"I wonder if, in their snip-happy way, EA truly realizes how devastating to the core principle removing swimming pools really is. What The Sims is is a consumerist middle class fantasy about walling yourself off from the real world and reducing all measurement of human development and personal success to one's possessions -- your dragon's hoard of crass, suburban decadence. And in that game of Top Trumps, the swimming pool is a kingly crown. It's always the first thing on my progress list when I play The Sims, after a second toilet and a TV bigger than my left bumcheek."