Console Controller Feedback

[EA_Solaire]

Greetings, Console Simmers!

The Sims 4 team is investigating improvements to our console experience as well as the overall experience of playing The Sims 4 with a controller and we want to hear from you! Whether your experience is on PlayStation or Xbox and you are using a controller to play the game. Tell us your biggest pain points and most desired quality of life improvements.

• How do the controls feel?
• Where do you struggle most when trying to play with a controller?
• What experiences or features are difficult to use?
• Which buttons do you wish behaved differently and why?

We appreciate all of your support and feedback.

Thanks,

The Sims Team

[EA_Cade · Accepted solution]

Hey all, 

Today's patch addressed many of the concerns reported in this thread, I'll be closing this thread now and creating a new thread to provide feedback here. Please do continue to provide feedback so that we can continue to make the improvements that you want to see.  

Thank you all for taking the time to provide us with your passionate feedback, and for helping us make The Sims the best it can be on all platforms. 

[simsplayer818]

It's funny I should happen to spot this today, I just checked my game earlier to see if it was possible to play as I've had crashing after 5 minutes since the patch that came out with HSY (which I don't have). I'm on Xbox Series S and my controller was unusable. The slightest tap on the left or right sticks and the cursor was virtually bouncing around the screen. It was hyper sensitive. Selecting anything took ages. I was in build mode. I was really struggling to control the cursor. Even just loading the game, I chose Load Game but it moved so fast it opened up New Game instead.

I already had a lot of bugs in my game but I'd decided to take a bit of a break from it in June after MWS affected gameplay so much. Then the excessive crashing from the summer patch and now this. I was only checking to see if it was any better and really struggled to handle the controls. It made it more difficult as I have dexterity and grip issues as part of my disability. But I've used consoles for decades and not had an issue this bad with the cursor. I'm using a Nintendo switch right now with no problem so I know it's not my disability that's the issue.

So when my game crashed to home after about 5 mins again, I left it switched off. I've been patiently waiting for a fix, luckily I have other games...but I miss my Sims. I have over 50 add-ons and I'm pretty disappointed.

So I'm really glad you've asked for this input today, thank you.

[AlannMint]

As I have mentioned in a bug report: when moving the cursor, there is no deadzone for up and left. It would be nice if the deadzone could match down and right again. I’m playing on v1.10 because this is what’s on my disc, and doesn’t have this issue. My experience is on PlayStation, but a friend confirmed this to be true on Xbox as well (both controller). That is my only annoyance.

[OGRevellica]

- Playing on a PS4 & dying for the advanced roof feature available on the PC 

- Simmibg off & on since 2001 but this is the first time I've been stuck on a console - the experience is infuriating. I have over 40 packs but it bugs out & crashes so much I spend more time trying to fix the game than actually playing it. 

- Camera glitches/delays

- Love new curved rooms/platforms, but they show ugly triangle ridge; must go into build mode & delete/undo to fix appearance each load

- please make sims use the closest sink available to the toilet they're on

- *Please* improve responsiveness & routing. If I cancel an action before the sim even moves to make it, then it should cancel instead of showing the x over the action while making me wait for them to cross a 50x40 lot & 3 stories before they finally stop.

- Since I've had to start a new game & transfer all 60 of my sims & their lots 3 times now, is there any way we can get a "set relationship" option in cheat menu? 

- The food list in "cook" is so massive now, which I dig, but can we get categories or a search option?

- Love the concept & flexibility, but the "Quantity over Quality" of the game makes me reluctant to purchase new packs. 

Thank you!

[PipMenace]

I'd previously been playing on Mac but got the free base game on PlayStation to try it out. Even knowing the basic game from years on my Mac, Emily's opening tutorial still felt like a huge info dump on what functions went with what buttons, and I wish there was more of a chance to test what she describes - like controlling the camera - before it moves on to the next tip.

Also found it oddly annoying that I had to back all the way out of a clothing section in CAS to swap the top level - I couldn't be in sweaters, for example, and jump directly to pants. I had to close the actual sweaters section, then close the shirts submenu, and only then could I get back out and switch to pants. Which would then require me to pick a submenu again before I saw anything - so 4 clicks of two different buttons for an action that takes 1 click on a computer. Would have been much more intuitive to just allow the cursor to move to the left to select a different section (and to have the "all" submenu open by default when you open that top category).

Another annoyance was that I have to navigate all the way in - click the Sim, click a menu, click a submenu - before I could see which outfit I was even looking at, let alone swap to the next one.

[simsplayer818]

I absolutely agree about CAS controls particularly adding another outfit. When you have a lot of packs it takes ages scrolling up to add 2,3,4 and so on.

Also we need to remove the need for any repetitive clicking. I use selling from build mode as the perfect example. In the personal inventory we just press Y to sell a stack. On PC there is a quick way to sell a stack. But on Console we have to click sometimes hundreds of times to sell from the Household inventory. I use it a lot to sell harvestables but it plays havoc with my hand and joint problems. If you move house it's a nightmare if you forget to sell your furniture and it takes ages to sell it all if you don't want it. So either a key function or a drag and drop function is needed.

[PipMenace]

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@simsplayer818 wrote: 

Also we need to remove the need for any repetitive clicking.

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This, exactly. Minimizing clicks is UX design 101, at least in websites.

[luvdiamantee]

I’m not new to The Sims at all, I’ve been playing since I was 4 years old. I only downloaded the game on my Playstation 4 console because it was free. Everytime I go into build mode, I’m not able to click on anything in “Build” or “Objects by Room.” The cursor itself just moves near household funds and only allows me to move the cursor side by side. The only thing I’m able to use properly is “Objects by Functions.”

[xpinksims]

@EA_Solaire I like the console controls, but I wish we had options for more roof manipulation in build mode like PC players. I’m referring to Shift +C . There is no console equivalent to this

[xpinksims]

@OGRevellica Yep I just made this same exact comment