The Sims 2: Live and Let Die

So as you've probably heard Maxis and EA finally made the sequel to what most people will tell you is the number 1 PC game of all time. I think it was about 4 years ago the sims made their debut on the PC. The game did well in fact it was the number one selling game for quit some time and set a couple of records in the process.

This proved The Sims 2 was only a matter of time, but instead of making a sequel right away Maxis and EA produced a plethora of expansion packs adding more and more to an already incredibly deep game. No matter how hard you tried you couldn't resist playing it. Just the fact that you have total control over a "life" and no matter what you do to him/her there's always the option to restart.

Finally after several expansion packs the creators at Maxis answered the call of Sims' fans everywhere and even gave them more then asked for. The Sims 2 was born and at the same time gave death. That’s right finally your sims will age, not only age but be affected by their surroundings to determine how long they live.

Ever since I played The Sims I've been hooked on it, it's so bad I've actually caught myself imagining clicking on things before using them. But then you start to realize playing this game is like building on quicksand, no matter how well you did on the game there was never really an end. Sandbox play is fun but after awhile a person needs something to drive them, hence a time limit to accomplish things in your life.

So finally death has a face in The Sims so to speak, with death in the game this creates a whole new experience from the first one. First of all you know have a drive in life not only does your life effect the way you live but it will eventually hurt your future sims. You see this year not only can you die, but having a baby no longer requires a phone call.

Yes they actually do it in bed. In fact you have a choice whether or not you just need to raise your fun and social meter or have a baby. By relaxing on a bed you can call a sim over to join you and then you have the option to make-out, cuddle, talk, or make woo-hoo (don't ask me). The first time you do this the bed will jump sparks will fly along with some weird form of gibberish dirty talk.

Anyway after you test drive a potential parent and like them enough you have the option to have a baby, no you don't have to be married. Anyway the cool thing this year about sim's and their relations is this time when they have a child it takes on actual attributes of it's parents. Things like physical appearance, personality, desires, and wants are taken into account from the parents and then mixed together and boom there's a baby.

For now I'm going to assume you just started with a pre built family so I'll get into the create a sim mode later. So now your new baby has been born time to name it, choose a sign for it, then choose an aspiration path for it. The naming part and astrology sign are self explanatory but something new this year has been added. It called Aspiration, basically what this does is gives you something to find out what your sim really wants and then try to achieve it, this makes your meter go up which increases your mood, and in the long run if you have your sims aspiration meter full when they change ages the next stage of their life is a lot easier.

You see if you aspiration meter is full this makes you very happy when your happy you get promotions and can make friends easier. Also the more full you keep your aspiration meter the longer your sim will live. The aspiration meter is determined by your wants. Your sims now have more wants, and depending on what you choose for an aspiration path will determine the types of wants your sim will want. For example if you choose the wealth path your sim will desire finer things such as artwork, big TV's, expensive furniture things like that the more wants you meet the higher the meter goes until it's filled at which point your sim hits a state of serenity.

When your sim is in this Zen like state it's the perfect time to study or talk to someone you become very confident and satisfied. There are Ten different paths to choose from some other are Love, Knowledge, Family, and so on.

Now on to the aging, your sim's life span will now be altered by the actions in his life. If you keep your sim shut in and never talk to people he'll end up always wanting someone around and it becomes a pain. But if you give him what he desires in life he will become a success and die a wealthy happy man.

But along with wants you now have fears, and if you trigger one of these your sims mood will drop like a rock. Things like having an invitation turned down or have a bad phone call with a loved one things like that. If you like you can turn your sim into a quivering little pile if you want just make him realize his worst fears.

Your sims don't grow day by day but by stages, they go from a small infant that can only cry or laugh. After about 5 days or so you will receive a message saying your baby will become a child at 6 or some time like that so you should set up a party same goes for each birthday after until you reach death. Each time you advance a stage your aspiration meter becomes more important. When your toddler becomes a child that’s when they’re able to do things for themselves, they begin wanting things and that’s when the aspiration meter becomes important, you see depending on how well you did during the previous stage will determine you’re overall satisfaction with your life.

When you begin to reach the end of the child stage the wants will become larger and more difficult to perform, you go from wants such as looking through a telescope or gaining a skill point to getting into private school or graduating at the top of your class. If your able to gain these wants your sims aspiration meter fill almost instantly and then when you become a teen into an adult each stage before that will be evaluated and then based on how well or poor you did your sim will actually have to deal with the result.

If during your little sims childhood you never paid enough attention to them, that may affect their social skills and make it difficult for them to make and keep friends. Or if they’re schoolwork was always lacking they may find it difficult to learn new things or gain skills, but if you pay attention to them and keep they’re grades up it will be a lot easier to live a happy life. If you get into the private school you have a better chance at getting an early start in any career you want, and you may even get an early promotion.

When you enter your adult stage this starts the longest and most active part of your life, this is when it all happens, you get your job, have the kids, retire and die. That’s the end you don’t die immediately after you retire, not by any means. In The Sims 2 the stages in your life are basically tied to your whole life from birth to death, if you do bad in one the next one will be a little more difficult if your better in the next one you’ll enter the next stage of life a little over the even mark so it will be a little easier. Of course if you do bad again you’ll see a very bad drop in your sims lifestyle.

Your job in The Sims 2 plays a more important role this time around, not only does it pay the bills and buy things for your home, it will also determine how happy you are in your life. Once again it goes back to your aspiration, if you chose a wealth one you’ll want to be in a medical or legal career, if you have a job that your sim is happy at they will be happy when they go to work and this makes it a lot easier to get promotions. During this time if you want money you’ll drive for promotions you’ll do anything to get them, if you need to gain a skill point their wants will include wanting to gain a skill point, then they get their promotion.

During your adult hood you’ll have to deal with kids sooner or later, that’s if you want your name to live on. Now assuming you’ve met someone and you’re already living together you have a kid they grow up becoming teens and in the process changing what you want in life. Instead of wanting a promotion you want your kid to get into private school, or you want to spend more time with them, help them study and things like that. Finally when you think your young adult is ready to move out you can look through the paper and find your own place if you select yes that sim will then be placed into the family menu and you can move them, they keep their current simoleon value of all possessions but you don’t get any of them just the money.

Once you reach the stage of senior you’ll have 3 options, either you can call work and retire, depending on how long you worked there how high up the career ladder you were things like that. Or you can continue to work for the same amount of pay as in your previous stage and basically you just turn old and gray. Or you can retire from that job and get another one you’ll still get your pension check plus you can have a temp job on the side. Unfortunately you can’t become an astronaut then switch and become a judge, once you retire and quit from that job you can’t gain a promotion and you can only make about 150-450 per day usually a job you retire from is paying around 1,000-1,600 so if you still need a descent income don’t retire right away.

Now comes the result of your life depending on how happy of a life you’ve lived will now determine how many days old you get to be. I think the sims equation is close to 1-s day equals 1-r day because mine usually live to be about 102 or so and usually they’ve had a good life. Except my first one he died at 68 so it was pretty weird, I think he ate some bad food or something.

When you sim kicks the bucket it’s actually not that big of a deal mine died in his sleep, then turned into an urn, the only reason I knew was because a little window popped up and told me that my sim died now all his funds and an insurance policy will be divided up amongst his friends and family depending on they’re life long friendship, the closer the sim the bigger the chunk. Now when you die your aspiration meter is still somewhat important, if you die with it low the house there may be haunted by the sims ghost, depending on how bad it was you may even be a mean ghost, trying to scare the people in the house. I’m not sure but I think someone said you could pray and that makes them stop but I’m not sure I’ve never had the option but my sim doest haunt the house but he just walk around. But that’s it your sim is no more but he does live on.

Now The Sims has a family tree, now you can go to a menu that will bring up your family tree this shows you everyone that is related to you and how. This actually can be kind of fun because with this game another game mode on top of the typical free play. It’s called storybook mode, you play this by picking a neighborhood and then a screen will pop up telling you one of the stories going on in the town, you can then either select free play or pick the family with the storyline. Some stories are of family feuds others may be of secret lovers things like that you can then go and write the story by playing them.

This is definitely a plus for the game, its actually fun and addictive, if after you’ve made a story you’re proud of it you can upload it onto the sims website, you can also download stories then do what you want with them. When you enter the selected neighborhood you’ll also notice some open lots with signs in front of them, these plots of land are open. You can build houses, parks, store, and other establishments. Depending on if you have any parks in your area you can call a friend and invite them to a bar-b-que or something. This gives you a way to interact with other objects and gives more opportunities to accomplish goals in your life.

Some other smaller improvements in the game such as the easel are kind of cool, instead of just selecting paint, or self portrait you can now capture a picture of something then have your sim paint it, if their good you can even hang it on the wall or sell it for some descent cash. The way sims interact with each other has definitely become a lot better way more options and it’s a lot easier to know what to talk about, also you can actually pick the subject to talk about if you want.

The overall appearance of the sims is definitely an improvement over the previous. Things are much more detail and actually the performance of the game isn’t bad overall it seems to do decent on anything over a Pentium 1.5Ghz and if you do have some problems turning down the graphics seems to do the trick. The Sims 2 is in all aspects a success once again it’s topping charts and staying strong. The GUI setup is basically the same except you can customize the way you view things, either by room specific furniture, or group furniture pieces together.

The create-a-sim mode is extremely detail oriented right down to the size and shape of your sims nostrils, eye shape, chin shape, basically it looked like something the cops would use to create those print out pictures for posters. For every option there’s usually a second and even third sub menu of options, any part of your sim can be molded to your liking every physical option has a slider for fine tuning. You could probably spend a good 4 hours just playing around with this I actually tried using a photo of my girlfriend and tried to recreate her and it didn’t turn out to shabby, it did take about 2 hours and that was to do just the face the body is just as detailed thigh size, width, foot size, you name it you can adjust it. This is where you’ll also choose your astrology sign, and your aspiration path, just remember whatever you choose will stay with your sim till they die.

The build mode has also undergone some work, in some ways good others bad. Now when you build your house you can really make it look like a house things like foundations, and decks can be built to give your house that real feel. You can now also have a 3 story house, this gives you a lot of room for filling your house full of stuff. The selection you have to choose from is a good size all the way around it does have more of everything then the first and also added a couple of new things like game systems, and designer bookshelves, like I said everything and more.

The only real complaints I have about this game is how difficult it can be at times to build a foundation properly and other times I would have a problem with the roof tool, no matter what I tried to do it just wouldn’t cooperate. Also every now and then I get some little glitch problems where they think they can’t get to something even though nothing is there. Plus the sound in the game was just plain uninspired, I know there isn’t much you can do there but I was really hoping they would have the sims speak English, in my opinion I think that would be one of the biggest things you could do. Oh well maybe the third one, well wait they may put it in an expansion pack, I just bought the Sims 2 and like a week later (about a month after the game released) they have an expansion pack already coming out call The Sims University so be prepared for another Sims blitz. But for the most part The Sims 2 is a perfect example of what a sequel should be it kept all the good things improved or ditched the bad ideas a created some really good new ones.

Easily the easiest decision I had to make this game is definitely a must have, even if you’ve never played the series before now the time to try it.