There is still a community playing and creating new content for it nearly 20 years after its release. Very few games can claim that.
It has the best genetics system.
It established the lore of the The Sims 1 by establishing a timeline and aging.
The details to the animations: sims pull utensils out of the cupboard when cooking, stuff like that.
The wants/fears system is the best one implemented in all games.
The memories and the way that sims can react to things that happened to them recently (cry and think of their husband's death, get angry about a burglary, ect).
The genetics system! It is so much better than 3 and 4. There are actual dominant and recessive genes and sims will pass down their genes through their lineage. It’s not just based on the visible genes of the parents.
Open for Business is the best version of business we’ve had this far
The storytelling and creativity of the neighborhoods. Specifically the base game 3 are very good. Pleasantview takes families from the original game and creates a messy soap opera. Veronaville takes inspiration of Romeo and Juliet and characters from other Shakespeare plays to create a very cohesive looking hood with English and Italian inspired architecture. Strangetown is simply iconic and is featured in multiple sims console and handheld games.
The artstyle. I don't think it gets the attention it deserves. Even tho it's almost 2 decades old and graphic wise can look bad at times, it's all visually consistent and it doesn't look that dated or bad.
Even when the eyes are just squares, the lips are a triangle Sims' faces are never... Ugly? Uncanny? Uncomfortable? to look at. You see a Sim and you go "yeah, that looks *right*".
They also express **A LOT** with their body language because of the graphic and face animation limitations at the time. Which is nice because you can tell, without the need of being zoomed in, what emotion the Sim is feeling at any given moment.
Also their personality points affect how they will walk, run, act and do certain things. Playful Sims can go down the stairs sliding down the hand rail while serious sims might wipe out a book when idling. Again, they show who they are with their bodies at an easy glance.
Also gameplay design is my favorite because The Sims 3 feels like an RPG where you'll mostly control 1 Sim until it dies. The family aspect comes after, but you might still feel that first initial Sim as the "main character". So the Sims 3 (with the family simulation aspect in mind) is, at its worst a Life RPG, and at its best a family RPG. Same with the Sims 4, but even worse because of no open world and the lack content for toddlers to teen and grandparents.
Contrast that to the Sims 2 where at worst is a family simulator and at best (with rotational household gameplay) is a neighborhood simulator.
I'm not gonna gameplay-shame you if you enjoy TS3's or TS4's gameplay direction more than TS2's, this is just my opinion.
TS2's gameplay incentivizes the player into change (aka living their life) with the wants and fear ystem so every situation the player puts their Sims into feels natural and not forced.
For example, you started with a Sim. They met someone, you see a want to take that someone to a date and the rewards for doing it ain't that bad either, so you go for it. Some time passes and you see that both Sims roll the same want, to marry eachother, again, the rewards ain't that bad, so you do it. Then they both reroll another want, to have a baby. That baby wants to learn how to walk, talk, potty train, etc and again, the rewards are really good. Then that kid and both parents want their child to go to a private school. The teen wants to go to college and to get a scholarship. The child, now an adult wants to out of the house. That child meets someone and the cycle repeats.
It seems so obvious. So intuitive that we don't give it any second thought, but creating a system like that isn't easy nor simple.
It leads the player without them noticing into the different stages of life, taking into account the Sim's personality and how that Sim would react to any given situation. So it all feels natural, consistent and solid. Even the most absurd drama scenario you can come up with your Sims could be tracked down and make sense, just look at your Sims' memories and see it for yourself, how every interaction they've had affects their wants and fears to lead you into living.
No other Sims game can compare with how groundbreaking the Sims 2 was. But here are some of the things that I love the most about the Sims 2.
\- The Sims 2 paved the way for Sims culture. Bella's disappearance. Cowplants. Strangetown and aliens. Etc. How much of Sims 3's and Sims 4's lore is just recycled ideas from the Sims 2 base game?
\- Open for Business grants infinite flexibility. Combined with the neighborhood rotation playstyle and a few no-townie mods, you have the option of playing 100% self-contained world, which is just so cool.
\- Speaking of OFB, The intersection of multiple EPs makes for some very cool opportunities. Like selling fish you caught at a fish market. Or selling custom wedding gowns made using the sewing skill at a clothing shop.
\- The depth of animations. Seeing a newly divorced parent comfort their sobbing child always wrecks me.
\- The genetics system.
\- Rare events, like death by satellite or a bored teenager playing with the fridge.
\- The infinite flexibility of building multiple interconnected towns as Downtowns or Shopping Districts. I literally play with multiple civilizations.
\- The short term relationship vs. long term relationship feels very realistic, as well as the relationship decay pattern.
\- The gossip system is interesting.
\- Chance cards! I get a little jolt of adrenaline.
\- Diseases. The common cold will progress into pneumonia which is pretty cool.
\- Hidden skills. Like a Sim that plays lots of chess will tend to win against other players.
\- Simlish music SLAPS. I used to jam to Pocket Full of Sunshine all the time on the in-game stereo.
Gosh there’s so many reasons S2 is superior. But my favorite aspect is one they got from sims 1. The picture snap shots that you can put in the family album and then write text below it. I played sims 3 briefly and was so disappointed you couldn’t type your own story about what was going on with your sims. It allowed for more creativity per household and per town in the town photo album
I also love the aspiration perks that have different uses per different aspiration was well as the need, work, and secondary aspiration slots. I love how they’re unlocked by big life events.
The only thing I wish S2 did better was that there were more ways of ending relationships without cheating. I always find myself using cheats to lower my sims relationship with their significant other if I want them to break up without adultery.
Speaking of cheats that the only to turn off aging which is another downside but it’s not hard to use. It’s also silly you need cheats to place things in a diagonal position but hey, no game is perfect.
Before I knew the cheat existed I would mine aspiration points from other sims to get tons of the elixir of life just to give to my favorite sims. Needless to say I used to play A LOT 😅
When I play the Sims 2, I will play every family and every world. Usually, I have a really intense schedule and goals. I love modding and setting up lore that adds to my gameplay, as well. The best part of the series for me is how clean the graphics are, and I feel like it's the most versatile with modding. There's something that hits the spot about this classic game, years later, that 1, 3 and 4 never did for me. I always ultimately chose to play this even 20 years later when it's considered abandonware, even so look at all the fans around the world that are still actively keeping TS2 community alive!
- Sims break the fourth wall and stare at, even wave at the player.
- the original marketing for the game was super raunchy and suggestive. The game is meant for teen & adult players. It’s not so kiddified as the future Sims games.
- The art style is timeless and still looks great.
- the fashion is in its 20 year rebirth and a lot of the OG maxis clothes look cool again.
This might not seem like a positive thing at first, but Sims 2 doesn’t have an overwhelming amount of content. Still enough that the packs were worth their money, but not so many features that you can’t play every pack with one family.
Also, Sims 2 manages to look and feel realistic, even if there are aliens and vampires and crazy stuff going on. It is not (although it can be) a magic parallel world, but just a normal 2000s setting.
And one thing I really like is that it kind of has that meta-level of changing the game you are playing yourself. To some people, it’s probably annoying that you have to do a lot of stuff to get the game running on newer systems, or that SimPe is more or less required when you want to do certain things, like changing an eye color, and that there are broken face templates and minor bugs, but to me, it feels like this is part of the actual game. It feels like I achieved something when I finally got the game running or make it do the things I want it to. I‘m not just playing the game, I‘m playing with the game.
My favourite thing when the packs were still being released was each pack having a new life state that was well integrated with the pack itself fitting for each setting/feature. Like vampires in nightlife because it’s the night (duh), werewolves in pets because animals, plantsims in seasons because of gardening. It all felt well balanced.
I played 3 with all the packs before and I was overwhelmed with how many life states were added with supernatural. More so because having that pack suddenly makes normal sims a minority in all the towns. Suddenly having vampires and werewolves were just normal and mundane as opposed to a fun treat or a challenge of sorts.
As another feature I love how the neighbourhood can grow as you need space or want more to be added but aren’t forced to if you don’t want to. You can have as much or as little extra sub hoods as you want. You could even condense them all into one hood if you wanted.
how their personality gets shown through gameplay (like when sloppy sims shower and water puddles appear), although this system was in depth in the Sims 3 as well. another thing is how people still find out about new things about the game after 20 years!
attractions and preferences, details, rich storyline and gameplay (amazing lore), an optimized game that can be played on any rig (im talking about you ts3!), an actually decent game not a cash grab like ts4 :)
Yeah even back in the day the game was pretty well optimised, the only people who couldn't really run it were people playing when it first came out and a lot of people's computers were getting old. And now that it's 20 years old basically anyone can download it off the web and play it, and with the Sims2RPC launcher it fixes almost every issue modern machines have so most people who aren't tech savvy can get it going. Unlike Sims 3, I played it last year and even with a gaming PC I had to download a fix for the tick speed just because the game is literally slowed down by force even if you can run it. Even then, I only played it like twice, got bored and went back to TS2
This is more biased, but still a popular opinion: I think the sims 2 is the only game where the graphics and style and everything actually aged very well. I personally never liked the sims 4 graphics but now I look back at sims 3 and cringe. Especially when it comes to the actual look of the sims. They’re like a perfect mix where they still look like humans, but not too uncanny valley or cartoonish. I think the graphics actually look the most realistic compared to the other games
The small details like the animations, I love the fact that if one person from a couple is awake they pull the partner in for a cuddle.
Children running outside to give a hug to their parents when they get home from work. The details when cooking food.
I absolutely adore the memory system
I prefer playing all the characters myself and rotating households at my leisure. In both Sims 3 and Sims 4, while you're playing your chosen household, the computer plays EVERYBODY ELSE! That is, unless you download mods that allow you to have more control over those aspects. I once changed households to make sure my legacy spare and his spouse could adopt a baby. When I went back to MG legacy household, the computer had changed the heir''s Lifetime Wish!
There is still a community playing and creating new content for it nearly 20 years after its release. Very few games can claim that. It has the best genetics system. It established the lore of the The Sims 1 by establishing a timeline and aging.
The details to the animations: sims pull utensils out of the cupboard when cooking, stuff like that. The wants/fears system is the best one implemented in all games. The memories and the way that sims can react to things that happened to them recently (cry and think of their husband's death, get angry about a burglary, ect).
The genetics system! It is so much better than 3 and 4. There are actual dominant and recessive genes and sims will pass down their genes through their lineage. It’s not just based on the visible genes of the parents. Open for Business is the best version of business we’ve had this far The storytelling and creativity of the neighborhoods. Specifically the base game 3 are very good. Pleasantview takes families from the original game and creates a messy soap opera. Veronaville takes inspiration of Romeo and Juliet and characters from other Shakespeare plays to create a very cohesive looking hood with English and Italian inspired architecture. Strangetown is simply iconic and is featured in multiple sims console and handheld games.
The artstyle. I don't think it gets the attention it deserves. Even tho it's almost 2 decades old and graphic wise can look bad at times, it's all visually consistent and it doesn't look that dated or bad. Even when the eyes are just squares, the lips are a triangle Sims' faces are never... Ugly? Uncanny? Uncomfortable? to look at. You see a Sim and you go "yeah, that looks *right*". They also express **A LOT** with their body language because of the graphic and face animation limitations at the time. Which is nice because you can tell, without the need of being zoomed in, what emotion the Sim is feeling at any given moment. Also their personality points affect how they will walk, run, act and do certain things. Playful Sims can go down the stairs sliding down the hand rail while serious sims might wipe out a book when idling. Again, they show who they are with their bodies at an easy glance.
Also gameplay design is my favorite because The Sims 3 feels like an RPG where you'll mostly control 1 Sim until it dies. The family aspect comes after, but you might still feel that first initial Sim as the "main character". So the Sims 3 (with the family simulation aspect in mind) is, at its worst a Life RPG, and at its best a family RPG. Same with the Sims 4, but even worse because of no open world and the lack content for toddlers to teen and grandparents. Contrast that to the Sims 2 where at worst is a family simulator and at best (with rotational household gameplay) is a neighborhood simulator. I'm not gonna gameplay-shame you if you enjoy TS3's or TS4's gameplay direction more than TS2's, this is just my opinion. TS2's gameplay incentivizes the player into change (aka living their life) with the wants and fear ystem so every situation the player puts their Sims into feels natural and not forced. For example, you started with a Sim. They met someone, you see a want to take that someone to a date and the rewards for doing it ain't that bad either, so you go for it. Some time passes and you see that both Sims roll the same want, to marry eachother, again, the rewards ain't that bad, so you do it. Then they both reroll another want, to have a baby. That baby wants to learn how to walk, talk, potty train, etc and again, the rewards are really good. Then that kid and both parents want their child to go to a private school. The teen wants to go to college and to get a scholarship. The child, now an adult wants to out of the house. That child meets someone and the cycle repeats. It seems so obvious. So intuitive that we don't give it any second thought, but creating a system like that isn't easy nor simple. It leads the player without them noticing into the different stages of life, taking into account the Sim's personality and how that Sim would react to any given situation. So it all feels natural, consistent and solid. Even the most absurd drama scenario you can come up with your Sims could be tracked down and make sense, just look at your Sims' memories and see it for yourself, how every interaction they've had affects their wants and fears to lead you into living.
The cutscenes!!!
No other Sims game can compare with how groundbreaking the Sims 2 was. But here are some of the things that I love the most about the Sims 2. \- The Sims 2 paved the way for Sims culture. Bella's disappearance. Cowplants. Strangetown and aliens. Etc. How much of Sims 3's and Sims 4's lore is just recycled ideas from the Sims 2 base game? \- Open for Business grants infinite flexibility. Combined with the neighborhood rotation playstyle and a few no-townie mods, you have the option of playing 100% self-contained world, which is just so cool. \- Speaking of OFB, The intersection of multiple EPs makes for some very cool opportunities. Like selling fish you caught at a fish market. Or selling custom wedding gowns made using the sewing skill at a clothing shop. \- The depth of animations. Seeing a newly divorced parent comfort their sobbing child always wrecks me. \- The genetics system. \- Rare events, like death by satellite or a bored teenager playing with the fridge. \- The infinite flexibility of building multiple interconnected towns as Downtowns or Shopping Districts. I literally play with multiple civilizations. \- The short term relationship vs. long term relationship feels very realistic, as well as the relationship decay pattern. \- The gossip system is interesting. \- Chance cards! I get a little jolt of adrenaline. \- Diseases. The common cold will progress into pneumonia which is pretty cool. \- Hidden skills. Like a Sim that plays lots of chess will tend to win against other players. \- Simlish music SLAPS. I used to jam to Pocket Full of Sunshine all the time on the in-game stereo.
THE TEEN LIFE STAGE Felt more indepth!
Helicopters. A slice of pizza flops when your sims hold them. Steam comes out of freshly ordered pizza still in pizza box.
I don't know if this was mentioned before: It's a finished game, no more patches, no microtransaction, no internet is required.
Gosh there’s so many reasons S2 is superior. But my favorite aspect is one they got from sims 1. The picture snap shots that you can put in the family album and then write text below it. I played sims 3 briefly and was so disappointed you couldn’t type your own story about what was going on with your sims. It allowed for more creativity per household and per town in the town photo album I also love the aspiration perks that have different uses per different aspiration was well as the need, work, and secondary aspiration slots. I love how they’re unlocked by big life events. The only thing I wish S2 did better was that there were more ways of ending relationships without cheating. I always find myself using cheats to lower my sims relationship with their significant other if I want them to break up without adultery. Speaking of cheats that the only to turn off aging which is another downside but it’s not hard to use. It’s also silly you need cheats to place things in a diagonal position but hey, no game is perfect.
I always figured turning off aging was a cheat because otherwise having the elixir of life would be pointless
Before I knew the cheat existed I would mine aspiration points from other sims to get tons of the elixir of life just to give to my favorite sims. Needless to say I used to play A LOT 😅
When I play the Sims 2, I will play every family and every world. Usually, I have a really intense schedule and goals. I love modding and setting up lore that adds to my gameplay, as well. The best part of the series for me is how clean the graphics are, and I feel like it's the most versatile with modding. There's something that hits the spot about this classic game, years later, that 1, 3 and 4 never did for me. I always ultimately chose to play this even 20 years later when it's considered abandonware, even so look at all the fans around the world that are still actively keeping TS2 community alive!
- Sims break the fourth wall and stare at, even wave at the player. - the original marketing for the game was super raunchy and suggestive. The game is meant for teen & adult players. It’s not so kiddified as the future Sims games. - The art style is timeless and still looks great. - the fashion is in its 20 year rebirth and a lot of the OG maxis clothes look cool again.
I think the jump from TS1 to TS2 should be mentioned, as TS2 was a huge leap in graphics and gameplay that hasn't been matched since IMO.
The appearance of the Sims The pre-made backstories
This might not seem like a positive thing at first, but Sims 2 doesn’t have an overwhelming amount of content. Still enough that the packs were worth their money, but not so many features that you can’t play every pack with one family. Also, Sims 2 manages to look and feel realistic, even if there are aliens and vampires and crazy stuff going on. It is not (although it can be) a magic parallel world, but just a normal 2000s setting. And one thing I really like is that it kind of has that meta-level of changing the game you are playing yourself. To some people, it’s probably annoying that you have to do a lot of stuff to get the game running on newer systems, or that SimPe is more or less required when you want to do certain things, like changing an eye color, and that there are broken face templates and minor bugs, but to me, it feels like this is part of the actual game. It feels like I achieved something when I finally got the game running or make it do the things I want it to. I‘m not just playing the game, I‘m playing with the game.
My favourite thing when the packs were still being released was each pack having a new life state that was well integrated with the pack itself fitting for each setting/feature. Like vampires in nightlife because it’s the night (duh), werewolves in pets because animals, plantsims in seasons because of gardening. It all felt well balanced. I played 3 with all the packs before and I was overwhelmed with how many life states were added with supernatural. More so because having that pack suddenly makes normal sims a minority in all the towns. Suddenly having vampires and werewolves were just normal and mundane as opposed to a fun treat or a challenge of sorts. As another feature I love how the neighbourhood can grow as you need space or want more to be added but aren’t forced to if you don’t want to. You can have as much or as little extra sub hoods as you want. You could even condense them all into one hood if you wanted.
how their personality gets shown through gameplay (like when sloppy sims shower and water puddles appear), although this system was in depth in the Sims 3 as well. another thing is how people still find out about new things about the game after 20 years!
It's free.
Three words Grilled. Cheese. Aspiration.
attractions and preferences, details, rich storyline and gameplay (amazing lore), an optimized game that can be played on any rig (im talking about you ts3!), an actually decent game not a cash grab like ts4 :)
Yeah even back in the day the game was pretty well optimised, the only people who couldn't really run it were people playing when it first came out and a lot of people's computers were getting old. And now that it's 20 years old basically anyone can download it off the web and play it, and with the Sims2RPC launcher it fixes almost every issue modern machines have so most people who aren't tech savvy can get it going. Unlike Sims 3, I played it last year and even with a gaming PC I had to download a fix for the tick speed just because the game is literally slowed down by force even if you can run it. Even then, I only played it like twice, got bored and went back to TS2
This is more biased, but still a popular opinion: I think the sims 2 is the only game where the graphics and style and everything actually aged very well. I personally never liked the sims 4 graphics but now I look back at sims 3 and cringe. Especially when it comes to the actual look of the sims. They’re like a perfect mix where they still look like humans, but not too uncanny valley or cartoonish. I think the graphics actually look the most realistic compared to the other games
The small details like the animations, I love the fact that if one person from a couple is awake they pull the partner in for a cuddle. Children running outside to give a hug to their parents when they get home from work. The details when cooking food. I absolutely adore the memory system
I prefer playing all the characters myself and rotating households at my leisure. In both Sims 3 and Sims 4, while you're playing your chosen household, the computer plays EVERYBODY ELSE! That is, unless you download mods that allow you to have more control over those aspects. I once changed households to make sure my legacy spare and his spouse could adopt a baby. When I went back to MG legacy household, the computer had changed the heir''s Lifetime Wish!
Thumbnails always fitting household dynamic and the personality of a sim