with new neighbors. Sadness of old friends leaving, but possibly making new friends. And I would so love gameplay like that.
I don’t know if this would be hard to implement, but I think a section for World Progression/Story Progression in settings would be the best for customization of our own towns. We could choose what the NPCs in the world can and can’t do with toggles.
Examples
“Parafolk in the world can move to new homes” (Yes/No). And if no is selected, they’d stay locked into the home they were initially placed in.
“Parafolk can acquire pet [dogs] [cats] [horses]” With each option being selectable. So if you click off cats and horses, but not dogs, no Paras that didn’t previously have a dog will go out and get any.
With holidays, I know Alex said they’re considering a calendar. If it makes it through, I agree it would make sense to be able to mark on the calendar when a family celebrates a particular holiday. For the rest of the town, perhaps that could be done with a slider to select what percentage of NPCs will celebrate each holiday. So that way you could make a holiday that is universally celebrated, and others that only a few people in town celebrate.
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