This is the best installment in the Sims franchise to date.
4th is too dumbed down and overmilked by the EA with countless minor add-ons that add up to thousands of dollars in price as you go through them.
Certainly, Sims 3 are also majorly milked by the EA with add-ons, but those are significantly fewer and each one has more content.
Even just the base game is good enough to play on its own, without any expansions.
Still an incredibly hostile behavior on EA's part to charge circa 500 USD for all expansions. I'm not going to buy them on the principle. Even if they go on sale.
Also launcher is terrible and will leave your play time meter on even after you close the main game.

What do I hate:
EA
Sims Store
Sims Store integration in the game loading screens
Sims 3 Launcher
Ridiculously overpriced expansions. Especially since it has been 14 years since game release.

What do I like:
Sims 3 the game

Giving it a thumbs down just to hurt EA's business at least a little.

UPD. I just realized that for a game from what, like 2008 it is still horribly optimized. So much so, that even modern hardware __takes time__ to load the game itself and then your save. No matter how fast your SSD I/O is and what clock speed your CPU is running. Where Half Life 2 or Portal loads in mere seconds, Sims 3 will take up to a minute. Granted, this is not an apples to apples comparison, but you get the idea.