The Sims Online

My kids (and to an extent, my wife too) are Sims fanatics. My pc has the original game, plus about 6 add-ons, which cover everything (well, the positive stuff) and more that you'd expect in real live. Then came The Sims Online, which promised to be an extension of the single player game, but with real people instead of bots interacting with the player. So far so good.

Since its release a year or so ago, I decided to read up on how the Sims online experience was developing. My kids are itching to get the Online addon but, as with anything to do with the internet, I thought it best to investigate first. First, I came across The Alphaville Herald, an unofficial online publication which acts as the local newspaper for Alphaville, the primary Sims Online city. The paper reports the major issues affecting players, which you'd think would be 'best wallpaper sources' or 'where to buy new pets'. To my amazement, the online communities activities would seem to be far more sinister than that, with reports concerning Alphaville's Bondage, Discipline & Sadomasochism Community, the Sims Shadow Government and even the alleged harassment of the newspaper by Maxis and EA!

This BBC report summarises the situation so far.