My one request would be that when you select a category (Buy Mode, Build Mode etc.) instead of opening up the drop down menu and making you click/choose the broad category again it filters by that category immediately. That second click makes the search feel unresponsive/annoying to me so I would prefer a separate "narrow search options" link or something similar to access the drop down menu.

All in all I think it's great though and like the change a lot.

Glad you like it!  I did actually test a version that had exactly the functionality you want, but it felt clunky, because if you wanted to get to, for example, Lots & Housing -> Residential, you'd have to click Lots, then wait for the refresh, then click again on Residential just to get there.  I also tested a version that had a + sign that you could use to expand out the sub-categories, and have the main one be the link, but that again felt clunky, because it was different use cases for whether you wanted a sub-category or a top level category.  Having it be in a single tree felt better with the amount of sub-forums and categories that exist.

It may be a second click for the top level categories, but it saves *many* clicks *and* reloads for anything below that (anything up to 4 page refreshes depending on depth).  I'd argue that saving time for a click is way better than wasting it waiting for the page to reload, then drill down again, then reload, etc.

I am having an issue when I am on my profile page viewing my uploads. I tried clicking on the Residential lot section and instead of seeing my own 23 residential lots it takes me to all lots from all the games uploaded to the site. It does the same with the other sections on my bar as well.

Thanks for the report.  That should be fixed now.

There are things I like about the new system. The modding group info for a creator is easy to spot and check. The new download info tab has useful info, some of which I'll want to refer to when I forget where the item is in the catalog.

There are things I really don't like.

The main page has no page bar. The page bar was good. No, I wasn't ever going to page through all 6K plus pages, but I did page back through the most recent four or five pages. I also miss the "jump to page" option. The five-category presentation strikes me as busy and not so helpful.

1. Recently Uploaded
Very helpful, always has been, I check it almost every day.

2. Updated Downloads
Of the five categories, this is the only one not on the dropdown list under the Downloads menu bar. Most updates are for downloads I don't have. If I'm concerned, I can check my downloads list and filter by up to date.

3. Popular downloads
4. Featured downloads
5. Picked downloads

I miss the previous presentation at the top of the page. It took up less space. I could scan it, then move on if I didn't see something interesting. In addition, these are all available from the dropdown at the top of the page.

Filtering downloads is harder. The sidebar has the advantage of being collapsible, but I didn't find the old category buttons at the top to be in the way, possibly because they didn't reduce the number of columns visible. In its current state, the sidebar doesn't show number of downloads in each category, which the buttons did, as they do now on a creator's main page.

Which brings me to the creator's page. It still has the "Creator has n downloads in the following sections," which is good.

Then I click on any category. My filter changes from Sims 2/Compatible to All/All. Sure, I can fix that easily, but I didn't have to do that before.

The creator's downloads home is the same as the main download page, filtered for the creator. Same five categories, same issues. And I just saw the creator's picks on their creator page.

From creator's page, I click on the button for subcategory, in which there are n downloads. Filter again changes to All/All. No buttons for subcats and no numbers on the sidebar. If I choose a subcat from the sidebar and there's nothing in it, I have to click on the creator's name to go back to their downloads home, at which point my filter has been reset again.

Old system: Downloads buttons with subcategories and number of downloads in each subcategory. Drill down to what I'm looking for, back up by clicking the previous item in the tree that persists as I drill. My downloads preferences don't change whenever I move.

Regarding the member profiles - there are multiple buttons that you can click that depend on what you want to see.  The "Downloads Home" is the same as search by creator (by design) and lets you see the different popular, newest, etc.  "Newest Downloads" takes you to.. the newest downloads by that creator.  And so on.  So you have plenty of selection there, you aren't just limited to the home page.

I added the "Updated" downloads because it's been a requested feature for many years.  Same with Popular.  I'm not sure what the issue with the layout is - previously, there was a lot of stuff you had to scroll past to get to the actual downloads.  Featured, for example, was always on the old download browser, so there where already 2 categories.  Now it's just expanded. In fact, on my 2560x1440 screen, the downloads where not visible until almost the bottom of the screen.  Now, they are much higher on the page.  (This is especially true for guests, where the ads are a bit bigger)

Just so you know, at some point the future, the actual creators profile page will be revamped, and at that point, the downloads themselves will be removed in favour of the downloads page itself.  

I assume with regards to "clicking from the creators page to the main downloads page clears your sims 2 selection" and that you have "The Sims 2" specified in your user options? If so, that was also broken on the old pages too, and has been for quite some time. (Otherwise, see 2 paragraphs down) Also, the previous browser only had 4 pages available in the navigation, now it has 5.  Yes, the jump to is gone, but analytics showed that hardly anybody used that anyway.

I've also fixed the issue with clicking on the sidebar categories not respecting the selected game or compatible filters.  Also, did you know you can hide the sidebar, and only re-show it when you need it? Thanks for the heads up about the counters not showing next to the forums in the sidebar - this is now fixed.   I've also changed the sidebar categories to now always show all forums, regardless of how deep you are, and counters should be more accurate, even with searching.  

Thanks for the feedback.

Thanks for the quick response. The sidebar is much more useful now. I did know that it's collapsible.

I do remember the filter reset being a problem before, but I don't remember it being such a persistent problem. Is that something that can be fixed, or am I doomed to spotting something cool and then realizing I haven't reset the filters?

I'm not actually surprised by the analytics of the jump feature. It's not so much useful as something I used when I wanted to browse old downloads but didn't have a specific category in mind.

If you see any filters that still aren't working let me know.  I checked a whole bunch last night but it was like 1am so I might have missed some edge cases.  Just let me know and I'll look into it!

The sidebar counts are working down to the next-to-last level. They show for Decorative, but not for the sub-cats.

Working! Thanks!

Yup, the only one that doesn’t is within body shop but that’s a special filter. Thanks for the feedback!

The old categories and filters worked better; as. build/flooring/ wood. Looking for Japanese floor tiles I tried searching using various words. "Floor tiles" brought me residential lots ("Floor" was in the description), and SOME of the MANY tile flooring that I know are in there somewhere. . Googling showed me what I wanted...TWO types, AT MTS! Maybe I'm missing something?
Searching for Pets brought me Arbor Falls, where "Pets" is not even in the description. Frustrating. So I looked for Hoods...got a FEW of the populated hoods I know are here...plus of course hoods (clothing). Searching for populated hoods brought...nothing.

The new browser has nothing to do with search results. You would have gotten the same with the old browser. The underlying technology hasn’t changed only the look and feel.

Try 'neighbourhood':

Thank you SImsample; maybe my failure at finding things is because I'm not using the right words.

Can you please clarify what you mean by this?

To be honest, I'm finding the new browser interface not very accessible, for me personally. I'm finding things too small & condensed I suppose. White and navy blue was also helpful for me to keep my place on the screen because the contrast clearly defined stuff, whereas the streamlined more monotonous thing with both light and dark mode is kind of confusing imho. It'll definitely take some getting used to, but I reckon it's a shame that now the download browser is overwhelming and confusing in the same way a lot of websites are.

I do think I like some things about the category display bit, I forget the word. I understand that a lot of people might like the new interface better and possibly why they might. I just personally find it hard to use and hard to see. I might adjust my overall scaling of my browser's view thingy and see if that helps. And no I am not like 120 years old, I'm in my 20s

I have two pieces of feedback

1. The "see more" button in general. It appears in weird places, and actively makes browsing more annoying in others. If I were to be on my profile, and I click on game mods category (in which I have 40+) uploads, I only see 8. And if I press the see more button, it forgets the game mode category and just shows me all my uploads. And if I were to pick a category where I have less than 8 mods, the see more button is still there even though it has no use.

2. I'll be honest I hate everything about this new system. I think it's clunky, user-unfriendly, and eons worse than the old system. Filters are harder to find, and navigating takes a lot more time and energy. But I get you are keeping it, so it would be nice if it did something the old system could not do. I like an option to exclude a category when browsing latest uploads. A lot of people uploads lots, and it has a tendency to drown out other types of uploads, so it'd be nice if we could turn things around and instead of selecting one category and viewing only that, you could chose to select one category and view everything except that category.

And I'd still like to hear you elaborate on what you meant by creator profile page will be revamped and downloads removed.

1. When selecting a category from the profile page you get taken to the “overview” page of that category, similar to the main downloads page. This allows downloaders to see your recently uploaded, personal picks, and latest updated. From there you can then see more according to what you want (New, Updated, etc). I am not able to recreate the flow you mean with it “losing” your game more selection. If I filter from All Games to The Sims 2 while looking at your game mods, and then click See More against the newest one, then I can indeed see all your newest TS2 uploads in that category.

2. This is entirely personal preference. Just because it’s changed, doesn’t mean that it’s worse. Filters are now no longer only limited to the specific section you are in (requiring you to click, reload, click, reload, click, reload, just to go from, say, Downloads to clothing for females. Instead, you can go in one go in the filters directly to whatever section you want, so it’s actually quicker and easier. Sorry, but this wont change

In fact, the whole “exclude forums” is (and was) already part of the download browser. In the sidebar, go to Download Browse Editor, and there you can select forums to hide, and then they will no longer show up in the main view.

Oh @gummilutt I see what you mean now you wrote it again!
@Tashiketh I think this is what gummi means:

Yes that's what I mean Simsample. In the past when I then re-selected game mods in that view, I'd get the see more again and just circle between seeing 8 of my game mods, and all of my uploads. But now if I pick game mods again after that first step, it remembers that I clicked see all, so while clunky to have to pick the same thing twice, it's at least possible. Previously it just kept me circling between the two seemingly not being able to filter by category and a specific creator.

Tashi I think you need to read point 2 again, because you don't seem to have understood what I said. I get you think it's "just" personal preference and the new page is going nowhere, I said so myself in my post. That's not the point I was making.

And I'm still waiting for an elaboration on what you meant by revamping profile page and removing downloads. I know what it sounds like to me, but I'd rather know what you meant than what I think you meant. Just trying to figure out if I need to pull all my stuff from MTS or if I'm misunderstanding you.

There was nothing wrong with the old system. The new system is pretty much worse across the board. I don't understnd why it was changed at all. There's tons of white space (there's probably ads there, but I don't see them). When you click "Sims 4" and "Downloads", you get taken to a weird landing page and have to click a third time to actually get to the downloads page. I'm not going to be clicking through categories constantly, so there's absolutely no reason to have the category list constantly present on the side instead of on top, where there could be an entire extra column of downloads. The color contrast is worse across the board. The entire thing just looks messy and not like I'm looking at a website that has existed for 17 years.

There's no reason all of this needs to be two lines



There's no reason all of this needs to be two lines



The actual download pages are just tons of empty space. There's no reason the post title and author info needs to be two lines. There's no reason the Infobox needs to be present on every tab. There's no reason for the thanks/favorite/subscribe thing to be its own line (or bright yellow).



This is a scroll bar despite having tons of white space underneath it



(and despite not needing to be a scroll bar on the old site style where this stuff was at the top of the page)

I have no idea what these numbers mean



Every single time you choose a category you have to click "See More"



I'm sure I could go on.

The whitespace is indeed because of the ad spaces. Not much I can do about that I'm afraid.



See my comments below.



You know you can hide the sidebar, right? . That expands out the downloads to show an extra column. It also remembers the choice so next time you load the page you won't get it. Regarding the whole "17 years" thing - if we had kept the same look for 17 years we'd get accused (and have done) of looking dated, and people wanting a more modern look (which they've said to me). So obviously any website thats this old is going to get updated from time to time, and the last update was.... a very long time ago.



It's a limitation of the paginator. Unfortunately, not much I can do about that without changing the paginator on every other page (forums, threads, etc).



Correct, and this is now fixed.



Download pages have been like that for years. Not sure why it's being brought up now With that said, there is a new download page with a redesign (and similar colour scheme) coming very soon.



Yep, overflow-x: scroll is now changed to overflow-x: auto, thanks for pointing it out!



Number of downloads in that section. So you can easily see how many downloads exist for each category as you drill down. This was already the case with the member profile pages, but it's now available everywhere.



Yes, and I actually agree that it's not optimal right now. The main idea for the new download page was to highlight things that people didn't have before - namely the popular and updated downloads, as well as picked, in the category you are looking for, as well as easily being able to switch categories without having to click lots of buttons (because in the old browser, to drill down from Home to Body Shop outerwear for females is not just lots of clicks but also waiting for the page to reload).

However, this does present somewhat of an issue. We actually have multiple people who browse the downloads section in multiple ways, as well as creators who expect it to work how they want. In essence, because MTS has had the concept of "Downloads == newest" for years, it's difficult to integrate something that also has Updated, Popular, etc as well.

Most issues with the new browser seem to stem around the navigation *between* the different categories. I do agree that right now, it feels janky when, for example, you are browsing "New" downloads, and then use the sidebar to change to, say, Game Mods, and it takes you to the landing page where you have to click "See More" again. This is something I'll be working on in the next few days. Ultimately what needs to happen is that the sidebar category changing needs to become smarter such that it knows what you are looking at (Newest, Updated, Popular, Featured and Picked), ie similar to the older browser.

I don't want to get rid of the "Landing page" because it's the best way to showcase new Featured and Picked uploads (which on the old browser, Featured was on *every* page 1 through 4). However, making the sub browsing experiences stay within the particular spheres should be much better. As I mentioned, I'll be working on this in the next few days, as well as clearing up issues with the wizard.

Thanks for the feedback.

The only "jankiness" would come from when you want to go from, say, go from Picked Uploads, to Newest Body Shop, but that was already a janky navigation method in the old browser.

I also didn't care for the look and feel of the download pages you guys implemented a couple of months ago. I thought it was horrible.
Then, a few days ago, you went to something that was much better (with the subsections listed across the top of the pages), but now it's back to the previous horrible interface again.
Right now, if I just want to see new Lot uploads, I'm at a loss how to do it.
IMO, there was nothing wrong with the way it was prior to all these changes.

Edit: I now see that the Sims 2 download pages are different from the Sims 3 and Sims 4 ones. The Sims 2 pages do not have the subsections listed across the top of the page. Hopefully this is a work in progress and will be fixed.

I am not seeing the same issue within TS2. Can you please screenshot what you are seeing? I've checked with an admin, a guest, and a regular user, and all show the buttons at the top.