Presented by EA Game Changeres
Let’s not sugarcoat it – Del Sol Valley, the world that we’re getting with The Sims 4 Get Famous is the biggest missed opportunity that we’ve had in a while.
During Sims Camp I had a chance to test out The Sims 4 Get Famous Expansion Pack and see what it has to offer. During that time I was surprised by the amount of new gameplay, fame & reputation tech and all the possibilities that the pack has to offer. The only problem? Its world is the smallest residental world we’ve got with a Sims 4 Expansion Pack thus far.
With only 2 neighborhoods that come with 3 residental lots each it’s a shame to see a big pack like this get trapped inside such a small space. Sure, you can turn any of the venues from Starlight Boulevard into a residental lot but is it really worth it removing even a single lot from a world that comes with only 11 editable lots in total?
Before I dig into the problem why Del Sol Valley has so much wasted potential (even though by just looking at the map alone tells a lot) let’s just take a quick look at all the residental worlds we’ve gotten through Sims 4 Expansion Packs. Get to Work is going to be excluded from the entire story considering it brought a playable Neighborhood (planned originally for venues) + 3 neighborhoods that you can access through active careers.
Windenburg definitely set whole new standards and even beat the Base Game worlds with its massive size. This world still manages to hold the trophy for the biggest world we’ve received in a game thus far.
Then we have San Myshuno – another world which, although had less lots than Windenburg – still managed to beat Windenburg in terms of the amount of liveable space considering it had a few apartments that had 2-4 different blocks.
And last there’s Brindleton Bay – a rather decent world with 16 lots and more than enough space in each neighborhood for your Sims (and Pets) to explore.
So, why is Del Sol Valley a disappointment?
The answer to that question lies within the fact that each of these 3 neighborhoods have way too many details but way too less space for your Sims. Developers also added a full-on beach on the Map that you would think you’d be able to travel to it (or even get close to it) but it’s just there to give into the faux LA / Hollywood vibe. The world is even at that point where you would think that a house across an editable lot is liveable but NOPE – it’s a very detailed faux house shell with a lush garden and objects placed outside.
I thought that faux apartment buildings that we got in San Myshuno would bother me…
But little did I know that 2 years later we would get this:
Yes, it’s an acual shell that’s just 5 steps away from both lots nearby that you can’t even access.
Now, don’t get me wrong – each of these 3 neighborhoods look magnificent and the attention to every little detail is remarkable. But faux homes and spaces that could’ve gone and assigned to more empty lot spaces just become so frustrating.
While playing with the world at Sims Camp in London I wasn’t too happy with it but I generally didn’t mind it considering that the new gameplay and items that come with this pack were too distracting for me to focus too much on the world’s small size.
Most of the community members share the same thought about the world. The majority of comments on my World Overview video all share the same opinion.
I also went to Twitter and asked our followers about their thoughts on Del Sol Valley. Here’s how they responded:
I love it. It’s beautiful. Really spot on- I think I could see Century City from the hill. Lol. I like the larger lot sizes as well very much-that said I would have really liked about twice as many lots or an apartment tower imported from CL.
— 🏳️🌈Jason Anthony Sterling #EAGameChanger (@Jasonsterling70) October 23, 2018
Cute world, it’s what I wanted but it’s too small and the cars are overkill.
— (un)OFFICIAL CHELSEA LAGASSE NEWS (@timr0dd) October 23, 2018
Tiny but beautiful 🤣😭 pic.twitter.com/hpaqYi0R3r
— Yorkie 👻🎮 (@TheYorkieLad) October 23, 2018
Wasted potential of possible big city. Instead we’ve got a village with lots of fake backgrounds.
— Ludvik 🇨🇿🇪🇺 (@imludvik) October 23, 2018
The empty shells (as you mentioned) are rather aggravating😂😂
— Lexie (@lexiestevens112) October 23, 2018
it’s cute, could’ve been MUCH better, not just 3 lots per neighborhood pic.twitter.com/VFNhBcJKBt
— ً (@fentyknew) October 23, 2018
I think its kinda small for the price, but the sims team have to do what they need
— its_swiftie1989 (@ISwiftie1989) October 23, 2018
It looks very lived in and detailed, but it feels a bit cruel seeing so many cars that we can’t drive. Also, I was expecting an LA-inspired world to be much bigger. We haven’t had a new livable world in a year and that’s what we’re getting.
— Julian/Iron Seagull (@Iron_Cgull) October 23, 2018
SimGuruKate has addressed the concern about Del Sol Valley and pointed out the fact that the main reason for a small amount of lots is because they wanted to balance out the general performance of The Sims 4 and that they’re constantly trying to improve the game’s mechanism.
I’ve seen a good number of folks asking/commenting about the smaller size of Del Sol Valley. The simple answer to this is that as we create more and more packs we have to be very thoughtful about game performance and this includes the number of lots/Sims.
— Kate 🔜 TwitchCon (@SimGuruKate) October 22, 2018
However, what does this mean for the future of worlds that we’re gonna get in the game? She said that we shouldn’t necessarily worry about the upcoming worlds and use Del Sol Valley a a start of the lot number decay in future worlds.
Not necessarily. But it definitely becomes a balancing act. And our amazing engineers are constantly at work on optimizing and improving performance.
— Kate 🔜 TwitchCon (@SimGuruKate) October 22, 2018
Del Sol Valley is just one of the features that make this Expansion Pack among many other features that we’re getting in the game. Still, at least a few more empty lots would be enough for me not to write this article.
What are your thoughts on Del Sol Valley?
Completely agree with this article, although I definitely understand Kate’s point of view, too, and appreciate her talking to us about why Del Sol Valley is so small.
I think a good solution to that is they release an empty world in January as they did with the new crest. I feel that this world had a lot of potential, but it was little explored. We could receive an empty world but with the same footprint of the del sol valley with California vibes and new lots!
I really do want a new world like newcrest. Or a few small worlds with different surroundings. I think that would be well received by the community. Maybe a city one where we can build apartments that function similar behavioral functions like in city living. I’m mostly saving this world for the higher leveled celebrities I’ve got planned to use for this EP.
Jeez who cares, don’t buy it then. That’ll show’em. >_>
People are allowed to have and express their disappointments because – shocker – no game is 100% perfect.
It’s not so much of a disappointment as it is wasted potential, they could have easily given us a beach/pier with a few beach houses but they are probably saving it for another pack…
I thought they’d save that for a tropical game pack introducting mermaids and ocean swimming. They are aware from that recent poll mermaids are popular and they’ve also discussed swimming in open areas ( for furture shipped worlds).
I was surprised at the number of lots since this is an EP and not a GP. However, I am more disappointed in a lack of beach lots. You can’t have a world with a faux beach and it be about celebrities. Celebrities thrive on the beach. Plus where is the fishing. I’ve come to expect tons of fishing lots and new fish with EPs.
I wish they would make some beach lots available, especially muscle beach.
One thing that I keep running into again and again is the lack of a CAW tool that allows the community to make its own worlds. With Sims 2 and 3, any frustrations we were feeling about the Maxis-made worlds could be solved by simply making our own. With Sims 4, we don’t have that option, or any other option to expand our sims’ universe. I find myself using the same lots over and over again, because I like them, and because they’re one of the very few lots that meet my needs for my play style. This problem is only exacerbated by the tiny, tiny worlds. Here’s a fun fact — if you add up all the lots available in all the livable worlds, including Forgotten Hollow and Newcrest, you come up with 120 lots. Just as a reminder, Sunset Valley in Sims 3 shipped with 92 lots. That means that we’re only 28 lots over what we had with base game Sims 3.
Lets be real here, the sims team don’t really care what we really think. If they do, they would had done something in the previous packs with all the. They think they are right all the time which is just no.
*with all the feedback
Lol if they dont care a lot of the feature that we have now wont even exist.
I’m lucky I saved in 2017′ games sgr file. With new content comes degenerating sgr files to improve performance. All this talk about performance restrictions will hurt the future of this version of the SIMS> 2GPU 4K GAMERS like me really aren’t worried because I voluntarily max out all my 3d settings to give the game more realism and i still have animation fps headroom
At this point, I care if every world is just one giant shell with a single routable surface, as long as there are functional objects for characters to interact with, autonomously, throughout the environment. The number of lots is irrelevant, since there’s nothing to use any of the venue types for.
*don’t care.
“Performance” doesn’t hold a single drop of water when the game doesn’t load any lots or neighborhoods other than your own.
If Maxis absolutely couldn’t do more than 3 lots per neighborhood, FINE I GUESS, but while I’m in Mirage Park, the game isn’t loading the Pinnacles. So why not an additional neighborhood? Additional neighborhoods have ZERO effect on performance, since they effectively don’t exist when your Sim isn’t IN them.
I thinks nothing would happened to the game if there’d be bit more usable space, not to mention the beach….
I’m so tired of them flat out lying about why they do the things they do. It has absolutely nothing to do with performance because the whole reason we have loading screens in Sims 4 is so that online lot is loaded at a time. It doesn’t matter how many other lots are in a neighborhood or world because none of that is being loaded at the same time. It’s literally just because the pack was rushed and this was all they could make in the time given. Honestly.
I agree that this new world is too small and I thank you for this article. But what I’m also expecting from a journalist is a rather investigative approach to SimGuruKate’s statement that it’s about performance. Don’t just spread other people’s words but also reflect them and tell us what you think about them.
Therefore:
Jovan, do you find the statement realistic that Del Sol Valley is so small because the team wanted to avoid performance problems?
Thank you.
I think the world is so small because they also had to design a separate neighborhood for the Acting career workplace, no? In the same way that Get to Work only came with a single neighborhood to live in because they had to make separate neighborhoods for its careers.
It’s a shame they focused so much on backdrops and empty shells. They look nice but once I start playing, I look at the places my sims can use, the rest doesn’t matter.
And what bothers me most: when you add a beach to the map overview, people expect to be able to go there. It’s nice they want to show the studio’s in the overview. But with the limited amount of lots, it feels like the studio representation on the map is taking up to much space. Space which could have been used for an additional neighbourhood or more lots.
I like my sims to hang around in the neighbourhood they live in. So I really like to have 4 or 5 lots per neighbourhood so I can have 2 or 3 families live there and a public place for them to go to. For the Pinnacles I understand to have only 3 lots, it is exclusive after all. But the other residential neighbourhood could have done with 2 additional lots.
I’m surprised by the performance explanation. I believed the entire point of loading screens was so not every lot had to be loaded at once into the game. Of course if they fill all housing lots with premade sims, we have more sims in our games. But why not more empty houses/lots if the number of sims is the problem. Just making worlds smaller and smaller from now on makes me wonder if the worlds in the next EP’s will still be worth it.
“I believed the entire point of loading screens was so not every lot had to be loaded at once into the game.”
That’s exactly why I believe the performance explanation is garbage. Seems like whether or not the game has a plethora of loading screens has much less bearing on performance than the Sims team wants us to believe.
Well in my opinion you do have a good point though. I’m kind of a person who prefers to focus more on the gameplay and new objects or outfits. But one thing I do miss in the sims 4 is the beach. But anyway it is what it is. the new world doesn’t really bother me cause every new expansion pack I got that comes with a new world I never made my sim live there (except city living love those apartments). but I do travel a lot to the worlds often though.
I’m not good at commenting lol forgive me I’m new to this
Well I like del sol valley. I don’t need a lot lots because I have mostly just one family in a savegame. And if they aren’t famous or want to be famous they wont live there either. No disappointment to me. 🙂
This “perfomance” excuse is really getting on my nerves!
I mean if people playing with a microwave can’t get a decent pc then i highly doubt they would buy the entire serie (and so would i if that “performance bla bla” lie is mentionned one last time)
Don’t get me wrong i’m not saying that some people can have performance issues that we had with sims 3 games but with the number of PLAYABLE worlds we got and the lack of open world in this game i can seriously deny the fact that this game couldn’t run on even the lowest device
SO PLEASE SIMS TEAM stop with that lie i’m sure you won’t risk the name of this game franchise just for a bunch of microwaves that can’t run a game as poor in content (compared to the other sims games) like the Sims 4
I rather have a smoother performing game to be honest. Cause with the sims 3 game lag it drove me insane.
I kinda like this little world its cute In my opinion
It is indeed! That’s why that “performance” excuse doesn’t stand to me
Sims 3 had its own issues (like every game ever), but interestingly, most of the lag stopped when I stopped trying to play it on a computer with the minimum standards for it.
I don’t mind it honestly. Vampire pack only had 4 lots. I like that there is more detail in the surroundings and I personally don’t use every lot as tend to stick to one household at a time. Also I feel with what they are doing for the pack, I would hate if it was a big world and laggy or glitchy because of the pack. The world is beautifully done and am pleased, no matter the size
Vampire was a Pack. this is an Expansion. Double the price, not twice as nice.
It is possible that this was a game pack and at the last minute it has been transformed into expansion to get more money.
And singers, models, directors, tv presenters???
IMO the “Its smaller for performance issues” is a total crock of shit. These are expansions, not game packs. Sure if you own all the content/expansions, your game might be a bit slower cause of all the households (Though don’t quite get why, as it is not an open world like Sims 3, but It adds less value to the expansion pack itself .
Won’t be getting this, and any further content (and for that matter content i do not currently own) if this is the trend forward.
Quite frankly screw the potato computer people. If you want them all invest in your machine because the franchise is suffering pandering to low performance systems
Honestly, I agree with this. Technology advances fast, so those people will eventually have to catch up anyway. I worked a minimum part-time job and saved up money to buy a desktop set-up (after having a laptop for five years). If you’re trying to keep up using a 15 year old computer, you’re going to have more struggles than potentially missing out a game.
Well maybe the most fastest way to make a big world is just throw everyone at the sea and let they build waterborne house. With glass basement it may fun to build house on water and watch fish under it throught basement glass wall.
Welcome to EA! xD
At this point, this really shouldn’t be a surprise and, rather, it should be an expectation of EA. Remember how apartments in San Myshuno turned out to have less build customization than apartments of Sims 2? Or that the “big” city itself is mostly a background? Personally, I find it more shocking if EA meets the smallest of expectations. Falling short is their routine when it comes to Sims 4.
The “performance” excuse has gotten really old, this game can run on any potato. They’re dumbing it down enormously just so a small group of people at the bottom of the gaming spectrum can run it, and that means there’s nothing to do for the rest of us. Shameful.
I like Del Sol Valley, I just honestly want skateboards in the game but i love the new world coming and the features.
Lol, cutting corners as per usual.
Kate’s answer is complete bull. Why would adding lots potentially damage the game’s performance when the lots in the game are loaded one at a time? This isn’t an open world game like the Sims 3 in which every lot had to be loaded at once.
I’ve been making the most of Del Sol Valley. I don’t think Starlight Boulevard was made well honestly. But after editing the park, the museum, changing Orchid a Go Go to a night club and changing the gym to a restaurant, I now feel it’s a nice place to hang out.
I was surprised at the number of lots since this is an EP and not a GP. However, I am more disappointed in a lack of beach lots. You can’t have a world with a faux beach and it be about celebrities. Celebrities thrive on the beach. Plus where is the fishing. I’ve come to expect tons of fishing lots and new fish with EPs.
I wish they would make some beach lots available, especially muscle beach.
I think a good solution to that is they release an empty world in January as they did with the new crest. I feel that this world had a lot of potential, but it was little explored. We could receive an empty world but with the same footprint of the del sol valley with California vibes and new lots!
I really do want a new world like newcrest. Or a few small worlds with different surroundings. I think that would be well received by the community. Maybe a city one where we can build apartments that function similar behavioral functions like in city living. I’m mostly saving this world for the higher leveled celebrities I’ve got planned to use for this EP.
Jeez who cares, don’t buy it then. That’ll show’em. >_>
People are allowed to have and express their disappointments because – shocker – no game is 100% perfect.
Lets be real here, the sims team don’t really care what we really think. If they do, they would had done something in the previous packs with all the. They think they are right all the time which is just no.
Lol if they dont care a lot of the feature that we have now wont even exist.
*with all the feedback
At this point, I care if every world is just one giant shell with a single routable surface, as long as there are functional objects for characters to interact with, autonomously, throughout the environment. The number of lots is irrelevant, since there’s nothing to use any of the venue types for.
*don’t care.
One thing that I keep running into again and again is the lack of a CAW tool that allows the community to make its own worlds. With Sims 2 and 3, any frustrations we were feeling about the Maxis-made worlds could be solved by simply making our own. With Sims 4, we don’t have that option, or any other option to expand our sims’ universe. I find myself using the same lots over and over again, because I like them, and because they’re one of the very few lots that meet my needs for my play style. This problem is only exacerbated by the tiny, tiny worlds. Here’s a fun fact — if you add up all the lots available in all the livable worlds, including Forgotten Hollow and Newcrest, you come up with 120 lots. Just as a reminder, Sunset Valley in Sims 3 shipped with 92 lots. That means that we’re only 28 lots over what we had with base game Sims 3.
I thinks nothing would happened to the game if there’d be bit more usable space, not to mention the beach….
I agree that this new world is too small and I thank you for this article. But what I’m also expecting from a journalist is a rather investigative approach to SimGuruKate’s statement that it’s about performance. Don’t just spread other people’s words but also reflect them and tell us what you think about them.
Therefore:
Jovan, do you find the statement realistic that Del Sol Valley is so small because the team wanted to avoid performance problems?
Thank you.
Completely agree with this article, although I definitely understand Kate’s point of view, too, and appreciate her talking to us about why Del Sol Valley is so small.
“Performance” doesn’t hold a single drop of water when the game doesn’t load any lots or neighborhoods other than your own.
If Maxis absolutely couldn’t do more than 3 lots per neighborhood, FINE I GUESS, but while I’m in Mirage Park, the game isn’t loading the Pinnacles. So why not an additional neighborhood? Additional neighborhoods have ZERO effect on performance, since they effectively don’t exist when your Sim isn’t IN them.
I think the world is so small because they also had to design a separate neighborhood for the Acting career workplace, no? In the same way that Get to Work only came with a single neighborhood to live in because they had to make separate neighborhoods for its careers.
It’s not so much of a disappointment as it is wasted potential, they could have easily given us a beach/pier with a few beach houses but they are probably saving it for another pack…
I was surprised at the number of lots since this is an EP and not a GP. However, I am more disappointed in a lack of beach lots. You can’t have a world with a faux beach and it be about celebrities. Celebrities thrive on the beach. Plus where is the fishing. I’ve come to expect tons of fishing lots and new fish with EPs.
I wish they would make some beach lots available, especially muscle beach.
I thought they’d save that for a tropical game pack introducting mermaids and ocean swimming. They are aware from that recent poll mermaids are popular and they’ve also discussed swimming in open areas ( for furture shipped worlds).
I’m lucky I saved in 2017′ games sgr file. With new content comes degenerating sgr files to improve performance. All this talk about performance restrictions will hurt the future of this version of the SIMS> 2GPU 4K GAMERS like me really aren’t worried because I voluntarily max out all my 3d settings to give the game more realism and i still have animation fps headroom
I’m so tired of them flat out lying about why they do the things they do. It has absolutely nothing to do with performance because the whole reason we have loading screens in Sims 4 is so that online lot is loaded at a time. It doesn’t matter how many other lots are in a neighborhood or world because none of that is being loaded at the same time. It’s literally just because the pack was rushed and this was all they could make in the time given. Honestly.
Well I like del sol valley. I don’t need a lot lots because I have mostly just one family in a savegame. And if they aren’t famous or want to be famous they wont live there either. No disappointment to me. 🙂
I don’t mind it honestly. Vampire pack only had 4 lots. I like that there is more detail in the surroundings and I personally don’t use every lot as tend to stick to one household at a time. Also I feel with what they are doing for the pack, I would hate if it was a big world and laggy or glitchy because of the pack. The world is beautifully done and am pleased, no matter the size
Vampire was a Pack. this is an Expansion. Double the price, not twice as nice.
This “perfomance” excuse is really getting on my nerves!
I mean if people playing with a microwave can’t get a decent pc then i highly doubt they would buy the entire serie (and so would i if that “performance bla bla” lie is mentionned one last time)
Don’t get me wrong i’m not saying that some people can have performance issues that we had with sims 3 games but with the number of PLAYABLE worlds we got and the lack of open world in this game i can seriously deny the fact that this game couldn’t run on even the lowest device
SO PLEASE SIMS TEAM stop with that lie i’m sure you won’t risk the name of this game franchise just for a bunch of microwaves that can’t run a game as poor in content (compared to the other sims games) like the Sims 4
I rather have a smoother performing game to be honest. Cause with the sims 3 game lag it drove me insane.
I kinda like this little world its cute In my opinion
Sims 3 had its own issues (like every game ever), but interestingly, most of the lag stopped when I stopped trying to play it on a computer with the minimum standards for it.
It is indeed! That’s why that “performance” excuse doesn’t stand to me
Well in my opinion you do have a good point though. I’m kind of a person who prefers to focus more on the gameplay and new objects or outfits. But one thing I do miss in the sims 4 is the beach. But anyway it is what it is. the new world doesn’t really bother me cause every new expansion pack I got that comes with a new world I never made my sim live there (except city living love those apartments). but I do travel a lot to the worlds often though.
I’m not good at commenting lol forgive me I’m new to this
IMO the “Its smaller for performance issues” is a total crock of shit. These are expansions, not game packs. Sure if you own all the content/expansions, your game might be a bit slower cause of all the households (Though don’t quite get why, as it is not an open world like Sims 3, but It adds less value to the expansion pack itself .
Won’t be getting this, and any further content (and for that matter content i do not currently own) if this is the trend forward.
Quite frankly screw the potato computer people. If you want them all invest in your machine because the franchise is suffering pandering to low performance systems
Honestly, I agree with this. Technology advances fast, so those people will eventually have to catch up anyway. I worked a minimum part-time job and saved up money to buy a desktop set-up (after having a laptop for five years). If you’re trying to keep up using a 15 year old computer, you’re going to have more struggles than potentially missing out a game.
It is possible that this was a game pack and at the last minute it has been transformed into expansion to get more money.
And singers, models, directors, tv presenters???