Last October I began as a beta tester of The Sims Online and became very addicted to it for a time (I've posted about that and some of the other angst associated with my off-and-on online habits in a previous entry) and later to another online community, There.
Even before Jeff and I started dating, though, I'd pulled way back from both TSO and There; by April of this year already I was rarely on TSO, and by early summer my attention to There similarly had diminished. There wasn't costing me anything, but I was still paying for two monthly TSO accounts. Even though I wasn't accessing the service, I was finding it difficult to actually cancel my accounts and end the lives of my virtual personas.
Last night, though, I finally thought about it again and decided to start cutting the cord; I logged onto my secondary account and transferred that character's cash and belongings to another, and then called and cancelled the account. My primary character will be more difficult to resolve; not so much because I'm still as attached to the Sim itself, but because of the time, thought and passion I put into developing the property he owns, a beautiful park. Even as I type this, though, I realize that I really do need to just let go of that Sim and the property, and I'm not feeling any real anxiety about it. I need to arrange with Roger a time for us both to log on so I can transfer the property and all its contents to him.
I am keeping the There account, though, even though it's moving to a pay model (albeit a very affordable one, since as a beta tester for it I'm eligible for a lifetime subscription with a single payment of under $30).
Is it vastly different from the normal Sims games? I bought the main programme and some add-ons but it hasn't really grabbed my attention that much. I also tried out SimCity 4 as well and it was average.
Sian,
Sorry to be so long in replying. While the interface on the surface is quite similar, the focus is very different from that of the offline game. It's an odd hybrid of the offline game with a visual chat environment that doesn't succeed at capturing all the interest of the first with anything particularly groundbreaking for the second. For example, while the web site encourages you to be a social player and the environment seems to confirm that this is more of a chat environment than a "game," you're still required to keep up your sim's motives and needs and you also need to make money--which at least early on was a very repetitive, boring, almost anti-social activity, making for a somewhat inherently self-contradictory experience. I'm much more pleased with There, which has a more attractive fully 3D interface and is clearly meant to be a social environment first, with any game aspects being created as part of the social interaction.
If the offline Sims didn't grab your attention that much, and if you have other outlets for online socializing (assuming you have an interest in that), I really wouldn't recommend TSO.