Late Night will be the next expansion pack for The Sims 3, and while it has echoes of the Hot Date expansion for the original version of The Sims, it'll offer a whole lot more. We recently had a chance to briefly try out the new content, start a band, moonlight as a bartender, and explore the game's…unusual interpretation of rated-T-for-teen bloodsucking.
Producer Grant Rodiek describes Late Night as a "return to the open-ended gameplay of The Sims" in reference to how the expansion will focus more on socializing and exploring, in contrast to World Adventures and Ambitions, which were more focused on directed, role-playing game-like advancement. Instead, Late Night will focus on getting your sims out of the house and into the nightlife at various clubs throughout the brand new town of Bridgeport, which was modeled after both the bohemian city of San Francisco and the home of Tinseltown, Los Angeles. These clubs include anything from lowly dive bars to the trendiest of venues, where the bouncers only let in the social elite. Late Night will have a "hot spot" system that highlights which of the town's clubs will be the most crowded and which will be flat-out empty.
The hot spot system plays into several of Late Night's new features, such as the new "celebrity level." All sims can gain up to five levels of notoriety (indicated by a 5-star meter that floats above each one's head). At lower levels of fame, your sims will be able to only get into low-end clubs and will get checked by bouncers unless you have other skills that can sneak you through, such as computer hacking, which can get you in through the back door. At higher levels of fame, not only will your sims be welcomed with open arms through the velvet ropes, but your sims may also be able to pick up some extra cash being a professional party crasher, taking in a little extra cash from nightclub owners to grace their parties with your presence and have your picture taken. This is not unlike certain Los Angeles-based starlets whose primary claim to fame is…showing up at parties.
Parties are important for making a little extra scratch in Late Night. For instance, if you're taking advantage of Late Night's new bartending feature, you can collect recipes from books and from skill advancements. Late Night has plenty of new and goofy animations for stirring, shaking, and mixing up advanced "juice" cocktails to serve for cold, hard cash. And if you happen to be in a band, your bread and butter will come from playing gigs. Fortunately, Late Night actually expands the range of instruments you can play beyond just electric guitars--you can also play piano, upright bass, or a drum kit (no Rock Band 3 play set, though). While your musically inclined sims can try to earn a little spare change outside the subway station playing alone (assuming they don't get mugged, which they can in Late Night), they'll make the most scratch playing a happenin' club.
