[ WP ] You find a copy of The Sims 5 at a used video game store . You decide to buy it and try it out . Slowly , unscripted and non programmed events start to happen . You realize that you 're actually controlling a real family .

`` I need a game that a kid would like!'' he shouted frantically as he entered the store, `` A little girl.'' 
 `` X-box or play station?'' barked the clerk from across the store. 
 `` Neither'' he shouted back 
 `` We have a sale on consoles right now. That would be a great gift'' 
 `` I'm not buying her a damn console. Something cheap she'll like,'' he said, getting frustrated, `` And quickly, please.'' 
 `` Here, Sims. Just came out,'' The clerk said, game in hand, `` It'll run on any computer from this decade.'' 
 `` Great! I'll take it. Can you wrap it?'' he said, checking his watch. 
 
 `` Fuck.'' 
 `` FUCK!'' 
 James bashed his steering wheel. This was not the first time that he had fucked up; but forgetting his own daughter's birthday. That was truly a new low. He left work early, trying to surpise her by coming home before her, hopefully a nice gesture. 
 
 As he pulled up to his small house and ran inside. He checked his watch, 3:20. `` They should be back,'' he said as he marched through the door. But nothing. 
 
 The house was empty, and in the kitchen he saw a note propped up against a dozen empty bottles. He opened it and it read `` I'm leaving and I'm taking Lizzy. Do n't try to find us.'' His heart dropped. `` No!'' he shouted. 
 
 He ran up the stairs to find his room a mess and his closet empty. In his daughters room, nothing. Even the bed sheets were gone. `` Her mother,'' he whispered, they have to be there. He dialed her number, then again, and again. No answer. `` Fuck!'' he yelled for no one to hear. `` Did she give her the idea. That bitch never liked me. Fuck!'' He almost drove to her house before remembering the note. 
 
 The shock faded and terror set in. It was over, everything was over. He willed himself to move, step by step, to the garage, pulling one bottle of scotch and drinking as much as he could before heading to the tv. Every part of his body shivered with anxiety as he took another sip from the bottle. His nightly routine started a bit early tonight. 
 
 He woke up with a gun in his hand. He thought to himself exactly what he had planned to do with it. Awful was the thought that he was going to kill himself, but he was physically repulsed when he thought what he might've done to his wife. The wife he knew he loved, but hated. 
 
 That was it. He poured the entire case down the drain, along with anything he had in the fridge. He was cutting out the single thing that ruined his life. That ruined him. 
 
 The first night was easy, the second harder. He took the week off work hoping less stress would make it easier, but it gave him little to do. `` Life is boring when you stop drinking,'' he thought to himself with a smirk on his face. 
 
 He threw the game into the computer. ``'Anything from this decade,' thats what he said.'' Then the game booted up. He had played once before, his daughter showed him the family she had built. He remembered feeling weird when she used the word. `` You dont built a family.'' 
 
 Then, with no warning, the game started. Voices faintly spoke from the machine as images of people walked around a 3 story house. `` If only it was that easy.'' He explored the game, doing the things his daughter had showed him. Making the family cook, clean, work. Motonous daily activities. He hated it. 
 
 James left for the TV. Less thought. He figured that getting through the day was all that was important, and without thinking he could get through the day. But after an eternity of stupid shows, sports, and news he checked the clock. 10:30. `` Fuck,'' he whispered to himself. James had began to realize how often he had said that. 
 
 So he went back to the computer. The game was still running, and he saw the computer person doing something perculiur; it was taking a smoke break. A game for kids, and it was smoking. But James had another idea, he could use this character to do all the things that he had never done. 
 
 First was smoking. He was still baffled that this `` thing'' would smoke in a kids game. Next was... nothing. He watched this thing sitting at a desk for almost ten minutes before he could even think of something to make it do. `` A casino,'' he thought. He had never gambeled with anything other than scratch-offs. 
 
 He had the thing leave the building and drive to the casino. Hours of loosing before James had realized that there was no point to a virtual casino. There is nothing to win. Nothing real he can loose. So he decided to leave. Both the game and James' world were dark. As the thing walked out, he was propositioned. `` Ten buck for a joint,'' the shady looking man said audibly through the game. Dumbfounded, James decided to take it. Smoking pot was another thing he had never done. The game became odd. Oddly accurate. The man's driving was significantly worse, and speaking to his wife was slower and more incoherent than anything said before. 
 
 `` A fucking kids game'' he shouted. Then anxiety washed over him when he remembered why he had bought the game in the first place. He wanted a drink. But that was what got him here in the first place. 
 
 Then he got back to the game. Realizing that he could controll the entire family, Husband, wife, and son, he switched to the wife. She was cooking dinner when the husband came home. She had stopped to yell at the husband for smoking, and the pot on the stove began to boil over. `` Go and fix it,'' he commanded. But then another thought. Why did he make her do that. There are no repercussion, nothing of value can be lost. The game was like the casino. So he decided to go a different route with his playing. Not things he would want to do, but rather things he would never do. But not tonight. 
 
 James went to bed, having a tough time with the slowly growing headache. In the morning he opted to skip breakfast for another 10 minutes at the computer. He started the game up to see that the people were still sleeping, when an odd command appeared under his cursor. James could n't resist clicking it, and just as commanded the wife disappeared under the covers, and the husband quickly awoke. `` Lucky him,'' James murmured to himself. 
 
 That morning he followed the girl, and with his new plan and improved skill, decided to make her more... outgoing. He watched her go to work, which he found incredibly boring. An accounting firm. Again, he was stunned how this game was given to him for a kid. Then he decided to take control. `` A strip club!'' he thought. She left work and drove directly to a strip club, walked in and, by his command, got on stage. Dollars flew at her from the 10 or so patrons, and with each green spec the on-screen cash number increased. 
 
 Then the husband called her. Yelling so loud that James had to turn down the volume. He grew angry. The reminder of what he was going through was not a welcome sight. He promptly dropped the phone, then smashed it with her shoe. Then, without hesitation she grabbed the closest patron and dragged him to the bathroom. 
 
 As night rolled around, and the tiredness meter depleated, his day of nefarious behavior was over. As her car rolled into the driveway the husband ran out of the house. Screaming. Ten minutes of fighting in the driveway ensued, as much as James commanded them to stop. Then, they moved into the house and the screaming grew even louder. 
 
 Then she hit him. She walked out the door and drove off in the car. James threw the keyboard across the room. 
 
 He had already made it 4 days, but every second seemed like an eternity and he gave into the stress. All he could scrape together was not nearly as much as he wanted, but he was far from sober. Then he went back to the computer. 
 
 Rage. Rage was all he felt as he watched the wife come back into the house to find the husband sleeping on the couch. James commanded her to sleep, and took control of the man. He pulled a jerry can from the garage, the had him spill gallons of gas across the first floor. He ordered the man to stay in the house. 
 
 He was done. 
 
 The next morning James had woken up with his head against the monitor. `` Fuck,'' he said aloud feeling the hangover. He walked to the chair where he used to spend almost every free moment and turned on the TV. Nothing good on at 8 in the morning except the news. His hear stopped as he switched to his local news channel. Paralyzed, totally unable to move, to breathe, to think, he blinked. It was still there. 
 
 The screen read: Husband takes life in murder suicide arson in Aullville. 
 Three familiar faces were presented below.
