EA released a rather lengthy 30-question Q&A that focuses on The Sims 3. Here's just a small sample for your reading pleasure:
13.How has player feedback impacted changes you have implemented for The Sims 3?
We're all fans of The Sims, and a lot of our team worked on The Sims and The Sims 2, so player feedback is built into our team. We also spend a lot of time interacting with members of The Sims community around the world. I don't think the game would be what it is without The Sims community. Fans have always wanted more interaction with a community of Sims. If you think about it, The Sims is the most detailed depiction of contemporary life to be presented in a work of fiction, but half of life was missing. In The Sims 3, we’ll let you explore the other half of life that happens when you are not at home.
14.How do the 'new personalities' work?
There are over 70 personality traits that players can choose from. When you choose traits they are represented as a simple word that you might use to describe someone you know so it’s easy to understand what they will do in the game. What makes traits so powerful is that they can change the game in profound ways. You’ll see different behaviors, interactions, advantages and goals depending on the traits that your Sims display. Just to name a few examples of more extreme traits, you can let your Sims be Insane, Evil, Kleptomaniac, Paranoid, Brave, Hates Kids, Genius and more.
15.What challenges did you face in the creation of The Sims 3?
Working to tune the AI so that the people who live in your town have lifelike behavior. Over time, all of The Sims in the town grow and develop, and it takes an impressive amount of tuning to make this work just right. I think that people are used to seeing lots of other characters in a game world, but they’ve never seen a game world where every character is being motivated by unique personality traits and motives like The Sims 3. Another thing we’re working on is a feature called Create A Style which allows players to customize just about everything, from clothing to furniture to cars. We want players to be able to change the game like our artists can. The interface is really powerful and we want to make it perfect.
Feel free to read over the other 27 questions and answers over at Kotaku.
We're all fans of The Sims, and a lot of our team worked on The Sims and The Sims 2, so player feedback is built into our team. We also spend a lot of time interacting with members of The Sims community around the world. I don't think the game would be what it is without The Sims community. Fans have always wanted more interaction with a community of Sims. If you think about it, The Sims is the most detailed depiction of contemporary life to be presented in a work of fiction, but half of life was missing. In The Sims 3, we’ll let you explore the other half of life that happens when you are not at home.
14.How do the 'new personalities' work?
There are over 70 personality traits that players can choose from. When you choose traits they are represented as a simple word that you might use to describe someone you know so it’s easy to understand what they will do in the game. What makes traits so powerful is that they can change the game in profound ways. You’ll see different behaviors, interactions, advantages and goals depending on the traits that your Sims display. Just to name a few examples of more extreme traits, you can let your Sims be Insane, Evil, Kleptomaniac, Paranoid, Brave, Hates Kids, Genius and more.
15.What challenges did you face in the creation of The Sims 3?
Working to tune the AI so that the people who live in your town have lifelike behavior. Over time, all of The Sims in the town grow and develop, and it takes an impressive amount of tuning to make this work just right. I think that people are used to seeing lots of other characters in a game world, but they’ve never seen a game world where every character is being motivated by unique personality traits and motives like The Sims 3. Another thing we’re working on is a feature called Create A Style which allows players to customize just about everything, from clothing to furniture to cars. We want players to be able to change the game like our artists can. The interface is really powerful and we want to make it perfect.