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Now, I admire The Sims as a game, but from a story viewpoint, there are two glaring problems. First, your relationship with those characters is like they're bugs in a jar. There's no empathy. And secondly, you've got this clunky, chemistry-set interface between you and them, with bars to show how tired or angry they are. It's all tell not show.

The great games are the space sims and driving sims and these experiences where you're basically sitting at a table with nothing happening in front of you. A lot of interesting things are evolving there. There are great games that can be made.

The second thing for me, probably a few clicks down, is the idea that The Sims smoothly age and have different concerns and motivations and needs at different age ranges.

And every now and then people find the bugs, and they interpret those as cool failures in the Sims terms. For them it's like a treasure hunt, you know.

Casual games are a great way to spend time when you get bored. It's hard to keep people off all their little games.

I had a very boring life, which is fine. I like being boring.

Also, after people play these Sim games, it tends to change their perception of the world around them, so they see their city, house or family in a slightly different way after playing.

What fun is life without a bit of showing off?

I like normal life, but I will go crazy if I'm not working.

The Sims is kind of an interesting case because we had all these expansion packs. We were able to incrementally add on and explore without invading the core dynamic or the core game play.