Energy

You are a creative (painter/musician/dancer/author etc.) living your daily life (Sims/slice of life style). During the day, you freely navigate your character's life while balancing a human's basic needs (food, shelter, clothing) through any means that you the player deem necessary. During the night (or days off based on your play-style) you enter your artist state (possibly through being high/drunk/meditative) and work on your creative project.

The artist state will play like a puzzle game similar to Catherine.  These "levels" will be timed and the quality of the artwork will be based on how fast you complete the puzzle (or how far you get in the puzzle before time runs out). These artist state modes will occur one time a week during the Sims style play-through.

Lastly, a third mode of play comes in the form of artist battles. When you successfully complete a high quality artwork in the artist state level, other NPC artists will approach your character and try to collaborate with you or challenge you. These collaborations or challenges will take the form of RPG style battles similar to Persona. These battles can also occur during the week in the form of various scenarios. These scenarios can range from being extremely hungry, to having unpaid utilities, writer's block or taking bad drugs to name a few.

What the player does during the Sims style levels will affect the artist state and then the battle stages. Each state will have different experience growths that affect an overall rank. The better the player is at handling the daily grind of life, the better the player can be at handling the creation of their art and the competition among fellow artists.