After i read this,I understood how boring i am on sims 2! I always do those types of 'perfect family'.I havent even had a fight on sims 2 hahah

-Mob family
Have a sim work through the criminal career track until they reach the top and then have them compile their 'family' of other sims/criminal associates. Pretty soon imagine them as pretty influencial and powerful in your neighborhood and related subhoods. Have this sim become the patriarch or matriarch of a very powerful family that can grant their allies some under-the-table kachings. Their enemies are found in the pools without ladders.

-Vampire Clan
Kind of like the mob family but with Vampires - they recruit the most talented sims in their younger years and live forever. The befriend the rich and elderly so they inherit money when the elders die to support their elegant night life style. Don't have them reproduce. If they fall in love with a mortal then they can either recruit their partner or get 'cured' and become old and die.

-Farmers/Breeders business.
Live off the land and run a market business as well as raise and sell animals (pets) or switch out the animal part and have them raise a big family that works on the farm.

-Brothel business
Recruit your romance sims and have them make money by creating a home business that uses the bandatron. Sims being paid for hanging out and flirting (and more) with customers.

-Retirement Home
All the kid's gone? House too big and lonely? Lone Sims and older sims can be a burden so why not move a handful into a retirement home where they can garden, paint, hobby, and play majong, and socialize to their hearts content? Get a communal pet to give your elders comfort, have the widower meet up with the widow and find a second love in the golden years. Have an adult caretaker to arrange the remains when your sim passes or hire a butler instead.

There's some really helpful ideas here, thanks. Some more ideas:

Tragedy Familes
Make every family have a tragedy or drama of some kind, even if it seems insignificant. You could make lots of little tragedies that will eventually affect your game and make it really interesting.

More Interesting Sims
Use all of the CAS content that you don't really use and put it all into one Sim and see how they turn out. Creating themed Sims can make the game a lot more interesting and introduce more drama to the game, for example making your Sim purposely nerdy in CAS and then continuing it in the game if you made them not get along with Sims that are 'jocks'.

Plan Your Game
It sounds really weird, but I found planning a game so it had all the drama I needed was really useful. I made a story outline and all the characters grow up around it, each affecting each others lives. If you prefer playing it as you go along like I do, you can draw a really rough outline of the main dramatic events and have your characters do whatever you want to do in between them. Trust me, it's fun.

Life Story
If anyone's like me there will be loads of Sims that have never actually met each other in the neighbourhood even though they live next door to each other. You can try and have several families but constantly jump between them so that the kids in them stay the same age as in the other families so that they can eventually grow up and go to college with each other. You might have more fun then if you already have enemies and friends to play around with.

Create Sims Like People You Know
I haven't really done this myself, but it might be interesting to try.

Mygame is pretty interesting anyway - I really don't do anything out of the ordinary! Chester Gieke (knowledge) became a witch and went on holiday. When he came back, he had alien twins (not from the telescope, apparently from being on holiday). I send him on holiday again and he had another set of alien twins! (All this without any cheats or mods whatsoever). Chester is suddenly the hottest thing in town!
I also plan the game, keeping kids from different families the same age, if possible, and I rotate between families, but once in a while I discover that I haven't played with a certain Sim for a while. I have 67 families in my hood, so I guess that's not weird. If I get bored with one family, I leave them for now and go and play with another one.
I really like to send the townie teens to university - I pack them into dorms (6 each) and that is always fun because one does not really know what their aspirations/ skills are. I've even sent the paper boys and girls.
The Goodies have adopted 4 kids and are still alive and kicking, they should have been dead by now, but they're not, perhaps because they both were abducted by aliens five times. All four kids are at uni and they now have a new roomie.
I am also waiting for some Sims to finally meet some other Sims. Sanjay Ramaswami likes throwing parties and is friends with almost everyone, so I let him throw parties and that's where most of my Sims meet - at Sanjay' house. Because when he throws a party, everyone invited turns up and there are some others passing by that join in.

Running bussinesses at home is a very addictive thing; last one I made was a painting gallery with original paintings and I sell them very expensively. I'm actually trying to get to the highest level of bussiness and to collect as many stars as I can.

Talking more personal, I think I'll never get bored with this game, since I tend to write stuff about my characters and watch the generations grow... and mine is a very large neighbourhood, so I have years to spend there yet, and I huge lot to write about their lives... not to mention I usually quit playing for about four months a year.

While my game is a variation on the"perfect family" it can still be done if played right.

1. Don't use cheats. Don't use Kaching and motherlode at all. It is fun to see your house improve over time thanks to your sims hard work. Limit maxmotives and only use it when you are having a lot of fun somewhere (such as at a community lot).
2. Don't constantly skill your sims I know a lot of people have the urge to constantly skill your sims, but it becomes boring if that is all you do. Especially if you have a family of skills all simming.
3. Interact interact interact The best part about creating "perfect families" is seeing your sims enjoying life and hanging out with each other. Make your sims constantly interact to create an element of "realism" into your sims. If you have two parents who love each other deeply, have your parents do a lot of romantic interactions together when the kids are asleep or busy, take them on dates. Have your parents play with your kids (water balloon fights are fun for the whole family). Have your sims be there for each other and interact with each other and you will have more fun.
4. Send your sims to community lots. Community lots seem like a hassle. There are loading screens, and it is so easy to just have your sims stay at home. Don't! It can be a lot of fun sending your sims to community lots. Have a couple go on a date to a restaurant, or park. Have family outings at parks, pools, restaurants, or even clubs (you'd be surprised how much your sim kids can do there depending on the intractable objects).
5. Download or create community lots with things sims can do. There are a lot of lovely community lots to download. Beautiful parks, city squares, plaza, clubs. Once you add them to your game, go in and check if there is enough things for sims to do. Did you download a beautiful park with not much to do? Add some chess tables or a don't wake the llama table.
6. Create a custom clean neighborhood. Download the clean neighborhood templates from MATY and then create your very own neighborhood. If you are not good at building from scratch, then populate the hood with maxis and user made houses, community lots, ect. Create a few townies yourself and use the create townie cheat on the mailbox to speed up the process. Over time you will have a custom neighborhood with beautiful lots and sims. Tip: Download default face replacements, custom hair, and possibly custom eyes or skin to make your townie sims look better. Also you can use the wardrobe wrangler to townify custom clothing.
7.Take lots of pics You don't have to, but it can be fun taking pics of your sims and then looking back at them later and remembering the fun times you had. I use fraps so I can get higher quality pics.
So for all you control freaks out there you can still enjoy the game having your sims live fun and exciting lives without too much random drama.

I've been spending the last forever-and-a-half remaking Bridgeport from The Sims 3: Late Night as a Sims 2 'hood. So far the lots I have done are the Landgraab Sell 'n Swap, The Grind dance club, Marina Park and I just finished The True Modern Art Gallery, by far the most complex thing I've ever built.

Here's a comparison for the art gallery:



I love building stuff

EDIT: Here's the description :P

"Do you describe yourself as "Avant-Garde"? Do you often critique soap dispensers? Do you just love glass cubes? Then Bridgeport's True Modern Art Gallery is the place for you!"

Just discovered someone was already making Bridgeport. Now I'm slightly depressed.

Think I'll just play the game and ignore that I just wasted like a week.

You did not waste that time. You learned things while doing it. Learning is never a waste.

If I were "in your shoes" I would not give up on or toss out a project like this simply because someone else just so happens to be doing something similair. Your Sims2 Bridgeport replicas will be different from any one elses. What you are doing is unique.

A few years back I downloaded Broomhilda's Old Town Sc4 terrain map and set about painstakingly recreating the homes and the little central park. Others have before and since done similair. Similiar is not the same and can indeed be very different.

Someone made a good point and so I decided to continue a day or so ago! Thank you though.

Update!:

Civil Suites, with Mike's Cornerstore in the background. How does it look?

Sims 1 has posted an excellent list of ideas of things to do, all without needing any CC, in a separate thread. Personally I think it would have been better if he'd posted in this thread, so I'm adding this link so that people looking here will find his ideas.

I reckon there's always something new you can do in The Sims 2!

If you have SimPE, go into it and while using the "sim browser', change all of the primary and secondary aspirations for adults and teens. (FT needed). You can also change the hobbies while you're in there.
That will sometimes change the entire set of dynamics for a neighborhood!

I never have a boring moment with my sims 2...(oddly with sims 3 but never sims 2).
-I usually start out in one neighborhood with 2 "homemade" families and a "homemade" mayor then build on from there.
- I have a main hood, a downtown, a farming hood and the suburbs to start.
- then I have several different countries and other states to travel to (and eventually some sims created to play in each of those hoods too)
-when I use university each of the internatiional and "state" hoods have their own U to go to
-The homemade families start relationships with the Maxis townies and downtownies on their own and if I find that the townie is active enough with the household....he or she can become a "Citizen" (playable character)...lol thats where the Mayor comes in.
-The townie moves in with the mayor to become playable then moves out after a week into his or her own lot.
-The mayor in my hood always has lots of money (to help the citizens) and is in charge of taking in foreign visitors etc.
-He or she is also in charge of owning the banks and decorations/landmarks in the main hood.
-The other thing I do is all my sims start out living on a completely empty lot....they have to build with what the have for funds and use of cheats to keep them alive meanwhile....families with babies especially.
- And also almost all of my sims own their own businesses either home businesses or community lots and each sim is expected to have 5-10 different careers/businesses.
-Same with the businesses empty lots...to be built over time. I do this so that I can "play" right away instead of spending so much time building right away.
-music is also important in my game - lots of custom made stations etc...lots of foreign music to set the mood for all my international hoods
-and my downtown hood is where all my lovely freaks live (witches, zombies, vampires, plantsims, aliens, werewolves etc)
-They even have their own mayor and their own realm (humans are only allowed access to certain downtown lots)
-Most of the human owned businesses are located in the main hood
-Most of my schools are also sim owned and playable including some home- made "city universities"
-The private schools are on home lots and the public schools are on community lots

Right now I have 5 different sim "state" hoods, 4 subhoods and 18 different international hoods all of which have playable sims living in them
Since I switch between families often (never a boring moment) Simtracker is a must

I recently started playing Riverblossom Hills for the first time EVER and when I started playing the Greenmans, I immediately cured Rose of plantisimisimsimsm. Color me surprised when she had a positive memory of being cured and then rolled a FEAR of becoming a plantsim again. Um, ok? On the other hand, her husband kept rolling wants for her to become a plantsim again. After reading their family description where Rose was described as her husband's "green goddess", I realized he probably has a plantsim fetish and maybe she stayed a plantsim to please him? Oh well, I set her free and he will have to deal with it.

In regards to Daisy, I can't speak of what happened to her. We just don't speak of her anymore

p.s. I'm actually having alot of fun playing Riverblossom Hills, I'm really surprised. I realize I love the big lots (even with the hideous country-style deco) and how it easy it is to garden and grow plants. It's made me appreciate Seasons that much more.

I love The Sims so much, but we are missing someone

lmao Judge Judy would be great in my divorce court

Holy crap that is a great idea! I have to try this!!!

Has anyone suggested a call girl service? Basically, you have a few girls with the romance aspiration who lonely sims can call to hang out with, or umm, more. You might need the phone book mod to make the right sims know them, but this might be a fun idea.

I have this but expanded it to a brothel business so the ladies can have fun with any male customers who come by AND earn money. The other day one Sims called over an escort for fun and uses the money mail order mod to send to her the next day.

Sometime I need to create a male escort service too. Very handy for romance Sims.

Got accessoires for making fantasy creatures downloaded, but don´t want to start a new neighborhood?
Then you may want to introduce your sims to the UGE, the "Unexplained Genetic Expression".

The concept is taken from the pen & paper RPG Shadowrun.
A little background: There are times of waxing and of waning magic in the world. When the magic level is low, fantasy creatures like Trolls, Orks, Elves and Dwarves (in our sims game more like Plantsims, Vampires and so on) appear as humans and magicians cannot access their powers.
But the heritage sleeps in their genes and is passed down through the generations until the magic level rises again.
When a sufficient level is reached, children born to human couples may be supernaturals. Also, teenagers and adults may transform into supernaturals.
(In Shadowrun Elves and Dwarves can only be born, whereas Trolls and Orks transform, but that´s your call depending on what kind of supernaturals you want in your game.)

Roughly 10-15% of the population are changed by the UGE.
You can A) use percentile dice or random.org to check for each sim individually or B) handpick a number of sims of up to 15% of your character files in the given neighborhood. Method A is more random and can procuce anything from 0 through 100% of your sims to be transformed.
Additionally with apartment Life installed there is a 10% Chance for magical aptitude. Sims thus blessed gain the ability to learn magic, but needs to seek out a teacher as per normal game rules.

After the initial surge sims no longer transform spontanously. From now on the children are of the parent´s race (50:50 chance for either parent´s species in a mixed couple).
Magical aptitude is not inherited and must still be checked for for every sim individually.

Anyone who has The Sims 2 Homecrafter should post it on here and don't say we can download from other sights or we already have a link those are scams (Virus detected) anyone who downloaded on the OFFICIAL SITE years ago. I think that would make the game interesting for new comers and so on

You Know what I thought of something to make the game more realistic why not have sims pay taxes every year and make welfare for poor sims. What do you guys think about that?

Many people already do that-by having a few hacks (Monique's bill payer hack) that deducts funds from a household automatically a certain set amount..it can be reversed and used as 'funds for the poor' as well.

I, myself, have a very old (and rare hack) that is called a 'welfare table that lets sims collect a certain amount everyday in welfare according to their skills and family size.

Thanks for the help