Mod The Sims - Keeping the Game Interesting!

Mod The Sims (https://modthesims.info/index.php)

- Sims 2 (https://modthesims.info/forumdisplay.php?f=558)

- - Keeping the Game Interesting! (https://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=334957)

What I always do is that i create a neighborhood. That neighborhood lives in harmony and all sims like each other. I create some families, some families i take from the pre-created neighborhoods such as pleasantview etc. and build them houses. Let them live here and enjoy every moment of their life. And then I play with 1 or 2 families and you know just that typical boring playing but after a while I create like 2 mysterious families with witches and vampires that take the dominion of my neighborhood and completely change it to mysterious dark town with vampires, witches, werewolfs.. It's so fun when you have perfect family and one sim decides to be a witch and kills every sim that he didnt like :dd
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Also when I play my family and I meet someone who is really rude or just silly as hell I go to my test household, spawn this bi*** and throw a satelite on them

) it feels so satisfiyng :d
I was in college and my chef was always burning the food so i decided to burn the college along with this chef

)
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When i'm going to college i mostly play as girl sim. But the first date is always a girl too, idk if its just me but i always do that :dd and after graduating etc. they stay friends and both of them start to create a family :dd
But I also do same gender couples in my game. In the moment one of my fav sim's sons is dating with one guy and its hella cool finally dont have this boring woman man xd.
And I downloaded a mod that teen can date an adult and i totaly love it.. that two guys couple is also teen x adult and it feels so nice when the adult one, the smarter one who owns a flat can offer a place to this teen whenever they want too <3(lifegoalsxdd)
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That reminds me of a girl that can act like a boy.. crafts robots, repairs cars etc. - and run a workshop bussines ^^
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Yayy, that's all and im ready for that hate:--):D

I was playing a vacation hood when I thought "what if the tourists/vacation goers get trapped and never got home, would they be able to survive in an unknown land???"
families with vacation homes could have a comfortable life, but what of those who pay for night, or those who camp? What about those who left their family and friends back home in the main hood? It's pretty interesting so I'm working on a new set of rules to play by :3c

Here's an idea sparked by the Squinge "College" hack set:

So all those kids are going to college! What's a uneducated adult to do?

Go back to college, using the career (available from here) "Adults go to College", which even pays them a minor fee to do it. No more uneducated adults in the neighborhood, and it's ideal for those unemployed, or retired.Adult College Students

It also keeps them actively gaining skills to pass their courses and to stay out of trouble-plus the added bonus of having more career choices when they graduate. I'm going to be using their hobby preference to set the final degree.

Thanks for all these great ideas that will make my game even more interesting :D

Have teen pregnancy also, make woohooing have a higher chance of pregnancy.

Here's a challenge-make a working volcano! It's not easy, but it can be done, so that with the help of Sophie-David's special effects mods, it looks very realistic. My only complaint is that I can't make it blow up once in a while..

I did a reverse vacation hood. My main hood looks like a vacation hood, my playables are the locals, and the townies are the tourists. Now I gotta set up some tourist traps---errr respectable establishments!

I realize that I'm bumping, but I think that it's fun to make cartoon characters from popular shows and have them live out their lives in The Sims.

Don't know if this has been done before, but I have an idea for a household. A teenage Knowledge Sim, with two parents and 1-3 younger siblings. The challenge is to have the teen go around town trying to meet the High Witch. Once the teen has befriended the High Witch, then you try to make the teen become a witch, and practice, without parents or siblings finding out. To make this easier, both parents work, and so do any teen siblings. In my game, this leads to crazy shenanigans and drama, such as the teen sneaking out with a lover to distract Mom from the cauldron she nearly found in the cleaning closet, younger siblings being in the simlogical boarding school, the teen taking her cauldron and spellbook with her to school so the toddler doesn't find them, or hiding a black cat in her closet, or even skipping school to study magic or mix things in her cauldron. It's great. The coolest part is coming up with a punishment, or alternatively the "Oh my god, we have no clue where our kids really are!" storyline, when someone inevitably finds out. As for who "wins", the parents win if they find out on their own, the sibling(s) win if they find out and tell on their older brother/sister, and the teen wins if they make it to college without being found out. If they manage to leave anything "witchy" in their room on the way out, the parents automatically win (because the teen, realistically, can't actually have arrived on campus before Mom/Dad is finished cleaning their room.)

I've also been trying to different fun ways to play Sims 2...

"Try to run some successful affairs without getting caught!" is what Ive always done, I think the most I ever got to was around 50 something romances/love at the same time (using cheats)

Quote: Originally posted by HystericalParoxysm

We've all had that problem at one time or another: Sims 2 just seems boring. We play the same sorts of families and the same scenarios and it's just no fun! So how do you keep from getting bored? Here are my suggestions - add your own to this thread and I'll incorporate the best ones into the first post.

Play differently!

If you're stuck in a rut of "couple gets together, gets married, has babies, work to the top of their careers" type stuff, then stop it! Start a new family and play it utterly differently than you normally do! It's refreshing to get out of your comfort zone. Try:
One or more hot romance sims living in a house. Try to break up as many marriages as you can!
A grumpy loner who shuns all romantic relationships and is a workaholic.
Try to run some successful affairs without getting caught!
Stay-at-home sims - if you've been having sims have regular careers, try having a novelist, painter, crafter, etc.
Had small families up until now? Try having a family with tons of babies! Or if you've always done big families, stick with just one or two children - or even none!
If you never let your sims age to elder... try letting your sims grow old and die and raise the next generation!
Stop cheating! If you're making your sims' lives too easy upping their needs and giving them money, knock it off! Instead, look for hacks which can make their lives harder! Higher bills, harder grades, harder homework - anything which can increase the challenge!
Think about things you haven't done or haven't tried before - and then do them! Whatever you do, stop playing the way you have been, because it's boring!

Unused game features!

Most of us have several EPs... and a great number of us have never used a lot of the features! Now's a great time to try out things you never have before, and maybe discover fun new aspects of the game you hadn't thought of!
Base game: Get abducted by aliens! Send an adult male sim, and come back alien pregnant! More info here.
University: Go to college! Take a sim through college and get them great grades - or spend the whole time partying! Join a secret society (more info here)! Then once they're finished, get them a job in one of the college-only careers.
Nightlife: Go on dates! Use the gypsy matchmaker! Take two completely incompatible sims out and figure out how to get them a dream date! Try going bowling, out dancing at a club, rock out in the Electro-Dance-Sphere!
Nightlife: Become a vampire! See how it is to live as a creature of the night, never seeing the sun, and going, "Bleh!" all the time!
Open for Business: Run a business! You can run a business not only on a community lot, but also from home - both of which offer their own unique challenges. Get your business up to five stars, keep your employees happy, and see just how successful you can become. Already tried a business? Try a different type! Do a makeover salon, an art gallery, a bakery, a toy shop, a florist, an electronics store, a restaurant, an arcade, a real estate office... Make your sim into a business tycoon!
Open for Business: Make some servos! It'll take quite a while of tinkering making smaller robots on the robot crafting station (or you could just cheat with testingcheats and spawn one) but have your very own robot friend who can run amok and electrocute you!
Pets: Have tons of pets! Make an old cat lady! If you've had the regular cats and dogs, try getting a womrat or a bird. If you have Open for Business, try breeding your pets and running a pet shop! Or spend some time in Create a Pet making all sorts of strange and cool new pet breeds.
Pets: Become a werewolf! Howl and stalk the night all furry and scary. More info here.
Seasons: Have a garden, and grow all your own produce. Try the juicer and see what cool effects you can get from different juice recipes. See how big a garden you can run and what kind of profits you can make. Join the garden club and try out the wishing well. More info on all that here.
Seasons: Become a plant sim! Discover a whole new way to play including different needs by going green. Create spores of happiness and please all your friends. More info here.
Bon Voyage: Take a vacation to each of the three vacation destinations. Collect all of the souveniers. Dig for treasure till you find the maps to the secret lots in each place, and meet the secret NPCs - the ninja, the witch doctor, and bigfoot!
Free Time: Find out all about what the different hobbies have to offer. Craft your own pottery or clothing, and sell it if you have OfB. Visit the secret hobby lots. Get the genie!

Try a challenge!

There are tons of cool game challenges which you can try - ranging from long-term challenges like the Legacy Challenge, to shorter, crazier challenges like the Asylum Challenge. These challenges usually have certain rules (which you can choose to follow or not!) and direct you to play a certain way.

For a great list of challenges including their rules and discussion threads about them, see our Challenges Forum!

Live off the land!

This works best if you have Seasons for fishing and gardening, but you can use Echo's harvestable crops if you don't have Seasons. Make a family, make a house for them, don't cheat, and have them live off their garden and pond exclusively - no buying groceries, no working outside of the home (though they can do other activities like crafting as long as they stay at home), and children don't go to school. If they get successful enough, you can have them sell off some of their excess produce to other sims in the neighborhood... you can even run the whole neighborhood off the land - all food must be purchased from your farmers!

There's lots of discussion and more ideas on this play style on this thread.

Learn to create!

For many people, this can be just as fun and addictive (if not more so!) than actually playing the game. With all the help, support, tutorials, and info available to you, why not try it? Some of the more advanced stuff can be quite complicated, but you may surprise yourself at how well you do at simple things like walls and floors and recolouring objects and clothing.

"Don't Panic, Start Here!" is a great starting point for beginning creators and links you to the proper tutorials for complete creating noobs.[/url]

Play something else!

Shocking, I know! But absence does make the heart grow fonder, and if you're just bored as hell with TS2, go play something else! There are tons of fun games out there - go play an RPG, a first-person shooter, a city-builder, an arcade game - whatever you like, just something different. Put TS2 aside for a day, a week, a month, and then come back later once you're refreshed.

I've started basing my Sims astrological placements based off of the time of the year they were born. I change this with the Personality Adjuster from the Insimenator.

If they were born in Spring

Day 1/2 would be an Aries Sim
Day 2/3 would be a Taurus Sim
Day 3/4 would be a Gemini Sim

If they were born in the Summer

Day 1/2 would be a Cancer Sim
Day 2/3 would be a Leo Sim
Day 3/4 would be a Virgo Sim

If they were born in the Fall:
Day 1/2 would be a Libra Sim
Day 2/3 would be a Scorpio Sim
Day 3/4 would be a Sagittarius Sim

If they were born in the Winter:
Day 1/2 would be a Capricorn Sim
Day 2/3 would be an Aquarius Sim
Day 3/4 would be a Pisces Sim

Then, I go further into their inner "planetary placements" by basing it off their personality traits. I do make an exception for twins/multiples if they do have different personality points. Here's a link about the planets in astrology. I keep the Mercury, planets to at least one sign before or after or in the same sign; for Venus I keep it at most two signs before or after or in the same sign as the Sun sign. The other planets can be in any sign from the Sun sign, though some may be "retrograde" if they are far enough away from the Sun. Jupiter and Saturn are the only two outer planets I use in game. I don't include Uranus, Neptune and Pluto.

There is also the ascendant sign, which is dependent upon the time that you are born, so I keep an eye on the time that Sim babies are born in-game. Say for example, a sim born at Midnight would have a Capricorn ascendant if they're an Aries. Similarly, an Aries sim born at 12PM would have a Cancer ascendant.

Here's an example of a Sim born from my game.

Jeffrey was born on the 1st Day of Spring, so that gives him an Aries Sun sign. Jeff was born at 8:30PM so that gives him a Libra ascendant. He's very playful and outgoing, so I gave him a Leo Moon. Jeffrey has a Mercury in Pisces because his imagination is so creative. He has his active bars maxed out, and has very good standing power, so I gave him a Mars in Capricorn. I wanted him to have a go-getter attitude so I gave him a Venus in Aries. I based the Jupiter and Saturn placements upon where the parents were in their life-state, as well as in relation to when the parents were born.

For Jeffrey's twin sister Christine, I wanted to make sure the moon placement fit well with her personality. She's also outgoing and active (less so than her brother), which can fit. I can attribute her seriousness to her Capricorn Mars that she shares with her brother.

I'd like to think of the first day of the teen years as a Jupiter Return and where I figure out which aspiration they will get based off of personality/interests/circumstances. If you play YA's their 2nd Jupiter return can be thought of as soon as they graduate college. For the Saturn returns I'd like to think it would be the mid-point of the Sim's Adult stage. Their 3rd Jupiter return can be the last quarter of their Adult stage. It can also go on in their Elder stage with (I would think) the last Jupiter return at some point in the middle of the elder stage.

That is just awesome. Mind if I create my own variant for my fantasy game?

Build a commune/artists' squat and try out communal living instead of families/couples/singles. I usually run them as home businesses too. You can sell goods and services or just use the ticket machine to charge people to hang out and see how the hippies live. You probably won't get a level 10 business just having people chilling on your sofa, but I think that's more realistic - commune residents don't want to be business tycoons, they just want to eat. The dynamics of the household are completely different and I always look forward to them coming up in the rotation.

Making elaborate neighborhoods is pretty fun! It seems daunting, but if you take it one step at a time it's (at least for me) kinda relaxing. If you don't feel like building everything, just build the things you want to build and then make decorative lots for everything else. You can also download other people's lots, assuming you have permission from the creator to use them. If you give the neighborhood and it's inhabitants an elaborate backstory, it might even inspire you to create a machinima using your neighborhood as a big set for it all.

I have a few "dog trot" or "shot gun" houses that are bare necessities on very small lots. When young adults go to college, I have each one restore a car if their grades are good they get the car. When they leave college, regardless of family prosperity they have to start from scratch with no family backing. They start in the shotgun houses and have to suffer just like their parents and grand parents. Then if they have maintained a good relationship with their family, they move into the family home when their parents are near their deaths.

Here's one (might have been mentioned before) :

For those teens who don't have a lot of friends and need some-a local Boys Club and Girls Club. Using the Visitor Controller, you can set the sex and age for those visiting the lot-put in all the things that teens like to do that are wholesome, like a chess table, dart board, pool table and any version of Two Jeff's food replicator with appropriate seating included.
I put in a pool in the back and a portable outhouse. (the "all in one bathroom" is great for this lot).
I test ran my girls club yesterday and all the girls enjoyed it immensely. They liked that no boys were around so they could gossip to their hearts content about them.

Additional idea:
While I was writing up game rules today, I finally discovered a good way to play and use servos:

As a caretaker for the surviving elder pixel in a family house!

When there is one remaining pixel left in a house, the servo (human or not, up to player) the servo will take care of the house and them-when they die, they distribute all the funds in the house to the children, organize the funeral, and clean up the house afterward. When they're done, they can be sent back to the 'townie pool' for their next assignment.

Finally-a useful outlet for those mechanical maniacs!

I just make "maze" houses and let my sims walk from point A to B. Sometimes I put swimming pools in the way.

I was actually thinking of playing all of the Bon Voyage locations through soon! A very fun idea!

Normally if I need a refresher, I often try the "100 Babies Challenge" or the "Completely Change Your Genetics Challenge" which are both good options. Each of my varied challenges usually change per which Sims game I'm playing too. ðŸ˜ŠðŸ™Œ

I've been trying to come up with things to act as shorter term goals for my sims. So far here is my list:

Hobby Outings - 4 sims with same hobby interest go on an outing and do stuff related to that hobby.
Travel plans - with friend(s) /family /grandparents & grandkids/aunt and uncle with niece and nephew/ Greek house/ hobby group/ work retreat (using cheat to control other sims)
Rock band outings - try to make ends meet getting tips with the same group of people who are your band mates
Play dates - with friends who have same age kids
Pet play dates - with friends who also have pets (maybe they will even fall in love)
Poker night
Board game night
Hot tub night
Give toddler artwork to all relatives
Collect all bugs
Gain badges (pottery, sewing, toys, flowers, robots, fishing, gardening, hair dressing)
Redecorate room (without cheating to pay for updates)
Max hobby, Max 2 hobbies
Have 10/20/30 best friends
Max telescope ability and summon aliens
Run business (toys, electronics, bakery, food, flowers, art, cars, restaurant, bar, arcade, coffee shop, etc)
Buy house/vacation property (without cheating to pay for property or to renovate it)
Pay for extension on house
Train pet in all skills
Win dance/cooking competition 1/5/10 times
Collect all vacation benefits
Get garden award
Encourage child to max trait
Learn how to make all dishes
Go on successful blind date 1/5/10 times. Try it with low-medium payment to matchmaker
Adopt stray
Max career
Survive off only using aspiration rewards objects
Run art gallery with custom paintings
Plan theme birthday party
Become a famous DJ
Succeed as a bartender/barista
Influence others to clean and cook always
Succeed as pool hustler
Succeed as gambler
Use perfume all the time
Get bad reputation
Maintain 3 simultaneous romantic relationships
Actually have a great party
Run a farm
Run a fish farm
Run a communal artist home
Hermit loner (only one pet allowed)
Own 6 pets
Be on a juice cleanse (only drink/eat juice)
Decorate home with family photos/buy photo albums
Make one child hate their parents/siblings
Have a couple constantly break up and get back together
Have a teen run away from home

On most Sims 2 installations, I've usually kept to myself. I made my self-insert Sim, my ideal wife Sim, had my little happy family, and... just kinda repeated that. Usually in a custom neighborhood. It got kinda boring. But on my recent plays, I've decided to spend a lot more time with the Maxis Sims. After all, I had interacted with the Goths quite a bit in Sims 1. I've dabbled a bit in Pleasantview here and there, but for the first time I'm really giving Strangetown a go. I'm spending most of my time there now. I'm enjoying experimenting with which alien Sims are considered family and which ones aren't, as well as seeing which facial traits get passed down.

Make a neighborhood full of "superpower" Sims, each that have exceptional rule-set/play style incorporation to represent their powers.

Taking Nervous Subject from zero to hero challenge:

Make Nervous Subject successful in his career, happy (high aspiration level), social (at least 5 bffs and 1 girlfriend), handsome (change appearance and Dr. Vu's Automated Cosmetic Surgeon), skilful (at least 5 maximum skills and max stats of predestined hobby), fit and rich without using any cheats or glitches. And proper personality points. Because Nervous' personality is a bit weird. (I guess the only trick that can be done without SimPE or cheats is being abducted by aliens)

First, "find your own place" from the newspaper, build him a nice and modest house and start looking for a job for him.

Good luck

I will never get tired of the sims 2, it is true that I always played with "happy" sims, they studied, they went to work, everything was correct, a month ago I read your challenges, and I love the asylum, it is easy to learn the rules, but it is extremely difficult in the norms! I never saw things that I'm seeing in the sims, the sims can't sleep well, they wake up at night hungry, they pee, they go crazy with lamps on their heads, etc. !! I haven't won a challenge yet, I tried it 4 times, but I don't get tired! I will try to make it less harsh, and I still get it, if someone has tried it, try it! Get out of your comfort zone, I take this opportunity to thank all the creators of personalized content, challenges etc ... all of you who share with us all things and have fun with the game of life (yes, if that game is the sim 2). Long live the Sim 2! Thank you all

right now, I'm coping with the current state of Education in my country and projecting my pain on sims by building them the best university I can give them.
I've never built and finished a hood from scratch but I found building a university town is much easier (and more enjoyable) cos I know what kinds of lots I should be making. Instead of giving lots conventional names, I used names of my pre-colonial gods, nature spirits, local sayings, and characteristics in my own language.
Some examples are
Balai Lakambini (Home of Lakambini, god of youth, food and festivity), a dorm for Culinary Arts and Undeclared freshman students
Balai Lumawig (Home of Lumawig, god of industry and a fair society) a dorm for Economics & Political Science students

And one of my favorites is the "Tiyaga & Nilaga Cafeteria", where "Tiyaga" means "perseverance", and "Nilaga" means "Stew"
It comes from the original saying "Pag may tiyaga, may nilaga"-- "If there is perseverance, there is stew."
As we are a poor country, our aim is mostly to eat everyday. So the general idea is if you work hard, you will be able to eat everyday.

Using your own language and heritage might be a normal or common thing other players do with their games. But with me, well...let's just say the colorism and colonialism runs deep.
Working on this university is the most fun I've ever had with this game in a long time <3

Oh! this university hood is for this main hood

Quote: Originally posted by kanzen

Can't believe I've been playing the same hood since 2018 :lovestruc

Quote: Originally posted by HystericalParoxysm

Play something else!

Shocking, I know! But absence does make the heart grow fonder, and if you're just bored as hell with TS2, go play something else! There are tons of fun games out there - go play an RPG, a first-person shooter, a city-builder, an arcade game - whatever you like, just something different. Put TS2 aside for a day, a week, a month, and then come back later once you're refreshed.

In my case, it was about 15-ish years shelving it for sequels that just didn't stick with me in the same way. Now that 20 years are coming up, I feel like an abandonware renaissance is coming. I'm running this thing on a machine that can lift it with a pinky, throwing ridiculous house parties for the entire population of Strangetown.

Much much love to LazyDuchess and osab!

Long live the na-na-na-na new generation!