Hi,

I've been kind of stuck on this question for a while. Sometimes I just can't figure out what a sim is like, or should be like. For example, there are a couple pre-made EAxis sims that came with expansion packs that I don't have much interest in playing because they don't seem to have much personality. How do you give them one? Do you look at their hobby(ies)? Do you look at their personality points? Do you look at their hair and clothes?

What I've started doing is basing them off of characters from TV shows, books, or movies, although I'd like to come up with some more original characters. Any suggestions would be appreciated!

I Usually design a sim in my mind beforehand, i kinda choose a 'social group' Like posh, gothic, rockstar... ect and expand/work from there

i usually do what kustirider does, like choosing a social group.
Sometimes I depend it on aspirations, like family- would be loving and stuff like that. Plesure- would be a 'raver' going downtown all the time and having a crazy life. ectt ectt.

I never play pre-made sims. I did once, in Pleasantview. And yeah, I choose my sims personalities same like the upper ones. But I don't like aspirations. They're really scant, and sims' personalities are performed more.

I usually always go by the sim's appearance. If they look shy then I'll make them shy and they'll spend more time by themselves. If they have a unique style then I might make them outgoing, and give them the Pleasure Aspiration.

I love neat freaks because I dont have to have them clean they will do it all on theuir own, Aspirations are boring so I just give them whatever by the rool of the dice and with turn-ons and turn-offs the same because they are completely bogus.

I use almost all the options Maxis provides in identifying a Sim's character: appearance, personality points, preferred hobby, aspiration(s), LTW, wants, fears, turn-ons/offs, general behavior, social interactions, idle activities. (I use a virtual dice roll to assign aspirations and turn-ons/offs.) Oddly enough, the one thing I never check is their interests.

I usually have a general sense of who they are by their early teens, but some Sims take significantly longer than others before the personality clicks and their story really takes off.

To all intents and purposes, they - to you - are townies. They are just making up the numbers and possibly clogging up load times, so just delete them.

I usually have it in my mind before creating the sim, or if I don't, I usually go with their looks, or just the look in their eyes is enough. I sometimes make them resembling by the personalities of the people I know or the characters from my books. My sims can be shy, artistic and caring or they could spend nights in downtown with a bunch of friends and love meeting new people or they could just be concentrated on their families or careers and goals. Even if they might not look like that.

It's a little interesting... I kind of go with the looks sometimes too - I just put everything together as I go along. I usually go with the looks when choosing a name, too. In a sense, I guess it makes things a little boring to subconsciously make all of my Sims sterotypical charicatures of some particular social group. Now that I actually think about it, it would be fun to actually make some more realistic and unique Sims...

If I have to bring a cas sim into the game - this only happens when starting a hood - I usually have an idea of who they are, but still I let the dice decide their personality, turn ons and aspiration. With personality there's twelve, so first I throw a dice to see which side of the twelve they get, then I throw again to see which sign they get. Most of the time I get completely different personality and aspiration to what I had in mind for that sim. With inborn sims, they get what ever personality and turn ons they automatically get, and aspiration is determined by dice.

I start with an idea, a social group, a tv star and then try to flesh out that Sim. Right now, though, I don't make any new Sims because I just play a 'hood with about 20 different families and all the Sims are born in game (and thus come with personality points).

Usually I try to match their personality to their looks. So if I have a female sim decked out in partywear, I make her outgoing, energetic,etc. Normally, alot of my sims end up being calmer, nicer, and cleaner. I just think its more fun to play them that way.

I try to have variety, so I have everything from super-nice sims to 0 niceness point bastards and in between, and I'm not afraid of using extreme personalities with either 0 or full points in a trait or more. It keeps things fun, and even though I do have sims with most traits in the middle, I find the extreme ones more entertaining, because they're also harder to predict. I like surprises.

I do the exact same thing; I don't create sims often (I prefer to have born in-game sims), but when I do, it's the ones with extreme personalities that I end up finding the most entertaining. Their dramatic behavior makes them all the more fun, and therefore almost all of my CAS sims end up with at least one trait that's within two bars of the end of the slider, because that's when the extreme behavior starts and when watching them gets exciting.

I realized I have never played a family past gen 1. lol That is horrible. I think it's just my 'perfect family' problem. I installed the ACR last week and I'm trying to get some sims with dramatic personalities around. Hopefully with some fresh personality, I can play through a few generations.

I kind of do it as I'm creating the Sim. Sort of like, "Hmmm... this hair looks good on her... and this style of clothing really suits her. She looks as though she'd be a really serious, quiet type... so, maybe make her a Knowledge type... and... let's see... she'd probably like really logical guys... and probably someone who's already employed in a decent work position..." and so forth. So, by the time I get around to actually playing the Sim, I have a pretty good idea in my mind of what that particular Sim is going to be like.

If they're born in-game, I kind of just let stuff develop in my mind. For example: "She's the first girl born, after her parents have tried for years for a girl and had nothing but boys. So, she might be kind of spoiled, a little selfish... maybe gets better quality clothes and stuff from her parents. And maybe she grows up to be a Romance type..."

I played pre-made Eaxis Sim families when TS2 was out and got bored to death: abandoned the game for nearly a year. Then I came back and started creating my own Sims and/or downloading other players' Sims if I happened to like them. I have also deleted at least half the families who came with EPs: after finding out what amazing job TS2 community has done with CC I refuse to go back to ...boredom.

I always start with a fixed idea of what x Sim's life will probably be, such as social group, aspiration, sexual orientation, turn ons and offs, even working on their background and past; I create their future companions in advance, too. However, I let them decide themselves whether they are one of a kind or not.

Usually when I'm making a sim, I start off with their basic background story in mind, so the aspiration and personality tends to come from that, as does his or her particular look. For instance, I had a sim whose backstory involved a bad home while he grew up in Downtown, where he lived with his father hitting and cheating on his mother... so he was created as a very mean, yet outgoing and highly active, sim of the Romance persuasion. He was always dressed to the nines, looking every bit the smooth operator, because it really worked well with the fact that he would get with absolutely any woman he'd find and then toss them aside. On the other hand, I might have a sim who had a picturesque life growing up in Pleasantview; her parents were happily married, a sibling or two and a dog, living in a house with a white picket fence... you know, right out of the stories. She got everything she ever wanted, had perfect grades, went to a good college and got her degree, then moved back to her hometown to start a new life all on her own. Generally, that sort of sim would be a Family or Fortune sim for me, possibly a bit on the shy side, almost always neat, maybe a bit playful, fairly active, and very nice.

I do generally have a bit of a rule of thumb, though; generally, I'll prescribe certain personality traits to each aspiration (it's also how I tend to decide on their secondary aspirations). So where a Fortune sim might be grouchy and serious, a Pleasure sim would be outgoing and playful, or a Romance sim would (in general) be active and nice (making it all the easier to get people to fall for him or her). That sort of thing. I tend to change up some of the premade sims' aspirations based on these values, as well. That way they fit more to who they are as a person (and, yes, this does mean that teenagers will tend to change their aspirations around if their parents encourage certain behaviors in them).

Thanks everyone for the great ideas! I appreciate your time and thoughts, and will put your suggestions to use!

hehe, How do i do it....You might not care but I dont. LOL Im so lazy at choosing personality points. When I did I was like zero neatness coz they can just hire a maid. I had heaps of outgoing and activity. So now I dont bother.

I usually create a story in my head before i go into CAS or BS and decide how that sim plays into the story and is how i choose their personality. I usually have 2 sims in one family that are complete opposites to keep things entertaining.

I don't
I take whatever the random gives me, and I love to play the sims the opposite- such as a lazy sim becoming a top athelete, or an outgoing sim becoming a live at home, agoraphobic bookworm.