Brief Retrospective of Sim-ness (SimEarth and SimAnt)

[major_kerina]

Not gonna talk about the new PC game from Will Wright, rather I'm gonna take a video look back at the Sim games that really stuck in my thoughts as being amazing...




SimEarth

Shame there isn't a better video of the game itself. But you can see here, there a lot of graphs and things to track with making your biosphere hospitable to life. I loved how it managed to allow you (with the right work) to make squids into a sentient species. @_@ Hold that calamari! The technological effects of each process of development was incredible and engaging and most of my species wound up blasting the planet with their "see ya!" rocket launches or nuking each other to heck. Either way, the game consumed my childhood and imagination. You can control f-ing continental drift! How cool is that?!? It is the ultimate fun/geeky game. From a time where Software Etc. actually existed and they had more than some "SpongeBob Squarepants Teaches Typing" game so far as PC software. I could rant on about the downfall of the really awesome "learning" games and software but I'll leave it at that.



SimAnt

*memories coming back* Omg @_@. The sounds are even more disturbing than I remember. I loved how your ant gets reborn and I especially loved driving the humans out of the house. Seeing how far you could conquer and especially when you managed to get enough together to take down the spider. Ahhh...so satisfying. For the colony! *grins* Beating back the red ants, despite insurmountable odds...I actually imagined that the swarm was converting so it was kinda...proto-zappy feeling.

Comments

[major-kerina.livejournal.com]

*thinks back* Meat-eating plant, right?

[anna-wren.livejournal.com]

lol, and DInos

[major-kerina.livejournal.com]

They were pretty easy to lift to sentience. I think I even got Mollusks to it without the monolith needing to be used. Which was awesome.

One thing I can't recall...were water species based in the sea with their cities or did they have to go on land when they evolved?

[maychanlj.livejournal.com]

I always made the Carniferns the dominant species, plants running around with spears... then they'd exodus and I'd ruin the planet for kicks...

and sim ant... playing sandbox mode as the queen and invading everyone else's colony...

[anna-wren.livejournal.com]

Land I think

[allieflowlight.livejournal.com]

I never played SimEarth. I now think I should. Thank you. ^__^

What version of it is the best?

[eirienlisandrie.livejournal.com]

Last versions they made were for Windows 95 and OS 8/9, so running it on a modern system, the Windows 95 one might be easier, especially given that I'm pretty sure WINE runs it splendidly. they're all the same underlying code, if I recall correcttly thoug.h.

[major-kerina.livejournal.com]

*suddenly remembers that* @_@! That was so fun ^^ <3.

[major-kerina.livejournal.com]

Uh, actually they just get reborn as a little girl (ant).

[aisaku.livejournal.com]

I remember reading about this one in a magazine. Never got to play it. *shrugs* Sounded intriguing at the time, maybe will give it a spin for the sake of it. Your mention of how computer store racks have changed over the time speak of a place where the line between the 'gamer' and 'general computer user' wasn't as blurred. Where someone would give a sim* game a try, today these people are happy enough playing simple flash games.

Thinking about that, there's a fun and somewhat evil game you might have heard of: http://www.crazymonkeygames.com/Pandemic-2.html (ads ahoy, sorry)
Pandemic 2, where you develop a disease with the goal of wiping out the human race.

[major-kerina.livejournal.com]

Yup, seen it and played it to the death of all mankind. It was good ^^ <3.