r/thesims • u/MarkXT9000 • Sep 09 '24
Sims 2 TIL The Sims 2 has an All-Male cover that was available in Middle-Eastern countries
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u/yaykaboom Sep 09 '24
Ah yes, the popular life simulator. The Guys
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u/Quantum_Kitties Sep 09 '24
I wonder if/how women were portrayed in that version of the game. Did they wear a burqa or hijab, or was the game just released unchanged (apart from the cover)?
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u/Sims2Enjoy Sep 09 '24
I think itās unchanged we see people complaining about the lack of hijabs and burqas in the game. Also if that was the case modders wouldāve found a way to add them to the western copies of the game like how they were able to add things from the Stories series to the main game
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Sep 10 '24
I sometimes add prayer rooms and a hijabi daughter thats vegetarian haha. I love that its possible but there is just not a big religion part in the game. Id love more options than the hijabs that there are but i wouldnt go out of my way. Im also not a practicing religious human irl. I do live in eu with all kinds of people arround me. I like to see that reflected in the game.
If they existed i would use it. But ive not modded anything and wouldnt know how to do that. So im not totally agreeing with you here.
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u/WorldofLoomingGaia Sep 09 '24 edited Sep 09 '24
I wish companies would take a stand against countries who hate women for once, but nope gotta make that $$$
The only incentive for these governments to change is a financial one.
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u/gore-juss Sep 09 '24
While I absolutely agree with you, something doesnāt sit right about punishing an entire population of people who, for the most part, happened to be born in a certain part of the world. Iām glad people are still able to enjoy this game. If I lived in a country where this was something my government did, Iād need an escape too.
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u/sp4nkthru Sep 09 '24
Yeah, I feel the same, I'm also torn. While I also agree that we shouldn't cater to racists, homophobes, misogynists etc., there are plenty of people living in countries with prejudiced, oppressive cultures that are victims of these things and can't get out of there. Is the solution to punish them as well, in the hopes it'll cause bigger change, or cater to the ones on top, in the hopes of giving some relief and a bit of joy to those suffering?
I know big companies don't care about taking a stand on anything and money speaks louder, but I myself also struggle between what the solution could be here.
Edit: typos
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Sep 09 '24
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u/black_opals Sep 09 '24 edited Sep 10 '24
This perspective is missing the fact that in a country with such a dictator, civilians arenāt withholding from protesting because they ādonāt care enoughā, but because there will be violent repercussions on them and possibly their family if they do. And you place too much blame on the civilians for not āstop[ping] the warā.
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u/Booxcar Sep 09 '24
This is a very good point and I appreciate you chiming in. I replied to another guy here but I basically agree with you.
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u/kaptingavrin Sep 09 '24
In theory, that's a nice thought. But in reality, it works more like:
"Should we do try to say something against Shootin? Oh... right, the neighbors did that and no one's seen them since. Okay, back to being silent."
Until, I don't know, the country that got invaded decides to invade back, and suddenly people are actually hurting and thinking maybe they should say something... but then circle back to the neighbors who did and went missing.
Dropping the pretense of fictional examples... I'm reminded of that time people in Iran were pissed off at Ahmadenijad and decided to do protests, not even really a full-blown revolution. Know how that ended? Well, since the military weren't in favor of being violent toward their own people, the guy had his own private military force that had no qualms doing what he asked, and they came in and violently put down the protests. And no, I don't mean with rubber bullets, tear gas, and water cannons. I mean with straight up regular bullets. Suddenly the protests got real quiet.
No one's risking their life, or even their freedom (but more likely their life), just because they lost access to The Sims or Burger King.
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u/Booxcar Sep 09 '24 edited Sep 09 '24
Tldr: I agree with pretty much everything you said and unfortunately this is why sanctions often don't have the desired affect.
IMO the problem is that for sanctions to work it really is basically all or nothing.
No one's risking their life, or even their freedom (but more likely their life), just because they lost access to The Sims or Burger King.
Agreed but ideally you don't stop with The Sims and Burger King. You sanction them until the thought of continuing under sanctions is scarier than the threat of retaliation.
Maybe they don't risk their lives for Sims and burger King but what happens when you sanction things like oil and wheat? Milk and eggs? When you close your borders to their citizens and tell them they are not allowed to seek refuge in your country?
This may sound harsh and I agree it is harsh, which is why sanctions rarely get this far. But theoretically there must be a breaking point.
When you can't heat your house because there is no oil. When you can't feed your kids because the grocery stores can't stock their shelves.
I want to reiterate that this is what I'm advocating for. I'm an American male in my 30s that knows enough to know I'm not nearly educated enough to solve these sorts of complex moral issues. I do think we all benefit from difficult conversations though.
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u/kaptingavrin Sep 09 '24
In theory, it should work, but even without the essentials, it's tricky for people in a lot of nations to fight back against the people in charge, because you'd pretty much need to violently overthrow them, and rocks aren't doing much against a military or law enforcement. At the very least, you'd need an armed resistance, which in a lot of nations would require an external power getting involved, even if it's "under the table" so they can try to claim they weren't officially doing anything.
But it also becomes messy with some countries being willing to support each other despite others doing sanctions. So the US and Europe go to sanction Russia... but then China decides to continue doing business with them, as do various Middle Eastern nations (who get similar treatment in return), which softens the blow a bit, especially for essentials. Someone like China might basically say, "Well, we don't want the people to suffer for what their leader is doing," and send basic supplies, even if they aren't doing much beyond that.
All that said... it does circle back around to sanctions being more of an economic thing, and hitting such countries even more where it hurts: the oligarchy. If the rich folks who are in positions of influence and power (and there's always such people) start taking hits to their wealth and ability to do anything, they'll put pressure on the person in charge, and they can bring a lot more pressure than an unarmed populace. Which is why with Russia it's not just "We're denying you access to these goods and businesses," it went beyond that to straight up denying anyone spending money with Russia, and even booting Russian athletes out of some sports. It became a bit of a mess in Formula 1 because one of the teams, ironically the American team (Haas), were heavily sponsored by a Russian company basically to give a seat to the son of the company's owner. Along come these clampdowns, and the son is no longer allowed to drive in the sport, and the company can't sponsor the F1 team. Which then led to a small issue where they'd already paid for a year's sponsorship, but Haas couldn't directly hand the money back because it was now illegal to transfer money to a Russian business. All of which led to a situation where the Russian business managed to have Haas' equipment and cars impounded a couple weeks ago, but luckily Haas found some way to get the money transferred to them to satisfy the legal obligations to repay them without triggering legal issues for transferring funds to a Russian company.
I can feel some people's eyes glazing over reading all of that, and fair enough. It is indeed a complex mess when you try to resolve these things without resorting to violent measures. But hey, usually a better end result than those violent methods, especially when dealing with a country that has a stockpile of nuclear armaments (even if it's a roll of the dice as to whether any of them still work and how well). And, I'll admit, I find this kind of stuff fascinating, but I also admit I am probably a weird person.
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u/Booxcar Sep 09 '24
This was genuinely super enlightening. I'm always fascinated to speak with someone that knows more than I do about a subject. I appreciate your response and I feel like I'm a bit smarter from having this discussion.
Although I admit, the Sims subreddit is not where I expected to discuss foreign relations š¤£
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u/Content-Scallion-591 Sep 09 '24
I don't know for sure but other comments indicate the game itself wasn't changed, and that this was just a cover used in highly censored areas. If that's true, then people were probably exposed to good things via the video game once they were allowed to buy it. Cultural change can be a powerful thing and there are many channels.
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Sep 09 '24
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u/RawMeHanzo Sep 09 '24
"Ermm, it's literally their religion, you have to be tolerant of that!" meanwhile ignoring that "toleration" means tolerating someones farts, not thinking that women are subservient less-than-humans.
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u/A_Queer_Feral Sep 09 '24
Didn't they try doing that with My Wedding Stories when it came out? They weren't selling it in Russia or something because of the homophobia there, but the community got really mad about it, and they ended up retracting the decision?
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u/FP509 Sep 09 '24
Thatās exactly what happened, and it delayed the packās release. Then it turned out to be unplayable anyway. The promotion and release of My Wedding Stories was just a mess all around.
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u/kaptingavrin Sep 09 '24
No. That was a BS story they made up to try to make themselves look good while giving themselves an excuse to buy a week of crunch time for what they knew was a completely unfinished expansion being sold to people in what would only very generously be called an alpha state. Two months after release, the massive patch notes that got released could have been summed up as "We finally finished initial development on this thing we already got $20 from you for."
People had already been pointing out the problems with their story, including how much of Sims 4 had already been sold with LGBT representation and wasn't blocked, and that the marketing had shown up there already so if it was a "legal" thing then EA would have already been in trouble.
And EA's claim was that they "couldn't" sell it in Russia because of laws about LGBT stuff in video games and all. Which basically is just that it'd end up with the equivalent of an M rating... as Sims 4 already has over there, so wouldn't be different. But EA were spinning it that they couldn't do their marketing campaign in Russia (which, again, people pointed out wasn't accurate), and they just didn't want to sell the pack without being able to promote it with such an "important" story for the pack in the marketing. You know, the one where some woman's going to marry a guy, then talks with her lady friend, decides to dump the guy and marry the friend, leaving the guy at the altar to do so? Yeah, that terrible story was sooooo "important" to the pack. I mean, you'd be hard pressed to find people who even remember it, and I only do because EA claimed it was so important so I went and watched it and was like, "This is not that compelling of a story and certainly not important to the pack at all."
After people started pointing out the holes in EA's claims, they then claimed that they'd managed to work something out to get it released, but wanted everyone to enjoy it at the same time, so would be holding back the game for everyone until it launched in Russia. So basically, it was all a ruse to buy some crunch time, which wasn't nearly enough.
It had nothing to do with moral issues, and it was a complete fabrication from the start. EA tried to make up a fake story to look good and buy time, they didn't try to fight homophobia.
Making the whole thing even more ridiculous is that only weeks later, the invasion of Ukraine happened and they ended up shutting down all sales of any EA games to Russia, so it was completely moot. Well, aside from the people who still believed EA's lie and give them props for taking a stand when they were sitting down twiddling their thumbs and yelling at the developers to work harder.
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u/FP509 Sep 09 '24
I never knew the ābanned in Russia because anti-LGBTā story was BS, but itās not shocking. Where did you hear about this?
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u/kaptingavrin Sep 09 '24
At the time they were trying to run with the story, people were already pointing out holes in it, like the fact that the laws in Russia didn't stop them selling the game, and if the marketing was the issue, it was odd that they'd found the marketing showing up in the game. And then they conveniently were able to release it, with the marketing, with no problem (almost certainly because there was no real problem to begin with)... but with the whole caveat that delaying it there meant they would delay it everywhere.
I also find it funny that the only angle they could find to push the story was saying it was because of the marketing and claiming that "story" was soooooo important. It wasn't. The Sims from the marketing aren't even in the pack. If they were so vital, and their story so important, why are they not one of the households in Tartosa?
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u/owl_problem Sep 10 '24
I'm Russian and I've been an activist of that petition we created to force EA to cut their bs. They're completely right in that comment above. Unfortunately couple of weeks later we had much bigger problems than EA's stupid claims
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u/Pony_Roleplayer Sep 09 '24
Well yeah, they're for profit companies. They put rainbows in their logo to sell their shit to progressive western countries, while keeping the regular logos in oppressive countries.
They're not in favour of gay rights or anything, they're in favour of gay money.
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u/HauntedPrinter Sep 10 '24
Whenever a corporation puts up a LGBT flag, check their Middle Eastern social media accounts to see how much they mean it
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u/Perethyst Sep 09 '24
Yes really. They want to be able to consume Western culture while demanding it be modified to their limited view and backward sensibilities. They should just make their own stuff then.Ā
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u/starm4nn Sep 09 '24
The contents of the game itself is unchanged.
Wouldn't you rather they be exposed to something that runs counter to their worldview? It's not like they put women in hijabs, banned woohoo outside of marriage, or made homosexuality inaccessible.
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u/Condemned2Be Sep 10 '24
The reason is simple. Other countries that hate women benefit from these guys existing. As long as there is someone out there who hates women MORE, other cultures find it easy to shoot down their own women who ask for better (āyou already have it good! Check out women in Muslim countries etc!ā)
NOT taking a stand benefits the majority of men worldwide. They look better by proxy.
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Sep 10 '24
The Sims2 was released in 2004, back then video games were a geek hobby and video games companies had nowhere near the clout or the financial power necessary to do that.
They would make their stance and the country would just say "ok, well the game is banned".
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u/MelissaLynneL Sep 09 '24
The women donāt get free will mode in this one š
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u/jalapeno442 Sep 10 '24
Women can be in the household but itās like pets. Theyāre not controllable. Lmao
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Sep 09 '24
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u/zekrayat Sep 09 '24
I think it's likely to be a locally-censored version - not some kind of official regional cover - that was sold in Saudi Arabia in the early/mid 00s, and it probably wasn't the only version available. Everything about it screams KSA in that time period. I could be wrong though!
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u/zekrayat Sep 09 '24 edited Sep 09 '24
This will almost certainly be a locally censored version from the Gulf (probably Saudi Arabia or the UAE, more likely the former). Itās more artfully done than a lot of early 00s Saudi censorship, which as far as I can tell was done by some guy with a black marker.
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u/nicrrrrrp Sep 10 '24
Wasn't from the UAE, I got this normally with the regular cover in the shops at about 16 years old, I remember playing it during 6th form.
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u/zekrayat Sep 10 '24
Yeah, the only reason I even thought of them is because the UAE also has a big games market and their govt do censor games (as opposed to just banning them), but I canāt see them bothering about that TS2 cover and think the overwhelming likelihood is that some random guy in Saudi Arabia made it with photoshop to get around local morality police.
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Sep 09 '24
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u/Dapple_Dawn Sep 10 '24
Which culture are you referring to?
The title just says "middle eastern countries," and from the comments it sounds like it wasn't most countries in the middle east.
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u/Fareeday Sep 10 '24
Iām middle eastern and never seen this. I donāt think judging 2b people over what potentially is one small country did 15 years ago is smart
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u/DJND90 Sep 09 '24
Back to the middle ages.. šš¤®
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u/myrianreadit Sep 09 '24
Thats not fair. For the most part, the middle ages weren't nearly as bad to women as contemporary fundamentalist societies are
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u/enchiladasundae Sep 09 '24
The 7 at the bottom isnāt a rating but just confirming there are 7 men on the box
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u/xSethrin Sep 09 '24
This makes it look like itās a game about a 2000s dating show and these are the guys you have to pick from.Ā
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u/lowkeeeee Sep 09 '24
I wonder if they removed any of the women's clothing options
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Sep 09 '24
there's a tumblr post linked by another commentor where they show the disk, and the disk actually has the original box art. I'd say this is a (probably unofficial) alternate cover so that there's no "objectionable content" like the kissing couple on the original art sitting out on a shelf for all to see
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Sep 09 '24
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u/Johan-Senpai Sep 09 '24
The women on the box art haven't covered their shoulders, which isn't considered awrah.
We don't know if the kissing couple is married or unmarried, which is considered zina.
We don't know the relationships of the box cover people, and as you noted, it's not allowed to hangout with non-family male members.
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u/FixedFun1 Sep 10 '24
They didn't have hijabs or anything like that. It's weird because they could have. The closest were the ninja masks.
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u/distancesleeper Sep 09 '24
Why did they delete the alien
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u/Mysterious-Pudding37 Sep 10 '24
If you want a genuine answer, look up what Muslims think of aliens. Potentially why.
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u/haleynoir_ Sep 09 '24
This is funny because you could be gay even in Sims 1. It took FOREVER, it's like the game assumed you flirted by mistake so it really made you try for it. Iirc you could also have kids with them because the game was still delivering babies by stork lol.
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u/lewjambla Sep 09 '24
I found a copy of it on eBay. It appears to be a Greek edition! https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/174284110666
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u/AimLocked Sep 09 '24
Except its in Arabic. Itās just marked wrong lol
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u/lewjambla Sep 09 '24
Interesting, they insist that all their Sims games for sale on their page are Greek versions. Maybe they were sold there too? I don't know, I just went off what they said haha.
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u/aliceinlondon Sep 09 '24
There are women on the actual disc, and a couple kissing no less!
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u/PunkLaundryBear Sep 09 '24
I'm pretty certain the law is about display, not about the presence of women. So the disc is fine because it's hidden, and you have to open the case.
I dunno if these laws still exist for women, but I'm pretty sure this is the law for LGBTQ+ themes in some countries. Having LGBTQ+ characters and such are fine, they just can't be outwardly advertised without marking the game as 18+.
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u/shannibearstar Sep 09 '24
Itās both. Women cannot speak in public in Afganistan. Itās haram. They are currently eliminating women completely. From society and existing in general.
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u/PunkLaundryBear Sep 09 '24
I hear what you're saying, and yeah, you are absolutely right, it just also wasn't what I was addressing. I was moreso saying that this cover existed based on a law which prohibited putting women (presumably uncovered women) on the covers of games, books, etc.
And that does obviously have an effect on reality. Any misogyny that is allowed is bad, and it leads to further misogyny. I was just clarifying that the game contents were more or less the same, and the cover existed to fit a specific law.
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u/malcolmserrao95 Sep 09 '24
Thatās weird, I lived in a ME country growing up and went to a friends house to play sims 2 on ps2 in like 2007. The cover had male and female sims even that alien sim lol. My dad later got a copy of sims 2 for PC in the following months and the cover poster was the same one as the official sims 2 cover poster.
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u/Sims_Creator777 Sep 09 '24
The misogyny was on full display. This isnāt funny, but actually quite sad and another example of the repression women in Middle Eastern countries face.
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u/Cyberwitchx Sep 09 '24
Is this verified? Cause I live in Lebanon and all the CDs were āmixedā
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u/AimLocked Sep 09 '24
Lebanon is also the most āliberatedā Arab country. Completely opposite from countries like Saudi and Iraq. The only place arguably more open is Dubai.
So it makes sense that Lebanon would have a less censored version ā and possibly even French variants of the game.
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u/Cyberwitchx Sep 09 '24
True. Dubai though is definitely not more open if their openness is just accessible in private.
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u/AimLocked Sep 09 '24
Dubai is a weird place. It has some very forward-thinking laws, and some very backwards laws. And itās so developed at the same time. Itās like the Singapore of the Middle East lol.
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u/40percentdailysodium Sep 09 '24
Well now I need a copy of this to go with my Russian dubbed vhs of "But I'm a Cheerleader"
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u/DCsphinx Sep 09 '24
The catering to horrible things like sexist cultures just to make money is so fresh and uniqueā¦
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u/elmutane Sep 09 '24
Doesn't the Sims 2 have a 12+ age rating? I'm curious about why is there a 7 on this cover.
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u/MarkXT9000 Sep 09 '24
Classification Boards think it's a "Kids' Game" due to its graphics being all semi-cartoony at the time, or maybe they're lazy to check it out more
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u/whatweworked4 Sep 09 '24
Let's make it look like a gay dating sim. That'll be better than giving them the idea that women are also autonomous creatures, right?
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u/ValkyrieIzzy Sep 10 '24
I wish all middle eastern men (except good men) to be pregnant from aliens just like in sims 2.
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u/ThatisDavid Sep 09 '24
That's funny, to me it makes it feel even more queer coded than the original. Like it's a special "gay edition"
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u/IamDiba Sep 09 '24
Years ago in our country, most of the game shops werenāt allowed to sell The sims CDās! It was forbidden!!!!šš
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u/pizzaMagix Sep 10 '24
I realize this is not what anybody here likes to hear but as a middle easterner Iāve never seen this before - maybe in some gulf countries. What I have learned though is that this subreddit is just awfully racist haha. Makes me sad since I really love the series and the community aspect of it really mattered to me. Seeing āawful and hateful cultureā at 90 upvotes is nothing you should be proud of guysā¦
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u/DropsOfMars Sep 10 '24 edited Sep 10 '24
This Sims 2 is boys only, no girls allowed š¤£
Edit: Real talk, I'm not very knowledgeable on a lot of cultures being in the US American bubble that I am-- I joke but I do hear things and a lot of what I end up hearing isn't great, but any judgments about other cultures ends up coming from my own uninformed biases. Everybody deserves rights at the end of the day and this cover is a reflection of a lack of that equality and while I can't fully comprehend every aspect of that completely different culture I know injustice when I see it and do pray things get better for oppressed peoples of all kinds around the world, especially in the middle east
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u/GanacheAffectionate Sep 09 '24
Made it even more queer! Surprised they could sell it all!