Games I Played in December 2025

The Sims 4

EA's Site

So had the month gone differently, I wouldn't even put this game's name as a placeholder for a heading. There's a lot I could say about The Sims 3, but its sequel is its capitalist flaws exaggerated beyond parody. It has advertisements and microtransactions and "FOMO" and so much more slime streaming from its surface the second your stare meets any sign of it. Its inclusivity a marketing tactic to a degree greater (Okay, I don't want to talk about the topic this second half of this sentence was about, but I like the next sentence so :p) Ironically, The Sims has the better opinion of trans people in that comparison. And in the time since its release, EA's reputation as the gaming industry's symbol of greed has only become more extreme, in part due to its recent acquisition. This game's saving grace is not that the base game is free (that's part of the marketing), but that it's so easy to pirate (which doesn't erase the problems, and regretfully I am not providing the instructions how to do so here).

And yet - while it is not the only the game I played at all during December. It is the only one where I don't need more time before finding what I want to say. So then, what additional insights could I possibly have when my disdain for what this software is and represents is so grand?

There was absolutely a version of this post where I tried to describe playing this game during the approach of winter. But I found myself just describing a popular playstyle that I honestly wasn't entirely committed to during December anyways since I had another save that I wasn't even going to mention. The one aspect I actually had something to say about was how the plethora of small goals the game is eager to throw at you gave me constant direction, and then I realized I was constantly chasing goal posts unrelated to my actual ideas for play.

There are checklists for your sims getting promoted, a task for them to do between every work shift, multiple checklists for their aspirations with each item on the list keeping its own count, every holiday has a checklist, you have to follow a checklist for your sims to have a successful date. And this doesn't have to be a bad thing, but that "constant direction" I mentioned earlier was not my own ideas and following twists that arrived as I played in a life-sim sandbox, it was checking off boxes. While it's not as if you are pointed to buy more game content in order to check off lists in front of you, this flattening of the experience does feel tied into the monetization. "If you get bored of doing the same thing over and over, try buying new checklists!"

That's a very cynical perspective, and it's not as if these small goals completely removed the sandbox I come to these games to sit and play in. But it is telling that after having the in-game achievement for playing that save file for 24 hours (that's counting playtime in January as well, but ouch) a lot of my current thoughts for several households is their current progress through different checkboxes.

If you enjoy the Sims 4, more power to you. Hell, I wouldn't have played it so much if I truly hate it. But I do think it gets harder to look past the circumstances surrounding its existence with each passing year. I think for what I play next, I'll follow my own checklist.