I noticed that PlayStation 2 modding is starting to become all the rage, and I want to find a way to make mods for the Sims console games.

Someone a while back managed to hack in Urbz music in The Sims 2 for consoles and it worked like a charm. I was wondering if I could like do music mods for all
four console games, so they could choose which soundtrack to listen to.

The Sims 2 files has some leftovers from The Urbz, and was originally planned to be a sequel to The Urbz (as found on the forum), and there might be an unused location
relating to Skyline Beach (referred to 125th Avenue, the original name of the location).

The Sims 2 Pets might've planned to include death, as there are references to it in the strings, even though it was mostly taken out.

The Sims 2: Castaway has a handful of leftovers from Pets, including normal, regular furniture that might've been found in crates (rather than clothing) at one point.

So my goal is to find a way to make mods for Sims console games.

When I extracted audio from the games, they needed different rates, so they would play at the right speed, so that might be a connection? Also, in The Sims 2: Pets, I found leftover Build/Buy Mode and Neighborhood music and music from Pets in Castaway.

Do you think there's also an unused level in Sims 2? I hear there might be an unused location of Skyline Beach (referred to 125th Street in files and prerelease material), and I'm wondering if someone might've found out way to access it.

That pretty much confirms my conclusion that The Urbz used the same engine as the Bustin' Out, as some leftover logos relating to the said game can be found in the files in different languages. Were they in The Urbz aswell?

I just wish there was a way to open/use the models & textures extracted from the .arc files...

edit-
you can *kind of* get some stuff by dumping textures (I use dolphin emu), for example here's a random sim

and dolphin dumped to me these textures



there's also a lighter version of each (not sure why). so obviously the engine uses textures in a weird format, applying colour through some other method I guess to reduce space taken up by textures, i think similar to how sims 3 textures work? this guy told me a while ago and it made sense.
if anyone has more experience with pcsx2, do you know if dumps textures like this? maybe it could provide some more reliable dumps.
also i'm still wondering what kinda model format that the game would use, i know it's something definitely with maya, but i guess we can't use it, only rip models from the game with 3dripper/ninjaripper :/

Try the PSP/PS2 Texture Explorer. Don't forget to set the values to "PSP" and 8 BPP. No Swizzling either.

Thanks @sodadog for your help, I was able to rip these random clothing textures https://imgur.com/a/EPhib (i literally picked random ones).
Anyway, this is pretty cool but I'm guessing there's no way we can compress them and put them back in the game if we edit them?

I still play the Sims on my PS2 so I really wish there was a way to mod it! One of the things I hated most about them was the limited objects you could place, I really wish it could be removed!

Could someone make a mod that would make the bills higher for The Sims 2 and The Sims 2 Pets on PS2?