It makes me remind the thread https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=657186
Lol.

The thing about Sims 4 packs is that we ALREADY know they're going to be inferior to Sims 2 and Sims 3 packs, but they STILL manage to disappoint. The fact they made an ENTIRE EP centered around two Sims 3 Store premium objects + llamas + overgrown vegetables and called it a day, without adding ACTUAL gameplay baffles me. And the fact everyone is fawning over such a lackluster, featureless pack almost offends me. This NOTHINGNESS is supposed to get us excited? Give me a break...

Ooooooh .... we 'member those things....

Yeah, that release trailer doesn't seem so great now, does it?

People need to learn at some point that EA uses the smoke and mirrors routine extensively to get you to buy their shit. Why do you think they went on and on about a "surprise" being featured in the pack, despite having nothing "unusual" besides talking to and becoming literal best friends with farm animals? Why do you think the animals were featured as the selling point of the pack? Because they're literally the focal point of the entire pack.

I say this over and over. I don't know why anybody is surprised anymore, or continues to shell out cash to EA in the hopes that the next successive packs will somehow be better.

I can’t believe they copied the Journey to batuu mission system. I mean I shouldn’t be surprised. But why does this game need missions?? Especially as Carl shows in his video it doesn’t make any sense why you are doing it in the first place.

Fetch quests shouldn’t be in the sims.

So what is new in this pack? Cows. Llamas, bunnies and chickens, some new recipes and what else?
Because gardening isn’t new, nor is cooking. Cooking “together” looks as if it causes more trouble than it’s worth if Carl’s video is anything to go by.

So they call this an EP now. They made 4 interractable objects (cow, chicken, bird and rabbit holes) and the rest of the EP features are a bunch of texts and quests tied to the actual EP world. Big no thanks!
Festivals and food / shop? stalls make me sick of how redundant they've become.

The thing is it makes you wonder how tiny their budget is, because the surprising part about the trailer was they did NOT cut corners on animations. Usually they're absolutely awful about animating anything because animation is admittedly difficult/expensive, so they just don't. I remember a period around Laundry stuff where every single pack included at least one janky animation that was essentially missing frames.

So now they actually did their job and if we were rating the animations for the pack alone, then it's at the minimum a solid 8/10 (for effort; not saying the animations are omg amazing to watch or anything like that)........aaaaaand that's the pack lol. They made animations and then said "aight I'mma head out" and made seemingly nothing else for the pack. Kids can garden (animations), kids can cook (animation), animals seem fully animation and there don't seem to be glaring limitations, but there's zero gameplay objects beyond the animals, the Gurus spend extensive time talking about OMG NEW COOKING RECIPES and we're all left wondering where the damned content is.

Outside of animals, everything they added was stuff they could do cheaply, but also not well.

Festivals, we’ve already had before.

Oversized crops are gardening, but with special objects. VFX is light work for them.

Picnic baskets are just an object that carries food and it appears on the table. That’s stupidly easy to create and I’m sure a modder could do it.

<struggling to remember what else is in this this>

There’s a new aspiration new traits, and lot trait. We never get those so they really scraped the bottom of the barrel for content.

That’s my biggest gripe about the recent expansion packs: The pack should expand something beyond its immediate scope and there’s something we should be able to do or experience that’s not a direct like to the main theme.

Don’t want to do anything related to a farm? There’s canning (debatable) and a picnic. They didn’t even add a picnic blanket.

Not only that, but they have a limited time purchase incentive.

They can’t even sell the pack with build/buy like they used to because there’s nothing there.

That's the thing. Everyone always went on about, especially early on in its lifespan, about how fluid and expressive TS4's animations are. What people find out is that you can have the best looking animations in the world, but if there's no gameplay to back it up then what's the point?

TS2 and TS3 proved you don't have to have "wild and expressive" animations to have content that you can actually play with. Hell, for TS3 actually, the base game alone recycled some animations from TS2. Know why a lot of people didn't care in that instance? Because it was enough of an upgrade to justify doing things like that.

We're at the almost 7 year mark for TS4, and the selling point for the entire game, emotions, is at best an afterthought nowadays even with the new scared emotion. Instead, we're supposed to be grateful for packs such as this, an expansion pack that expands nothing.

For a person that made a big stink about a farming pack last year or possibly the year before, I find it interesting that Deli can now claim that she's most excited about this pack since Seasons. Talking in a high pitched voice and temporary amnesia only works for those that are into voice pitch changes and temporary amnesia.

https://youtu.be/4BrlgnlhKls?t=60

She'll never learn...

Deli didn’t want farming? (I don’t watch her)
I’ve only watched Carl’s video. When I’m in the mood for over the top screaming and crying I’ll watch a Game changer

Of course because "farming." Many of the players have wanted content even remotely close to farming to a while, but they didn't complete the process. It's just another iteration of gardening - which is technically fine for a farming pack, but they didn't even include actual crops to harvest to even sell as farming. Even the sims 3 store had crops (albeit bugged).

Why convert chicks and cows, but not the actual farming equipment and content?

She spouted her nonsense in Sept of last year. I'm not on Twitter and can't be bothered to search for said nonsense, but there was at least one video about it. Deli and her minions hated the idea, now it's the best pack ever. Ugh!

Excuse Me? FARMS in Sims 4? WHERE?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPSp6KD4AAU

People are allowed to change their opinion. But we all know Deli doesn't have a mind of her own. She says whatever her EA overlords want her to say. I hold her and other Game Changers partly responsible for the state the series is in. Deli, James, Lilsimsie, etc. have all HUGE platforms and can actually convince people (especially young, impressionable people) to buy a lackluster pack and waste their money (or their parents' money more likely). When it's all said and done, I believe they'll realize they caused the franchise an irreparable harm. And when it eventually meets the same fate as SimCity 2013, their channels will be done too.

Honestly? Aside from the depressing lack of build/buy stuff (especially clutter and other deco items) and the fact that the ponds aren't swimmable...I actually don't have a lot to complain about with this one. It's almost everything I would have wanted out of a farming pack (though I was never really clamoring for a farming pack to begin with so my expectations weren't particularly high). This is the second expansion in a row where I'm pretty satisfied....now if we could just work on those game packs

Really my biggest complaint is something that I also had with Cats & Dogs. This was another pack that would have been a perfect opportunity to introduce the concept of finding small animals in the wild and actually making them pets. That was one of my favorite things to do in TS3. Going out and looking for birds, lizards, rodents, etc., and actually like...collecting them. But alas, it looks like the closest we'll ever get to small pets is in that stuff pack that I absolutely refuse to buy.

Does anyone know if the animals clothes can be crafted, or do they need to be purchased?

Animal clothes are purchased stuff.
https://youtu.be/vKA_uSxGcbA?t=883

They don't even tie into the knitting pack? Or the new stitching skill? That's dumb.

For what I've seen the stitching skill is pretty much like painting. You can stitch fixed designs or by reference, just like with the painting skill. You don't stitch new objects / clothes.

Not including sewing with wool this is such a missed opportunity. Using wool only to cross switch? Bye.

BUT I GUESS THAT CAN BE A NEW PACK /s

I found this picture from another sims blog.

Minor point here but I'd love to know the logic behind including stitching as a skill.

"Hey what skill should we include?"
"Knitting 2.0"

Like was this laziness or did some marketing dude see good sales numbers for the knitting pack and decide their fanbase must be REALLY obsessed with knitting specifically (and none of the other features or gameplay of the pack) so they demanded stitching to "boost sales?"

If it's the latter then holy hell they'd be out of touch

I expect stitching is in because they can probably re use animations from knitting. Also when the knitting pack was being voted on wasn't cross stitch an option? I remember crochet was as I had a friend who does that in real life and she wanted that.
So they can kill two birds with one stone and say “look we are listening!” It also appeals to the whole cozy, farming, cottage core vibe and it’s an activity the family can enjoy.

I have to say it’s good they have remembered kids and toddlers in this pack. It only took 7 years for kids to learn to garden. In another 7 they can bike ride if we are lucky!

Except that it may be TOO DANGEROUS for the poor little darlings.

I 'd when they said in the lifestream that children cannot spray for bugs, because of the chemicals. It's true, of course, but if I play a sim who lets seven rented orphans do his gardening, I doubt that sim would care whether his cheap workforce gets exposed to harmful chemicals. And if I play a responsible parent, then that household's children will never use the spray interaction. So there is really no need to not allow it at all, simply make it non-autonomous. Or, better yet, show me why it is a bad idea by adding a couple of strong negative moodlets and a drained energy bar to the interaction. (Same as how bathing in the quarry pond in EL should be handled.)

I'm seriously afraid that at this pace children in Sims 5 will rout automatically to bed at 10:00 sharp, because they need their sleep and that the interacion will be uncancelable.

Yeah the children not being able to use the spray for bugs because danger made me roll my eyes.

The same kids can do laundry and use the tumble drier which may go on fire as they use it. The same kids you never need to call a babysitter for and can leave them all day every day with no parents if that’s your jam. The same kids who can play with light sabers.