considering getting more expansions, seeking advice

[jennydeenyc]

So, I've picked up playing Sims 2 again after about 8 months away. I have Uni, NL, OFB, FFS & GLS, and I'm thinking about getting at least one more EP/SP. Thing is, I'm not sure which one(s) will be worth getting, based on how I play the game.

In a nutshell, my sims tend to spend virtually all their time on their home lots. I take them to community lots only about once every month or so (real time, not sims time), if that. My current family has a home business, but again, I find I can't be bothered to attempt to own or play a community business. My sims also haven't actually gone to Uni in forever, I just use hacks to add their extra want slots, etc. In light of my "homebody" tendencies, I doubt Bon Voyage would be of much added value for me, but I would like to know what people here think WOULD be worth getting, taking into consideration my playstyle.

Your suggestions are greatly appreciated, and if you have any questions about what hacks I use, ask away. Thanks!

P.S. Not sure it makes any difference, but I also tend to play a single family at any given time, working them up through generations, rather than skip between families. With my current family, I'm really trying to stick to allowing only one child from each generation to have kids of their own, moving any siblings out sometime between the Teen - Adult stages. Right now the decision on who gets to have kids is based on which (if any) child inherits the custom green eyes I gave the family's founding female :-)

[aussieone]

As you mentioned Bon Voyage would probably be the EP that you would get the least enjoyment from playing. IMO, Freetime sorta sucks, but perhaps I haven't given it enough of a chance yet.

The one EP which I loved right from the outset was Seasons. I like the farming/fishing aspect and the fact that some of my sims have become self sufficient by selling what they sow and catch. Being able to sell crops and fish for profit is fun!

[gynarchy]

I agree with aussieone, Seasons has been the only EP that I enjoyed from the start. The others have grown on me, FT included, but Seasons is definitely a cut above the rest. I was especially disappointed with BV because Vacation was one of my favorite TS1 EPs but I have really come to love Twikkii Island and beachfront properties. You could always ARRRR! the EPs if you wanted to "try before you buy".

[jennydeenyc]

ARRRR! ?

[Zazazu]

ARRRR! ?

As in, choose not to pay for. *ahem*

Seasons is a definite must. Totally and completely changes the game's feel and fishing and farming can mesh well with OFB. If you're considering a second, I'd get BV. I haven't actually had vacation sub'hoods linked to my last two 'hoods, but I love the beach lots to pieces, so even after you get bored with the vacation portion it's not like you'll forget you have the EP.

FreeTime....eh. I like some of the craftables, but the badges take so dang long to get, and honestly I find myself ignoring sim hobbies more and more.

[jennydeenyc]

Ok, so Seasons is a definite at least :-)

Anyone care to speak about the relative merits of Pets (which I haven't seen mentioned yet) or any of the SPs I don't have - which I believe are: Celebration, H&M, Teen, and K&B?

[SimWitch]

If you like animals and/or the notion of playing a simulated dog/cat breeder, Pets is a great addition. I like playing with breeding characteristics and I personally like animals, so Pets hasn't been a waste of hard drive space for me. If virtual animals aren't your thing, then the expansion is of debatable worth. Strays are highly annoying and require you to take some precautions to protect your yards (and are irritating regardless). Werewolves I haven't really gotten to test yet, but they seem more interesting than zombies and less high maintenance than vampires, so take that for what it's worth. But, really, if you don't put any animals into your households, you won't even notice Pets is installed until some stray comes and makes himself at home in your yard/garbage/front porch. (I highly recommend getting the cleaned templates to rid yourself of strays if you do get it.)

Oh, and I do believe it was the Pets expansion which added the option for Custom Paintings on the easel, which allows you to add your own artwork into a folder and have Sims paint it in-game. I play a lot of artist Sims, so I love that option to bits.

On the SPs, I know nothing about K&B. H&M is good if you aren't someone (like me) that downloads 8183491 pieces of custom clothing, because -- for EAxis -- a lot of the clothes added are decent, and are a definite step-up from the base game stuff. Celebration is something I "acquired" recently, and what tinkering I've done, I don't know how I lived without it. It's possible make a presentable weddings and birthday parties now. Teen, predictably, adds some new stuff for teens, though all I've seen so far are the new collections and furniture. I'll use it, I'm sure, but it's not something I'd say is worth buying.

Just my lurking two cents. Though I'm on the bandwagon touting Seasons as easily the best EP. It really does alter the whole game, rather than being a tinker-and-forget like most of the rest.

[talysman]

I'm sort of in the same boat as Jennydee, since I arrrr'd a bunch of stuff, but haven't installed Pets, Seasons, or FT yet (the FT zip turned out to be broken, so I guess I have to buy it.) So I have a question, which I'm sure Jennydee will be interested in as well: what are the performance effects of installing Pets or Seasons? I specifically skipped those when I installed OFB and BV, because I wanted to see whether the system would slow down with OFB/BV and a couple stuff packs installed. No visible difference, but I figure Pets might be different because of the extra animated creatures on the lot, and Seasons has a lot of extra visual effects. Are there noticeable performance drops with those two EPs installed?

[Lord Darcy]

Anyone care to speak about the relative merits of Pets (which I haven't seen mentioned yet) or any of the SPs I don't have - which I believe are: Celebration, H&M, Teen, and K&B?

Pets is just all about pets. I agree with SimWitch, it really depends on your preference. I like the futuristic furniture set and floor dividers (I believe it's from Pets), but that's about it. No new clothes at all. Custom painting option will be carried onto later EPs, so if you get Seasons you'll get it as well.

Until I acquired subsequent SPs, I didn't realize that GLS was actually a decent SP by comparison. None of later SPs is up to GLS IMO. They're too specialized. For example, if you don't care about wedding parties, you would not find much use for Celebration. As for Teen pack, the so-called "Elite" theme is more suitable for nursery IMO. I have little use for stupid GothEmo stuff. Teen hairs are quite nice though. As for K&B, Holy Simoly's donation sets totally PWN it, both in quality and quantity. Seriously, only 3 similar black shades for the new shower, which is near identical clone of base game shower in itself?

Go look at official homepage for items and screenshots. WYSIWYG. Nothing more.

If I have to pick just one SP, I'd choose Celebration. Before Celebration, I hardly bothered with wedding parties. Now I find myself throwing wedding parties more often.

[SimWitch]

On my old computer, which hated anything and everything I ever ran on it more complex than a web browser, I eventually had all the expansions up to and including Seasons. My install order was funky... it was something like base game --> Uni --> Nightlife --> Seasons --> Pets --> OFB. My system performance remained about the same (albeit crappy) until I installed OFB. It made the game damn near unplayable for me. I don't know if it was OFB's fault, or just stacking it on top of everything else that did it, but I had serious performance issues after installing it. For reference, my old specs were a 1.2GhZ AMD processor, 896 MB RAM, and 128 MB video card.

On my new computer, I have all EPs and SPs save K&B, and on max graphics settings I have no system troubles. I'm sitting at 2.2GhZ AMD processor, 2GB RAM, and a 512 MB video card.

For neighborhood start-up, Pets and Seasons will both add some time to the load screen when playing a neighborhood for the first time, but should load normally after that. Winter in Seasons can be somewhat stressful when it snows, but you can change around the seasons how you like in a neighborhood, and remove winter if snowfall causes too much terrible lag. (Which I do anyway, because I freaking hate winter and its useless bonus.)

From what I've observed, Seasons is a lot more system-intensive than Pets. I've had six pets on a lot (on my old PC) with several Sims, and performance stayed the same even after I whittled down the pets on lot to two. I've also never noticed my lots with pets responding any slower than my lots without.

Individual mileage will vary. OFB was my personal downfall, but I'm guessing most people didn't have issues with it.

[Gwill]

I say seasons and free time.
Pets and BV is utterly useless in gameplay.

[Kyna]

The only reason I keep Pets installed is because of the floor dividers.  If it wasn't for those, I'd probably uninstall it.  I do like some of the furniture as well, but not enough to keep it installed just for the furniture.

If I'd known FT would have BV's "walk to lot" feature & expanded range of turn-ons & turn-offs, then I'd probably have skipped BV.  I've had BV since it was released and am only now starting to play beach lots.  I was a bit slow to get into them because I don't build much and I've heard downloaded beach lots can be finicky about where they're placed.

My recommendation would be to go with Seasons because it adds a lot to the gameplay - more than any other EP does.  Free Time is growing on me.  I wasn't sure I'd like it, but I like the new objects and the tiled kitchen floors & matching walls, and the hobbies give my bored perma plat sims something to do.

[witch]

I've just installed all EPs plus a number of stuff packs on my laptop.

Sad story, my motherboard's RAID controllers and audio and networking and stuff is failing, so the board is off to electronics hospital. ONE DAY AFTER THE WARRANTY RAN OUT! Ahem. /end whinge (I might get lucky with the warranty anyway).

Anyway, I knew I'd be on the laptop for several weeks and I despaired of being able to play the sims. A 4400 dual core CPU, 2GB Corsair RAM, 2 Raptor drives in a RAID array at 10,000rpm versus the poor old laptop. I thought I had no chance of running the sims. The laptop is 2 Ghz CPU, 1GB RAM - with 128MB pinched for graphics - and a normal speed drive, possibly even 5700rpm rather than 7200rpm.

Being a tryer, I went ahead and installed anyway. (After I followed some web tutorials on how to tweak my machine and turn off all unnecessary stuff). I did all the EPs in order, plus patches where they fit. I even slotted in some of the stuff packs, GLS, H&H, Teen style stuff and the bathrooms and kitchen one. I installed the no cd crack so I wouldn't get securom and booted the game. The screen went black. I sighed. Then it started loading, the game loaded! Yee haar!

I entered an average sized lot - movement was smooth and and there was not too much loss of detail, though I couldn't run it at full anti-aliasing of course. I ended up adding my 1.5GB of downloads just to see what would happen. Glory be, that worked too! I'm so rapt, I totally didn't expect to be able to do this.

So my advice to you, is just try loading what you want and see what happens, you might just get a pleasant surprise.

If you have to pick and choose, I agree with most of the posters, Seasons is the best EP so far.

PS That's odd, they've missed the Holiday Party pack off the official stuff pack list. I didn't install that or Celebrations or the Family Fun stuff.

[J. M. Pescado]

Sad story, my motherboard's RAID controllers and audio and networking and stuff is failing, so the board is off to electronics hospital. ONE DAY AFTER THE WARRANTY RAN OUT! Ahem. /end whinge (I might get lucky with the warranty anyway).

They're specifically designed to do that.

[witch]

Do you know, I bloody thought that when the guy said I bought it on 29/4/06. 'Your warrant ran out yesterday', he said. 'Ah ha ha', I went, 'you are joking with me, right?'

And I'd spent the last four days reinstalling windoze repeatedly, swapping from the nforce RAID controllers to the Silicon image ones. And begging, pleading, whining etc. to any spare deity that might be listening.

[jolrei]

Speaking as a notorious EP avoider, myself, and noting your gameplay style is homebodyish, I would suggest Seasons (which I am planning to get as well) because of the gardening/fishing possibilities, the penguin, etc.

Pets is the least attractive for me.  It's needed if you want, well, pets.  As a home-body sims person, you might like that.  I tend to send my sims out all over the place.

BV, as mentioned already, has beach lots which means your sims have beach activities at home, which is nice, and there are some additional build/buy additions.  "Walk-to-lot" is great (avoids waiting for the taxi) and it might just take the sting out of community lots for you.  This is important if you ever do decide to take your sims on holiday, because holidays seem to be all about running between community lots to find different things for your sims to do.

FT is not everyone's favourite, and I tend to ignore the hobby obsession unless my sims really want to do something.  I like the new activities (sports, ballet, contests, etc.) and these would be suitable for a homebody type gaming style (i.e. set up a basketball court so your sim teens can shoot hoops).  Walk-to-lot would also be available with FT, so if you really want to avoid BV, and want this feature, you can just load FT.

[Zazazu]

Anyone care to speak about the relative merits of Pets (which I haven't seen mentioned yet) or any of the SPs I don't have - which I believe are: Celebration, H&M, Teen, and K&B?

I like Pets, but I'm in the minority. The only annoyance is strays, and Inge has a sign over at Simlogical that keeps them away if you want to go to the extreme. Really, all there is to Pets are the actual pets themselves. But I like breeding them...I've gotten some freaky combos and some adopted puppies that have turned out really odd.

For SP, I don't have Celebration (blah, my sims rarely have parties) and Teen Stuff (ooh, crappy princess and goth stuff I have better cc than). H&M isn't too bad. I like the jeans, and there's a couple dresses I like. K&B is a definite skip...very light on content and very high on bugs/lack of past EP features enabled, etc.


Also, make sure you get no-CD cracks from GameCopyWorld before running any new EPs. You don't want SecuROM. See sticky.

[Sivany]

Do you know, I bloody thought that when the guy said I bought it on 29/4/06. 'Your warrant ran out yesterday', he said. 'Ah ha ha', I went, 'you are joking with me, right?'

And I'd spent the last four days reinstalling windoze repeatedly, swapping from the nforce RAID controllers to the Silicon image ones. And begging, pleading, whining etc. to any spare deity that might be listening.

I've heard that, at least in Britain, if you kick up a fuss about the whole thing they may be legally forced to fix it for free. Warranties are pretty much useless and just something to trick the customer into thinking they have no rights once it's run out. The law says things have to work for an acceptable amount of time so it really all boils down to whether 2 years is an acceptable amount of time for a motherboard to work before it breaks.


Also on the original topic I'd say Seasons is definitely the one to go for. It adds the most new home lot features and some good gameplay (particularly the fishing and gardening). I can't imagine the game without it now, it's the one I'd really miss if for some reason I was forced to play just the base game again. After that I'd say Freetime just because it adds quite a few new activites, unless you really really like the idea of animals in your game (I did and still got bored of it after a couple of weeks so even that's no gaurantee). Seasons is definitely the top priority I'd say.

[Sigmund]

I have to second (third? fourth? how many times has this been suggested?) the Seasons idea. It's by far my favorite EP and, IIRC, the least buggy. Also, the gardening/fishing thing is a blast, and if you like keeping your Sims at home, it would probably appeal to you quite a bit. I lost interest in Pets pretty quickly and BV entertained me for about one vacation. After that, I was at a loss what to do with it.  FT, while it has a sort of nice idea, didn't seem to match up with what they *could* have done with it. (Especially since you don't get that many instruments, and would need University for full potential, I think.) Though if you enjoy keeping your Sims on their home lots, the ability to do hobbies might appeal to you.

[reggikko]

Must have: I'll agree with the majority and say Seasons, especially since your Sims are homebodies.
I have Pets, but that is one EP I could easily do without. I don't have BV or FT, but I am considering FT sometime soon.

[jennydeenyc]

Thanks so much for all your input! I'll be picking up Seasons soon, and then will look into FT some more after I get used to it. Don't want to blow my whole new EP wad at once :-)

The hack upgrade thing is the part I'm most dreading, I hope I can track down versions of stuff that work with Seasons but don't also require later expansions to function as well. Oh, and not that it has anything to do with this topic in particular, but has anyone made/seen a hack that lowers the attractiveness of the bubble blower? I only buy them when sims who want them are really in need of an aspiration boost, but I generally end up deleting them a day or so later to keep sims on the lot from obsessing over them. Also, are there any hacks that people find especially useful for Seasons? Thanks!

[Liz]

I'm gonna be totally original and say... Seasons. Honestly, if your style of play is more centered around home lots, it'll open up more activities for your sims to try without having to leave. I also love Pets, especially as an EP your homebody sims can get something out of. You'll need to adopt strays or add via CAS if you don't want to fuss with a pet shop (though you'll want to "go out" to buy some collars if you want to retrieve runaways... I've never had a runaway, though). If you want to add dogs & cats (or a werewolf) to your family, you may want Pets, but that's the extent of the EP. (If you decide to get Pets, you might consider adding "boolProp petActionCancel true" and "boolProp ControlPets on" to your userstartup.cheat file.)

With Seasons you have weather, and each season has a corresponding bonus. "Accelerated" romance in the spring and bonus family soc in winter don't really do anything for me, but the "faster friends" bonus in summer is very handy, and the faster skilling in autumn is wonderful. Also, you get the ability to grow crops and fish in ponds, both of which can be very profitable, especially if you have the garden club come over and judge your yard every few days. The juices you can make with your produce are kind of neat (both as an alternative to cooking and for their different effects), and there are some new fish dishes to grill/cook, as well as a couple of new desserts. Building snowmen is fun in winter (if a bitch to quit out of) too, and Plantsims are very low-maintenance. Plus there's the fun of seeing sims getting fried by lightning, which is always a hit, even though it's not deadly enough for me (^_-).

Seasons is not without its drawbacks, however. Managing your sims' body temperature can be a hassle, especially if you go it hackless. Don't go it hackless . Sim kids who love to jump on the bed can have their body temp skyrocket quite quickly, which will bring the social worker. The skating rinks are cool, but despite their constant wants to go skating, my sims never manage more than once around the rink before they're bored and on to something else. And without "antiweatherreaction" in your DL folder, every time it rains, every sim on the lot will drop what they're doing to run to the window and gawk.

As far as the SPs go, Celebration does add some cool stuff for your parties. Holiday has neat decorations, plus Santa and holiday cookies/roast to cook. H&M adds some nice clothing (though you can easily to better than with CC); most of its benefit is comm lot store stuff, which probably won't thrill you. I don't have Teen and suspect that I'm not missing much (I'd only get it if there were lots of CC things out that used the meshes). And I've bought but not installed K&B. Bought it because it was cheap, just to have the meshes for future CC, but it sounds like a bug-filled mess. Only just started playing with BV and FT, and now I get to diagnose a wacky new graphics snafu that's crashing my game (and locked my computer a couple of times), but once I get that sorted (please just be my card drivers!), I expect I'll quite enjoy the new home activities.

Enough ramble - hope that helps!

[Liz]

Ha, I just missed you, jennydee! Hope the ramble was a little useful anyway - I did mention a couple of hack bits in there. Regarding the hookah, jfade has a Less Bubble Blower Obsession hack on pg. 2 of the Global Hacks at http://www.djssims.com.

[notveryawesome]

I've found that pets are great for single sims with low outgoing points. A shy sim shouldn't need to talk on the phone every time its social motive gets low, because a shy sim is, well, shy. Having a pet or, better yet, two (to keep each other company when the human-sim isn't there) really helps with this. Seasons is definitely the best EP, IMO, for the reasons that others have mentioned, but the Pets EP is also good for the homebody sims. There are hacks to fix all the annoyances (TJs' visitor controller is a must), and pet-breeding makes for a very lucrative home-business. Cyd Roseland made a fortune running a puppy-mill. A pet with a few skills (being housebroken, learning not to destroy furniture, etc) can fetch (forgive the pun) over §1000, and it can all be done from home. Also, if you sell the pets to townies, the pets end up as strays, and this is a good way to populate your 'hood with only the strays that you want, as long as you use an empty template for your neighbourhood.

[Zazazu]

I also love how my sims with dogs or cats will occasionally come as walk-bys with their pet in tow. I'm eventually planning on starting to breed pets again, this time making matches between animals in the neighborhood by inviting their families over and putting them in a playpen to socialize.