Punching Pixels: Sims-sational summer fun

Game : The Sims 3 Outdoor Living Stuff
Platform : PC
Reviewer : Strawbz

Its summer time and your Sims deserve a beautiful outside area where they can sit back relax and soak up some sun.

As a Sims-addict myself I know that Sims players fall into many varied categories, you get your content designers, legacy players, story writers, movie makers, casual players, etc.

Me? I’m a builder; I can spend hours and even days designing, building and decorating the perfect house for my Sims and then uploading that lot for other players to enjoy in their games. After playing Sims for close on ten years now I have become pretty good at it except, and it really pains me to admit this, when it comes to the garden. I always leave that till the very end and usually end up following the same basic garden layout, a pool, a table and chairs and a bunch of trees, then I leave it up to the players who download my houses to ‘customise’ the gardens themselves. Its not that I have not tried to make the gardens spectacular its just that for some reason it never turns out the way I saw it in my mind.

This week I was handed the new Sims 3 Outdoor Living Stuff pack, which adds over 50 new outdoor items, a range of casual outfits and two new hairstyles to your game.

There are two distinct outdoor styles to choose from, the ‘Sunstet Veranda’ set has a warm, casual outdoor feel while the ‘Garden Terrace’ set adds elegance and style with beautiful ornate wrought-iron pieces.

For the Sims that enjoys cooking outside you can now design an entire outdoor kitchen complete with build-in countertop grills, fridges and matching counters. Entertain your friends with the large screen outdoor television and fire pit or cuddle up to your favorite Sim on the stylish wrought iron loveseat.

I had a great time tinkering around with all the new content and in no time at all I managed to build my Sims the back yard of their dreams. Where they can now entertain their friends, hang out under the stars or soak up the bubbles in one of the new bigger, stylish hot tubs.