We have recently begun to re-investigate the use of the ‘Sims 3’ to act as a model for the real world, and how the real world (or someone’s opinion of the real world) represents the arts, in particular ‘the artist’. Sims 3’s perception of an artist is a painter, as the Sim becomes a more accomplished painter he/she produces works that objectively resemble the ‘real’ world, each time ‘improving’ on the previous painting. These improvements are predominately governed by the painting’s accuracy in relation to existing objects. So as the Sim’s painting level increases their paintings become more lifelike and the childish fictions that the Sim used to paint when they first started begin to fade out being replaced by a less superior view of their own world. Someone has programmed the game to do this; a decision has been made by an individual to portray the artist as an entity that can only create fiction-less scene. The Sim, as if stuck on a loop, now only has the capacity to copy repeatedly until they die. In a way this is actually a fairly accurate comment on the world exterior to the game; the habitual actions of a human is based upon common archetypes; everything is a copy.
Objects that exist within the game are only accurate representations of objects exterior to the game, thus rendering the Sim’s painting a copy of that copy. The Sim appears to paint a manipulated reality. The 3D rendering of such objects within the game mirrors the rendering of a Sim artist and the work they produce; an individual’s opinion has been expanded to represent the real world. This opinion is conveyed as if it is the only true reality of a specific object/idea/profession.
The game gives the user the ability to control their own world and create fictions within this world, however, they are still merely creating these within someone else’s idea of a world; the freedom that the game advertises is only a freedom within the opinion of the creators of the game. An ability to create and manipulate within the game is therefore an illusion. Such an illusion is also mirrored with the life of an artist within the game; the work they produce is pre-programmed and based upon a relatively complex system that takes the Sim’s characteristics and interests into consideration, but however complex this system may be, there will still always be a limited amount of work one Sim is able to produce; sooner or later the work produced will begin to repeat itself, to copy itself.
The creative freedom of an artist within the Sims is therefore the same as a person playing the game; the artist is limited by the player’s world, which in itself is limited by the parameters that the game designers have decided. This is not a new occurrence; parameters define and limit everything that has ever existed; human communication is limited by one’s ability to converse, and one’s ability to converse can be limited by social and cultural influences; these expansions can carry on infinitely and are constantly present. As a consequence of this, the representation of an artist within ‘The Sims’ could be seen as relatively accurate; this is seen less so in the actual work that they produce, but if one considers the notion that everything that exists is operating within certain parameters then they may draw some parallels with the act of making art. Everything that the Sim appears to produce is limited and defined by the world that he/she exists in. Everything that the Sim appears to produce is a copy of a copy.