Sims 2 Store live today, microtransactions abound
by Alexander Sliwinski 
{ Jun 30th 2008 at 7:00PM }
*turns on Simlish to English translator*
Better? Good! EA announced that its Sims 2 Store is now live for US and Canadian shoppers. The online retail location practices the fine art of micro transactions by offering items available in Sims 2 expansion packs and "all-new exclusive" content.
The store works by converting real money into "SimPoints" at an exchange rate of $1 for 100 SimPoints, and most items we saw appear to be between 75 - 100 SimPoints. Sims 2 fans can decide for themselves if it's worth micro-transactioning through the Sims 2 Store or picking up the full expansions at retail. The store seems like the type of thing that's perfect if your Sim just needs to have that new shower head and nothing else.
[Via BigDownload]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
sinai @ Jun 30th 2008 7:05PM
to the editors of joystiq, engadget, et al.
Let's quit calling these a PR-friendly "microstransaction" and call them for what they really are "nickel-and-dimes." The uglier we make these sound, the more aware the public will be, and hopefully, the less likely publishers are willing to nickel and dime us.
Sims 2 Store live today; nickel and diming abound!
BigD145 @ Jul 1st 2008 1:23AM
Sing it!! Scream it from the highest rooftops.
Brock @ Jun 30th 2008 7:20PM
I wish i was that dude's hand (brown jacket).
Nick the Hero of Canton @ Jun 30th 2008 7:27PM
The majority of us Simmers (yeah, we call ourselves that. I guess we won't be taken seriously now? =p) are, quite bluntly, sick of EA's bullshit.
Titanium_Orchid @ Jun 30th 2008 7:29PM
Easier than selling crack to crackheads
KonohaShinobi @ Jun 30th 2008 7:29PM
aren't they about to release Sims 3?
GenBanks @ Jun 30th 2008 7:33PM
Meh... EA come up with lots of evil ingenious ways of making money but just like many of their games, their evil master plans are half-assed botched attempts.
If I was in charge of EA I'd go much further; I'd have people log in to play the Sims (like World of Warcraft), and then have people make micro transactions from within the game when they want to get new stuff. You would be able to set up a direct debit to give you a certain number of points to spend, or you could buy the points a la carte. All of the furnishings that people can buy would be tied into advertising deals with Ikea, Habitat, etc.
I'm not saying it's a good thing, but I'm just annoyed that all of EA's attempts at digital distribution are such inconvenient fails:
*Your digital purchases aren't backed up permanently like they are with steam
*You have to buy insurance to extend your download period
*These micro transaction things will probably be a hassle to bring into the game
If EA weren't so full of crap they could pull off such negative things as micro transactions without annoying the hell out of me. But they fail.
I'm in a really bad mood tonight :(
Massmass @ Jun 30th 2008 8:05PM
So, are they testing the ground for nickel and diming in Sims 2 to see if they can entirely eliminate free user created content for Sims 3?
To me, one of the biggest draws in the Sims series was the custom content. You know, when it was free...
Another EA acquired series takes a step towards oblivion.
pikelet @ Jun 30th 2008 10:28PM
If they want to eliminate free custom content from the community, they have another thing coming.
EA didn't support it very well for the Sims 2 - they only provided tools for making clothing and walls/floors - , but the community SimPE http://sims.ambertation.de/en/ , which is a pretty hardcore data editor and makes almost anything possible. At this point it even allows custom animations and object interactions to be created, which is pretty amazing considering EA never released any documentation for the SimAntics coding language interactions are based on.
I don't really think the Sims community gets credit for the modding they do. It may be a 'casual game', but one look at some of the modifications available for the game and how they were created proves that there's some serious work going into this game from it's players.
As long as the modding community for the Sims 3 is as dedicated as the one for the Sims 2 has been, then free custom content will be just as huge a part of the game. EA is not stupid enough to completely block user content, and if they did try, I have no doubt that it would quickly be circumvented.
What they are trying to do here is to drive paysites out of business - charging for items created for the Sims 2 and distributed in EA's .package format isn't allowed under the EULA (see: http://paysites.mustbedestroyed.org for the position the majority of the community holds), but EA has been slack about it. Now that they have their own ministore, they have a reason shut down ripoff merchants like Peggy http://www.peggyzone.com/html/index.html
I honestly don't think the Sims community is going to take well to this, though.
Amanda @ Jul 1st 2008 2:33AM
I think it's an alternative for all those fans who don't want to spend $20 on a pack of items when they really only want 1-5 items from that set.
Meh, I'm not buying it but I'm sure there is a market for it or EA probably wouldn't do it.