I love every expansion and stuff pack. Even pets, I don't get what people dislike about it. It may not have came with much but what it did is good, in my opinion. I love breeding pets, teaching them tricks, having companions, them earning some extra cash, and the reptiles you can download on here are awesome! I just wish it came with other pets, like horses or something.

Could people help me, I'm finishing my Final Year Exams soon and would like to buy myself a new Sims game. Which is something I've always done at Universityn since I learned about the Sims during my first year. Now I have all the EPs, and I have the following SPs: Festive Holiday, Glamour, K & B, Ikea and M & G.

I would like to eventually complete my Sims series (Don't plan to go to the Sims 3 and not sure about the Sims 4), I was just wondering what SP would add more gameplay to my storylines, for those of you who don't know me I'm the kind of sim player that has my sims tell me the story and I'm all about story telling. So of the following which one would you suggest?:

1. Christmas Party Pack
2. Family Fun (though I heard it requires a patch, will this SP conflict with Inteen or ACR)
3. Celebration
4. H & M
5. Teen Style

Now if you suggest that I shouldn't get any, then that's fine too.

Thank You

First of all, I agree, get all EP's and SP's, don't leave out any!

Second, about Family Fun Stuff: I don't know about ACR, but I can ssure you that it doesn't conflict with Inteen, as for the patch, you can still get them from either simsprograms (it has a new name now) or even from MTS here.

Third, I repeat, make sure you get all EP's and SP's, that is, when you are financially capable of doing so. Now, if you want to buy the SP's one by one, and if you want something that tells you more about your sims, I think you should either get first:

Teen Style Stuff: Consists of Goth, Gamers (or whatever they're called) and Socialites themes, both for clothing and furniture. The TV that comes with this SP, I use it a lot!

Family Fun Stuff is made as if your sim parents want to spend some quality time with their kids, which is why they have matching out first for all ages, in addition to that, children get the princess and themes clothes.

Christmas Party Pack adds more towards the religious theme. If that helps with any of your families' backgrounds.

H&M mainly concentrates on clothes, hardly anything for your sims' homes, in terms of furniture. And Celebration SP just adds more towards the Party section of Buy mode, the deco's are amazing, just make sure you know what you're doing when decorating a place for your weddings, but hardly a nything that will tell more about your sims.

If you are into stories, I'm going to make the conclusion that themes and things would help you improve those stories. From that list, I would get christmas pack first. I personally love it, specially when combined with Seasons. Where I live, christmas stopped being a religious matter many years ago so I don't feel it adds a religious touch to the game. It just gives my Sims the ability to celebrate christmas with their kids, and have a house that is full of seasonal decorations. It's always added a lot to my story, and I'm really glad I have it.

After that I would get either family fun or teen style, because those are kind of the same thing only for children or teens. It will give you the chance to make themed rooms for your kids/teens, which could enhance or clarify the personality of the Sim in the story you are playing/making.

H&M is indeed mostly clothes, but out of all the EPs and SPs, those are the only Maxis made clothes I tend to use. It would largely depend on preference if one uses it or not, but I find it has great things for my more down to earth Sims. Celebrations is probably my least favorite EP, because for weddings I tend to prefer custom content. However, for a story if you take pictures there is a lot of useful material.

Summarizing:
Christmas pack - Get it if you like the idea of having your Sims celebrating christmas and having a house full of christmas things
Family fun - Get it if you like the idea of giving your kids themed rooms
Teen style - Get if i you like the idea of your teens having more teen-focused furniture and more defined rooms
H&M - Get it if you like H&M style clothes and want to have more Maxis clothes to use
Celebrations - Get it if you like arranging weddings and feel you need more props for it, such as themed chairs, tables, and stuff like wedding banners/balloons

I REALLY love them all, to be honest.

My favorite expansion packs from most favorite to least favorite:

1. Seasons
2. Apartment Life
3. FreeTime
4. Nightlife
5. University
6. Bon Voyage

Don't have Pets (though I have Pet Stories) or Open for Business, but if I had OfB, I'm pretty sure it'd be my favorite since it's awesome.

And... stuff packs.

1. Mansion & Garden Stuff
2. Kitchen & Bath Interior Design Stuff
3. Ikea Home Stuff
4. Festive Holiday Stuff
5. Glamour Life Stuff
6. Teen Style Stuff
7. Celebration! Stuff
8. Family Fun Stuff

I don't have H&M and couldn't care less for it, lol.

I feel that OFB is a very underrated EP. It's one of my favorites because even though it doesn't have too many hairstyles and objects, it lets you customize a huge portion of your neighborhood. You're not limited to certain types of businesses. It all depends on how creative you want to be. You can make fake hospitals just by plopping the medical career reward object onto a community lot and setting scrubs as a uniform for your employees. You can create an office, city hall or any other type of building where you want certain sims to show up. Without OFB you're stuck with NPCs in community lots. I think it's more fun to send one of my sims to a restuarant and be served by another sim I created. Perfect for storytelling.

I have to agree. OFB is underrated, but I think I know why. You don't quite realize how awesome it is until you try it. I was never motivated to get it, because I thought it sounded awful. It just wasn't an EP I felt I needed. The only reason I ended up buying it was because I found an SP I wanted second hand, and that person also had OFB at a very cheap price. I figured since I was going there to pick up the SP, and OFB was only 5 dollars, I might as well get it for completion.

Now it is tied for second favorite with BV, only beaten by Seasons. I love everything about it. I agree with Original Sim, it's more fun to send your Sims to a community lot you made that is run by your own Sims. I don't care much for restaurants (yet), but I like being able to sell anything, instead of being limited to the very few items that EA included.

Here is my ranking:

1. UNIVERSITY: The first one I bought and still my favorite. Although university may be a bit repetitive, I like it. It's definitely not anywhere close to WoW's daily quests!

2. APARTMENT LIFE: The EP that got me back into Sims. Witches are a blast to play!

3. SEASONS: Fall skill bonus. That is all.

4. OPEN FOR BUSINESS: I can't say anything about OFB that hasn't been said already. It's fun. Very fun.

5. FREETIME: Lifetime Aspiration Rewards. As someone who likes to play aliens, I like the Knowledge Lifetime Rewards, and am still trying to figure out how to mod the Summon Aliens reward into TS3.

6. NIGHTLIFE and BON VOYAGE (tied): I've never really gotten into either of these EPs. However, they have to be better than...

8. PETS: You can't control the pets! You can in TS1; you can in TS3! Why not in TS2?

9. ALL STUFF PACKS: Come on. It's EA. There's going to be a money grab. This is it.

PSDuckie: You CAN control pets, with "boolprop controlpets", which oddly also lets you control roommates (from Apt life).
Actually, I like Univ the least, hardly ever use it or vacations (Bon Voyage), love Pets and Seasons.

I was bored so I'm gonna rank the expansion packs again.

1. Seasons
2. Freetime
3. Apartment life
4. University
5. Nightlife
6. OFB
7. Bon Voyage
8. Pets

Without hacks that makes the time on the university shorter, it would be 6th.

I see all these comments about pets. Why? I love it so much!
But here's how I see it.

EXPANSION PACKS
1. Freetime. I think its very fun to make your own clothes in game, alot of new hobbies, and stuff for your sims.
2. Seasons. I think its great having a garden, and well, seasons! I love fall the most (my birthday is in fall LOL) But that's not the reason. I love seasons.
3. Bon Voyage. I always thought It was cool that our sims can go on vacation. Seasons + Bon Voyage is a great mix!
4. Apartment Life. I love this pack, cause I think its cool that our sims can live in an apartment and FINALLY brush teeth. LOL.
5. Pets. I LOVE PETS! I love pets in real life, and I think my sims is uncomplete without this pack. You can control with the cheat "boolprop controlpets on".
6. University. I don't see the point of this one. I mean yeah, they go to university and have phones but I don't like it.
7. OFB. I never ever EVER liked this one. It feels so dull. My sims always fail on this business thing. I don't like this one. AT ALL.

STUFF PACKS
1. H&M. I love fashion and both H&M so this is a total yes!
2. Teen Stuff. Its pretty cool cause all of the fashion that our teens get.
3. IKEA Home Stuff. Finally some cool stuff for our sims' houses.
4. Kitchen & Bath Interior Design. Its cool, I guess. For the bathrooms and kitchens.
5. Mansion & Garden Stuff. Yeah, I like this one. Stuff for my Mansion.
6. Celebrations!. I don't like this one. Its just for weddings. I don't see the point.

definitely get open for business, definitely get pets. seasons is pretty good too. it can slow your game down though. the next ones i would get would be whichever ones add the most content and interactions, and i dont know that. im not sure what all freetime adds, but if it adds hobbies id get tht cause it feels cool to have a hobby.im just not too sure how much stuff it adds or how much hobby stuff. bon voyage is good, i like collecting things from the vacation site. i guess that leaves apartment life and university. i would get university because i want to be able to have a young adult.


edit: a reason i like hobbies is because it can help fill your aspiraton meter in little bits at a time that look realistic, like blogging about cooking or talking about cooking as a hobby. another thing is if youre a cook or have another job, you can get to the top of enthusiasm for that thing, like cooking, and it gives you aspiration points too. as well as just being the most interested in like cooking. i forget what its called when you reach the top of wanting to know about your hobby. but thats what it is. it isnt a major addition but if i have to have freetime its a nice one to have.

i think you guys arent being too creative with your pets. try getting two pets that look well together. also, cant you control them to do things once you have them trained? i read. somewhere

if you had to not get one i guess i would say not get bon voyage, cause i dont thik it adds tha many new interactions. m not sure how many objects it adds. collecting vacation items is cool.

university adds too many interactions and objects to not get, being the first ep. also sometimes you want to see your sim as a young adult and give them a longer life and just experience it. with seasons you really want the get leftovers interaction. open for business and pets are also essential to me. nightlife adds a bunch of interactions and objects.

i just get two dogs that look good. i like having them run around while im doing stuff like running a business, or if im at work. i like to make the have puppies sometimes too. i like the interactions between cats and dogs too. i dont know what the big deal about having pets is. i usually get a boxer girl and a terrier pit guy they look great together

This won't be hard at all.
1. Nightlife- This is my absolute favorite EP for TS2 of all time. The comeback for The Sims: Hot Date. Dating, downtown, outings with friends, night clubs, restaurants, vampires, bowling alleys. This EP really brought the sims out of their quiet suburbs to the alive and fast-paced downtowns of SimNation. The Nightlife is so bright and lively, there's always new downtownies to meet, date, and even fight with. I know it looks like I'm just giving a basic review of it, but this expansion just has a special place in my heart. I love it.
2. University- Something that just wasn't in TS1, I had doubt in this expansion, but they did not fail to please me. Campus life is just something I never even thought could be possible for The Sims. But it was, when I first got it, I even graduated 6 sims from college in the first week I had it. Something in this expansion just makes it so addictive, but I don't know what it is...
3. Open For Business- Something new, it was really enjoyable. The best part of this expansion is that you are actually pretty connected to your customers, pursuading them to buy expensive things was all I ever did. Haha. Didn't really bring any glitches or bugs, cool expansion.
4. Freetime- A pretty interesting expansion, it felt like the sims had things that they were ACTUALLY interested in. Their hobbies really brought character to our sims. Awesome expansion, but not better than OFB.
5. Apartment Life- Apartments, I never really was interested in the apartments at all. I thought they were nice, but honestly nothing awesome came with this expansion except for the reputation ( Something that should have been in the base game) and magic. If there was a The Sims 2: Makin Magic, I wouldn't have even looked twice at Apartment Life.
6. Bon Voyage- I'm not a fan of traveling, but I just had faith that something cool would come with it. Nothing did. I really don't have much to say about it, I just don't think I should have even bought it.
7. Seasons- A very overestimated expansion pack in my opinion, it added something that should have been in the BASE GAME. Nothing else. I also hate the temperature system with a burning passion. I also hate how sims stop what their doing just for the silly "It's ( Current Weather ) ing " autonomous action. Sims have these clothes that they HAVE to wear outdoors during the winter? I've uninstalled this expansion.
8. Pets- No. Uninstalled it after I went through all of the features, I didn't really install it for the pets though haha but I just wanted to see if there was a little more besides the pets. Nope, there really wasn't imo.
On to stuff packs. I've only bought two, but the only one i'll really ever recommend to anyone is Teen Style Stuff. It adds much more character to your teen sims. I love it. ^^

Nothing else?!?!? How do fishing and gardening count as "nothing else?"

I, of course, love all of them. I'm kind of glad I didn't install them all at once, though, as some of my characters would have developed differently with OFB or Freetime installed. Plus I had plenty to learn all at once.

I think Seasons is my favorite (because of Plantsims. I actually have a mod to turn the weather off). OFB is a close second (servos). My least favorite is BV because it has so many bugs (they couldn't get WA for TS3 right either, it seems).

Best to Worst:
Seasons
OFB
Nightlife
FreeTime
Pets
AL
University
BV

I have almost all the EP's. Pets is my least favorite though. Only because you get your hopes up to have pets, then you cant control them. (You with a cheat but thats the only way) I also dont think the animals are very "realistic" looking. My favorite ep is either apartment life or seasons. They are both wonderful. I love the witches in Apartment Life and in Seasons for me it brings the game to life.

So I managed to acquire every Sims 2 EP and most of the SPs only to be forced to switch to Windows 8 and losing the ability to play. I finally broke down and got Sims 3, and having to decide which EPs to get made me think about the ones I had for Sims 2.

In order of favorite to least favorite:

Seasons: This is by far the best expansion pack, at least based upon my play style. I love having the seasons, just because it makes everything so realistic. Plus, it helped me remember and keep up with my neighborhood rotation. The gardening feature was fun, and I liked a lot of the collections that came with this EP, especially the country kitchen and bedroom. If I could only keep one EP installed, it would be Seasons hands down.

Freetime: This was the second to last EP I got, but I wish I'd purchased it sooner. (I went pretty much in release order.) The addition of hobbies made me feel more connected to my sims, and I really liked being able to choose more about their personalities/lives this way. It also made kids more enjoyable for me, just because they got some cool items and you could make them ballet stars or super scientists. The perks system was nice, too. Picking two aspirations really fleshed my sims out.

Apartment Life: This was the last expansion pack I got, and I really liked it. I used apartments a fair amount, especially in University mode. I also liked all the furniture and build mode tools we got. The witches were just okay - they could have done so much more with them - but overall this is a great EP.

Open For Business: This used to be my least favorite until I downloaded a mod that made community time count like real time. (As in, when you returned to your home lot, time would pass.) Suddenly I loved OFB. It's a nice challenge when you get bored with the game. The clothes from this EP are awful, though.

Nightlife: To be honest, I got double deluxe so this came with my base game. It's hard to think about it separately. The cars are nice, but they don't really add any benefit other than that you don't have to hear the carpool honking at you. I hate all the terrible clothes from this EP and would rarely play a Downtown sub-hood because I hated their townies. Just kind of meh as an EP.

University: I had to hack my game just to make Uni bearable. It's too long, IMO, and the "cute" features like the streakers and the cow mascot get old so, so fast. The new careers were nice, and I don't remember hating the clothes or furniture. It's an expansion pack I can kind of take or leave.

Bon Voyage: I would actually probably say that I like the gameplay of Bon Voyage better than Uni, but I'd leave Uni installed over Bon Voyage just because I used the college system way more than the vacation system. The vay-cays were fun, and I loved planning honeymoons. But they don't actually do much in the long run, and the clothes/furniture/SINGING from this game suck.

Pets: Look, I don't hate Pets, but if I had to uninstall an EP this would be the first one to go just because I don't think it adds much. The pets are nothing to write home about. And I'm not even complaining - after all, it's a Sim game, not a pet adoption game - but this EP is just underwhelming. The dogs and cats are a nice feature but nothing essential, and the pet decor just clutters my catalogue.


...on to stuff packs. I never bought a SP on it's own: they all came as packs with the EP. There wasn't a single one that I would ever purchase by itself because custom content is usually better than what they supply. Still, in order of most to least favorite:

H&M: This had some pretty cute clothes, and I love love love H&M. This pack did an awesome job in making cute but realistic clothes for men. I always struggle with finding interesting male clothing, even with custom content. If I was ever going to buy a SP, this would be the one to consider.

IKEA: I guess the branded stuff packs are the best because they're based on real objects instead of the weird stuff EAxis creates. Again, I used the furniture here a lot. The one bad thing is that the objects had low comfort/sleep/environment scores, but I guess that's realistic for IKEA. It's cheap for a reason.

Teen Style: This had some of my favorite male outfits and hair. Plus you can find some neat adult and child conversions of these clothes around the site. I even liked the socialite and surfer furniture sets.

Celebration: I didn't have parties much, but when I did this pack was useful. Also, weddings. I don't know how you could have a good wedding without this pack. The clothes were lovely, too.

Kitchen and Bathroom Design: It's always nice to get more stuff for your kitchen and bathroom, though I feel like this SP offered less items. The hairs and clothing were terrible. Would've rather they skipped the CAS stuff altogether for more furniture.

Mansion and Garden: I would rank this higher, I'll bet, if I built more houses. Usually, though, I just download pre-built ones, so a lot of the features of this pack didn't get used much by me.

Family Fun: UGH. Nothing good came from this pack. Every now and then I'd use the space or castle bedroom collection for my kiddies, but mostly I avoided the clothes and items like the plague.

Never got Glamour or Holiday packs because they weren't included in any of the bundles. XD

At the risk of sounding unoriginal, I think the Seasons expansion pack is my favourite too. The weather was the one BIG thing that was different from the Sims 1 and made it seem more real. Also now Sims 3 is here I do feel a bit disappointed that you can't venture out into the neighbourhoud without loading in the Sims 2 but with the seasons expansion pack you can do so many things outside on the same lot that it doesn't really matter as much.

So, I've been looking to get one or two expansions to add to the game in the near future due to the fact that base game + Nightlife is going to get kind of... well, boring at some point. I'm kind of limited to probably Seasons and before it, so I kept that in mind, and decided I want to get OFB as one of them. I've been considering Seasons, but I have an Intel 2000 card and I don't know if it can even run that. I've also been considering Pets and University - University because it has some cool objects and college sounds fun to play, and Pets because while it's probably the smallest expansion, you don't see a lot of people not with dogs or cats now.

So which one of these (Uni, Seasons, and Pets) would be worth grabbing with an Intel 2000 chip?

I only have Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 3100 (yeah, not exactly recommended for HD or extra pretty graphics) and all my expansions run fine overall. But if you want to be extra sure, there's a website, CanYouRunit that scans your computer analyzing it's specs and all that fancy tech stuff before letting you know if a certain game will be playable on your computer. Only Seasons was claimed to not be playable on my computer. My solution? I installed Apartment Life before Seasons since AL passed with flying colors, and I'm able to enjoy the seasons (I only suffer some slow down during the transition to heavy snow fall, but nothing gameplay stopping).

Personally between the three both University and Seasons will give a dramatic change to your playing. I treat University as the dating and skilling pool for my sims, since there's plenty of time to go through that since working isn't required (especially after earning scholarship money, and collecting grants from good grades each semester) and the classes are 2-4 hours a day. After all your hard work your sim has an easier time reaching the top of their careers and lifetime aspiration. Oh, and you have the option to change your aspiration after Sophmore year when you do well enough too.

Seasons is cool since you can control the weather of each neighborhood (whether you want the seasons to go traditional, or have it always be summer/winter/fall/spring). I personally skip Spring because I usually have my sims in the hot tub and it's not my favorite thing to see the neighbors get electrocuted, or the butler rushing to call the fire department when the tree gets on fire only for the rain to wash it out 3 seconds later.. and that's just a taste on how much effect Seasons has. :P

Unfortunately, CanYouRunIt is bogus and will tell you the wrong answers. Don't rely on it.
http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=346215

Seasons is the EP which will probably strain your computer the most. So, if you're concerned about destroying your computer, I'd recommend against Seasons.

I'm actually glad you contradicted me, since I didn't realize there was also this list of approved graphic cards for desktop computers in the same area that thread was posted in (this might help you Mr.Newbie if you're not on laptop?). Guess it wasn't shere luck that my computer could run Seasons and SIms 3 (not in the best way, but good enough) despite CanYouRunIt stating that it would not.

Well, let's say Seasons is out of the picture for a while because I don't want it to completely bog down this computer. What's better, Uni or Pets? I've heard Pets is the WORST expansion for the game, but I'm actually kind of interested considering I''m liking the idea of dogs and cats in my game (other than the god dang stray dogs mucking up the garden), but at the same time, Uni adds some really nice new objects and college to the game. I'm also a bit of a builder, so the expansion that comes with better objects is really the thing for me. I'm not ruling out Pets at all, it comes with a new pets set which could be nice for pets shop and a space set for kids, which'll probably be helpful for my kid Sims.