The Sims

If there's one thing you can count on with a successful enterprise, whether its a movie, a TV show or a video game, it's that the makers will keep on making sequels. Why? Because it's guaranteed to be a success and make them even richer than they already are.

Take "The Sims" for example. After the success of game designer Will Wright's SimCity in the early 90's, the turn of the century brought about his new vision of simulated life. In The Sims, you could control your own town, tell people to go to the bathroom (or not. Mostly not), buy a new house and find a job. If only real life were this straight forward. One click and you're away. I'm sure the Jobcentre would like us to believe this is true, but unless you're happy to work in Tesco (or 300 miles away from where you've specified - Ed), it's really not.

In 2002, The Sims became the most successful PC game in history, selling nearly six and a half million copies worldwide. And inevitably came the sequels and expansion packs. The Sims Livin' Large, The Sims Hot Date, The Sims Unleashed, The Sims Pets, The Sims Safari...You get the idea. The point in time arrives, though, where a great fresh idea becomes an old, tired, flogging a dead horse idea.

What simulation environments could they possibly have left? The Sims On Mars perhaps, where you play as a large man with a strong Austrian accent and biceps bigger than most people's torsos. Your task is to uncover a planet-wide conspiracy about aliens who left oxygen machines beneath the planet's surface. Perhaps a terrorist shoots out a window (doh!) and your Sim character is thrown onto the surface of Mars, where his eyeballs pop out of his head as he suffocates to death?

No, that's Total Recall isn't it. Still, don't be surprised if The Sims On Mars appears anytime soon (although the eyeballs popping out might not make it in. Stupid ethical conduct laws!). In truth, Will Wright has already delved into planetary control with 1990's SimEarth, but back then we were still basically in the Pac Man and Dizzy The Egg school of block pixels, so it doesn't really count.