In general, it's hard to decide because most of the time I like one feature of a pack but absolutely hate another...

What is your most favourite/least favourite expansion pack, and why?
I'm gonna go with Bon Voyage as favorite, because you can live at the beach and swim in the ocean and travel, or Open for Business because of the endless possibilites for stores.
Least favorite would be University, Apartment Life or Freetime. The first two because I never play in dorms/apartments, the last one because except the cool new hobbies, it doesn't add much to the game play for me and I don't care about the hobby enthusiasm.

What is your most favourite/least favourite stuff pack, and why?
Fave is probably Happy Holiday Stuff because I love christmas, or Mansion&Garden because it adds more realism (heater and stuff). Oh, and H&M because more stuff for your stores!
Least favorite is Family Fun, 'cause I don't like the furniture.

If you could rank how much you like each expansion or stuff pack in order, what would your order be?
Oh god. I guess...
Bon Voyage
Open for Business
Pets
Seasons
Nightlife
Freetime
University
Apartment Life

Stuff packs is too hard to decide.

If you had to remove an expansion, which one would it be, and why?
I would remove Apartment Life or University. I wouldn't miss apartments or universities, 'cause I never play them. But there are some objects and small features I really like...

Nightlife >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> rest

Hey guys, what is the worst pack, clothing wise? I really wanna know. Also, best pack, too.

I already posted some of my opinions on the EPs and SPs, but I might as well have a proper entry here. I'm prepared to be roasted!

What is your most favourite/least favourite expansion pack, and why?
My favorite EP is Seasons, which allows for gardening and fishing, providing more variety in terms of income sources and lifestyles, and I like the changes in weather as well. It brought some of my favorite careers and career rewards, introduced the stackable inventory, and payment of all of your bills at the mailbox without searching for them yourself (oh, how I wish I could do this in real life). Overall, I think it's the best EP for what it offered for gameplay - it's useful for a variety of settings (medieval, modern farms, etc.).

My least favorite EP, as I'm sure other members have heard me talking about, is FreeTime. I find the hobby system poorly implemented - I would've wanted certain hobbies separated like Film and Literature, some hobbies are shafted in terms of activities, I find the overall enthusiasm system invasive with the constant wants and interest-enthusiasm bleed, and dislike the way hobbies and interests don't work together in a logical manner.

What is your most favourite/least favourite stuff pack, and why?
Mansion and Garden, IKEA, and Kitchen and Bath tie for my favorite SPs. M&G is practically an EP disguised as a SP, and IKEA and K&B are useful for modern lots. My least favorite SP is Holiday - the theme is rather limited and its features don't fit my playstyle or preferences at all.

If you could rank how much you like each expansion or stuff pack in order, what would your order be?
Expansions:

• Seasons - fishing, gardening, weather, leftovers, new jobs, moonwalking penguin
• Nightlife - new aspirations, dates, downtown, chemistry system, new interactions, the fury
• OFB - crafting stations, talent badges, businesses, subhoods
• Apartment Life - This is mainly because I like apartments and the AL bookcase skills. Why ever did they think that we need even more townies at this point though?
• University - I mostly play them for the story-value of sims attending them and not the default gameplay itself, which I've heavily modified to my liking, but I like the LTW feature the most.
• Pets - This would've been higher on my list but I find it somewhat lacking in implementation. I'm also confused why the furniture looks more The Jetsons instead of something like TS3's Farm Fresh Folk Set (though I guess that's in Seasons anyway); it's useful for certain settings, but I'm curious as to how Pets made them go for this specific aesthetic.
• Bon Voyage - I'll be honest - I use BV more like a SP (especially for the camping/mountain themes) and like it primarily for allowing us to walk to lots. I'm not fond of beaches or vacations either, so it doesn't suit my playstyle. The Unsavory Charlatan also seems to have a one-sided fixation on me, which was funny until he actively stalked my sims around.
• FreeTime - Elaboration below.

Stuff Packs:

• Mansion and Garden - I love the roof angle adjuster.
• IKEA
• Kitchen and Bath
• H&M Fashion
• Teen Style Stuff
• Glamour Life Stuff - I think the bedroom set is all right, but I haven't used the clothes that much.
• Family Fun Stuff - I'm okay with the medieval children's bedroom set (not my style so it's hardly used), though not a fan of much else.
• Celebration - I'm generally not fond of the objects' color schemes in-game and the items don't see frequent use either.
• Happy Holiday - I never installed this since I don't particularly want nor need its features.

If you had to remove an expansion, which one would it be, and why?
FreeTime (you knew it was coming). I love the idea, but as I mentioned, the execution was lost on me, and I wish it wasn't. My favorite feature from this EP is the option to have secondary aspirations, I like the Indie Wave radio station, and some of the additional activities are interesting, like pottery and repairing cars.

Still, there are several things that weigh it down and asides from the shoddy hobby system, it seems to be a matter of playstyle. I prefer gameplay on the slightly more challenging side and FT has features that don't see any use in my games at all - LTA permaplats, aspiration benefits, and genie lamps have been banned among other things. I might have been more amenable if you could choose the benefits instead of the ladder system they chose to implement. I'm not fond of the BFF system and most of the career rewards pale in comparison to the previous ones. There are also a few other minor qualms, like the attraction to and disengagement from the toddler activity table and how they broke contacting NPCs through the phone. Some of these are fixable through mods, but the hobby system affects the want trees, which are more difficult to tune.

This easily could've been one of my favorite EPs if it weren't for all these problems - I loved the potential but not the execution.

University is my least favorite. I've never had the desire to play around with it much and it's just kinda boring.
I have a love hate relationship with Pets, love because I'm a "omg puppies and kittens" kinda person but hate because that's really its only appeal. Open For Business is okay, I like the features it has and god I love Servos so much

I'll probably love Seasons and Apartment Life until I die.

Nightlife is essential. That's all I have to say. As for the Freetime and Bon Voyage, I love them too, but never as much as Seasons and AL

I've heard that Uni in TS2 isn't that good. I have Nightlife which I highly recommend.

Well, you didn't hear that from me! A lot of people don't like it, but I'm convinced that this is usually because they're not approaching it on its own terms.

First of all, time moves differently there (unless you have an age mod that greatly extends normal sim lifespans, like Almighty Hat's "It's the Proportion). University is on a completely different time scale. If it moved at the same pace as the main neighborhood, you wouldn't have time for anything except Grinding for Grades, and what fun would that be?

University isn't about getting the grades. It's about splashing out, trying new things, really getting to know your sims. Unlike other sims, YAs have a game mechanic for natural character change and development - the opportunity to change aspiration at the beginning of Junior Year. YA sims have time to do proper courtship and engagements, rather than the rush to get married in the bathroom at 2AM that I'm always seeing other people do. They have time and space to write novels, start a garage band and go out to have gigs, have as many first dates as a Pleasure sim can stomach before finally growing up and settling down to a new Fortune aspiration. They can take craft stations with them and make stock for their future store. Heck, they can start the store! Or they can just party all the time. Or they can grind for grades. Or they can invite their families over a lot. The goals the game sets are easy, so you set your own. The more active sims you have in University at the same time, the more fun you can have; and if, in the end, you find you've got too many sims to play in the main hood - graduate them or drop them out and turn them into townies.

Some people, of course, don't like any of that, and that's fine, too. But don't take anybody's word for it. Try it for yourself. If you turn out not to like it, or to like parts of it and not others, that's what mods and cheats are for.

My favourite EP could be Open For Business : badges are great, the business system is well programmed even if you need some mods (like any TS2 EP) to work 100% properly, the subhood Bluewater Village is nice (finally we have the Landgraab family !), some CAS elements may be too tacky nowadays but default replacements can solve the problem. I don't like custom careers so the 'employee career' is essential to me. Oh, and servos of course.
My second favourite is Seasons and my third is Nightlife.

My least favourite is clearly Free Time : Desiderata Valley kinda bore me, hobbies system could have been way better, the science hobby is a bit forgotten, there is not enough new objects, secret hobbies lot are useless to me. The worst part : you can't assign a hobby to your sim, the game decides for you ! Really, EAxis ? This EP needs a lot of correcting mods to be logical, consistent and fun...

Least - Bon Voyage and Pets. After a few times I stopped taking vacations and having pets. Pets also seems like it was really done half-assed. There's not really anything BESIDES pets and related things, unlike every other EP. It's more like an SP in a lot of ways. It has a few things of new content, but not very good - like the stuff that looks like how people in the 1930s-1950s thought thing would be like now.

I have a hard time choosing which ones I like the best, because I like features from all of them. The one(s) I would not manage without would be AL and (M&G) because of all the neat storytelling and decorating help I've gotten from those two (shiftability and the freezer clock mod based on witch spells are a must for taking pictures and decorating, and the plants are great for taking pics in a CC-light game). I don't use witches or apartments much, but I did try them out.

I think my least favorite may be BV and Uni solely based on the main features, because I hardly ever use them any longer (haven't played Uni or vacations in ages). However, I probably use a ton of the other features they offer (a lot of the furniture is quite neat), so I don't feel buying them was wasted. Same with pets. I don't use pets that often, and find strays very annoying, but I do like that I can use pets if I want to (I've used birds and hamsters for my story, so I guess I do use the features a bit, and the odd story or picture have included cats or dogs over the years). I think that's my main con with most of the packs - I don't use much of the actual features they come with (any longer), but I still use objects and functions from those packs a lot. I've avoided using weather from Seasons too (because of pink-flashing issues), but would probably have used it more often if it wasn't such a graphic problem. There's a lot of other neat features from Seasons, so it's not that big of an issue.

Basically, there are things I like or dislike with all the packs, but I wouldn't want to be without any of them. Not sure which stuff pack I like best or least either, but I have used several of the items some or another time while playing. I probably use the features from FSS and GL the least, but I used to love the dragon/princess bedrooms for kids. I think I've used several items from the other stuff packs fairly regularly, both in a CC-light and CC-heavy game.

I haven't had the graphics issues. Nightlife is important so you don't have to have them walk or wait for the stupid taxi/have the carpool sitting there obnoxiously honking the horn.

Overall, this thread is in pathetic shape. Here are some of my thoughts on it:

How dreadful! This thread is dead!

...Jokes aside, I can't really pick my favorite EP anymore, but my least favorite is Pets, followed closely by Bon Voyage. Pets is a big disappointment (I guess making pets from scratch ate development time for actually fleshing them out), while Bon Voyage's content isn't really relevant in my regular gameplay. My favorite stuff packs as of now (in no particular order) are M&G, Ikea, K&B and H&M (they got better at them as the game went on). The rest are pretty niche for me.

I like K & B & Ikea. M&G is more an EP than a SP. Teen Stuff, Family Fun and the Holiday one are pretty much a waste.

There's so much... In Sims games, each pack usually adds something incredibly useful. Nightlife adds cars, Open For Business adds the ability to make any food at any time of day, Bon Voyage lets you choose which Sims will go downtown, etc. So many little quality of life features that don't always get advertised or first come to mind with the theme. So it's hard for me to pick just one.

Bon Voyage seems to be one of the least favourite expansion packs overall, but I must say that I love what came with this ep!
Even though the holidays are not as adventurous and exciting as they could have potentially been, this expansion pack added beach lots and all the beautiful interactions attached to them. The build mode fences and the buy mode sets of furniture are necessities for me: they are so useful and I specifically like to decorate my house with objects related to Asian culture. The tropical objects are very vibrant and I often use them to decorate backyards, pools, community lots near the beach. The mountain wallpapers are great for creating cozy cottages and bungalows, especially if your neighborhood is set in a cold environment and it would only seem logic to use wood logs to build houses.
Bon Voyage has very specific sets of items and clothes, so it's really up to the player's taste to determine if this expansion pack is useless or essential.

I haven't played the later expansions from BV-AL very much, so I might have a heavy bias towards the previous expansions. That said, the only expansions I actually cared to buy were Nightlife, Pets and Seasons. At some point someone gave me one of those combo packs with the the Deluxe base game which included NL along with Uni, OFB, Family Fun stuff and Glamour Life stuff, so that's what I have most experience playing for a long time before deciding to complete my collection before life happened and I stopped playing. That said, I'll rank the EPs as I see them.

1. Seasons - I feel this pack ultimately is my favourite because it added many of the things I love into the game. Weather and changing seasons were great additions to the game, and I liked that you could customise the seasons in different neighbourhoods. I think some of the graphics were improved here too like pools. Leftovers are a mandatory feature for me now. I also loved gardening in TS1 Unleashed and Makin' Magic, so was very happy it was included here after my disappointment with Pets. I also liked the seasonal effects, particularly the faster skilling in Autumn. Of course I had a few gripes with it as well. Plantsims are too easy to make by mistake because ladybugs aren't as useful as they should have been, and while I think the ability to spawn plant toddlers is cool, I hate that they age straight to adult. I also really wish they had added the ability to swim in ponds as in Castaways (which uses a modified Seasons engine IIRC) and/or the ability to ice skate on frozen lakes. I really didn't like those huge skating rinks.
2. Nightlife - This is a close second to Seasons. Though I don't really care for the dating aspect, this added the attraction system which I think makes the game far more interesting and wouldn't want to play without it. It also added driveable cars which while I don't particularly like how driveways work, I think the various interactions that cars add makes up for it. I also liked that sims could go to work later or still go to work if they missed a carpool. Vampires are probably my favourite lifestate and though I would prefer if they had been given more special traits, mods do make up for that. Inventories were also introduced here and I think many of my favourite objects come from this EP. In an unmodded game though this EP had a lot of bugs and annoyances, Mrs Crumplebottom picks on people she shouldn't, and some things which were funny at first but quickly became annoying, people randomly kicking over trash and steal newspapers, the gagging and swooning.
3. Pets - I would put this much lower on the list but I wouldn't want to play without it in my game. Honestly I feel like this was a minimal effort EP. Though there is a lot of customisation in create a pet, I would have liked if a little more effort went into the other aspects because I barely ever used create a pet. At the very least I would have liked to see all the features from TS1 Unleashed brought forward, I missed the tricks (like cats playing the keyboard) and having them hunt various pests such as mice, gophers and rabbits. They also missed the racoon pest and the small pets like turtles and iguanas from Unleashed, it would have been nice to have more small pets like these. I also think it would have been nice to be able to befriend and even adopt the skunk, the racoon from Unleashed or even the Dragons from Makin' Magic. These are all the minimal things I wanted from it that we didn't get, but we did get the ability to teach cats to use the toilet, so I guess that's something. Though I don't care as much for it, I don't see why they couldn't have included the pet show stuff from Life Stories because pet shows were also a thing in Unleashed. For additional things not seen in Unleashed, I would have liked foxes, horses and various farm animals, or some more exotic animals like elephants and tigers.
4. Apartment Life - This is pretty high on the list more for secondary things and also because there are a good amount of mods that require it. I was extremely disappointed that only 4 families could live on an apartment lot, couldn't only rent apartments and the way roommates are handled (like pets!?) does put me off having them. Apartment lots should have had both community and residential functions, as most apartment blocks in real life have shops on the ground floor, and I think it should have been possible to visit apartment lots (if not residential lots too), and really, 4 sublots is ridiculous and I don't know why nobody has made a mod to increase this. While the reputation system and social classes do remind me of The Urbz, I don't particularly care for it.I like the magic but not particularly how it was implemented, and why this was shoehorned in here instead of an additional Magic EP or Freetime (it seems like something that would go with hobbies and the secret lots are like hobby lots) is puzzling to me. Something like celebrities in Superstar would have been a much better fit here. I think the alignments are dumb, playable evil witches don't really have any useful spells like good witches do so there's no real use in playing an evil witch. I would have preferred the spells to be more altruistic for good witches and selfish for evil witches instead, so both would be beneficial to gameplay, but in different ways. I also wish for Bonehilda here, and one that actually takes care of children like the TS1 version unlike the TS3 version or the spectral assistants. I do like some of the social interactions added here, babysitting, walking to work, toddlers being able to use some pet objects, and of course shiftables and deco slots.
5. Bon Voyage - To be honest I don't think I've played vacations much, but I do like the beaches and far eastern stuff a lot. Again I would have liked some features from Castaways here like supporting bigger neighbourhoods and lots without roads, as well as swimmable ponds and exotic animals. Also while mountain and tropical could be generic enough, the Far Eastern destination seems a little weird when your family has a similar background. I also missed the winter theme from TS1 Vacation with snowboarding and igloos, but I guess these should have been in Seasons instead. I also missed Volleyball on beach lots. The carnival games are also missing from TS2 and I would have liked to see them either here or in another EP. One of my main gripes though is the lack of support for pets and toddlers. I also don't like how limited building is on beach lots, I don't understand why they limited building on the beach. Many people like Bigfoot but I don't care much for him either, he is inexplicably talented in everything despite living in the middle of nowhere, and is severely limited as a sim. I would have liked to see a real lifestate like fairies or mermaids implemented here.
6. Open for Business - While having my sims run a business never really appealed to me, I do think this EP is fairly decent and does open up some gameplay options. I do like that sims can own community lots and have home businesses, but I don't like how EAxis didn't really design owned businesses to be visited by other families, while home businesses cannot be visited at all. This also introduced the talent badges system which I personally dislike. To me it doesn't make sense that someone who can use a computer just fine and/or has high logic can't operate a cash register. Overall though I think it would have been better to simply make them use the regular skills like charisma for sales and mechanical for robotics or simply rolled into a badge for business (bronze can use the cash register, silver can restock, gold can do sales) and the crafting go by skills instead (though robotics could be something a skilled toy maker could do!). It would have made a bit more sense having separate badges if one could train their employees for their role. Robotics is maybe the most interesting craft but were also a disappointment here. While having servos as sims makes them more flexible, they are essentially another sim you have to take care of and I don't think they should have normal sim aspirations unless they were modelled after the Bicentennial Man (which now that I think of it could have been interesting if one could upgrade servos to be more human over time if desired). The other robots are mostly useless and break too often. The flower arranging, cosmetology and toy making don't really add much to the game and I really could do without them.
7. University - I would have put this one much higher if I didn't absolutely hate how just about everything was implemented. I do however like many of the interactions added by this EP as well as the ability to form a band. This added cellphones which I quickly found necessary in my game. I don't like the fact that only teenagers can go to college and will age up even if they still have time left to be teens. I would have much preferred young adults to be an additional lifestage that all sims go through whether or not they go to college. I don't like that their age meter is replaced by semesters, this could have been implemented similar to seasons in the UI or simply on the grades panel. I also think adults and even elders should be allowed to do uni courses and also work while studying. I also think that if the college system wasn't so tied into aging, it could open up the possibility for a diligent students to write finals early or do "part-time" uni where they take longer to graduate but can work full-time or otherwise finish their studies on their own time. The majors and uni job requirements are completely nonsensical, eg. you don't need to go to uni to get into the medical career but you do for show business?? Also majors don't actually matter for getting you into a career, you just have to have gone to college, you could study Drama for the Natural Science career. Dorms and rented houses should have been available outside of uni, I don't see why a single adult or teen shouldn't be able to live in a dorm-like lot if they don't have much money. YAs also can't study without going to uni or have children or pets in the uni hood. I would have liked this EP so much if it wasn't horribly flawed by design.
8. Freetime - I would absolutely pull this EP if it weren't for some mods requiring it. The hobby system is useless and redundant when we already had underutilized interests in the game. The message spam is annoying, I don't think the hobby lots are particularly useful, I don't like that there is no way to choose the one true hobby for a sim like attraction traits and aspiration. Without that annoying hobby system, all the other things I do like could have been a kind of hobby stuff pack instead. I actually got this pack after TS3 and thought tinkering was actually useful, it isn't. I fail to see what the point of the hobby system was and how it actually adds to gameplay that actually warranted an EP. The secondary aspiration is about the only other feature I would want, but even so I could do without it.

For stuff packs, I don't think I actually used most of them so I won't rank them because I don't actually know what's in all of them. I do really like the furniture from the IKEA pack and M&G for the green energy stuff. The H&M pack probably had the best clothes and though I mostly used CC clothes, I think it was a nice touch that they added the items to create an H&M store in the game. I also liked the holiday pack because of Santa and the New Year's party, but I think it should have been combined with celebration stuff personally, though I don't think I actually liked anything in that one. I also think the IKEA and H&M packs should have been free promotional packs personally since they're essentially ads for the real companies.

My favorite EP is either Seasons or Nightlife. So original right? Both of them add so much to the game they're literally essential. It's like I can't imagine playing without having Downtown or having weather so that's a sign those are great packs.

My least favorite is Freetime. Such an annoying and useless pack honestly. All my thoughts about it has probably already been said in this thread but the hobby system sucks and it just adds such annoying additions to the game, like the hobby idle animations and the movies on TV. *shudder* Why do they have to be so loud...?

I feel like talking about EPs today, let's do an (almost) full ranking here.
I read a lot of undeserved hate about some EPs up there. If only they knew all features they have, and not just the "main" one. (Well, it's understandable since with the Ultimate Collection we got everything together.)

Top 1: I only played apartments once and don't really remember how they work, but my top 1 is still Apartment Life.
- Witches: they are the best, I just love them. I don't want to type 4 paragraphs about how much I love them, so let's continue.
- Furniture: don't ask me why but I just love the furniture??? The wall closet, that TV with shelves, that simple square coffe table, that modern library, the classic modular sofa, the socialite objects (gearhead ones are ugly though, I have to admit).
And other, but still very good, stuff:
- A lot of architecture items
- Ability to move wall objects up and down
- The playground set
- Spiral stairs
- The 3×3 aquarium
- The heater
- The cabinet with mirror with the new interactions for the sink.
And probably a lot of stuff I'm forgetting. It just added a lot of things the game needed. Well, enough of AL.

Top 2: Open for Business.
I probably like it as much as AL, but honestly, OfB alone wouldn't be really good, it needs the other EPs to have all its potential. 2nd place it is.
Well, the obvious feature, running your own business. What makes it so good is the variety you can have:
- You can simply buy from catalog.
- Or sell what you craft from the 3 stations or the 2 ones that came with FT (sewing and pottery).
- Run a barber shop.
- Run a restaurant (one of the few things I still didn't try, but it really sounds fun).
- Sell cooked food directly.
- Sell the fruits and vegetables you grow.
- Have a witch with a potion shop.
- Run a car shop.
- Or a pet shop.
- You can even just simply put a ticket machine in your house and it will be profitable (if you are willing to have half of the hood walking around home freely ).
And then there are mods that add even more kinds of business. Massage shops, pharmacies, chocolate shops...
- The 3 crafting stations are still very good even if not used for a business. The snapdragons make life so easy... I love Servos, they are a nice addition to any family. And the toys are so fun, specially the evil versions.
- Some business perks are really useful even outside your business.
- There isn't a lot of furniture, but I like the Mission set. The windows and doors too.
- And the bathroom towels. It doesn't look important but I like it, specially because when OfB was released, K&B Stuff Pack didn't exist yet.
I think that's it about OfB?

Top 3: I guess my top 3 would be Bon Voyage.
Honestly, I don't send my sims often on vacation, but there's still a lot of cool things in this EP: massages, learning teleportation, having Bigfoot in your family, the pirate ship, the rolling log, the sauna...
And the beach lots, of course. Great addition to the Seasons EP.
And the jewelry, probably the best CAS addition from all EPs.
Plus a lot of good furniture and clothes, and architecture objects. There's no way I can dislike this EP even if traveling isn't that fun for me.

Top 4 goes to Seasons.
The seasons themselves and the weather can be really annoying sometimes, but that won't stop me from putting Seasons in top 4, as you can easily control all that with the weather machine.
Even though, I still like seeing snow. And with the Holiday SP, it's almost a must.
Gardening is tiring, but I really like it. Being a Plant Sim makes it much easier. I use them as full time gardeners and then sell the vegetables and fruits to all the hood. The juices you can make with them have nice effects, or you can put them in the fridge for the shiny food.
And then, the kitchen deco, just like the bath deco from OfB, it was very needed.
Also the hot chocolate machine, I don't know, I just love it.
And let's not forget the careers. This is one of the only 3 EPs that add careers, and I love career rewards.

Top 5: Free Time.
I have to agree that the hobbies are annoying. Those messages telling you your sim is losing enthusiasm in X hobby appear too often, and the sims inviting you to the hobby lots too. And I also dislike how unbalanced the hobbies are. It's easy to accidentally max the enthusiasm for Arts and Crafts, but if you want to do it in Science... Prepare your sim for nights of looking through the telescope.
Now, the aspiration benefits are really good and I couldn't live without them. The Best Friends Forever thing too.
It also came with many careers and so many new objects: a new set for kitchen, baby and children objects, pottery, sewing, the model train, the lemonade stand, the ant farm, the soccer goal, the basketball court, the restorable car...
And the many new interactions, some of them exclusive depending on the sim's enthusiasm. But not all of them. Catching all bugs is still something I want to do.
It also added more variety to the sim's wants, with both the secondary aspiration and the hobby related wishes.
And I almost forgot the Genie came with this EP.
Well, I can't dislike this EP no matter how annoying the hobbies are. There's just so many new cool stuff. And there are hacks to make hobbies less annoying after all.

Top 6, near the bottom, will be Nightlife.
Honestly, I would most likely choose this EP if I needed to remove one, but I'm trying to be a bit objective here, it doesn't deserve being at the bottom.
Personally, I don't really like restaurants, discos, or well, the downtown in general. But I can't deny they are a good addition to the game.
The chemistry is something I can live without, but the dates are nice. I like my couples to keep the letters or roses from before they were married.
About the vampires, well, they are not bad but they are my least favourite life state. I hate that they lose their needs so fast even if they are inside home, without windows and in the basement. They can't do much, you basically need to have them sleeping 12 hours of day. It's also annoying that they can't work in normal careers properly (without mods). Well, at least there's OfB for that.
Cars are nice, but my fav car is the restorable one from Free Time, so...
I like most of the furniture and clothes, and it has some great objects like the wall TV, the photo booth, the fire jet, or the bowling alley.

My 2 least fav ones: I'm sorry but I can't choose the order for the last 2. They both have good parts.

- University: There's nothing I dislike from it. Most of my sims go to uni. As much as I like the careers, the university life and the benefits from going to it, I can't put this EP any higher, because it doesn't have much more to say about it. Well, I like the fountains, the mini fridge, some of the medieval furniture, it also came with some instruments and exercise machines, but that's it. Well, and the bubble blower.
I never played a zombie, but they don't look as unique as the other life states. (Besides, zombies were re-added in FT and AL).
Understandable from the very first EP, but I'm sorry, you needed more content.

- Pets: I read so much hate to this EP and I don't like continuing it, but there really aren't enough reasons to put it higher.
Pets can be annoying. They are very good company to single sims, but having them in bigger families is just one extra thing to worry about and they don't really contribute to the family. I don't often have pets. The womrats and parrots are nice, though. They don't need as much attention as cats and dogs, and parrots are a more fun way of skilling charisma.
Let's be honest here, I love werewolves. I would put this EP at the bottom with no doubt if it wasn't for them.
The futuristic looking furniture doesn't look bad, but that's it, there isn't a lot of new items.
I have yet to try having a pet shop, may be fun.

And for Stuff Packs...
Top 1 would be Mansion & Garden. I love the climbing ivies and the other plants. I don't really like the Second Empire set, but well, it's there.
It added the tool to adjust roof angle, it was possible before, but with cheats, it was harder.
The solar panels and windmill are really good so you can stop worrying about the bills. Then it added the ceiling fans, the lake fountain, and also some hairs and clothes that are pretty good.
But the best feature of M&G is definitely the quarter tile placement cheat. I can't live without it.
It added so many things, definitely the best SP.

If we count M&G as an EP... Then my fav would be either Holiday or Kitchen & Bath. I like all the Christmas stuff. And the objects, walls and floors for kitchens and baths were really necessary.
My least fav is Family Fun. Sorry for it, but I don't like the furniture.

Not really an EP but I hate Life Stories with a burning passion.

Apartment Life is the best in my opinion because it offers so much an because apartments are so common irl it is unrealistic not to have it in Sims 2.
Seasons is also a banger because it has seasons obv, it doesn't get boring, offers a countryside life in contrast with AL. Weather and seasons are also essiential.
Nightlife is also good for me because I'm extroverted and a city girl so I obv prefer tht kind of gameplay more.

University is boring af, it lasts for sooo long. Sims 3 did it better but uni parties in both games suck. As a uni student, it was a huge disappointment and even more depressing than real life lmao. Sims 4 is a master at parties because it can carry so many sims on a single lot so I assume that Sims 4 uni was the best,

My most favorite expansion pack is NightLife. The aspects of gameplay that it adds get integrated into people's daily life, as opposed to being reserved to a special mode, such as owned business or vacation.

The strongest part of this expansion is the design of lots. Downtown is large, the buildings vary in style and are quite detailed. Most of them are furnished with expensive items and include pleasant vegetation. Unexpectedly for the setting, Downtown includes small starter homes, which are the most beautiful and practical among all, with a fence for protection and a parking space.

NightLife is the only expansion where NPCs have received manual tweaking to their facial structure, clothing and relationships. The population is localized to its neighborhood, which aids in immersion.

The new entertainment objects feel solid, without significant bugs. Dining in restaurants is nice, it seems to be programmed well to avoid failures and force completion. Formal dating provides a realistic guide through this process. However, it also makes gaining aspiration and even wealth too easy. But every other expansion adds elements that make play less challenging. Non-romantic outings unfortunately do not progress organically. Attraction and Fury make relationships more dynamic.

The inventory system adds freedom of carrying value with the person on move out. Last but not least is the addition of cars, which remove dependence on the strangely ever present and free community carpools.

Not everything is great Downtown. I've already mentioned outings, which are scored only by relationship deltas and trigger members to move too often. It is far too difficult to have a successful outing without romance and realtime-with-pause commands. The vampyre life state, like the others, is unrealistic. Restaurants and Barista advertise their presence to patrons too much, but I'm not sure if that is a problem created by Open for Business.

My second favorite expansion is probably Seasons. It adds weather effects that people can experience every day, and the Leftovers option on refrigerators.

I've mostly forgotten exactly which small improvements or flaws were added with each expansion pack, because I've jumped from Basegame to Seasons, to FreeTime. I do remember finding the Base extremely difficult and bland.

I know literally NO ONE asked for it, but here is a list of the expansions, based in my opinion from best to worst, and why I think that way.

1- Nightlife
Ya know, a few years back I played the base game only, without Nightlife. It was WEIRD. I mean, I enjoyed it because, ya know, Sims 2, but it felt like something was... missing. I mean, that was probably because I had ordered both the Base game and Nightlife off Amazon, but Nightlife refused to be installed, but I digress. When I got the Ultimate Collection last summer, Nightlife became one of the two packs I used the most, along with the next one on the list. Nightlife's stuff is so great! I dress my Sims in Nightlife stuff all the time, I send my Sims Downtown all the time, they go on dates all the time... The great thing about this pack is that everything feels like a natural extension of the Base Game's mechanics, and I really understand why EA decided to package Nightlife with Deluxe and Double Deluxe.

2- FreeTime
A lot of people don't like this one, and I find that sad. Look, I know that Desiderata Valley is kinda boring, and that hobbies can be really intrusive. But I honestly don't mind. Yes, the hobby wants clutter up your sims' wants panels, but... it's kinda realistic? I don't wake up thinking "Hmm, yes, today I want to find my true love." I think "Hmm, today I want to go play Sims 2." Plus, the hobbies give such an interesting facet to your Sims. Coral Oldie likes to sew, Ophelia Nigmos likes to read, Hermia Capp likes to paint, etc. It's even nicer if it's something you wouldn't expect from them. Olive Specter, black widow and probable serial killer... loves to cook? I dunno, I wouldn't eat anything she makes for me. The uber-aggressive Tybalt Capp channels his anger into the guitar? Huh, okay then. Juliette Capp, the dignified heiress to the Capp family... is a die-hard gamer girl. And that's not even getting into everything else FreeTime adds, like the new careers, new CAS outfits, and the metric assload of new stuff added in buy mode, like the train table, restorable car, pottery wheel, sewing machine, violin, ballet barre...

3- Apartment Life
Maxis really went out on a bang for Sims 2 expansions, didn't they? Adding apartments finally allowed for proper urban gameplay, and they're quite fun to play with. I don't often dabble with supernaturals, but witches are quite fun mess around with. Belladonna Cove, while it may not be quite as lore-rich as the three base-game hoods, is still decently interesting, and it looks absolutely STUNNING. Add in the new CAS and buy mode objects, and you got yourself a pretty tidy package. Also, a funny anecdote- when I was around 5, I used to love watching my cousin play Sims 2, so she sent my family a copy of Sims 2 and some expansions. Now, what did she get us? The Sims 2 Deluxe, and FreeTime, and later on she sent us a copy of Apartment Life (which we never installed, and I only found years later.) She knew my tastes, even back then!

4- Open for Business
I'm rather fond of this pack... even though I've never really dabbled in the MAIN ASPECT of the pack. I've had Patrizio Monty manage a restaurant for a couple of days before I realized I wasn't doing a good job, and ended up selling it. I really need to get on with that someday. Anyway, you may ask why do I still like this pack? It's all the extras the come with it that seal the deal for me. The CAS content is quite nice, and even if you aren't running a business, the workbenches are quite fun to mess around with.

5- Seasons
Here's where I start getting less enthusiastic. Okay, Seasons has been growing on me- gardening is nice, the new careers are AMAZING. But again, I basically never use supernaturals, so I'll basically never touch PlantSims, especially since PlantBabies get screwed out of the Child, Teen, and Young Adult stages. And the main features, Seasons and Weather, don't affect the game as much as you think they would. Like, it's snowing? Okay, I guess you'll have to go inside once you start getting cold. It's really weird how easy it is to completely ignore the main feature.

6- Bon Voyage
Maybe I don't send my Sims on vacations enough. But the problem with this pack is that it does basically nothing if you aren't on vacation. I mean, there's beaches, that's cool? Jewelry, nice I guess? But the new buy mode stuff doesn't really belong anywhere outside the Vacation destinations or in the homes of VERY rich people. I mean, what is the average middle-class sim going to with a massage table? Or a sauna? Or a mahjong table? Or a goddamn pirate ship?! And then there's the vacations themselves, which for me, are just frantic rushes to get vacation mementos, interspersed with the exact same shit I do at home. Cool. Am I doing vacations wrong?

7- Pets
It sure does exist, doesn't it? Why does this pack feel so barren??? I'm baffled at what EAxis didn't include in this pack. Like a new neighborhood. Or ANY CAS CONTENT FOR HUMANS WHATSOEVER. And then there's the pets themselves. The pets are just sorta... there. I mean, they can get jobs, I guess. Because when I think of pets, I think about exploiting them for profit! Honestly, my hot take is that this is the WORST version of the Pets pack in the Sims series.

8- University
Uggghhhhhhhhhhh
Why does the game keep trying to shove college down my throat? It's worse than the hobby spam, in my opinion! Like, if you don't send a teen to college, they basically instantly have a mental breakdown upon becoming an adult, EVEN IF THERE'S NO COLLEGE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD! And I play rotationally to keep my sims' ages consistent. This means I HAVE TO SEND EVERY ONE OF MY TEENS TO COLLEGE IN ORDER TO NOT FUCK UP THE AGES. UGGGHHHH!!!! And then there's college itself. It's a repetitive, overly long slog of giving my sims too many skills and making them do too many assignments. Because if they don't pass, IT TAKES EVEN GODDAMN LONGER. And college is LONG. 24 days MINIMUM. Adulthood is by default 29 days! So you know how I said I play rotationally? I usually play 1 day rotations so play sessions are quick. But in order for the length of college to make any sense whatsoever, I have to cram an entire semester in one rotation! And I cram all my college sims into 3 dorms to make it so I don't have to play any MORE extra long rotations, but this means I can't dabble with Greek Houses! I genuinely dread the end of my rotations when I have to play my college sims. I genuinely hate this pack.

I don't know if the listing reflects my actual opinion of which pack I like the most (I'm really bad with ranking things), but at least it's some of my opinion on each pack.

1- Apartment Life (and M&G)
I love this one purely because it adds some features I can not live without for storytelling (if I can't freeze sims, taking pictures is 1000x times more difficult), and for the baby play items (I don't think they can be used without the M&G and/or AL packs? Either way, I have both, wouldn't part with either since most mods are based on these nowadays), but also for some playground items. That, and the shiftability function (makes my life much easier with the shifting OMSPs). I swear, this one is all in with the functions. M&G has some neat features too (it deserves a mention since it's kind of a mini-EP), and all those mods you end up possibly missing out on if not for these two...
I don't play with witches or apartments (have tried both earlier - prefer residential lots, and I think I was mostly over my supernatural phase at the time I installed AL, so didn't play too much with witches), and don't care for the AL neighborhood.

3- FreeTime
Hobby items. They add a bunch of fun features, and I love it. I mean, there's probably some clutter in the wants panel, but I don't mind too much. Breaks the monotony up a bit. The hobby people can go and lock themselves in on their respective hobby lots, though (and bring Humble). I don't want to see them (need to go find mods for that...). Couldn't care less about the neighborhood.

4- Open for Business
Work benches. What to do without them? I love playing with lots of kids, and they need toys - and the meager selection without the benches (flowers are also fun!) is not that great. There's a bunch of other things in this one, too (I think some cakes?). I've done some shop managing in "earlier times" and it can be fun. It's got some neat shelf functions as well, and the chill benches that looks good in cafes, whether they're just for set dressing or functional. I think Bluewater came with this one? Not sure if I've ever used it...

5- Seasons
Weather - meh. I had to turn it off for my game just to be able to run it decently enough, because snow always caused pink-flashing after a while, and temperatures were only an annoyance. I usually kept it perma-spring in that game except when I needed weather for something (it's nice as an option, but has a lot of downsides). Other than weather it's got some decent functions and of course outerwear as an extra clothing category comes in handy even without the weather. Gardening can be fun. Plantsims - I've played some with them, but the "sameness" and annoyance with the ages grows old pretty fast. Also can't be bothered with the neighborhood.

2- Nightlife
Cars. Not that I use them much, but when I need them, I'm really glad they're there. I think the pack has a lot more that I use without thinking - It's the first pack I installed after getting the game (I've had BG+Uni ALWAYS, got this one very shortly after), so really can't remember how simming was without it. Probably not too fun. I don't use Downtown.

6- Bon Voyage
Found vacations to be pretty broken. Tried it out a few times, but the family I used one of the times got borked pretty bad in one of the runs, and I don't think I've had any of my sims go on vacations since. Might have been before a patch (not sure). Anyway, I like a lot of the furniture (not too overly happy with some of the original colors, but recolored it's great), There are functions I like in this pack - items, the sea/beach (when I can be bothered to make lots with it, which is extremely rare), some clothes, so it's not like I hate it. But like with a lot of these packs I don't use the "main feature" (vacations).

7- Pets
I like the option of having pets. I just don't use them a lot. Could've had a few more pets, though (but at least it's better than a certain other game where you had to by a stuff pack to get rodents - not even getting birds!)... :/
Mostly I don't use them a lot because they get boring after a while, and rodents/birds/fishes (without mods) keep dying all the time (I swear, those things are impossible to take care of if you don't keep your eyes peeled on them 24/7. Mostly I add pets for storytelling or picturetaking purposes, but usually I don't. I had some fun with the werewolves back in the days, but don't think I've had any in my game in quite some time.

8- University
Loved it at the beginning (when it was my only EP), but after a while the constant nagging got to me. Haven't had a sim go to the Uni in ages upon ages. I think there's probably some decent stuff in there, but to me everything is mixed with the BG since I've never seen them separately. It's a decent Uni variation of the main games, though. It's just very naggy and a bit same-y when the game wants you to do it for EVERY-SINGLE-TEEN. And if they don't do it, they get "punished". Let them actually have a choice, and then we'll talk, okay?

--
Most of these packs added either a function, some nice CAS content or buy/build content that I use or for some reason don't want to part with, and I've played with the full game since 2009 (my ancient laptop slowed down about 10 steps after FT, so installed the last 4 -I think?- packs when I got a new computer), so I've gotten used to having all the functions. There's also a limit to what I can remember came with what pack (especially when it's not marked ingame - CAS content is fine, but functions and buy/build is a bit iffy unless connected to an EP/SP. I honestly don't remember enough to tell what I'd be willing to part with, especially when I know there's things I want to keep in most, possibly all of the packs... Anyway, I've got the UC installed now (still have my CDs as backup), so it's all or nothing, I guess

Here is my ranking for the expansion pack
8: Pets
While I like cats, I don't really like the element of the game, the pet is annoying, the stray is annoying, it is basically annoying and I would remove it, If I Need Two to be removed then it is,

7 (tie) : Nightlife
While the aspect of attraction is my main love for this pack, I usually don't like everything else. I don't know, I just never tried it.

6 (tie) : University
I love building dorms and making greek, but the gameplay?. just sucks, I usually mess around with "Term Paper" and "Assignment" to mix the time between done and not. but it is still boring, every time My Student get enough Grade, I usually just fast forward until the Final Test. I rather my teen become adults without this university boring gameplay, I just regret making an University now I need to send all teens in my neighborhood to college so they would be "Happy"

5: Free Time
I'm sorry, but everything in the next list is just better than this, no matter what. Free time is still good, I love the aspect, the hobby is fun. is just fun.

4: Bon Voyage
Again, I'm sorry, This one was a little bit boring but I still put it more than free time, because building Hotels is perfection. I just love it, every time I send my sims on vacation, is always for a mixed reason, From Exploring to Dating. and then go to my "controversial" opinion

3: Season
It is fun, but I had almost zero activity other than gardening, yet only one household in my neighborhood to garden, It almost had nothing to offer other than the season for me, Probably because I didn't discover anything yet. also the temperature just.. I HATE IT, it is just not as fun as the next one in my opinion.

2: Open For Business.
I absolutely love it, Sometimes the career just sucks. but sometimes it really makes the fun. I had nothing to say other than making business is fun.

1:Apartment Life
Apartment play just really gets my mind. from the building aspect to the gameplay aspect, It doesn't do much in cas but hey! I don't even really care about my sims look

I would say my ranking would be as following... Best - Worst

1. would be apartment life... It is buggy as hell but I love being able to rent rooms and houses instead of buying a house directly cause it seems more realistic to me... Who moves out of home and directly buys themselves a home? Usually you live in a rented apartment... I love the addition of witches and the three types they have.. and I love the playground items! I wouldnt want to play without it

2. Seasons... Weather of course adds alot of realism and the items are nice... I don't care for Plantsims and winter is annoying but still without weather the game would feel... empty idk

3. Freetime... I like the LTP system and the new careers... AND MORE TOYS AND ITEMS FOR TODDLERS! The hobby items are neat too...

4. Pets... My neighboorhod is drowning in Cats! I have to add that I started to use pets more with mods now that kitten can have patterns and my cats can have fantasy colors and wings...

5. University... I like the between step of having my sims to go to collage and get faster a high level job

6. OfB... I didnt played with it at all yet but I planned to make shops for sims to buy them at a store instead from buy mode but my sims first have to reach adult age :D

7. Nightlife... Vampires are cool but I dont care for the rest except the social elements

8. Bon Voyage... Never play with it really... never travel... if I would have to uninstall something then it would be that pack... but there is no reason to uninstall anything

I wont say anything to the stuff packs cause I always saw them as waste of money and I always lended them from a friend and never bought them... (Except H&M and M&G to complete my installation but M&G didnt arrived to this day )
I also cant say anything to the hoods cause I ALWAYS play with costum hoods... never cared for the original sims and their stories...

Oh, I love rankings! I don't know why I'd never seen this thread before!
Anyway, here is my ranking (I'll go from least favorite to the best one imo)

8. Bon Voyage
When I used this EP for the first time, I really loved it. I remembered vacationing in the sims 1 and really loving it, so i really loved it in TS2. However, after playing it for so long, it kind of becomes somewhat pointless. I think I have the same opinion as many other people do. Unless I am working on a challenge or a specific gameplay idea, I never care for completing the vacations mementos. I like using beach lots in my main hood from time to time, but it never became a big necessity for me. I LOVE building hotels, but I never play them because sending my sims on vacations feels like "wasted time" to me. After discovering all three hidden spots, I don't feel like doing it again and again. It was fun in the beginning but now I barely use it. It's a good expansion pack, it's just the one I use the least.

7. Free Time
I really like all the new items that this ep brings, and I think sims having a hobby is a nice addition plus more personalization to the sims! However I barely ever pay attention to it. There was a time where I respected my sims wishes and tried to give them stuff related to their predetermined hobbies, but I found it very burdening for my personal style, so I stopped doing it. In conclusion, I don't play with hobbies, I never visit the hobby lots and I modded out the hobby stalkers, but I LOVE the items!

6. Pets
Sometimes I get the urge to adopt a pet or two in few households, but for the most part I avoid using them. I think this is kind of similar to the way I look at Bon Voyage; once you have a pet and do the things you can do with it, it's not as fun anymore to do it again. Sometimes I even think that pets are rather annoying. I always mod out strays and maybe only 5% of my families actually get a pet. Also, I find it stressful when I don't know what to do with pet tombstones. I don't feel like they look good in my cemetery and I don't like keeping them in their owners' houses. I guess I could make a pet cemetery, but I still haven't gotten around to it...

5. Seasons
I guess from this point on I'll be talking about eps that I do like and enjoy playing with. I love the new activities that seasons brings; fishing and farming are some of my favorite things to do in the game and I don't get tired of them no matter how many sims do it! I like that we can customize neighborhoods with the seasons they go through. I LOVE THE PENGUIN AND THE SNOWMEN. I do, however, turn off winter half of the time, but then I miss it and put it back in. Then I turn it off again and the cycle continues!

4. Nightlife
I LOVE Downtown and the ability to create my own custom downtowns. I love the vibe of partying in the night and having a bunch of places for my sims to go to. I really like sending my sims on dates and outings. I LOVE RESTAURANTS. THE VAMPIRES!! MRS CRUMPLEBOTTOM! All gold. I really appreciate the small piece of lore that came with this ep as well. I love nightlife.

3. Apartment Life
I love love love the way that apartments work in this game. I really enjoy building them and I like the idea of the social groups. This ep has given me the most amount of bugs I've seen in my game but nothing that I can't handle. I think there is an old thread somewhere in here of me asking why the hell one random roommate had spawned in the middle of Brandi Broke's family tree. I love the apartments dynamic and witches are my favorite life state out of all in TS2.

2. University
University is another thing I never get tired of. ALL of my sims go to university. I LOVE MAKING DORMS IT'S MY GUILTY PLEASURE. Unpopular opinion: I actually like the normal amount of time that university lasts and I do play through the 24 days with every single one of my babies and I love seeing them enjoy their young adult era. I really love the whole concept, I love the way they walk, I love the NPCs! Cafeteria lady, marry me. I do use the college megapack so that some of my sims can stay in my main hood and not actually go to college. I like to imagine that some of my babies go to "community college" and still live with their parents while they attend their classes. I almost never care about their degrees and their grades if I'm being honest, but the university experience is what does it for me.

1. Open For Business
THIS EXPANSION PACK IS AMAZING. I find great satisfaction with playing my stores, and every time I start a new neighborhood I have the urge to create a business for every possible thing I can do. The possibilities are endless and I never get tired of them! Tell me why I have 20+ businesses in my current neighborhood and I still feel like I need more? I LOVE THIS PACK, IT GIVES ME LIFE. THANK YOU.