Simlish
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Simlish is a fictional language featured in Maxis' Sim series of games. It debuted in SimCopter, and has been especially prominent in The Sims and The Sims 2. Simlish can also be heard in SimCity 4, but far less frequently. It also featured to an extent in the Firaxis game Sid Meier's SimGolf. Designer Will Wright was conscious of the need for dialogue in the game, but thought that using a real language would make it sound too repetitive and would also be too costly to hire translators for world languages.
The Sims development team created the unique Simlish language by experimenting with fractured Ukrainian and Tagalog (one of the major languages of the Philippines). Inspired by the code talkers of WWII, Sims creator Will Wright also suggested experimenting with Navajo.[1]
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[edit] Music
Sims have been able to listen to Simlish music on their cheap boomboxes, or fancy stereos since its inception; since Hot Date, they have also heard music on wall speakers on Community lots.
In The Sims: House Party and The Sims: Vacation, Sims sing campfire songs. They are sung to the tune of "She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain", "Michael Row the Boat Ashore" and "On Top of Old Smoky". Lyrics for these songs were posted on the official website. A free full-length soundtrack album for The Sims: Superstar has also been released for download (complete with cover art), with several tracks sung in Simlish. [2]
[edit] Outside artists
For The Sims 2 expansion packs University and Nightlife, rather than creating unique Simlish music, recording artists cut new performances of their songs with Simlish lyrics. These artists include Annie, The Pussycat Dolls,Dexter Freebish, Paramore, Abra Moore, Charlotte Martin, Da Riffs, The Daylights, The Perishers, Cansei de Ser Sexy, Reggie and the Full Effect, Acceptance, Go Betty Go, Steadman, The Faders, Adam Freeland, Hyper, Junkie XL, Lemon Jelly, MxPx, Timo Maas, Barenaked Ladies and Trivium. The songs included in any one game depend on the localization. Kajagoogoo's Too Shy also appears on the New Wave music channel. Fellow Brit and synthpop artist Howard Jones re-recorded his hit song "Things Can Only Get Better" in Simlish. It also appears on the New Wave channel.
The Black Eyed Peas also contributed to the recording of Simlish hip-hop songs in Urbz: Sims in the City.
British synthpop band Depeche Mode recorded a Simlish-language version of their single "Suffer Well" for Open for Business.
Heavy Metal band Anthrax made a Simlish version of their song "Now It's Dark" from their album State of Euphoria.
Barenaked Ladies re-recorded three songs ("Easy", "What A Let Down", "Wind It Up") from Barenaked Ladies Are Me in Simlish for inclusion on the Family Fun Stuff pack. Skye Sweetnam recorded her song "Boyhunter" in Simlish prior to its appearance on her album Sound Soldier. Several artists re-recorded hit songs in Simlish for the expansion pack Pets, including Aly & AJ doing their "Chemicals React"[3], The Flaming Lips with "Free Radicals", The Pussycat Dolls with their top chart hit "Don't Cha", The Format with "The Compromise", and Saving Jane with "Girl Next Door". In the Spanish version, La Oreja de Van Gogh remade their hit "Dulce Locura". The band Malbec has also had their song "Given the Times" translated into Simlish.
Country artist Cowboy Troy also recorded his song "I Play Chicken With the Train" in simlish for an expansion.
In the Seasons expansion pack, The Veronicas have re-recorded their single "When It All Falls Apart". The Breadbox Band also added their song "N". Pop star Tata Young contributed a Simlish version of her song "Zoom". Lily Allen re-recorded her song "Smile" in Simlish.[4]
Natasha Bedingfield has also recorded a new song in Simlish. The song, as well as the new album, is titled "Pocket Full of Sunshine" (which is the U.S. version of her N.B.), and appeared in the newest Sims 2 Expansion Pack, The Sims 2: Free Time.
Celtic band Gaelic Storm made a Simlish version of their song "Scalliwag" from their album Bring Yer Wellies. It appears in The Sims 2: Bon Voyage and The Sims 2: Castaway. The Simlish version of Chemicals React can be downloaded in iTunes.
[edit] Written Simlish
Signs in The Sims games usually do not contain text, but consist entirely of graphics. For example, a pet shop sign in Unleashed displays a paw, a stop sign in Hot Date displays a white hand, and in The Sims 2 the sign for a grocery store depicts a cornucopia.
In The Sims, the headline The SimCity Times is visible on the daily newspaper, in English and in the Comic Sans MS font. (The game uses this font, with the Simoleon sign (closely resembling §) as the currency symbol.)
In SimCity Societies the simlish is written in much buildings and much of the letters are similar to greek.
In The Sims 2, most text is only distinguishable at very close zooms. On book covers, newspapers and Nightlife's "Sims Must Wash Hands" sign, the lettering is all nonsense characters that bear about as much resemblance to Latin characters as they do to Cyrillic. Almost no actual characters from any known alphabet are used. When Sims are writing novels or term papers, dingbats from the Wingdings font appear as text on the screen. Finally, the notebooks used for homework contain writing composed of random lines.
In The Sims 2, Simlish words occasionally appear on television screens. They are written in the same Simlish alphabet described above, or using the font Wingdings to produce symbols like Aum or Zodiac signs. In The Sims 2 University, eight "SimGreek Letters" appeared as signs intended for fraternity and sorority houses. University also contains the most unambiguous existence of actual English language in the whole The Sims 2 series; the words "Open house" are shown on a decorative noteboard on the top right announcement various times. It can only be seen at a very close zoom and is slightly garbled because of the JPEG compression. Most other appearances of English are logos for Maxis, Electronic Arts, or GameSpot. Also, the video games SSX3 and SimCity 4, found on the Sims' computers and TVs have numbers and the main screen has English letters and a rug from the H&M Fashion stuff pack features the letters H&M. The marketing of The Sims 2: Free Time contains excerpts from phony "hobby magazines" with front cover texts bearing some resemblance to the Latin alphabet. For instance, one magazine about car restoration has a title which can be read as "skitbil", meaning "shit car" or "shitty car" in Swedish.
Sleeping sims are illustrated by Zs floating around their heads, as usual in comics.
In The Sims Online, however, all text is in English.
[edit] Notes
- ^ The Sims Bustin' Out Designer Diary #3
- ^ [http://thesims.ea.com/us/getcool/graphics/superstar_cd.html Make Your Own Superstar Soundtrack CD!], Thesims.ea.com. Retrieved 14 October 2007.
- ^ EA and Aly & AJ collaborate on signature song for The Sims 2: Pets from GameZone. March 1, 2007.
- ^ [1] - Simlish version of 'Smile' on Youtube
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Charlotte Martin - Keep Me In Your Pocket (in Simlish) - in the Sims 2: Bon Voyage
- Spot On: Simlish stylist Robi Kauker. Simlish music in The Sims 2: University.
- Lily Allen - Smile (Simlish) Music Video - Lily Allen's Smile in Simlish
- Some songs in Simlish. Official The Sims 2 Site.
- Official Simlish Lessons. Official The Sims Site.
- The Big Simlish Dictionary The Big Simlish Dictionary thread on The Sims 2 Forum (BBS)
- [2] A video of simlish.
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