I also really miss NL-style chemistry and dating. Right now it feels like there's no reason to have a Sim choose any other Sim in particular for a match-up, other than "My biological clock is ticking, I need a mate NOW, and you're standing in front of me." Sims are not turned on or turned off by other personality traits, they don't care about hair color; I haven't played a Snob Sim or one with a LTW related to money, but I somewhat doubt those Sims will really care much about the financial status of romantic possibilities, either. Love is simply a vending machine in TS3.

I have had the pregnancy book issue with other Sims as well, who were not bookworms and had other books available to them. Maybe the pregnancy books are extra-attractive?

I just played a pregnancy/baby/toddler for the first time last night, and I have to agree with everyone else that the ultra-larval babies are weird, at best. Pregnancy seems to have gotten some interesting changes, but babies now creep me out, instead of just being a timesuck.

This is not a missed object, but someone above mentioned objects being too attractive, like guitars--another one is the garden sprinkler. Every time a Sim is idle now, s/he wants to go play with that stupid sprinkler. This would make sense for kids or those with the Childish trait, but a Neat Sim just traipsing off to get messy in the sprinkler? I don't think so.

And I really, really miss the ability to customize lot sizes. About half the lots in Sunset Valley are far bigger than I like to build on. I want compact, dense residential areas, not sprawling McMansions and suburban horrors.

That's what I get for assuming that they should be where they used to be, and/or for not investigating every speck of available decor prior to thinking about building! Thanks, folks. It does make sense for shutters to be a decorative item, but I am also amused by the fact that they must have got that idea after some object modders put out shutter items for TS2.

All of the above, plus windows with shutters. There are some architectural looks that just cannot be achieved without shutters. Actually, I mostly hate the selection of windows in the base game, not just for the selection itself, but because they changed the size of some windows from TS2 to TS3: The mission-type rectangular windows most significantly. Whereas they used to be placeable on a wall segment and pretty much fill it side-to-side, they no longer do that. So a wall of windows is only truly achievable if one wants a more modern or high-tech look, not on a house which sports a more traditional (e.g. Victorian or Craftsman) style. They also changed the traditional-style arch (with the multiple glass panes) from two tiles wide to three, a design choice which still leaves me scratching my head.

I love that I can coordinate textures with CAST, however, the underlying architectural styles themselves still need to work together, and I don't find that the base game does that very well. As per usual with EAxis.