Few games are capable of telling stories the way that The Sims does. The life simulator game franchise is awash with ways for players to customize, characterize, and dramatize their play. Unfortunately, that level of expressive freedom is often hampered by the rampant use of 'rabbit holes' in The Sims. For the next entry in the series, The Sims 5, ditching those immersion-breaking menu-clicks in favor of 'real' locations would be a benefit.
A 'rabbit hole' in The Sims is a location where the player/camera is not able to follow a sim. For example, the Bistro in The Sims 3 functioned as a rabbit hole. Players could send their Sims to eat inside the restaurant, but would not have any interaction beyond clicking that menu option, and the camera would not follow the Sim inside. The player is left to watch a small progress bar fill as the Sim(s) enjoy a lovely meal, free from the prying eyes of their otherwise omnipotent controller.
There are a few benefits to The Sims series' rabbit hole system. Reducing events to text-based popups allows for more creative and varied happenings that would be difficult (or near impossible) to portray with animation. The Odd Jobs system in The Sims 4 is a great example of this. There are a wide-range of jobs to take, from helping Sims move to setting up new televisions, but each is accomplished in the same way - the player selects the job, the Sim goes offscreen and does it, rinse and repeat. In this way, the jobs are really only limited by whatever The Sims' developers want to type into the description boxes. It's a great way to inject some wacky events into the game, and is certainly easier than designing all new Sims 4 locations or gameplay sections, but does restrict the direct control that players have over their Sims - and that can restrict storytelling opportunities.
Why The Sims 5 Needs Fewer Rabbit Holes
Both The Sims 3 and 4 have featured a large number of rabbit holes, but this should be dropped when The Sims 5 releases. A majority of the career gameplay has been done in this way in the past, and with the exception of the active careers, players are not privy to what goes on at their Sims' work. Having real locations in The Sims 5 for Sims to work at would be a great way to increase players' ability to tell the stories they want to tell - a big step forward for the franchise.
Did the Sim have a quiet day at the office, or did they spend all day around the watercooler? Did they chat with the receptionist? Did they have a long lunch at the diner next door? These events could be reduced to text messages during a rabbit hole event, but having them take place in real locations with real choices would be fantastic - and give the player something to do other than speed up The Sims 5's clock until their character gets home from work.
Ideally, The Sims 5 will have an open-world design. Populating the world with real locations for Sims to explore both inside and out would represent a big step forward for the franchise. Using rabbit holes to simplify complicated events, or to increase the variety of simple ones would not be unwelcome - but using 'real' locations for things like workplaces is a must for the next entry in the series.