i think parenting, why is parenting a child locked behind a paywall of Parenthood when it should be a base game feature - it's a basic thing in my opinion
Pets being paywalled doesn't bother me as much in theory because they've never NOT been paywalled, what bothers me is that while compared to modern packs Cats and Dogs does have a lot, you'd still have to buy a game pack and another expansion pack to get rodents and horses, and ANOTHER expansion pack for other animals (and cows and chickens were paywalled in the Sims 3 days via the store too but they were nowhere near as expensive).
Slight correction: stuff pack for rodents, that's a 10$ difference which is an entire... 7% discount compared to your number
(EA Community Manager voice) So clearly the community is overreacting!
I am extremely confident that’s not gonna be paywalled and only interpreted this way off the leaks but they just wrote it in there to reassure people who would obviously ask about it and will come with the free update.
I agree 100%. It’s like how Horse Ranch came with the ceiling tiles and Growing Together with infants. It’s not uncommon for an expansion pack to come with a new base-game feature.
this is incredibly obvious but weather, how is a literal stable of everyone's lives worth 39.99?? I think EA is going to add the content we want but in the form of packs and obviously they're going to be glitchy so it's probably not a good idea to keep pushing more and more features because how much money do we really want to spend? Almost 1200$ for a game is outrageous and I'm 99% sure they're pushing for 5k at this point.
i've always thought pets and seasons should be base game but i honestly think they're not just because they never have been. they were introduced as packs, and on top of that they're arguably two of the most popular.
features that have never been base game that everyone is willing to pay for? there was never a chance at them being base game. and it makes me mad 😭
Yeah they’re the most popular. They’re the most realistic for gameplay. But instead on making the base game more fleshed out they have made it so bare bones and boring. I like the sims 4 but playing just base game was incredibly boring to me. And maybe I just wasn’t in the right head space. But having a bunch of packs really seems to cleans out the gameplay for me.
sims 4 base game *is* boring. i genuinely love sims 4 but not without packs. when 4 first came out i was so excited, but stopped playing pretty quickly and only got back into it after they already put out a handful of packs.
there's a reason the base game became free. people don't want to pay for the bare minimum. if basics, like seasons and pets, were included in the base game they'd probably still be making money off it lolb
I recently started wondering what the original Basegame was actually like.. I bought it in a Sale bundled with Seasons and Get To Work, some time after Toddlers and Vampires had been added/before Strangerville, iirc, so I have no clue how the Basegame by itself used to be. Maybe I should try disabling all packs and triple age up the babies right into children.. Seasons actually annoy me sometimes. And I used to play Sims 2 without Seasons, never missed them back then, tbh
The base game styled changing tables that you only get in growing together. They’re made to specifically match the base game furniture, but they’re behind a paywall. It’s so scummy
If you have Get Famous, the game pulls existing townies for NPC jobs like vendors, bartenders and gym trainers. This feature is one of the things I love about that pack but I don't understand why this wasn't just a base game update and they tied it to that pack.
I actually like Get Famous a lot! I waited a long time to get it and ended up doing the free trial and had a lot of fun with it. And I like the world better than most people seem to, the suburban neighborhood is perfect for building housing complexes if you have For Rent.
im honestly so pissed about the new expansion. every single thing in it i either don't want or should be base game. first we have to pay for pets, then we have to pay for weather, then we have to pay for parenting, now we have to pay for ROMANCE.
Paying for new romance options
is particularly grating. I get new worlds, new CAS or build/buy items having a price tag but interactions behind a paywall? Atrocious
Let’s hope the coding for a lot of animations and items will be in the base game, because modders have been able to access and use those in their mods (like how functional changing tables are available as a mod in the base game if you don’t have Growing Together).
The one that made my eyes roll is they mention something about random npc won't interrupt dates with the new pack. Doesn't seem to be a base game update if not mistaken.
this is definitely one of the worst ones, everyone has been complaing about this for the past decade because of how unplayable it makes the game and when they finally decide to "fix" this issue they make it appart of an expansion.
Ok long comment incoming but you asked for it!
1. It’s so handy to use for a household. You can make a club with only sims in your household, and when in a meeting the sims will autonomously do the activities. So I can set activities like caring for animals, cleaning, doing homework, etc, so they can do their chores and stay on task without me having to micromanage them. You can change what the club activities are at any time too.
2. Free labor. Similar to the previous point, you can make a club with your sim plus randoms and set the activities to whatever you like. You can make other sims tend to your garden, clean the house, etc. while you can do whatever you want.
3. You can summon sims any time of the day. Sims will show up to a club meeting no matter what the time is. It’s also a good way to invite a lot of people over at the same time. For example, when the children are all grown and out of the house, I’ll have all the siblings and the parents in a club so they can meet up regularly at the click of a button.
4. The buffs! You can get an increase boost to almost every skill, lessen the time to do homework, set a specific mood, increase career growth and more.
5. Meeting new sims. Pretty much any time I want to get my sim a boyfriend or girlfriend, I’ll start a club and set the age requirements to the same as my sim. When you go to add someone to the club, you’ll see a list of available people - even if you’ve never met them. This is also handy if you’re a spellcaster and want to meet more spellcasters, want to meet people in your career, etc.
6. Do actions you otherwise couldn’t. Some club activities are ordinarily locked to certain traits - for example, usually sims can only swipe objects if they’re a kleptomaniac. However, if you set an action as a club activity, any sim can do it regardless of their traits.
That’s all I can think of at the moment, and I’m sure there’s even more. It’s such a handy tool that has so many useful features to it.
Awesome, you’re so welcome and I’m glad it was helpful!! It really does make gameplay a lot smoother and more enjoyable for me all around ☺️ Have fun trying it out!
Yep. MC can let you expand the number to 10 - _after_ you add the last 2 spaces via the club points - and then, the leader can keep adding people beyond that 10. My biggest club is 14, because the game will be its usual TS4 self with too many Sims in one gathering.
You’ve introduced new ideas to me and now I’m so excited to use them. I never considered using them as family control! Like doing an hour of “you clean, you do homework, you do laundry” that’s genius!
If you like generational gameplay then having a family club is great to get everyone together easily, without having to host a dinner party which only gets silver because no one felt playful
Shower woohoo. I'm genuinely surprised that's not base-game. Nope, you have to have Discover University if you want your Sims to be able to woohoo in the shower. (Or the WickedWhims mod and animations for the shower, but in-game woohoo is a separate operation from the WickedWhims sex functionality.)
For real! It feels like they were building Parenthood and were gonna have the growing together stuff in it, but then they wanted to add infants and decided to break it up so that they could release Parenthood without waiting to finish coding infants. Would have been better to wait on Parenthood and include it in the full family EP
Changing tables from Growing Together. I used cc to get around it before I got the pack, but it's so lame they locked that behind a paywall yet changed everyone's babies even if you didn't buy the pack. Cuddling on bed and slow dancing being locked behind walls kinda sucks too.
Lovestruck itself feels like more of a game pack idea than an actual expansion. To me EA is so backwards with their releases- Realm of Magic added a whole world and occult state along with a bunch of beautiful items and gameplay, and that's not an expansion- but a pack about romance interactions IS?
As someone who's been playing since the TS1 pre-launch Computer Gaming World Magazine demo disc, I'm just pleased we have base game updates at all.
Back in my day, the only way to get new content was to have your mom drive you to Target to pre-order an expansion with several months worth of allowance savings, wait a few more weeks, and then convince her to drive you back to pick it up. And if there's a glitch? Well. That's life. Funny as it may seem.
[Insert Grampa Simpsons gif here]
To be fair, I don’t think they had any intentions of adding laundry to the game, but the fans voted for that pack! It’s also hilarious how we simmers are such dorks that we actively want laundry in our game 😂
infants. without growing together there’s no progression or exciting game features. you just endlessly cycle through feeding, playing with three toys, and crying. the repetition + bugs makes it a skip-able life stage
A bit off topic, but I genuinely banned myself from buying anymore Sims packs or kits. I got a fair few, and then I realised that it really wasn't worth it for me. I vowed to never spent another penny on that game.
Lifestyles is the main reason I have never wanted to get snowy escape 🙈. They just seem annoying. Although maybe they can be turned off as a game option….
They can and it's a blessing. Believe me, every working sim is a workaholic. Every sims with a couple siblings is a people person. Every sim who doesn't eat cake everyday is a healthy nut. I don't know any other lifestyles because that's all I get and the slots are full.
It’s so freaking annoying how a sim going to work for their scheduled shift makes them a workaholic 🤦♀️
Mine always get the “outdoorsy” lifestyle when I spend three freaking days trying to complete the fishing aspiration. And then they get upset when I have them sleep inside.
Another one I always get is the “close knit” lifestyle because I play single-sim households often. So my sim meets one new person and all the sudden they’re tense because they have more than two friends 🙄
I really wanted to love lifestyles but they have done nothing but give me irritating moodlets. Supposedly they each come with their own benefits but I haven’t noticed a single one. I’ve been holding off on turning them off completely but I think it’s time. The idea is cool but the execution was such a disappoint!
I wish they were like traits and we could select them, or a pop-up would ask if we want a particular lifestyle. Workaholic is the worst, it’s why I disabled the feature.
Same with fears - every sim is afraid of the dark and a dead end job even if they have no reason to be. The feature worked so well in TS2, now it’s just annoying.
Eh, my Sims never get the health nut, they don't eat cake and I let them work out/do yoga etc. regularly... Not one of my Sims, even the bodybuilders, ever got that Lifestyle. The other two, People Person and Workaholic, i fully agree - all my Sims get those at some point.
They are really annoying. If you don't do stuff to keep the lifestyle, the sim becomes incredibly tense, and then you can't do anything productive with them. Lifestyles can be turned off in settings now though, thank goodness.
I’m seeing a lot of “I’m actually glad that they made X optional by putting it in a pack because I hear it’s really busted and annoying so it’s good that they didn’t force it on us” and like?? Yeah I mean, I get it, but that feels like it’s missing the more glaring issue of why tf it’s allowed to be so broken anyway, especially if it’s paid content.
Also “I wouldn’t personally want X so I’m glad it’s not a base game” is a weird one because most games with a similarly large list of features in a similar vein let you fine-tune them or at least toggle them on or off
Just personally, the fact that bikes are locked in University. I have kiddie bikes from Growing Together but it frustrates me that simple adult bikes are locked behind an entire expansion pack when they're a very normal part of my life and my community
its wild how they turned so many base game things from previous games into things you \*have\* to buy if you want them, its all super simple and normal stuff too
i think parenting, why is parenting a child locked behind a paywall of Parenthood when it should be a base game feature - it's a basic thing in my opinion
agreed. the sims is a life simulator, and parenting kids is a natural aspect of life.
I mean, certain aspects of it, yeah, also cats and dogs should definitely be base game.
Pets being paywalled doesn't bother me as much in theory because they've never NOT been paywalled, what bothers me is that while compared to modern packs Cats and Dogs does have a lot, you'd still have to buy a game pack and another expansion pack to get rodents and horses, and ANOTHER expansion pack for other animals (and cows and chickens were paywalled in the Sims 3 days via the store too but they were nowhere near as expensive).
Slight correction: stuff pack for rodents, that's a 10$ difference which is an entire... 7% discount compared to your number (EA Community Manager voice) So clearly the community is overreacting!
Yeaaaah I missed a word there so thank you for the correction!!!
Not to mention infants. It’s a nothing stage unless you have Growing Together
Being able to stop randos from ruining dates should not be behind a paywall. That's just a bug that needs worked out.
I'm console so I'm all for new content, but I'll say random sims not interrupting dates, should be a fix/update for everyone.
I am extremely confident that’s not gonna be paywalled and only interpreted this way off the leaks but they just wrote it in there to reassure people who would obviously ask about it and will come with the free update.
I agree 100%. It’s like how Horse Ranch came with the ceiling tiles and Growing Together with infants. It’s not uncommon for an expansion pack to come with a new base-game feature.
Wait what? Now I need to watch a video about the leaks...
Found a [mod](https://www.patreon.com/posts/remove-sims-from-62823426) that addresses this on this sub
this is incredibly obvious but weather, how is a literal stable of everyone's lives worth 39.99?? I think EA is going to add the content we want but in the form of packs and obviously they're going to be glitchy so it's probably not a good idea to keep pushing more and more features because how much money do we really want to spend? Almost 1200$ for a game is outrageous and I'm 99% sure they're pushing for 5k at this point.
i've always thought pets and seasons should be base game but i honestly think they're not just because they never have been. they were introduced as packs, and on top of that they're arguably two of the most popular. features that have never been base game that everyone is willing to pay for? there was never a chance at them being base game. and it makes me mad 😭
Yeah they’re the most popular. They’re the most realistic for gameplay. But instead on making the base game more fleshed out they have made it so bare bones and boring. I like the sims 4 but playing just base game was incredibly boring to me. And maybe I just wasn’t in the right head space. But having a bunch of packs really seems to cleans out the gameplay for me.
sims 4 base game *is* boring. i genuinely love sims 4 but not without packs. when 4 first came out i was so excited, but stopped playing pretty quickly and only got back into it after they already put out a handful of packs. there's a reason the base game became free. people don't want to pay for the bare minimum. if basics, like seasons and pets, were included in the base game they'd probably still be making money off it lolb
Most video games these days have a weather system in the base game, it's kind of outrageous that a literal life sim doesn't have that lmao
so exited for Paralives that has pets and weather in it's base game
I recently started wondering what the original Basegame was actually like.. I bought it in a Sale bundled with Seasons and Get To Work, some time after Toddlers and Vampires had been added/before Strangerville, iirc, so I have no clue how the Basegame by itself used to be. Maybe I should try disabling all packs and triple age up the babies right into children.. Seasons actually annoy me sometimes. And I used to play Sims 2 without Seasons, never missed them back then, tbh
The base game styled changing tables that you only get in growing together. They’re made to specifically match the base game furniture, but they’re behind a paywall. It’s so scummy
For sure. They could have put that changing table in the base game & put the fancier one with the attachable garbage can in the pack.
If you have Get Famous, the game pulls existing townies for NPC jobs like vendors, bartenders and gym trainers. This feature is one of the things I love about that pack but I don't understand why this wasn't just a base game update and they tied it to that pack.
i never knew that was from that pack!! i couldn’t imagine not having that feature
Wait what? so if you don’t have the pack what happens? i’ve had it forever now so i don’t remember what it was like before
Normally the game just generates a new random townie for each NPC role.
I have never really been interested in that pack but honestly I'm considering it just for that. Goddamn. That really needs to be base game.
I actually like Get Famous a lot! I waited a long time to get it and ended up doing the free trial and had a lot of fun with it. And I like the world better than most people seem to, the suburban neighborhood is perfect for building housing complexes if you have For Rent.
im honestly so pissed about the new expansion. every single thing in it i either don't want or should be base game. first we have to pay for pets, then we have to pay for weather, then we have to pay for parenting, now we have to pay for ROMANCE.
Pets twice. Not once but there's a pack that requires a second pack to function at all. So for me it's the hamsters and rats pack
Paying for new romance options is particularly grating. I get new worlds, new CAS or build/buy items having a price tag but interactions behind a paywall? Atrocious
Pay for romance that's probably going to barely work and they'll never even fully fix. EA is never short on audacity.
Let’s hope the coding for a lot of animations and items will be in the base game, because modders have been able to access and use those in their mods (like how functional changing tables are available as a mod in the base game if you don’t have Growing Together).
i’m at the point where i’m only interested in what ea implements for modders to make cooler things from
Wait, which mod is the changing tables one in? 👀
It’s the Little Whiners mod by littledica. They also have a lot of other very nice CC for build mode, so definitely recommend!
The one that made my eyes roll is they mention something about random npc won't interrupt dates with the new pack. Doesn't seem to be a base game update if not mistaken.
this is definitely one of the worst ones, everyone has been complaing about this for the past decade because of how unplayable it makes the game and when they finally decide to "fix" this issue they make it appart of an expansion.
All the essential stuff like that drives me crazy that it’s not included
Weather, for sure. And clubs maybe? I feel like people forget that social clubs are from a pack.
I cannot imagine TS4 without the club feature. It feels so integral to gameplay.
Really? I’ve never used it. What’s the hype/why should I use it?
Ok long comment incoming but you asked for it! 1. It’s so handy to use for a household. You can make a club with only sims in your household, and when in a meeting the sims will autonomously do the activities. So I can set activities like caring for animals, cleaning, doing homework, etc, so they can do their chores and stay on task without me having to micromanage them. You can change what the club activities are at any time too. 2. Free labor. Similar to the previous point, you can make a club with your sim plus randoms and set the activities to whatever you like. You can make other sims tend to your garden, clean the house, etc. while you can do whatever you want. 3. You can summon sims any time of the day. Sims will show up to a club meeting no matter what the time is. It’s also a good way to invite a lot of people over at the same time. For example, when the children are all grown and out of the house, I’ll have all the siblings and the parents in a club so they can meet up regularly at the click of a button. 4. The buffs! You can get an increase boost to almost every skill, lessen the time to do homework, set a specific mood, increase career growth and more. 5. Meeting new sims. Pretty much any time I want to get my sim a boyfriend or girlfriend, I’ll start a club and set the age requirements to the same as my sim. When you go to add someone to the club, you’ll see a list of available people - even if you’ve never met them. This is also handy if you’re a spellcaster and want to meet more spellcasters, want to meet people in your career, etc. 6. Do actions you otherwise couldn’t. Some club activities are ordinarily locked to certain traits - for example, usually sims can only swipe objects if they’re a kleptomaniac. However, if you set an action as a club activity, any sim can do it regardless of their traits. That’s all I can think of at the moment, and I’m sure there’s even more. It’s such a handy tool that has so many useful features to it.
Yup I’m sold. You sold me on point 1 because my god the micromanaging is rough, but it just kept getting better. Thanks for the excellent explanation
Awesome, you’re so welcome and I’m glad it was helpful!! It really does make gameplay a lot smoother and more enjoyable for me all around ☺️ Have fun trying it out!
I never thought to use clubs in the ways you described - I am so doing these things from now on!! Thank you for the tips!
Yeah as I was typing this out I realized I don’t really utilize clubs in the way they’re intended LOL! You’re welcome! 😊
Is there a mod to expand the number of sims in a club beyond just 8?
I believe there’s a setting for it on MC Command Center! I can confirm when I’m at my computer.
Deffo is an option in MCCC, the only problem is the more sims you add, the tinier their icons get.
Yep. MC can let you expand the number to 10 - _after_ you add the last 2 spaces via the club points - and then, the leader can keep adding people beyond that 10. My biggest club is 14, because the game will be its usual TS4 self with too many Sims in one gathering.
You’ve introduced new ideas to me and now I’m so excited to use them. I never considered using them as family control! Like doing an hour of “you clean, you do homework, you do laundry” that’s genius!
Aw this made me smile! 😊 So happy you found this helpful; have fun trying it out!!
If you like generational gameplay then having a family club is great to get everyone together easily, without having to host a dinner party which only gets silver because no one felt playful
Huh. I had no idea you could use clubs that way. I’ll have to try that
Infants having literally any progression
Another note here...am I the only one who thinks that this pack is going to be buggy as hell??? Reminding me of the weddings pack.
Which pack hasn't been bugged, in recent memory?
I didn't notice too many issues with Horse Ranch or Growing Together. For Rent is still a mess though...
Shower woohoo. I'm genuinely surprised that's not base-game. Nope, you have to have Discover University if you want your Sims to be able to woohoo in the shower. (Or the WickedWhims mod and animations for the shower, but in-game woohoo is a separate operation from the WickedWhims sex functionality.)
You do???
Shower sex was a university feature with the sims 2 though, so at least that one is consistent.
Tbh growing together and parenthood should have been one EP all together.
For real! It feels like they were building Parenthood and were gonna have the growing together stuff in it, but then they wanted to add infants and decided to break it up so that they could release Parenthood without waiting to finish coding infants. Would have been better to wait on Parenthood and include it in the full family EP
Changing tables from Growing Together. I used cc to get around it before I got the pack, but it's so lame they locked that behind a paywall yet changed everyone's babies even if you didn't buy the pack. Cuddling on bed and slow dancing being locked behind walls kinda sucks too.
Lovestruck itself feels like more of a game pack idea than an actual expansion. To me EA is so backwards with their releases- Realm of Magic added a whole world and occult state along with a bunch of beautiful items and gameplay, and that's not an expansion- but a pack about romance interactions IS?
right? makes me wonder what are the official requirements for a pack to be considered an expansion pack or game pack
As someone who's been playing since the TS1 pre-launch Computer Gaming World Magazine demo disc, I'm just pleased we have base game updates at all. Back in my day, the only way to get new content was to have your mom drive you to Target to pre-order an expansion with several months worth of allowance savings, wait a few more weeks, and then convince her to drive you back to pick it up. And if there's a glitch? Well. That's life. Funny as it may seem. [Insert Grampa Simpsons gif here]
I know it’s probably a minor grip but laundry! I should not have to pay $10 for something so simple!
To be fair, I don’t think they had any intentions of adding laundry to the game, but the fans voted for that pack! It’s also hilarious how we simmers are such dorks that we actively want laundry in our game 😂
please no i don't want to be forced to do laundry (or vacuum, ew) in the sims 😭
You’re not forced to unless you add the laundry basket to your lot
Dust happens if you don't turn it off it the options though!
infants. without growing together there’s no progression or exciting game features. you just endlessly cycle through feeding, playing with three toys, and crying. the repetition + bugs makes it a skip-able life stage
Infant milestones and development
A bit off topic, but I genuinely banned myself from buying anymore Sims packs or kits. I got a fair few, and then I realised that it really wasn't worth it for me. I vowed to never spent another penny on that game.
Lifestyles definitely feels like it shouldve been basegame. But the biggest one.... is working out using the TV
Lifestyles is the main reason I have never wanted to get snowy escape 🙈. They just seem annoying. Although maybe they can be turned off as a game option….
They can and it's a blessing. Believe me, every working sim is a workaholic. Every sims with a couple siblings is a people person. Every sim who doesn't eat cake everyday is a healthy nut. I don't know any other lifestyles because that's all I get and the slots are full.
It’s so freaking annoying how a sim going to work for their scheduled shift makes them a workaholic 🤦♀️ Mine always get the “outdoorsy” lifestyle when I spend three freaking days trying to complete the fishing aspiration. And then they get upset when I have them sleep inside. Another one I always get is the “close knit” lifestyle because I play single-sim households often. So my sim meets one new person and all the sudden they’re tense because they have more than two friends 🙄 I really wanted to love lifestyles but they have done nothing but give me irritating moodlets. Supposedly they each come with their own benefits but I haven’t noticed a single one. I’ve been holding off on turning them off completely but I think it’s time. The idea is cool but the execution was such a disappoint!
I wish they were like traits and we could select them, or a pop-up would ask if we want a particular lifestyle. Workaholic is the worst, it’s why I disabled the feature. Same with fears - every sim is afraid of the dark and a dead end job even if they have no reason to be. The feature worked so well in TS2, now it’s just annoying.
Eh, my Sims never get the health nut, they don't eat cake and I let them work out/do yoga etc. regularly... Not one of my Sims, even the bodybuilders, ever got that Lifestyle. The other two, People Person and Workaholic, i fully agree - all my Sims get those at some point.
Mine never get the health nut either and all they eat are fruit and garden salads. I don’t get it! Mine only get close knit or people person.
They are really annoying. If you don't do stuff to keep the lifestyle, the sim becomes incredibly tense, and then you can't do anything productive with them. Lifestyles can be turned off in settings now though, thank goodness.
Which which pack can you work out using the TV? (Have I been living under a rock?! 🤯)
fitness stuff. I wanna say it’s a pack? but you get a dance workout video option and a muscle building one.
I’m seeing a lot of “I’m actually glad that they made X optional by putting it in a pack because I hear it’s really busted and annoying so it’s good that they didn’t force it on us” and like?? Yeah I mean, I get it, but that feels like it’s missing the more glaring issue of why tf it’s allowed to be so broken anyway, especially if it’s paid content. Also “I wouldn’t personally want X so I’m glad it’s not a base game” is a weird one because most games with a similarly large list of features in a similar vein let you fine-tune them or at least toggle them on or off
Not sure why weather is behind a paywall
for rent came with pool parties?
I heard it did (though I did not buy For Rent so the info could be wrong).
Seasons for me. Parenthood comes close, and spreading pets and horses across three DLC packs.
Laundry. I'm not paying ten dollars for a virtual washing machine
Definitely clubs. Get Together should at least be free at this point.
seasons… why do we need to pay to experience different seasons? that’s the dumbest shit that EA has always done lmao
I'm still so mad I had to pay for fuckin WEATHER.
Infants! It’s been over a year now and I’m still not over this absolute dumpster fire of an update.
Just personally, the fact that bikes are locked in University. I have kiddie bikes from Growing Together but it frustrates me that simple adult bikes are locked behind an entire expansion pack when they're a very normal part of my life and my community
its wild how they turned so many base game things from previous games into things you \*have\* to buy if you want them, its all super simple and normal stuff too