The Sims is one of the most successful game franchises ever created but that’s not enough for Electronic Arts: new games slightly based on the Sims concept are being developed and, God help us – a Sims movie will hit the cinemas in the future! Having said that, it’s no wonder to see MySims Kingdom – the result of EA’s desire to expand the franchise and the proof of their determination following a slow start (the original MySims was not really a thrill, right?)
With the new MySims Kingdom for Wii, Electronic Arts changed from ground up the game they offered last year and, happily, they managed to do a better job: MySims Kingdom is enjoyable and charming from the moment you start it – and if you are a fan of the Sims series the thrill will last to the end, so it would be a bad idea to simply ignore it because of last year’s game.
The story in this new title is pretty simple but the overall experience is more focused on storytelling than ever, which brings a bonus to the franchise that completely lacked a story. So, after you create your character as you see fit, you take part in a contest (that can’t be lost) which will make you King Roland’s new Wandolier. In other words, this means that you’ll be given a magic wand and your mission will be that of creating all sorts of things to keep the people in the kingdom happy. This further means that each new area you’ll visit will have its own story.
Along your way, you’ll meet some familiar faces from the previous title – and they will all be needing your help and you’ll have to build, build, build. Because that’s what you will mostly do – proof of the fact that, once again that Electronic Arts just knows that The Sims fans simply love building and creating stuff – even if this eventually becomes repetitive.
You’ll start with some very easy structures but as you’ll advance in MySims Kingdom, you’ll be gifted with complete freedom and lots of elements to use as you see fit: you’ll build all sorts of houses and machines and even complete some brain teasing puzzles in all the provinces of the Kingdom. But things, although charming, are not that simple to achieve: you can’t just start shaking the Wiimote and build! You’ll have to gather all sorts of resources by mining, fishing or treasure hunting or even by chopping trees. At first this is a very fun thing to do – wiggling the Wiimote around and stuff, but after a while it will become repetitive and boring. Thankfully, even though this resource gathering is a very important part of the game, you will only spend up to four-five minutes with the gathering process, which is fair and doesn’t make you throw away the Wiimote in the screen.
Of course, since you’re in a Sims game, you’ll have a lot of socialization to do along your adventure and you’ll soon learn that it will be better if you were kind with the fellow citizens, as they can offer precious information to help with your quests. All in all, interacting with them is nice and charming, with all that Simlish gibbering promising to be a joy for the ears of the fans – and not only, since MySims Kingdom is spiced up by some really humorous comments made by the people around your character.
The overall game is linear, indeed and the quests are repetitive, but you’re offered the illusion of freedom, which is still good – you can go treasure hunting for yourself, whenever you want to, you can enter that recently built house and jump on the bed or prepare a breakfast – you can make the whole experience as long and enjoyable as you wish. Storming through the game and finishing it quickly is an option too, so it all depends on how you wish to approach this family-friendly title.
