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By Keith B (5th Apr 2008)

Picture this, Survivor meets Robinson Crusoe meets Gilligan’s Island. Mix all of that together with some C.G. dudes who you control and you’ve got The Sims 2 Castaway (S2C). This brand new instalment to the family which produced the most successful game in history has a lot to live up to. So does it cut the mustard or the cheese?
The basic premise of the Sims is that you are, in essence, God. You control the actions and environment of between 1-4 simulated characters (sims), and it is your job to make them happy. Their happiness, like in real life, depends on the base characteristics of the individuals. For example, one character may desire monetary wealth, while others may want fame or a large group of friends. The big difference between S2C and other Sims games is the setting and its direct influence on the characters needs. Basically that is a complex way of saying that this game is set on a tropical island and the major need is survival.
After you have created your ‘crew’ you find yourself on a pretty little beach bordered by palm trees and tropical plants. For the next while you control just the central sim, with one of your key tasks being to locate your crew mates and eventually explore the other islands and build a shelter until you get rescued. I have enjoyed this aspect of the game, the solo player control rather than looking after all four Sims straight away. It makes it far easier to explore the environment and is a good way to familiarise yourself with the controls (which vary greatly from the PC).
Overall, as with most games that have crossed over to the hand held format, simplification is one of the major keys to success. So I have no doubt that this was a primary concern for this game, given the plethora of controls and options on the PC version. They have achieved quite a successful result in this aspect. I found that it did take a little to get used to, and the loading times are frustrating when you have to jump from menu to menu. Considering the limited memory the creators had to work with, this point can certainly be forgiven.
The visuals are pretty much what you expect from a Sims game. There is a great degree of similarity in the appearance of the environment in comparison to its PC older brother. You don’t have the same degree of zooming ability, but in reality the game play itself is very different and it is easy to forget that you are playing a “Sims” game. The explorable area of the islands is a little limited and because they are divided into four or more sections the loading times can become tedious.
The character rendering is practically identical to the older PC versions. There was nowhere near the amount of character design options when creating your crew, but the ones available are managed well. The water, and other background elements that have full motion, animates well, with a transparency level that adequately allows game play to continue when the view is blocked. However, other solid objects and general level design does have draw backs where it comes to point of view rotation and it is easy to get stuck, momentarily, because of the illusion of a larger playable area.
I did find that, on occasions, there was a small amount of lag which I would credit to loading times. However, there are also some animation imperfections that detract a little from the overall picture. Where you can forgive a slight lag due to loading it is difficult to get past the animation issue. This may not be the same for all, but I found my attention was grabbed on a number of occasions and it did become a mild annoyance.
Early on in the game it is very easy to let your sim become unhappy due to the mismanagement of sleeping, eating and social interaction. As much as this is a ‘simulation’ style game this really did get my goat! It is probably the reason I have never been overly impressed by the other Sim’s games, the action comes waaaaaay too slow!
In the previous incarnations of the series you had to earn money to buy everything from furniture to food. Of course the local department store and supermarket is over 1000 miles away, and they don’t do home delivery.......so you have to find and create (from scratch) all your needs, including some swanky clothes. Fortunately, as there is no electricity, gas or piped water you don’t have to worry about paying the bills or calling in the repair man if the fridge is on the blink.
Given that the original Sim’s were something like the reality show Big Brother, the fact that this is bordering on a replication of Survivor or Shipwrecked (for those who remember that one) I have no doubt that that S2C will be very successful. It is definitely a game where you can lose many hours on end doing incredibly menial tasks. I am sure some day a game will be released that simulates house work or balancing cheque books or the likes, and will break sales records because again people seem to enjoy controlling characters that do the work that they do in a virtual world rather than do it themselves in the real world?!
Simply put, if you are interested in the Sims series and own a PSP, you should probably get yourself a copy of this game. As I mentioned earlier, the Sims is not my cup of tea. Having said that, remaining completely unbiased, I think the complete package of the game is very good. Minor imperfections aside, there are far more positives than negatives and the entertainment level would be high for anyone interested in a variant on a game that will go down in history as a classic. For anyone who has not played a Sims game before I would simply say this isn’t really a gamer’s game, but it has a broad appeal to the wider community that will make it a good option as a time waster.