Game: The Sims
Developer: Maxis (Electronic Arts)
Minimum Requirements: 233MHz or faster Intel Pentium MMX, Cyrix M2 or AMD processor, 32MB RAM, CD-ROM Drive, 300MB hard disk space, 2MB graphics accelerator compatible with DirectX 7.0, Windows 95/98 with DirectX 7.0

The next game on our list is quite an interesting one. The Sims by Maxis (owned by Electronic Arts for some time now) is a life simulator. That's right, you heard right, a life simulator. Instead of building cities or buildings, you take control of a human life and build on it's life! In this case, we're talking about career, relationship, hygene, hunger and level of amusement.

Even though the game was only released in late 1999, it's not going to deliver cutting-edge 3D graphics. In fact, it doesn't even use a 3D engine. What Maxis focused on is to have smooth, realistic human movements instead of realistic-looking figures--and they've done a fine job with it.

The best part of this game doesn't come from its graphics or sound, but from its gameplay. It may sound like a stupid idea at first to make a game out of controlling someone's life, but once you start playing, I can guarantee that you'll be glued to your computer screen for many more hours to come. It's a quite simple concept, actually. You start out with one or few characters, build them a house, buy some furniture and you're off. You then have to find them jobs and you'll also have to make sure they do their daily activities such as eating, taking showers (the game is "censored" when it comes to this), socializing and having fun. You choose if they succeed or not. You can even lock them in a room without any food and bathroom facilities until the person dies for all the game cares! Fun, fun, fun!

Buy The Sims @ Amazon.com

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