Now You Can Go Inside Stores: Finally! I hated sending my Sims off to shop and having to stare at the outsides of buildings for forever like I was playing a real-time strategy game and waiting for the battle to end. Naturally, the game also lets you build your own stores and fill it with whatever kind of junk you want to sell.

Quote courtesy of Sims 3 World Adventures: Chopsticks, Mummies & the French – Oh My!

Written by: Mike Fahey

The Sims 3 expansion pack World Adventures brings with it a basement tool, which everyone will use to build tombs, and not underground Sim torture chambers.

The new basement tool allows The Sims 3 players to create underground structures up to four levels deep, and EA has plenty of new tomb objects in store in order to help facilitate the joy of exploration. Objects like the Fogger, which hides unexplored areas from the player's view, or hidden stairways, which help facilitate secret passages. Other important objects include that old staple the floor switch, and traps that shoot fire, steam, electricity, or darts. This is going to be so much fun. Toss in a couple Saw-inspired face bear traps and I'll be in heaven.

Check out the rather large list of tomb objects EA released today below, and start planning out your tomb so you can get building when the expansion arrives on November 17th.

And yes, I am already planning my underground Sim torture chamber, but don't you dare judge me, or you'll be right there with them.

Here is some of the dozens of Tomb Objects and Object Updates:

Tomb Object (Fogger): The tomb object is the cornerstone of tomb building and will often be placed in every room of the tomb. The Tomb Object is what creates the "fog" that hides non-explored rooms from the player. This lets you create a sense of discovery and suspense as your Sims explore new tombs. The "fog" will recede from a room when a player enters the room through a door, descends stairs into the room, enters a room that is connected to a fogged room with an arch, or if a Sim "Looks Through" a window that looks into a fogged room. Adding or Removing fog is also a potential Activated Behavior.

Floor Switch: The floor switch is a classic adventure game object. It is a small, 1 tile floor object on which Sims can stand or push statues. Stepping On and Off the switch are both Triggers that can connect to Activated behaviors. Floor Switches can also be set to Appear or Disappear.

Wall and Floor Trap: The traps are two different objects that can be placed on the wall or floor. These can be set to shoot fire, darts, steam, or electricity on unsuspecting Sims. They can have a variety of states, including hidden and dormant, armed and visible, hidden and armed, or hidden and firing. Each of these states can be activated by Sims walking over them or as an Activated Behavior. Traps can light Sims on fire or knock them out. However, there are multiple ways to handle traps. Sims can disarm them by tinkering with them, or push statues upon them to disarm. Water will disarm a fire trap, which makes a great puzzle element when paired with the steam trap…which creates water! Sims can walk with immunity through a fire trap when soaked. Experiment and come up with your own puzzles!

Dive Well: Dive Wells are one of the most exciting Tomb Objects. Sims can use them to become Soaked, which makes them immune to fire, or to put themselves out when already on fire. A Hidden Switch can be set at the bottom of dive wells as a Trigger. You can always place treasures at the bottom. Another fun element is that you can set the color of the water in the dive well, so fire tombs can have blood red water, whereas a tomb with a poison theme can have murky green water.

Dive Wells are most fun when they are set up as portals. Dive Wells set as Portals will connect to each other. Sims will go to the bottom, and then emerge from the closest dive well on the same floor. It's also possible to designate a Dive Well as an Uber Dive Well. Here, you designate a name so that you can define the precise point of origin and exit – even across multiple lots in the world. This lets you create one-of-a-kind entrances to island tombs and other inaccessible areas.

Treasure Chest: The biggest reason to explore anything is to find treasure at the end. Treasure Chests let you fill your tomb creations with various treasures, keys, garbage, or whatever you can imagine. Opening and Inserting a Keystone a treasure chest are also Triggers that can set Activated Behaviors.

Sarcophagus: The Sarcophagus can act as a large, ornate treasure chest, a place to hide, a place to sleep, and even a place to WooHoo. Most exciting, however, is its ability to spawn mummies. Mummies will patrol tombs in search of unsuspecting Sims to pummel and *gasp* curse! Mummies provide an element of danger and the unexpected to any tomb.

Torch Lever: The torch lever, like the Floor Switch, is an object for Sims to pull on to trigger Activated Behaviors. Some can be set to active, whereas others can be dummies, forcing players to carefully examine their surroundings. It's possible to define the colors of the torch light, which allows Tomb Designers to provide hints and clues on how to complete puzzles. Or, to simply set the ambience of a tomb!

Pushable Statues: Pushable Statues are another classic adventure game element. They can be pushed on top of traps to disarm them, or cleverly pushed through a maze to unveil a formerly blocked path. Their most common use is to be paired with a floor switch. Floor Switch triggers can be set so that they activate something when a Sim is on them, but deactivate as soon as a Sim steps off of them. This means a Sim must push a statue on top of them in order to keep the floor switch depressed. Pushable Statues can be set to be secretly pushable (they require inspection), visibly pushable (no inspection needed), or not pushable at all.

Hidden Stairways: Stairways from The Sims 3 can be set to Hidden now. This is an Activated Behavior, so that a Trigger can now Hide or Unhide the stairs. Hidden Stairways are a great way to surprise players. Just when it seems there's no way out, pulling a switch reveals a stairway!

Source: Kotaku.com

Released today...

Beware of Mummies in The Sims 3 World Adventures!

In The Sims 3 World Adventures, you can accept challenges, find treasures, discover what’s lurking in hidden caves, tombs and more with the first ever adventure gameplay. While venturing to Egypt, one of three real-world inspired locations you can journey to, watch out for any sarcophagus in the tombs that may have an angry mummy just waiting to put a curse on you. Unless you are a master of the martial arts skill, the mummy will win in a fight and you’ll either be knocked out or cursed. When cursed, you can go to the Sphinx and plead before it in an attempt to find the soul peace statue, which removes the curse. If not, so long Sim!

What’s better than being chased by a mummy? Spend the night in a cursed sarcophagus and find out what it’s like to be a mummy! You will live longer, your energy and bladder motives won’t decay which means no bathroom breaks or sleeping. You’ll be strong, have unique mummy socials, have a longer lifespan, and more. But note, you’ll move more slowly and be prone to catching on fire more easily. But that’s ok, because you’d then be able to come back as a ghost mummy. Cool.

The Sims 3 World Adventures expansion pack will ship on November 17, 2009 for the PC and MAC.

Next week we’ll give you a lesson in building your own Tombs from simple to complex then we’re off to China.

Most of you have probably already seen this by now, but for those (like me) who enjoy their existence under a rock, EA have released the cover art for the first Sims 3 expansion - World Adventures.

Are you ready for it? Taa daa....

Courtesy of simoperations.com:

EAUK's Community Representative Adroit, has published details on why pricing for the first The Sims 3 expansion pack is higher than those of its predecessor. It shows that, like the base game, exclusive content will be available to download free online.

Hi, the pricing is a little higher than The Sims 2 expansions for some of the following reasons:

• World Adventures provides lots of additional gameplay and items, plus adds storyline elements by building on goal oriented gameplay from base game
• It offers $10 (£6) value of SimPoints to be spent on TS3 Store
• It offers access to an Explorer’s kit - 15 exclusive valuable items to be downloaded upon product registration

Apparently the expansion is listed as £29.99 some places (around $46 US), and is currently listed as £24.99 on amazon and play.com. Obviously we're still enough distance away from the expansion for ANY price to be officially released, so I wouldn't take sites like amazon as Gospel. But, given the statement provided by Adroit, I would expect the expansions to at least be $10 or more above Sims 2 expansions.

Give it is adding more to the game play in the form of quests and other mini games within the main game, I can see a difference in price. Although it's still "The Sims", number 3 is varying greatly in some areas from it's predecessors. But, if the price jack is based on the 'included' bonus of SimPoints to spent at the TS3 Store, then I can't agree with it. Personally I don't use the store, so they are no real use to me.

I like a lot of the items there, but I can't justify spending more real life money on each piece of furniture I need. For one, there will always be free items out there, we just have to give the designers some time to work out how to create them, and secondly, it's WAY too easy to spend $20, $50 or even more in the store when you buy bits and pieces here and there. For a franchise that will set you back $500* or more by the time you buy all the expansions along the way, do you really want to double that by buying constantly from the store?

* based very loosely on the price of TS2 + expacs...

News is coming out all over the place with regards to the first expansion World Adventures. IGN got a first look at the newly-revealed The Sims 3: World Adventures to see the expansion pack strategy.

At the base camp is a job board that has adventures, which are beefed up versions of the opportunity missions you found in The Sims 3; the more complex adventures might consist of a dozen or more tasks chained together. Completion of these adventures unlocks more challenging adventures, raises your visa level, and so on. An example of these adventures might be exploring tombs, of which there are many in Egypt. These tombs might have diabolical traps that must be circumnavigated or be dealt with. For example, fire traps can be tackled by dousing your sim in water (say by jumping into a small pool) before entering them; the soaked nature of your clothes will protect you. Or you might need to move objects around to activate pressure plates in order to open a secret door. Your sims might dig in rubble for artifacts that can help unlock other doors. Or, you might find all the parts to a rare item and reassemble it, thus giving you a nice trophy for that shelf back home.

Check out their full write up here.

Forbes.com posted an article today announcing The Sims 3 World Adventures to Feature Global Artists!

The Sims fans around the world will be rockin' out to new Simlish music in The Sims(TM) 3 World Adventures Expansion Pack* for the PC and Mac this fall. The EA Play Label of Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) today announced that in The Sims 3 World Adventures, players will have their chance to get down, Simlish-style, to artists like GRAMMY award-winner Nelly Furtado, rising star Pixie Lott, German sensation Stefanie Heinzmann, breaking new rock band Matt & Kim, global indie dance rockers Young Punx, and more!

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