The Sims 4: To Work

In addition, you can choose 3 new professions: doctor, scientist and police officer, the work process is completely controlled by the player. During operation, the character must complete the tasks given to him. The more tasks completed, the higher the academic performance. As a doctor, the character must study patients, identify symptoms, then to make the correct diagnosis. If the diagnosis is not correct, then this will badly affect the performance of the character. In emergency cases, the character must undergo surgery or childbirth. As a scientist, a character must perform many tasks from finding stones to mixing chemical elements and inventing new devices. With the help of invented devices and their improvement, you can control the consciousness of characters, clone them or even travel to another planet. If the character got a job as a policeman, he must conduct interrogations and check the prisoners, patrol the streets or conduct the investigation himself and identify the criminals.

In addition to professions, a character can conduct his own business in a rented room and open, for example, his own shop, photo studio or pastry shop. The character can sell any items from sweets, clothes to crafted items. In addition, the character must monitor the income and expenses of renting a house. There is an opportunity to hire store employees and ensure that they complete their tasks.

Together with the addition, a new town Magnolia Promenade ( English Magnolia Promenade Rus. Public space Magnoli ) appears, consisting of one district, where shops and a park are located. In addition, a new super-natural creature appears - an alien, which can also be created in the character editor. Aliens have special skin colors from green to blue-pink and are able to disguise themselves as ordinary people. One way to get to know an alien is to get into SikSim, their home planet, or expose a disguised alien. Aliens can also abduct unsuspecting characters, and men can return pregnant after being kidnapped.

The main topic of development was chosen by player-controlled careers in response to numerous requests from players to add the ability to follow the character's work into the game ^[2] . At the same time, a year before the release, the developers conducted a survey of what career players would like to see most in the supplement, among the possible careers were a doctor, scientist, detective, office worker, housekeeper, personal stylist, architect and designer ^[3] .

The developers decided to add three manageable careers, but each of them suggested a fundamentally new gameplay, if the scientist’s career adds elements of science fiction to the game and is more of a virtual sandbox, then the career of the police / detective is more tied to a linear passage ^[4] .

If professions are a set of tasks, then working on a business system, the developers wanted to make it as open as possible - a virtual sandbox with the ability to sell any items, be it clothes, purchased, found, created items or food, as well as the ability to choose a store theme, a way management and pricing. The remaining quarries are tied to special lots, which it was decided to make closed and to give the opportunity to edit buildings using cheat codes. The developers explained this limitation by the fact that the removal of a number of special objects on the work sites will lead to a violation of the simulation of work, so only "advanced players" can access this site. When working on diseases for a doctor’s career, the developers tried to avoid mistakes from previous The Sims games , where a sick NPC infected other NPCs, causing an epidemic in the city, for example, no more than six Sims in the world can get sick with one disease at a time. However, a controlled sim may still become infected by physical contact with an NPC patient. Aliens and abductions of characters with a possible outcome of male pregnancy were added specifically for old fans who were familiar with similar gameplay in previous The Sims games , while this feature was decided to expand and add the ability to detect hiding aliens in different ways, create them in CAS and choose them skin color ^{[5] [6]} . The ability for aliens to disguise themselves, as well as many ways to reveal their disguise, as conceived by the developers, is one of the interesting elements of the gameplay. The creators also admitted that the hidden location they created Sixim - the native world of aliens, became the most beautiful and unusual world that was ever created for The Sims ^[4] .

For the first time, the official announcement of the add-on took place on February 4, 2015, the add-on trailer was also released, and it was also noticed that the add-on will be released immediately on the Windows and Mac platforms ^[7] . "At Work" positioned itself as the first expansion pack for The Sims 4 , although many believed that the first "expansion" was Campaign , which, as it turned out, was a "game set". The release of the add-on was scheduled for April ^[8] . The editors of Softpedia expressed the hope that the upcoming addition will make the scanty gameplay of The Sims 4 criticized by players more diverse ^[9] . A Metro website spokesperson noticed a clear association of the scientist and alien career with the American television series The X-Files ^[10] .

The output took place on March 31, 2015 in the USA ^[11] . The addition took 19th place in the list of best-selling PC games in the USA according to the World of Gamers chart ^[12] and 39th place in 2016 ^[13] . The game also came out in Russia with Russian localization, which Softklab company was involved in ^[14] . On November 15, 2016, “At Work” was released as part of a collector's edition ( Eng. The Sims 4 Bundle: Get To Work ) on November 15, 2016, along with the game set “ On the Campaign ” and the catalog “Luxurious Party” ^[15]

On March 30, 2018, the add-on was released for the PlayStation 4 ^[16] and Xbox One ^[17] game consoles.

Following the traditions, along with this add-on, singles were rewritten in simlish . Together with the addition, music videos of famous musicians Echosmith , Big Data , New Politics and Katie Teese were added to the Work , in an interview with musicians Noah Sierota from the Echosmith group called singing on simlische the most difficult moment when he informed his friends and acquaintances, many were amazed, as they were familiar with the simulator earlier ^[18] . Noah himself admitted that he has been playing The Sims for 10 years. Katie Teese noted that this is “Whistle While You Work It” - her second song, performed for The Sims, and it was easier to play than the first song ^[18] .

Supplement “To Work” as of 2019, took fourth place in the popularity rating of supplements, compiled by the level of their use during the year after release ^[26] . “The Sims 4: To Work” received mixed reviews from critics; the average score for the Metacritic aggregator is 24% based on 24 reviews ^[20]

Some Internet critics praised the add-on, noting that it would fully satisfy the expectations of players who dreamed of observing the process of their sim's work ^{[27] [28] [29]} . A critic of the IGN website noted that although controlled professions and a private matter appeared already in previous The Sims games , it is this add-on that takes the game mechanics of the profession to a new level, allowing for the first time a player to accompany a sim to a place of work, work in his “office”, and communicate with colleagues and the boss to work, influence them day after day and ultimately be responsible for their career success or failure ^[30] . Jess Nickelsen, a critic of the nzgamer website, called the idea of ​​the add-on very interesting, since fans of previous The Sims games always dreamed of observing the process of their characters. However, to give all your best, you often forget about the basic needs of the characters for food and toilet, which creates certain difficulties with the game ^[27] .

Travis Hinker of Gaminnexus noted that the add-on added a lot of new actions and events to the game, significantly expanding the basic gameplay. On the one hand, the “To Workǃ” addition became, according to Travis, a worthy start to the release of extensions to The Sims 4 and did not undoubtedly satisfy the desire of some players to observe the work process, nevertheless, over time, you notice that the character has to perform uniform actions on the controlled work ^{[28 ]} . Brian Ertmer, on the contrary, called the work process dynamic and exciting, while players who are not interested in pursuing a career can be attracted by the opportunity to do business. The business system itself did not really please Brian because of the inability to keep the whole situation under control, and criticism was frustrated by the fact that the addition added few new items that were not related to public places ^[29] .

Another part of the critics left low-key reviews about the add-on, citing the fact that the game mechanics quickly get bored, and the player quickly notices the need to repeat the same tasks again and again. In addition, some critics cited the fact that the supplement did not solve the problem of the limited social life of the sim outside ^{[31] [32] [32]} . A critic of the Eurogamer website noted that of all the professions, the doctor’s career was the most boring and extremely monotonous, the scientist’s work seems more dynamic, but in the end the player will also get tired of constantly collecting information about the environment. The critic called the detective’s career the most interesting and thoughtful ^[31] .

Gamerevolution’s Nicholas Tan, although he appreciated the introduction of new careers, calling them significant compensation for the shortcomings of the base The Sims 4 , also referred to some significant shortcomings, for example, a sim with a detective career often has to move to different areas, which leads to loading screens, and doctor analyzes sick patients do not give a full guarantee that the doctor will choose the right medicine, which keeps the player in constant tension. Against this background, the career of a scientist, according to Niklas, turned out to be the best and most interesting. Also, Nicholas, unlike Brian, praised the mechanism of doing business, noting that if you configure it correctly, you can achieve huge profits ^[32] . Gamerrant’s John Jacques noted that although the addition adds innovative elements, it still doesn’t make up for the void found in the base The Sims 4 , nonetheless the “hardcore players” will like the opportunity to conduct business ^[33] .

The representative of the Gameover website left the most devastating review, noting that the need to constantly perform uniform and repetitive tasks in a compartment with constant loading windows kills the whole impression of an unreasonably expensive add-on, and “At Work” does not compensate for any gaps and shortcomings in the gameplay of the base The Sims 4 , making the life of sims more diverse in only one narrow direction ^[34] .

• thesims.com/ru_RU/ (Russian) - The Sims 4 official site: To Work
• The Sims 4 FAQ: Get to Work! (unspecified) .