Sims 2, Mod or no Mods?

[Squiggle111]

I for one, am a very indecisive person. I go back and forth between playing the game with a ton of mods and then reducing it to what it was before. When there's no mods I like to have the graphics on the sims kinda low because for some weird reason I like it when their fingers are joined together... :blink: *cough* Anyways, then I like to have a lot of mods and skintones and stuff... playing with mods is so fun but, I feel nostalgia and joy when I play without mods. I don't know what to do... :faceslap:

What do you guys think? Should I play with mods or not? And do you like to play with mods are just like the game the way it is?

[Mootilda]

I wouldn't play without mods. Too annoying, especially some of the later EPs.

[Clashfan]

Give me mods all the way. Way too annoying without them not to mention some of them actually make things work properly.

[Peni Griffin]

I think you should organize your downloads and take your mods in and out as it pleases you. Who says you always have to play the game the same way? Maybe you have one neighborhood with ACR and the others without; maybe you have a plain vanilla hood for challenges and one with just the things that annoy you changed; or maybe you play plain one week and fancy the next.

There is a particular satisfaction in mastering a game the way it came from the factory, raw, without a lot of tailoring; and another one in having everything just so. Why should you do without either satisfaction when you want them?

[Squiggle111]

I think you should organize your downloads and take your mods in and out as it pleases you. Who says you always have to play the game the same way? Maybe you have one neighborhood with ACR and the others without; maybe you have a plain vanilla hood for challenges and one with just the things that annoy you changed; or maybe you play plain one week and fancy the next.

There is a particular satisfaction in mastering a game the way it came from the factory, raw, without a lot of tailoring; and another one in having everything just so. Why should you do without either satisfaction when you want them?

Ah, thank you for the answer :D I was thinking of making a temporary folder for the mods I don't want to lose so that I don't have to download everything again. Thank you :anime:

[ginrouken]

I'm perfectly fine with playing the game without behaviour-altering mods (that stop autonomous so-and-so, that make customers buy their stuff and go away already, that make sims stop bathing and rebathing the starving baby all day, etc), or that introduce new gameplay that's just not possible with just the original game (loan certificates, casual romance, college in base hood, etc), or that are just little aesthetic nitpickings (no green witches, elders walk up straight, lazy sims spin normally, YAs don't walk all stiff, etc). That's all cool, I can do without those for a back-to-basics challenge, or just for added difficulty, no problem.

But playing without mods that fix those hood-exploding bugs that came with the game? Never. I love my hoods too much to let the game ruin them by itself even when I'm doing everything right on my end. That's where I draw my line at "mod-free" playing.

[sushigal007]

Mods, all the way. Apart from enhancing gameplay (ACR, I LOVE YOOOOOOO), many of Pescado's in particular are essential to actually keep things working properly. Batbox, stuck object remover, AL fixes... I could not play without them simply because I literally could not play without them.

[punkrockgoth1988]

I would choose a mod filled game over a vanilla one any day. There are just some things EA included/excluded that drive me up the wall. Then there are those little fixes and tools to help avoid hood catastrophe. Really, it's not a matter of whether or not you can stand a vanilla game, its whether or not you wish to play a particular hood for many generations or not.

[Julieryc]

Modded game. Without some of the critical fixes from MATY, I'm fairly convinced my game would implode (and hacks like the ones that prevent autonomous vampire biting, so that Crumplebottom doesn't get bitten and ruin your game.) I also love the NPC and townie-limiting hacks because they fit my gameplay style so well.

Also, non-critical fixes make the game more enjoyable. I love using hacks that enhance gameplay. I think the key is finding and using the hacks that make the game most fun for you and suit your playstyle best: Cyjon's Job Stopinator is perfect for my 'hood, while others might have no use for it. I love having normal-looking supernaturals and werewolves that don't get mean: for me, those are must-haves. Some things make existing game features even better in small ways (Monique's e-mail hack makes e-mail a useful feature for me, where I otherwise wouldn't bother.) I don't like playing elders, so TJ's lifespan mod is best for my game, since it lengthens adult stage while shortening elder. All the non-critical mods come down to what makes the game most fun for you. I couldn't imagine playing a vanilla game, but that's because my hacks make everything so much more fun, interesting, and aesthetically appealing. Your mileage may vary, though, and it ultimately comes down to what you like.

As an aside, I find that ACR is adjustable enough that you can leave it in the Downloads folder and mess around with settings, household-by-household and hood-by-hood.

[AlexandraSpears]

No more vanilla games for me.

It all depends on what you want to do with your game, like for story purposes, or maybe there are some annoyances you want to get rid of.

That's one thing I like about this game...and modders...you can set up your game however you like.

.

[Squiggle111]

I'm perfectly fine with playing the game without behaviour-altering mods (that stop autonomous so-and-so, that make customers buy their stuff and go away already, that make sims stop bathing and rebathing the starving baby all day, etc), or that introduce new gameplay that's just not possible with just the original game (loan certificates, casual romance, college in base hood, etc), or that are just little aesthetic nitpickings (no green witches, elders walk up straight, lazy sims spin normally, YAs don't walk all stiff, etc). That's all cool, I can do without those for a back-to-basics challenge, or just for added difficulty, no problem.

But playing without mods that fix those hood-exploding bugs that came with the game? Never. I love my hoods too much to let the game ruin them by itself even when I'm doing everything right on my end. That's where I draw my line at "mod-free" playing.

True, whenever I get rid of my mods like "Hair, Clothes, and skintones" I always keep stuff like Insimenator :P Definitely an essential for me :giggler:

[LilGeek]

....many of Pescado's in particular are essential to actually keep things working properly.

I've seen this creator mentioned in many discussions about mods. Can't seem to find him though. Could anyone toss me a link?

:report: Thanks!

[simsample]

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/ffs/

[Simsica]

I discovered the usefulness of mods back in the day when all we had was base game and there was this car portal deletion bug connected to the "read to" interaction on the bookcase. Since that day forward I haven't fired up my game without essential fixes. Pretty soon my Downloads folder was sporting tons of other mods, hacks, fixes, add-ons - whatever I could find to correct, enahance, introduce features. At this point of time, ask me about a mod and I've probably at least considered installing it if I don't already use it.
It's the mods that kept the game interesting for me, I admit it openly. These days, I wouldn't fire up my game without ACR, my "slower everything" folder, Community Time Project and many, many others. Most times, I'm not even aware what behavior should there be in a vanilla game.

So, mods all the way and back (and then all the way again), for me. But you need to arm yourself with tools that help you manage your Downloads folder (like HCDU and Download Organizer), and you have to tailor your mods folder so that it's really easy to find a possible culprit, if a mishap happens, because it will happen until you learn how to handle mods properly. In any case, as with any other CC, you have to back up your game saves (your hoods) so that, even if anything untoward happens, your Sims are safe.
And when you have back ups and the will to experiment, the world of mods is yours!

[Gcgb53191]

How exactly does ACR effect your gameplay? I just read the FAQ on the website, is it just meant cause more drama if a sim kisses someone hes not supposed to? I remember I had it installed once but I never saw a change in the game with it.

[Simsica]

ACR makes all romance interactions autonomous. Not only that but it adds depth to the Sims themselves - it custom tailors and/or allows you to customize their romantic behavior to their personalities. It also adds new dimensions to their sexual lives by introducing "fertility" and "risky woohoo" chance, or allowing teens to have woohoo, etc. They make their own babies (adults, not teens - for that you need InTeen), they find their true loves all by themselves... This was a chore for me pre-ACR. Now I only sit back and intervene in very rare, special cases.

[TychoH]

I cannot play without hacks. Age mod, elders sleep till 6 am, toddlers don't play with the toilet unless in a bad mood, inTeenimator, ... I'm so happy to have the inSimenator so I can easily delete any unwanted visitor of my lots. No more ruining the darts game which my whole family plays by a person walking by and shakes your hand and says 'welcome to the lot where everything is about playing', just delete that person.
But the game itself is really beautiful and I'm so happy that EA made it.

[katya_stevens]

How exactly does ACR effect your gameplay? I just read the FAQ on the website, is it just meant cause more drama if a sim kisses someone hes not supposed to? I remember I had it installed once but I never saw a change in the game with it.

Like Simsica said, it allows for a lot of autonomy for romantic actions -- I don't need to be concerned with making sure my sims are romantic or that I need to force them to woohoo or have children when they want, because ACR takes care of most of that.

ACR can actually cause less drama if a sim kisses someone they're not supposed to. The EA default is for jealousy to occur if a sim A has a crush on sim B if they flirt with someone else (sim C), while ACR has five jealousy settings: no jealousy at all; only if married; only if engaged or going steady; only if in love, only if in crush.

It might take a while to see any effects ACR has -- the best way is to use a test 'hood and have a couple of married sims in it, as you should see the automatic flirting and woohooing between them the quickest.

-----

On to the topic: I could not play without mods. I would have given up playing by now if I didn't have them (I went mod searching when I encountered sims waking up in the middle of the night to react to weather patterns -- it is three in the morning you do not need to cheer for snow), and I've found that not only have they squashed behaviour I disliked, they've also added autonomy to my sims (like ACR has).

[FranH]

Mods are completely essential to me. They make for a game that is less frustrating, and more variable than what it was originally designed as.

I've got mods that remove the plumbob, red lines around the screen frame, which makes the game appear like a 'pixelated soap opera', and makes photo taking a lot easier.

Life is short, and I firmly believe in enjoying the game, not putting up with the limitations that an unknown game coder put into the game. Why put up with their version of fun when you can make your own version as vanilla or as modded as you want?

There really are no rules to playing the game aside from the obvious "do not blow it up".

It's not cheating-just changing the landscape to please yourself.

[PolterGeist44]

Well, I don't remember how many mods I have, but I gotta love Squinge's College mod which lets Young adults to live in main neighborhood, or shopping districts or so on and have a job. Mog's Apartments and Shopping on same lot is quite awesome too. I think I had several of Pescado's mods and I used to have twojeff's mod that removes the need for friends for promotion.

[LilGeek]

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/ffs/

Pescado = MATY :rofl: Well now I feel like a noob, I did not know this!! :faceslap:

Thanks!

Btw, a mod to eliminate the OMG SUNSHINE salute? :report:

[pinimon162]

I completely get how you feel. I play sims usually on low setting and without custom content because I like it to feel like the sims! I think most people's sims with custom skintones and hair look horrendous. I have experimented with it in the past and actually quite liked some of the effects for taking photos, but not for actually playing. It's too much like you're trying to make it real, and I feel for me this makes the game lose it's quirkiness and I don't feel that they can do some of the random things that the sims was originally about!

I do have a handful of mods however that don't alter gameplay or anything, like no townie regen so my neighborhoods don't overpopulate, and also the marriage postmortum hack (which fixes it so if a spouse dies they are still married in the family tree, like maxis made sims)

[NollemD]

I for one, am a very indecisive person. I go back and forth between playing the game with a ton of mods and then reducing it to what it was before. When there's no mods I like to have the graphics on the sims kinda low because for some weird reason I like it when their fingers are joined together... :blink: *cough* Anyways, then I like to have a lot of mods and skintones and stuff... playing with mods is so fun but, I feel nostalgia and joy when I play without mods. I don't know what to do... :faceslap:

What do you guys think? Should I play with mods or not? And do you like to play with mods are just like the game the way it is?

You should play with whatever that is convenient to you. If you think that the in-game animations are annoying or bothersome, then you may want to download some fixing mods to 'patch up' your game. If you think you can take the game as it is, then you don't have to play with mods, if you don't want to. It's all your choice, really. ;)

Personally, I like the game as it is. I don't find the in-game animations as annoying as others would have.

[Orilon]

Pescado = MATY :rofl: Well now I feel like a noob, I did not know this!! :faceslap:

Thanks!

Btw, a mod to eliminate the OMG SUNSHINE salute? :report:

TwoJeffs has a "No Shade Eyes Salute" mod here: http://www.simbology.com/smf/index.php?topic=13.0

[dieKristina]

I played the game for a long time without any mods and I loved it. But when I discovered different mods and installed them in my game they really made me appreciate simming even more. If I, for some reason, was forced to remove all my hacks now, I would probably still play the game but I guess I would find it very frustrating sometimes.

[Gcgb53191]

Yeah I recently started playing again so I said 'no hacks or CC this time!' Simply because whenever I get bored of the game I uninstall everything and delete everything so its a pain to download again (I know better now) But its justso weird to not play with certain hacks I just feel they make it more realistic :)

[McChoclatey]

Mods for me are fun! I can still imagine playing without them, though--there would just be less options. Personally, I like playing with mods because I believe it adds some spice to the game, whereas, if I were still playing and I hadn't even heard of mods before, I'd probably be desperately searching every store for a new expansion pack--before I died of boredom. It's just that, the Sims isn't as fun as it was a few years back-I constantly need something fresh to keep me going. But, I'm sure that if mods were out of the question, I still wouldn't give up on the Sims completely. It's taken me years to play for a reason. ;)

[sushigal007]

How exactly does ACR effect your gameplay? I just read the FAQ on the website, is it just meant cause more drama if a sim kisses someone hes not supposed to? I remember I had it installed once but I never saw a change in the game with it.

My favourite thing about ACR is that I play a lot of 'hands off' stuff, asylum challenges and IBSI, that sort of thing. ACR means that the sims I'm not controlling aren't doomed to a life of eternal singledom. They can find love and woo hoo and have babies without me giving them commands, which is a lot more interesting than just watching them autonomously faff about forever. It also makes college dorms a lot more interesting, for the same reason. It does take a little setting up. Most importantly, you need to make sure your sims have a gender preference. If they're not interested in anyone (and by default, CAS sims have no gender preference) then they won't interact romantically with anyone. But you can make the mod set that up for the whole 'hood quite easily.

[Gcgb53191]

I just downloaded it. Do I have to anything after I put it in the game I read the Readme file and it kept talking about an adjuster of some sort. Ill go in the game soon and see if I can figure it out myself too :)

[Clashfan]

I just downloaded it. Do I have to anything after I put it in the game I read the Readme file and it kept talking about an adjuster of some sort. Ill go in the game soon and see if I can figure it out myself too :)

Click on a Sim and chose the "adjust" option on the menu. Click on the "casual romance" option and it will either give you and option to spawn the adjuster or it will say "zoom to adjuster" if one is already on the lot.

TJ has some very extensive instructions that come with ACR, I know cause I printed them out when I first got it. It's really best if you read the creators instructions as there is stuff you have to do to set it up for it to work in your game.

[Gcgb53191]

Quick question lets say they're going steady with someone and he has a crush on someone else and they have way higher chemistry. Why does the adjuster show his current gf as 'the one' instead of the one he has better chemistry? Is that not how 'the one' works? :wtf:

[Simsica]

Quick question lets say they're going steady with someone and he has a crush on someone else and they have way higher chemistry. Why does the adjuster show his current gf as 'the one' instead of the one he has better chemistry? Is that not how 'the one' works? :wtf:

When next in game, select your Sim that has a crush on another Sim who isn't his girlfriend and click on his girlfriend, select "Casual- Will I woohoo?". Do the same with the crush. The one with the higher score is "the one".
Or translated: chemistry is big in ACR, but love needs time ;) The crush will become "the one" if he pursues his relationship with her.

[Gcgb53191]

Thank you so much!! I saw that there was some attraction score so Ill look at that too.

Hmm looks like someone might be getting dumped during college ;)

[Simsica]

If you don't want "the one" to change, select "static" setting in "Sim Settings" in section "The One Sim". Click on "Setting is dynamic" - which it is by default - to change it.

[Gcgb53191]

Well before I got ACR I had planned for him to date both of them anyway to see which one he should marry, so now this is just helping me but of course I wont make a final decision until he really gets to know both of them and see how good their chemistry is.

[Allimae]

I just dowloaded all the mod's for Seasons that are on Maty because that is the last expansion pack I have. (I didn't want SecRom.) I just have to figure out which does what. It may take me awhile. Many thanks for alerting me to the posiblities.

[BurgundyStars]

It's up to you if you want to play without mods, but I just wouldn't be able to. There are far too many annoyances in the game and there are also various aspects that could be improved significantly with the right mods. I'd still play TS2 if there were no mods in existence, but it would be far less often than I currently play it.

[AlexandraSpears]

I find the Fitness 4 All mod to be pretty amusing. Along with the dormies visit community lots (not college lots) mod.

My Sims had a lot of fat dormmates....

[BirdieDesigns]

I wouldn't play without mods. Too annoying, especially some of the later EPs.

Fully agree. ;)