A Marxist Analysis of The Sims Franchise: How Capitalism Killed the Cash Cow
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- Опубліковано 5 сер 2024
- Once again, I am putting more effort into writing an essay for UA-cam than I am for university; and with that (not)shocker out of the way: I present to you A Marxist Analysis of The Sims Franchise.
In this video, inspired by a comment from Baby Bat on my Sanitisation of The Sims Series video (linked below), I first give a very brief explanation of Marxist theory relating to class and labour, then examine The Sims franchise through a Marxist lens to explore questions like why we have enjoy playing these games so much over the last two decades.
As I mention towards the start of this video, I may be a sociology student, but I am far from being an expert on Marxist theory - but I had a lot of fun writing this video and feel like I learned a lot. If I misunderstood anything, please correct me down below! I hope you enjoy!
Other videos you might like...
The Sims 4: The Sanitisation Of The Sims Series
• The Sims 4: The Saniti...
100 Ways The Sims 4 Could Be Improved (Before The Sims 5 Comes Out)
• 100 Ways The Sims 4 Co...
Why The Sims 4 and Animal Crossing New Horizons Share More In Common Than You Think
• Why The Sims 4 and Ani...
References:
IMF article:
www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/...
Will Wright interview:
www.theage.com.au/national/si...
Bram de Groot's video on The Sims and Capitalism:
• The Sims (2000) as Ant...
Guardian special report:
www.theguardian.com/technolog...
VGC News article:
www.videogameschronicle.com/n...
Videos from SatchOnSims:
• Everything The Sims 4 ...
• Something Strange Is H...
EA's Glassdoor Page:
www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/E...
Chapters
00:00 Welcome To A Marxist Analysis of The Sims Franchise
01:55 Marxism for Beginners
04:36 Where it all started: The Sims 1 and Capitalism
08:39 Why Do We Like To Play The Sims?
11:22 EA Playing The Capitalist: Monetisation of The Sims Series
15:13 EA’s Exploitation of Workers?
18:58 How Capitalism Killed the Cash Cow: Where Does The Profit Go?
21:35 Marxism and The Future of The Sims Series
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That’s why I was pretty annoyed when they announced their “Kits”. My boyfriend even mentioned how expensive expansion packs were, considering how old Sims 4 is . I fear Sims 5 base game will barely come with anything, since they know we will pay for everything
Yes!! Especially how now gameplay kits have disappeared following the total failure of bust the dust!! I have the same bad feeling as you, but I’m of course really hoping it won’t be the case 😭 thanks for taking the time to comment!❤️
Piracy is the answer
I think Kits wher an maxis idea as a compromise for Kits befor ea told them Do Kits no refreshes
Yes ther Outsourcing it to india
Absolutely will. That‘s why I hope The new competitor by the cities skylines ppl will rip EA a new one like they did with city builders. These ppl actually pretty much „stole“ EA‘s city builder fanbase since they developed a game that was 10 times better than Sims city and now cities skylines is pretty much the main player while sims city is dead.
As bleak as it all feels like. There‘s always hope with indies. Even if we indies don‘t have as much manpower or resources. We have passion to make up for it. And love to create. So as long as indies keep making games, there will always be a better alternative. If not better gameplay wise or scope wise, then better in soul and creative passion.
You just gotta look at cities skylines, before your eyes or paralives to see that. Even if the last one isn‘t out yet.
And with the slow shift from triple A praise to indie praise we‘ve seen in the last few years such as with games like Undertale, Hades, Minecraft even (when it was still indie) or that australian animal crossing clone that‘s also fun, there‘s just a matter of time until the big studios crash because of their consumer mistreatment and they‘ll have to atone for their sins in some ways. Cause I genuinely belive that there‘s an end to making the games more and more greedy and lacking. You can only make something bad until you do it too much and ppl will start to get really mad. And we‘re seeing this happening more and more with quite a few games already. Including ofc sims 4 and it‘s increasingly bad and bare bones DLC. Ppl aren‘t having it and with each new audacity ppl grown just a bit more pissed until they‘ll reach a a tipping point. And I‘ll anticipate that like nothing else tbh. Cause they need to pay for this all.
one of the biggest sims 4 problems is that the content isn’t originally thought with the idea to entertain the player with a given theme, but rather to strictly follow a pre-set number of items and gameplay elements for what the price tag is. That’s why most of the elements are pretty shallow and don’t connect with other stuff. it’s also badly implanted because they oftentimes double down on the same gameplay elements, so if you bought something 2 years ago for a specific item, that same item can be found in the next « pack » for no reason. but because it’s 2 different teams they don’t care and now you have two of those items and basically paid twice for it
Thissssss!!!! The re-packaging of the same items / gameplay features which were first meant to be exclusive to one pack has annoyed me to no end. I believe it represents a fundamental lack of creativity and organisation- there are so many features players want in the game, so there is no reason to be recreating the same stuff yet with a slightly different coat of paint on it. Thanks for this comment, I hope you enjoyed the video!🥰
Thissssss!!!! The re-packaging of the same items / gameplay features which were first meant to be exclusive to one pack has annoyed me to no end. I believe it represents a fundamental lack of creativity and organisation- there are so many features players want in the game, so there is no reason to be recreating the same stuff yet with a slightly different coat of paint on it. Thanks for this comment, I hope you enjoyed the video!🥰
@@YasminsCorner also not only the way how ea just makes pack stuff about things that are "trending" in the moment, like tiny houses, star wars, high school, marriage pack in February, ecolife, insteat of making new creative ideas or just fix and add stuff players want for ages or previous games had. They basic just go for the easy money and forget the packs are supposed to be played even after it stops trending
It's insane how there's so many issues for such a high price. There's still an issue with region locking (i couldn't change language to English as my game was region locked to Poland Czech and Russia, ) which i tried to Google how to fix, turns out the same issue was written on ea forums... In 2014.... They still haven't fixed it 😐 so i pirated anadius dlc unlocker since it adds all languages
I agree: yet fans of the series (me included most of the time!) can’t help but buying into it more - therefore signalling to EA that we don’t mind paying for poor quality. That’s crazy to hear, I never knew about that issue! I’m sorry you’re experiencing that 😢 thank you for commenting, I hope you enjoyed the video 🙂
It's so ridiculous how EA gets away with releasing so many insanely expensive, buggy packs which they don't allow to be returned even though they're unplayable. And also the gamebreaking glitches in each new update, not to even mention the constant cashgrabs, and of course the whole general decline in the quality of the entire game... It's infuriating.
Also, this is such a well articulated and thoroughly researched video, just like, wow. 👏🥳
Aw thanks so much for the kind feedback! I totally agree, I really hope the sims 5 will follow a different, more ethical route than sims 4, but we will see 😭❤️
the solution to this is pirating games that release a lot of dlcs
This video is so well done! i love it when people deep dive into the philosophy of video games and you executed it perfectly. You don't need to be a marxist scholar to understand the core values and ideas of the ideology you just need to deliver them well.
Thank you so much for the kind words! I won’t lie I felt a little bit of impostor syndrome / attack of the confidence with this one, so your feedback really means a lot 🥰❤️
Thank you so much for this video! It was even better than I expected ❤️
I'd only correct the part in which you mentioned Marx predicted a communist utopia. In "From utopian to scientific socialism", Marx and Engels state how their philosophy refuses any utopian views. Communism won't be system without contradictions, but will overcome capitalism's contradictions.
Much love and solidarity, comrade 💖 simmers of the world, unite!
In marxism, private property is not about owning a piece of land or owning stuff... It is about owning means of production, which the workers will use to produce and give profit to the burgeois.
Ah thank you for correcting me here, I appreciate it!❤️
@@YasminsCorner ❤️☺️☺️
I want to mark just one singluar thing, as an (almost) marxist scholar myself: we cannot refer to Marx vision as "utopia", - as you do in 5:56 -, mainy because it inquires that, just because it hasn't been applyed yet, marxism is impossibile to apply which is the opposit of its thesis
I'm really hugh so sorry for the mistakes in spellying
Ah thank you for the feedback! When I used ‘utopia’ I was somewhat using it sarcastically given how the oppressive nature of some states working towards communism today, but I didn’t think about it from this perspective: I shall be more careful in the future! Thanks again for the notes, I hope you enjoyed the video!
quick correction: marx didn't claim a revolution would lead to a communist utopia. an important aspect of this line of theory since its conception is precisely that it *isnt* utopic, and marxism-leninism specifically focuses a lot on materialism (as in considering the material causes and effects of things) and what steps can/should be taken in *organizing* the proletariat to make it possible to actually take down capitalism
the monetization wouldn't be a problem if it was actually a good game. i'd happily cough up $30 for every DLC if they had a fraction of inspiration that the sims 2 and 3 had. i have zero expectations for the sims 5 if EA uses the same team.
I completely agree!! As a fan of the series I absolutely want the best for the game. I wish I could have zero expectations for sims 5 like you… but sometimes my naive heart can’t help it 🙈
Advice for simmers who don‘t wanna support EA or are on a budget. Go buy Origin keys for packs they are usually way cheaper and will give u official copy‘s of the dlc via unlocking the product in the official store since keys are usually given to select ppl to review and ppl do frequently sell them hence why you won‘t support EA if you buy em but rather would Upport the key holder who probably got one for free. So u can support another simmer buying a pack from em without any pay for EA wich is great!
The best store that‘s also not as shady for this is Kinguin btw. Try it out yall!
The other option is piracy. Yeah I know. It‘s not very legal. But screw EA. They don‘t care about ethics with how they sell their products so you shouldn‘t either. If you can‘t afford it. Get it via piracy. Just use a cheap cpn if you‘re super paranoid and use a good free antivirus like malwarebytes to be safe. No need to spend over 700 bucks that will mosly just go to rich ghouls that had no hand in the game making process anyways. And if you don‘t wanna hurt the employees. Just donate to em the cash u would‘ve used to get dlc if u really want to.
Part of playing the capitalist‘s game against them is to find backdoors to game access and to refunnel the pay to the people that actually deserve that pay. Even if it‘s just your fellow cc creators if you wanna give these ppl some cash.
Screw EA. Pay the ppl that deserve the pay. And gon‘t let yourself get ripped off. Buy stuff when it‘s on sale and if you do buy, buy from resellers. That way, your support for EA will be cut entirely.
Very interesting and even educational take on The Sims. Great video!
Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed it! :)
Combination of discussing "low IT wages" and PoC Omaima Ghomari being arrested, photographed and searched was a bit jarring. I''m not sure if that was intentional and sarcastic, or random
Great analysis.
loved your analysis!!
Thank you!🥰
EA staff are disgusting profiteering so much from a game played mostly by young girls. For how much they charge they give the bare minimum in quality and rush to release the next thing to sell. It’s all buggy and they don’t fix it because they want to sell more! At this point I’d like to see them go out of business and hope their staff loses their job.
Yes, I agree. I really would like to hope that the vast majority of regular workers at EA are victims in all of this too, and that they would genuinely like to provide consumers with a better product that what they are allowed to with the financial, time and resource restrictions they may be under. Again, connecting to what I said in the video, it’s difficult to make these assumptions without the full picture. I agree with your bottom line though; EA desperately need to step up their game. Thanks for commenting, I hope you enjoyed the video!🥰
I really loved the video, I am very into socialism x capitalism this year because the election this year in brazil (where I live) is basically a huge working class against capitalists (there are also racist and homophobics) fight. The price 1kg of meat is R$50 (more than 2 times of what it was 4 years ago) and the high class (and proletarium who think are rich because earns a little more than the averege) thinks it's okay cause the PIB is getting higher (the richer are getting richer), and this applies to everything, literally.
(this will be quite a long text)
Anyway it got me thinking a lot about my consumism cause I really tend to just spend money in these online games because in mind "I cannot miss it!!!" and I regret it after, the sims really came on the way, especially about the packs, which is what I'm going to talk about, cause I REALLY HAVE A LOT OF THOUGHTS ABOUT EVERY ASPECT OF THIS GAME, and I'm not going to talk of everysingle one of them.
The analysis about "objecsts breaking up" in the begining actually can be use to the game itself and all the packs. All the packs are sold like "YOU REALLY NEED THIS TO IMPROVE OUR GAME" which is basically not true at all. The base game itself is nothing and has a really boring gameplay compared to previous games base games. So the only way people think they can have true fun is buying ALL the packs. I have to say I'm not against DLCs cause when done right they really could improve the game (for me expansion packs must at leat another base game in size), and the fact you can choose what you want and what you don't just makes the choice yours to spend or not the money.
But that's not the case to The Sims 4, all the new gameplay is really really not that developed and doesn't matter how many packs you have the game will still feel unfinished for the lack of content you know it could have. You're buying more to not having that much fun. Also the more I play The Sims the more I realize that I'm playing with the base game mechanics most of the time, almost nothing from the packs, the parts of the packs I play is usually the carreers, maybe aspirations. And with time you notice that most of the expasions packs and things that you really play with is like 10% of all the content that came with it, and 50% is annoying content and gameplays you disable (or wish to disable). So you're paying to play with the base game and get your game to be interrupted and annoyed with stuff you don't want to.
And I mean really play, because one the major things people want the expasion packs is the CAS and Build Mode items, which is something the base game is really lacking, so people buy packs not because they want the gameplay, but they want the items that come with them, and it's quite a general thought that in The Sims 4 is actually more fun to play building and creating sims than actually playing, which is not the case for previous games. Also I'm mentioning the fact that a expasion pack now has not even 50% of content it had 6 years ago, and everything new feels like "it could be so much more, so much bigger, it could have so much more gameplay and animations, but it's the same as the base game with different items".
For example just compare Windernbug with Cooperdale, the City Living festivals and Snowy Scape (empty) festivals. Get to work with Get Famous. All should be the same level of content and it's not. And don't get me wrong this packs adds a lot fo gameplay too, like the snowy sports, the high school, the farming. But are you really gonna play with it or you just want the possibly to play with it? You really want to explore Cooperdale, or you just want to live in a specif lot with a pretty view and landscape? What affects you in the everyday gameplay, the actual gameplay the pack focus or the annoying stuff ou don't want like celebrities interrupting when you are at the night club, neighborhood actions, lifestyles, broken weddings, etc? And I'm talking about expasions packs only, game packs are just broken and you don't play with any game cotent of it (unless you're into occults), stuff packs are just... meh... but people still think they need the pretty items for their house.
In resume, in The Sims 4 the lack of base game content makes people think they NEED all the packs to truly have fun, but what they end up buying is more content with lacking things, with annoying stuff and all the rest you don't acctually play that much, but you want the possibility of having that option, and those specfic clothes and furniture items you like. In the end with the base game (and some cc if you really want some items variety) you can still have a really good time and fun. I actually playing a basegame only let's play now and I'm totally having fun, I do miss some stuff time to time, but that really doesn't stop what I want to do.
I'm talking a lot about all of these, but I don't have that much problem with money in this game. I JUST P1R4TE IT :D lol. Cause one expasion pack is R$200 (remember the price of meat?) and I'm really prefer to eat and pay my bills (this is the only game I do this actually, all the rest is afforfable for me). Also just to say I really have an opinion of how much the media and industry spreaded in US and EU that pirated copys are bad, immoral and full of virus and malware, that people to this days still believe this is all true, when it's actually just the megacorps not wanting to lose money, and in Latin America people have the "culture" to do this because is was the only way to acctually having all these media contents, and everythings is just fine. These past couple years is the first time that all of these media content became accesible and people started to buy the original copies
Sorry for the long text, I really needed to get his out of my head, I'm thinking about the sims and this stuff a lot lately. Also sorry for words I misspelled
Thank you for taking the time to write this comment, I’m sorry it’s taken me a little while to respond: I wanted to make sure I had time to read it thoroughly 🙂 it’s very interesting to learn about the political / social landscapes of places I am unfamiliar with, so thanks for filling me in in some of the issues in Brazil at the moment: I’m sorry to hear how expensive everything is getting, I think we are going through something similar with energy prices here in the UK right now- it’s sad because with the sky-rocketing prices, many vulnerable people can’t afford to keep warm during the winter.
As for the sims, I totally agree with you: the base game is so weak that it subtly compels players to believe they need more to have a fulfilling experience. But instead of achieving that, each new piece of DLC simply makes the puddle wider rather than deeper. I desperately hope this is issue is fixed with the sims 5, but I somehow doubt it will be. Again thanks so much for taking the time to comment and for teaching me some new things, I hope you are keeping well! :)
Hi don't worry about the time to reply, I'm still glad you did it. To be honest, I think it's good they starting making the Sims 5 cause there's no way to fix The Sims 4 anymore, all the packs are limited by what the base game allows to do, and it's not that much. But it's EA, the cash grab won't stop... And btw I'm sso choked about the electricity prices on UK, it's just unbelievable to me something to be that high. And Brazil situation is quite changing now cause we took the facists out of power in the last election in October, an we put the ex presidente that made 12% inflation become 2% in 4 year during 2003 so there's a lot of hope now. Capitalism today is a sh*t and it's getting worse. But in the end we all know.. it's all fault of Margaret thatcher
This is why i fear Sims 5.