Almost exactly a year ago, the New York Times Magazine featured an interview with Will Wright, creator of "SimCity" and a host of other simulation games that have kept my sons glued to their iMacs for months on end. The focus was on Wright's latest invention, "The Sims," a people simulator in which you create family members, build them a house, purchase stuff for it, and, as Wright put it, "decide their careers and how much time they spend at work and with their friends and family and that sort of thing."

The next day I received an e-mail from the Jugglezine editor (and fellow working mom) who had also read the interview: "Why, when you do this all day, every day, would you want to come home and play it on your computer?"

She had a point. But I found that I very much wanted to play this game, just as I particularly enjoy reading novels about middle-aged women raising kids while trying to keep the customer satisfied. I want to know how they do it. It occurred to me that I could use The Sims to run an enlightening social experiment in which I could test different strategies for balancing work and life.

As it turned out, I had to wait a long time to find out how the Sims do it, because the game was first introduced in a Windows-only version (a serious misreading of its potential customer base, in my opinion). Then, when the Mac version was finally released and delivered to our home, my boys intercepted the UPS man.

Early learnings

Ever reticent about the details of their own young lives, the boys were full of stories about their Sims. Dylan tried out a life of crime; as a con artist he did quite well, earning bonuses from state senators. Emerson got fed up with his Sims' slobby ways. "They don't flush the toilet unless you tell them to," he complained, "and the trash piles up around the wastebasket and they don't even notice!" I could relate.

My youngest Dr. Frankenstein reported that it was possible to set up a Sim household with no adults, in which a child could watch TV, eat snacks from the fridge, and call for pizza delivery at will. His young Sim lived the life of Riley until the microwave broke and Eliot discovered that children don't have the option of calling for repair people. "You need grown-ups after all," he informed me sadly.

From what I was able to gather watching over my sons' shoulders, the game has all the banality and excitement of real life. To succeed, you have to juggle a number of factors--your Sim's personality, appetites, social requirements, and learning skills--all while making sure your creation makes it to work and feeds the baby. Just as in real life, time is the ultimate scarce resource, and you have to think carefully about how to use every hour (Sim-time runs gut-wrenchingly fast). Miss two days of work and you're fired. Forget to feed the baby and--well, you'll see.

Methodology

Since it would clearly take me months to reach my sons' level of playing proficiency, I hired Dylan to run the experiment for me. I asked him to set up two identical families--dual-worker couples in business careers--in identical starter homes, and then direct their lives for 20 Sim-days. During the course of the scenario, each family was to be blessed with a child.

The only difference between the two households would be their use of free time. Family A, the Nurtursons, would focus on home life. Family B, the Climbers, would focus on career.

Based on his by now vast experience in meeting Sims' eight basic needs (hunger, comfort, hygiene, bladder, energy, fun, social, and room), Dylan provided each family with 1800 square feet of living space equipped with basic kitchen appliances and bathroom fixtures, some furniture, a telephone, and a low-end computer.

Each couple comprised a neat, shy, active, nice, serious woman and a sloppy, outgoing, lazy, nice, playful man. (In Dylan's experience, Sims with complementary personality traits have the most successful marriages.) The households went live on a level playing field, each with $3,551 to sustain them until they found their first jobs--as mail room clerks.

Findings

Twenty Sim-days later, the differences between the two families were extensive.

Bob and Jenny Nurturson had each been promoted once, to executive assistants who brought home a total of $360 when their carpools dropped them off at the end of the day. With their young daughter, Jenny Jr. (Sim babies take only three days to grow into school-age children), they lived in the same house, with pretty much the same Spartan furnishings. Dylan did upgrade their kitchen appliances because Bob, the lazy one, was also the one with the highest cooking skills--a tactical error.

In spite of their hardships--they once had to sell off their lava lamp collection to raise money for groceries--the Nurtursons were a happy family. Their relationship indicator stayed steady at 100 percent. Their individual mood bars hovered between 3 and 4 (on a scale of -5 to 5). Their daughter maintained an A+ average in school, which might be at least partially due to the fact that the Nurtursons couldn't afford a television.

The Climbers, on the other hand, had each been promoted five times and, as business executives, were bringing in twice the Nurtursons' income. They had added a second story to their house, and furnished it with couches, a TV, restaurant-grade kitchen appliances, and an auto-flush toilet. Outside, they spruced up their grounds with a tulip garden, a white picket fence, and a swimming pool, hot tub, and fancy barbecue grill.

All of this stuff did help to raise the Climbers' mood ratings: their upgraded computer provided more fun in less time; their Modern Mission bed was much more comfy than the Nurtursons' "Cheap EZ Double Sleeper," which left them stiff and a little cranky in the morning; their oil paintings gave the Climbers more "room" points than the Nurturson family ever had--even when their lava lamp collection was at its peak.

Still, Bob and Jenny Climbers' relationship indicator occasionally dropped below 90, and in spite of (or possibly because of) outgoing Bob's constant schmoozing to maintain the friendships that lead to promotions, the couple's social bars were quite low. We'll never know what Jenny Climber, Jr.'s grade point average turned out to be because Social Services removed her from the house while she was still a baby.

Conclusions

Based on our findings, my research partner and I offer the following tips for families struggling to maintain a work/life balance.

Choose family members over sleep and business contacts. Dylan guessed he'd let Bob Climber nap a little too much on the days he cared for the baby (the couples alternated taking days off work to care for their infants) so that Bob would be in a better mood--and thus more promotable--at work the next day. Also, the Climbers' marital relations clearly suffered from a lack of time invested in talking and dancing with each other. As Eliot put it, "It's always handy to have more than one Sim so they can talk to each other when their social bars go down. But if one of them is at work, it's no use."

Invest for efficiency. Jacuzzis are nice, but they don't make a direct contribution to either family happiness or work success. Spend your money on things that help your family operate more efficiently. Kitchen appliances have a big pay-off, as do additional bathrooms.

Decorate creatively. Don't be a culture snob. Four lava lamps ($360) can give you almost as much "room" as one Modern oil painting ($8,500).

Don't ignore your fun bar. You can be an award-winning parent and employee of the year, but if your enjoyment of life drops below a crucial point, you'll wake up saying "I'm too depressed to go to work or talk to my kid."

Live long and prosper. You can't have it all--at first. But eventually, even the Nurtursons will be able to afford their Jacuzzi. Just remember that the repossessed wide-screen TV can be purchased again, but once you lose Jenny, Jr., she's gone forever.

Writer DEBRA WIERENGA and her research assistant, Dylan Wierenga Schreiner, live in Saugatuck, Michigan.