Apparently there are small people living in your computer who need a home and care to live a better life. These homeless munchkins come with their age, what they do, whether they want children or not, and their likes and dislikes. Your job is to kindheartedly adopt a person and house them in a home of their own. In time, this person will find a mate and the new generation of your couple begins. It is your duty to keep them happy, nurtured and healthy so they could have a great prosperous life.
You scroll through a cast of characters looking at what they do so they can bring in an income to support themselves. The person you choose will eventually find a mate, and the two will wander in and around the house doing chores, relaxing, reading email and exercising. In order to form their personalities you have access to 2 aids on the left of the screen. One is the green praising glove when you click on your person with this, he/she will continue to do the task he/she was doing. The other is the scolding glove and this must be used sparingly because they do not like it. If they are not getting along with each other, wait until later to bring them together. It’s funny because most of the time they wander around the house without interacting with each other. If there is a task to be completed, you must supply them with the necessary tools before they can complete their job.
Dropping your characters in a certain room or object will cause them to interact in the room or with the item. If you drop your character on the trash, he will take the garbage out. Their health, energy and happiness level will determine what they do or not do so you must be able to satisfy all their needs. That’s where the store comes in to fill food, medicine, home improvement and miscellaneous needs to make them happy, healthy and flourish. Also if you will not be near your computer for a few days, you need to make sure the people have enough food while you are away. They will let you know if you are feeding them the same thing each time by waving you down and telling you they want a variety of options. In the demo you are only have access to the food and not the medicines or the fun things in life.
There is a virtual family tree when your family grows generation after generation. In order to have children you bring the 2 together, and they will have a baby. Your children could leave for an opportunity elsewhere and the parents could earn money for it, but usually the children stay until they are 18. The tracking of the generations is interesting to see where they go and how they develop.
Also your people like to pick up things and there is a section for their collection. The best thing about the collectibles is it can be sold on the internet for needed money.
Virtual Families is very much like a simple Sims game, and the big difference is that it runs on real time and is synchronized with your computer’s clock so your people will be sleeping when you go to bed. I checked this out one night and found the screen dark with glowing lamps, but the 2 adults and the child were wandering around the house. When I dragged everyone to bed, the kid fell asleep, but the 2 adults did not. The family will go about their daily life whether you are on the computer or not.
This game can get a little strained when the people refuses to do something. To get around this you keep at it and they will eventually do what you want. It is a little strange keeping people, even though cartoons, as pets. I think I’ll stick to Fish Tycoon and watch the fish grow and flourish instead. Also this game is similar to their Virtual Villagers except in VV you have a lot of people with different skill sets, and in Virtual Families you deal mainly with one family. Sim players will enjoy this excellently developed and well made Mac game for hours of endless play.
Features of Virtual Families:
-Generations of Families
-Shop for Food, Medicines, Home Improvements, and more
-Quirky Characters
Rating: 
