The Evolution of the Sims Games

For a game that was first released in 2000, The Sims has enjoyed a great deal of longevity. Created by the same company behind SimCity, The Sims took the city-building strategy game
a step further and focussed on building people's lives instead of a high-population city.

The Sims enjoyed instant success, selling more than six million copies in its first two years - an achievement that made it the best selling PC game of all time. Its later incarnations, The Sims 2 and The Sims 3 have enjoyed similar success.

With a multitude of awards under its belt, it's impressive that such a simple concept has gone so far over the last decade. But when reflected on, against our society of Big Brother addicts, perhaps it's not so strange that one of the most popular games of all time is all about spying on other people's daily lives.

Each game in the series follows the same idea: the player must build lives for the characters they create in a simulated world. They build their houses, provide them with careers and aspirations and shape their personalities. From there, the player must provide simple upkeep and ensure their characters (known as Sims) are going about their lives in the correct way.

The strategy of the game comes into play here as players must make sure that their Sims remain physically fit and psychologically happy, going to their jobs and making enough money to pay their bills and to purchase food and so on. The game becomes harder when the player creates larger families or builds more Sims houses in the neighbourhood.

Most of the fun in playing The Sims simply involves sitting back and watching them going about their daily lives and this voyeuristic act forms the most entertaining aspect of the game for many players, and some will purposefully put obstacles into the lives of their Sims just to see how they'll react.

This form of entertainment can also be further enhanced through the addition of "expansion packs" which allow the game to reach out into larger areas, such as allowing your Sims to go on vacation or take each other out on dates.

The Sims has evolved a lot over the years, with each incarnation including more features and of course, better graphics. Its innovation only increases as each new title is released and the addition of expansion packs enhances the game a lot further.

The Sims 3 is the latest in the list and is bound to keep players amused for hours - so if you've always wondered what it'd be like to truly spy on the neighbours you can now create your own story and watch the developments unfold!