...
...so, anyway, here's Journey to Batuu.
Oh, don't look at me like that. Star Wars basically needs all the attempts at good press it can get. Partnering with Electronic Arts in the games department hasn't really done them any favors besides Jedi: Fallen Order and with the Google reviews page sitting at 16% at the time of this writing, I figured it wouldn't be too bad an idea to at least attempt to throw them a bone provided they let me. Besides, I'm sure all three of the people that still have a soul working at Maxis could use the pick me up.
So, first off, you can't live at Batuu, you can only vacation there. The game bursts your bubble right out of the gate with that one. It's a shame, really, I was looking forward to living on a moisture farm with the Sims version of Tina and raising our two kids Nicoletta and Emmett. But, no, you can only vacation there. Vacation there I did, heading off solo while tearfully leaving my wife and children behind to go see if Disney actually allowed them to do something other than-
Oh, god, Sequel Trilogy focused.
Actually, that isn't fair, I knew that coming in. So I really have no one to blame but me on this one.
However, yes, I sent me, myself, and I to Batuu for a vacation and found myself in the brand new Sims-esque Star Wars land of Batuu. I noticed immediately that the traditional Sims loading screens were traded out for traditional Sims loading screens that played Sims'd Star Wars music over the screen wipe effect.
I was dropped into a larger general area called the Black Spire Outpost, which is the home of the "Scoundrel" faction. However, members of the two other factions - the First Order and the Resistance - can be found running around as well as visited in their own spots using the travel feature on your phone. In the Black Spire Outpost you can go around, dance at the Cantina, eat a bowl of free popcorn, and go shopping at various places to buy various things like lightsaber parts - although the currency used here is Galactic Credits instead of the usual simoleons that are used everywhere else in the game. There also isn't any sort of exchange rate, so I hope you're keen on doing missions because you'll have to if you want to not spend all your time hanging out at the Cantina eating popcorn.
Yes, you can do missions for each of the three factions in order to earn credits. Get enough and you can go out and buy yourself a cool lightsaber and a custom droid all your own. Or, at least for the saber, you can just use your Programming skills and hax0r your way to getting a saber through breaking into crates that are scattered all around the three areas.
The missions are more or less what you'd expect from The Sims with no real variation. You look around for objects, interact with designated objects with said objects you either found or were given, and any missions that take place in a vehicle (such as the X-Wing) require the use of the Rocket Scientist skill and will be done almost entirely through text screens.
Here's where the problem comes in though, my readers, and it's a pretty big one considering you can do just about everything else involving this - but your Sim is incapable of using the Force.
Lemme repeat that. Your Sim cannot learn to use the Force.
I wouldn't mind this necessarily (yes I would) except for this being a Star Wars expansion as well as giving us the ability to craft lightsabers, which is literally just one step away from it all. Also, given that none apartment everyone from Rey Palpatine to the boy with the broomstick can use the Force without so much as an iota of training, why the Force isn't just something you can do just by being that is totally baffling to me. You'd think people would want to do that in a game like this. In fact, they kind of already have with the Realm of Magic add on.
Would tweaking that to have made The Force a thing be all that terrible considering how much more of this you're just ripping off for giggles?
That's it, though, really, isn't it? It's just another symptom of the Disney problem with Star Wars in general. Journey to Batuu utilizes all of the symbology and iconography of Star Wars with none of the substance, wanting to only do the work if what it wants to do is put front and center at the expense of literally everything else. Sure you can hang out with Rey or Kylo Ren, but it's not really about your adventure so much as it is standing around and seeing how awesome they are. The focus on the Sequel Trilogy did admittedly confuse me for a bit, given how much the Sequel Trilogy has been maligned that even the media that has been so staunchly in favor of it before has started turning against it, until I realized that the entire expansion pack is essentially an advertisement for the Galaxy's Edge park.
That's pretty much the point where I declared "That tears it" and had had enough of the thing. I'm sure you could find some enjoyment out of this and I admit that some of the decor items that you can bring back home with you do look a bit nice, but that's a bit like saying that my Star Wars poster is a beautiful thing until it reminds me that Disney beat any joy and optimism I had for the franchise to death with a trash compactor. This is legitimately one of the laziest attempts at an addition to a game that I have ever seen and is pretty high on the list for one of the most egregious misuses of an intellectual property in history. Then again, what else is new under the regime of Kathleen Kennedy when it comes to Star Wars?
To reference another franchise entirely - Disney and EA I have, after careful consideration, decided not to endorse your park. Enjoy that 16% approval rating - it's far too kind.
The Sims 4: Journey to Batuu is now available for PC, Mac, Playstation 4, and Xbox One.
For the latest from the MadCapMunchkin, be sure to follow him on Twitter @MadCapMunchkin.
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