Are twins ever identical?

[AuKestrel]

I started wondering this because I just had my first occurrence of 2 sets of twins in a family, one right after the other. The first set was a boy and a girl, but the second set consisted of two girls. However, they are not visually identical. (Certainly none of them is identical personality wise.) It's not that I want to have identical twins; I was just wondering if it was theoretically possible or if all twins are fraternal by default. (Obviously the game allows "clones" to happen with identical siblings in subsequent births if you don't scramble the dice or have a patch installed, but I have always thought that was a problem/bug, er, excuse me, "feature" rather than intentional on EAMaxis' part.)

[Count Four]

From what I understand it will never happen naturally in play, as the game will always use the next combination on the list for the second twin born, so twins will always be fraternal.

You could create a pair of identical twins with BodyShop and CAS, and a little bit of editing with SimPE if you want their interests to be similar. They'd start as toddlers, though.

[BastDawn]

If you need identical twins for a story, use identical parents.  Use a sim created in Body Shop to make your male and female parent, and all of their children will be identical.     You can use the plastic surgery machine from University to give one of them a different appearance so it's less obvious what you're doing.

[Quinctia]

It's theoretically possible; a luck of the draw thing.  Definitely more likely if the parents have the same genetics, or there are dominant ones (like black hair/brown eyes/similar skintones).  Also helps if certain features are dominant, say one parents' nose, and the other's lips.  I'm sure if you've done any amount of rolling the pacifier with two parents in CAS you've had two kids come up that are almost identical.

I've had at least two sets of twins with identical facial features.  Due to my sheer amount of geneticized custom content, I haven't had any that were completely identical, though.  I had a pair come very very close to identical, with similar (but different) shades of skin, brown hair, 2 slightly different pairs of green eyes, and the same face.  They even had zodiac signs that were next to each other and therefore theoretically possible for twins who managed to be born on two different, consecutive days to have.

Oh...and I had a set of triplets.  One boy, two girls.  The girls were identical save for their hair color.  With all the skintones I have, this was nothing short of amazing.

See?


Closer shots:  Gloria and Gwen

[Zazazu]

Quinctia, that image is hypnotic.

I've had a couple of occurrences of identical offspring (one with extremely different parents....kids were butt-ugly, but identical). They weren't twins, but really the odds are about the same. My closest to identical were two of a set of triplets. I really thought they were identical until they hit their teen stage and I noticed a very slight difference in the mouth.

[Tchan]

I had a couple of parents who went on a baby-spawning spree, and I named each child after a letter in the alphabet. Olivia and Natalie, I think they were, were completely identical twins, down to their birthsigns. I gave one of them black hair so I could tell them apart, but they were completely identical otherwise, plus being two of the prettiest born in-game sims I've had. This was about five incarnations of the game before my current version.

[Jadis]

I have one couple of "identical twins". I had to change one's hair to tell them apart, and IIRC, they also have the same star-sign and very similar personalities. However, I believe this is due to my sims suffering from the "first-born effect", as I've also had normal siblings looking very alike.

ETA: My "identical" twins, let me show u them (as kidz):

[Karen]

Jadis:  But those twins aren't quite identical, are they?  Look at the eyebrows. 

I have had twins I couldn't tell apart except by looking VERY closely.  I had a set of triplets once, two girls and a boy, where the girls were so identical that I couldn't tell them apart at all except by their clothing.  That could have been the first-born effect too, though.

Karen

[bowrain]

Will those identical twins still look identical as adults?

[Jadis]

Jadis:  But those twins aren't quite identical, are they?  Look at the eyebrows. 

I think that's only because one of them is smiling. Actually, you're right. The eyebrows are different, but they're still the closest thing to "identical" I've ever had. Here are two of my very few pictures of them as adults (they're crap, but should show the similarities even better because they are both stone-faced in them):




I used to get them confused constantly, as they live in the same house with both their wives. When I almost sent one of the wives to sleep in the same bed as the twin she wasn't married to, I changed the hair on one of them. It's the only way I'll remember who's who.

[J. M. Pescado]

Truly "identical" twins occur only by pure coincidence. There is no mechanism in the game that actually generates true "identical" twins, and twins are no more similar than any other two random siblings. In fact, you are more likely to get "twins" due to the firstborn effect than you are through actual twin births, which will always be seperate sequence values and therefore likely different in personality: The firstborn effect assures an identical personality, whereas getting the same personality by random sequence repeat is much less likely. Then, for twins to be identical, they have to inherit the same genetic parts from both parents. The probability of all that happening is rather low. There's maybe 10 or so sim facial features, like "brow", "eye", "jaw", cheek", etc., so figure you're looking at something on the order of 1/1024 chance of it happening, assuming no "dominant" features with elevated probability.

[FourCats]

In my game, I have 2 families that have twins that I consider "identical".  They may not be exact copies, but look very much the same as it is easy to get them mixed up.  I think that's close enough to call them identical.

[Strangel]

One of these days I'm going to use Sim Surgery to attempt to transplant one sim's face onto it's twin.

[kuronue]

One of these days I'm going to use Sim Surgery to attempt to transplant one sim's face onto it's twin.

Gah! Now I'm having flashbacks to (spoiler) Phoenix Wright, with those freaky sisters Ini and Mini..

[Strangel]

I'm (apparently) not up with the times.. whassat?

[Process Denied]

I have two sets of identical twins--one set are boys and they are identical except for their personalities(opposite which is pretty realistic).  The other set are girls and they also identical they also have identical personality points but one is a Aries and the  other one is a Gemini.

[BastDawn]

Jadis:  But those twins aren't quite identical, are they?  Look at the eyebrows. 

I think that's only because one of them is smiling. Actually, you're right. The eyebrows are different, but they're still the closest thing to "identical" I've ever had.

No, they are identical.  The eyebrows are styled differently, but the facial structure is the same.  It's like having different hairstyles.  The "plucked" style eyebrows are thicker in front and taper sharply, while the "combed" style looks more natural and feathers finely into faded ends.

[Simmerqueen]

I have only one set of natural twin boys (born to one of my CAS Sims' daughters and Dirk Dreamer) who appear to be completely identical. 

But if anyone hasn't played Brandi Broke yet in their game, I played her recently for the first time and had her eat cheesecake (she has enough cooking skill points to make it) and since she is already pregnant (by herself, as I understand it, so she can have only boys) she will have twin boys who I would imagine can only look identical since they are opposite sex clones of her.  Anyway, mine look identical (different birth signs, though) and are adorable!!   

[Zazazu]

But if anyone hasn't played Brandi Broke yet in their game, I played her recently for the first time and had her eat cheesecake (she has enough cooking skill points to make it) and since she is already pregnant (by herself, as I understand it, so she can have only boys) she will have twin boys who I would imagine can only look identical since they are opposite sex clones of her. 

The reason she is pregnant with boys is because EAxis coded it that way, for boys (I believe for twins as well). It's basically the only precoded birth in the game. It  has nothing to do with the fact that she is self-inseminated. Logically, if a girl were self-inseminated, she would only have girls as there is no Y chromosome to donate. 'Cause, ya know, that's possible right now.

[Simmerqueen]

Logically, if a girl were self-inseminated, she would only have girls as there is no Y chromosome to donate. 'Cause, ya know, that's possible right now.

Logic doesn't always have much to do with it when it comes to EAxis though, does it?!     Anyway, I know it wouldn't work that way in "real life" genetics, but I read that in Sims2 if you impregnate someone with themselves using the spawn cheat (or Sim Modder??) that they will always have an opposite sex child (don't know why or if it's true) with their own hair/eye/skin color because all genes for those things would come from them only (makes sense).  I haven't tested it myself though as I haven't done much with all the boolprop cheats yet...  I have also read that other people have had Brandi give birth to a single boy, not twins.

[Strangel]

Yeah, every time I've gotten bored enough to play Brokehouse, she births a single boy.

[Tarlia]

But if anyone hasn't played Brandi Broke yet in their game, I played her recently for the first time and had her eat cheesecake (she has enough cooking skill points to make it) and since she is already pregnant (by herself, as I understand it, so she can have only boys) she will have twin boys who I would imagine can only look identical since they are opposite sex clones of her. 

The reason she is pregnant with boys is because EAxis coded it that way, for boys (I believe for twins as well). It's basically the only precoded birth in the game. It  has nothing to do with the fact that she is self-inseminated. Logically, if a girl were self-inseminated, she would only have girls as there is no Y chromosome to donate. 'Cause, ya know, that's possible right now.

Sex is always determined at birth, I don't think even EAxis could mess with that in any other way - but if you make a sim pregnant with themselves, they'll have an opposite-sex-clone, so that's how EAxis ensured that Brandi gives birth to a third boy. Skip is still the father in the family tree, but they could have fixed that one easily.

[Zazazu]

Normally, yes. Sex is determined at birth. But I recall reading somewhere that Brandi's was somehow scripted. Of course, this was way back when, when it was still widely thought that cookies resulted in twins, and I don't recall who posted that bit. My memory isn't that long. I also never played her myself....I did play Pleasantview for about a month when the game first came out, but with Chuck and Saish Test (based off my family from Sims1).

[Dragon Slave]

I've never had a set of identical twins in my game, and I've drawn the conclusion that if anyone has ever had a pair, it's simply coincidential, like having two children that are genetically identical, one after the other.  

I think in my game, Taylor and Meredith Burb are Identical, save for skintone and hair.  I've studied their faces, trying to find differences, ever since they were toddlers, but I've given up.   I only wish they were *real* twins and not the result of first born syndrome.





Can't animals have identical litters?  I have never bred my pets, so I don't know.    If that's the case, why on earth can't sims?  What's the point of having identical litters anyways, if you're trying to create your own breed.  With more diversity, you get where you want to be faster.  But animals aside, there's still no reason why sims shouldn't be able to have identical twins, other than laziness on the programers part.

[Tarlia]

Normally, yes. Sex is determined at birth. But I recall reading somewhere that Brandi's was somehow scripted. Of course, this was way back when, when it was still widely thought that cookies resulted in twins, and I don't recall who posted that bit. My memory isn't that long. I also never played her myself....I did play Pleasantview for about a month when the game first came out, but with Chuck and Saish Test (based off my family from Sims1).

Yeah, it'd make sense if it was pre-scripted too but I really think the clone-thing is true, as people have tested this out with other sims, making them pregnant by themselves. Also, the baby boy Brandi has does look exactly like her, and has none of Skip's genetics. I gave her cheesecake a couple of times and she had completely identical boys, both times.

You mean cookies don't work?!