Dat is een vraag die de Engelstalige IGN zich ook heeft gesteld en ze hebben goed gekeken naar de releases voor Sims 1 en Sims 2. Het hele artikel vindt je op deze pagina van IGN.
De eerste geruchten over een uitbreiding doen al lang de ronde: het zou een uitbreiding worden voor banen en hobbies maar daar is door het Sims 3 team nog geen woord over losgelaten, ook niet over Sims 3 Stuff Packs. IGN verwacht de eerste uitbreiding begin 2010: ik denk dat dat eerder herfst 2009 gaat worden.
As you can see, there are some similarities across The Sims and The Sims 2. Hot Date and Nightlife introduced downtown areas. Then again The Sims 3 already has a “downtown” area that you can visit, but it could be fleshed out. After all, where are the night clubs? Animal companions are also a theme across both The Sims and The Sims 2 with Unleashed and Pets, and that seems like an obvious course. Meanwhile, vacations seem to be a trend with Vacation and Bon Voyage.
It’s worth noting that The Sims 3 already has some of the content that was introduced in these expansions, such as gardening and fishing. Meanwhile, it’s possible to head for the beach in either town in The Sims 3, though Riverview’s beach is nowhere near as spectacular as Sunset Valley’s. Plus, The Sims 3 is very different in scale than its predecessors; mainly in that you can go anywhere in town without hitting a load screen. So does that mean if there’s a University-type expansion for The Sims 3 then all the new university buildings get incorporated into an existing town, or will there be the need to create an entirely new neighborhood or town?
Finally, EA now has a delivery system capable of introducing new content apart from expansions. The Sims 3 Store is already up and running, and odds are that you’ve already spent some (if not all) of the 1,000 SimPoints that EA gifted you by registering. You can buy more, of course, at the rate of about $1 for 100 SimPoints, plus taxes. But the store is a way to purchase new items, clothing, hairstyles, and more from EA. We can imagine the store supplementing the expansion packs, but not replacing them. After all, the expansions have been extremely lucrative for EA, judging from the way The Sims has dominated the sales charts for most of the past decade. Why go away from them now?