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Urbz: Sims in the City Comix
Thanks to MaxoidHumanoid (a Maxis employee) who writes "The latest title of the Sims franchise, The Urbz, comes out next month, and there is a new feature on the website launched only yesterday called Urbz Comix. A new comix will be released weekly for 10 weeks. A stellar line-up of indy comix artists has been assembled. Here's part of the roster: Peter Bagge, Evan Dorkin, Jay Stephens, Jim Mahfood, R. Stevens"
it appears the the Urbz is console only, while Sims 2 is a pc based game (not sure if there's a console version yet). I think Urbz is aimed at teens who want to do cool things like go to a club or eat sushi, or strip down motorcycles, rather than have cocktail parties... (hence the console release)
kinda like the difference between an oldsmobile and an acura.
I'm a console gamer that's vowed never to buy another PC game again, yet I bought The Sims 2. I buy maybe 5 or 6 games a year, and I usually only buy the ones I know are going to be good, and I don't buy them if they're more than $20 unless I really want them. For example, I'm still workin on GTA3 and just bought Vice City a couple of days ago. But, I broke all of my rules and bought The Sims 2 for PC for $45 or $50 or whatever it was (well, I had an Amazon gift certificate, so it was really free).
Why? Because I'm a fan of the series, and so is my girlfriend, and we'll both get lots of use out of it. I don't know if I'll get Urbz when it comes out, but as long as it doesn't get trashed by the fans, I'll get it when it hits the $20-25 mark, which could be a very long time if it remains popular.
Urbz, I think, is an answer to the question "Why should I get The Sims for my Console if I already have it for my PC?" There's probably the perception - and rightly so - that there's too much overlap between the two, especially now that the PC version has a 3D engine, goal oriented play (though still more open ended than the console version), and a high level of customization. Urbz, then, might not be about capturing a different demographic, but about differentiating enough to get their existing customers to buy in to something they might otherwise see as redundant.
"This isn't the Sims, it's the Urbz, and you have to buy it because it's not the same, it's different." Ever since Maxis was acquired by EA, they've been dedicated to one thing, and one thing only: Sucking the life blood out of their existing customer base by creating add on after add on, and even requiring that you bought all the 99 prevoious ones before you could use the one you wanted. No more variety (sim life, sim ant, sim far, sim tower, sim earth, etc.), just The Sims and The Sims expansion packs.
So think of the Urbz not as a different game aimed at getting a different audience. Think of the Urbz as an expansion pack you can only get on consoles.