Unless you’ve lived under a rock for the past few years, you know about The Sims. Even if you’ve never played it, the title gives you an idea of what to expect. You play “God” and create an entire virtual world. What on paper seems like a chore, addicts in ways only a die-hard Animal Crosser could understand. Get a job, pay the bills, eat all your meals, get enough rest, keep your characters happy, get the mail… everyday life is the star attraction in video games' answer to “Reality TV”.

The developers at Maxis, however, have spruced up the console version considerably over the PC counterpart. Apparently us console lovers need a “point” in our games, whereas PC gamers enjoy pointlessness? Heh, either way – we have “goals.” In order to progress through the game you must complete certain tasks. Fix the TV, Pay the bills, Borrow Money – thus allowing you to move to the next level. Of course, you’re not a TV Repairman, so you’ll have to read “How to fix Electronics” in order to do this. This type of goal-oriented gameplay will only add to the addictiveness of The Sims. Now, not only will “what’s gonna happen next” keep you glued to your TV, simply getting to the next level will motivate the personal couch potato in all of us.

Visually, The Sims won’t win any awards, but it is now a truly 3D game. You can spin the camera around at any angle, as opposed to the isometric view of the previous versions. Eye-candy, this game is not, other than the showering girls you can peek in on... but it makes no difference. You don’t buy this game for graphics.

It remains to be seen whether or not The Sims can captivate the console audience in the same way it hooked the PC crowd, but it’s nice to see Maxis not resting on their laurels. They’ve put quite a bit of effort into catering this title to a different crowd when they could have easily just ported over the already popular PC version. Look for The Sims to hit GameCube in March.