I thought MySims was basically a child-oriented, anime-style version of the Sims, but after playing for a very short while I found it to be an adventure game with quests, and to have very little elements from The Sims.
MySims Kingdom is a follow-up to MySims. After a very slow initializing process, you can create and customize your character by picking a gender, eye shape and color, hair style and color, and some clothing options.
The story here revolves around some strange disappearances in the kingdom: overnight, decorations around the town disappear. Mayor Ellen doesn’t know what to do, King Roland is very upset, and this is where you come in. With the help of the eccentric local scientist and his inventions, you are to restore the town to its former glory.
The main items to do so are the Extractor and the Synth-o-Tron. The Extractor is like a zap gun that runs on
batteries. You can use it a number of times per day before the battery runs out, but it charges overnight while you sleep. You just need to aim it at any item that shows a little star icon and use it to extract its essence. There are 11 different kinds of essences, and you will use them to create new items to place around town. Which brings us to the Synth-o-Tron.
The Synth-o-Tron is a strange device that uses essences to create the items. Place any two essences in it and it will show you how many items that combination can make, depending on how you shake it. Using the stylus, you rub the touch screen in different directions to create the items. The item you make depends on which question mark box is highlighted on the top screen, so when you want to make a different one, you must wait for it to cycle to something you don’t have, and rub like crazy either up and down, or left and right. Sometimes it’s not easy to get the timing right.
But with this little machine and the tons of essence combinations, you can create everything from fences to phone booths, street lamps, flower beds, fountains, trees and more. You can simply press Y while in town to rearrange the existing items and houses, remove the decorations you don’t want and place the new ones you have created.
Game progression is done by talking to residents and doing their tasks. For example, one of them won’t open the clothing shop until you place some flower beds next to her house. Others will have mini-games for you to play, such as Kayak, Tennis, Ghost Blaster, Ski Jump, Snowball Fight, and my favorite, Vegetable Vendor, among others. The villagers will reward you with an item for playing these games for the first time, simoleons, as well as high scores, medals and extra gifts if you do well enough.
You can also go fishing and catch different fish at different times of the day, you can even design your own clothes at the tailor. There’s also a photo activity where you must find animals around the town, take a picture of them and give it to the zookeeper. The photos will help him track down the animals and restore them to the zoo.
More areas of the kingdom will open up as you progress through the story, including the forest, the zoo and wintery places. Progression is shown by the star level on the top screen.
As I said in the beginning of this review, there is very little in the game that relates to The Sims franchise. Aside from simoleons as your currency and the green crystal that represents your position on the map, nothing else will look familiar aside from purchasing clothes, buying furniture and rearranging it in your house. Your Sim has no needs or motives, so you don’t have to worry about eating, bathing, socializing or even sleeping. The only reasons you have to sleep are to advance to a different time of day or recharge the battery on your Extractor.
As it turns out, what you get is mostly an adventure/questing game that usually leaves you wondering what to do next, since it gives you very little direction. But the presentation is very cute, the controls are accessible to anyone, and some of the mini-games are quite fun to play, the world is fairly large, and I actually found myself completely taken in by the Synth-o-Tron, experimenting with item creation and placing them all around the different areas.
Even if this wasn’t exactly what I expected, if I managed to be this entertained by MySims Kingdom, I can only estimate that the target age group will enjoy it even more than I did.
Special thanks to Angie Newman, Audra McIver and EA for providing a copy of this title.