Hey everyone! I was wondering if any of you took the time to clean out your mods folder and, if you did, how do you accomplish that?

Right click> delete. Then open browser and start downloading afresh!

Well.. I go through a whole lot of procrastinating first and then I get overwhelmed by not being able to make a decision which ends up with me deleting everything and then regretting it only to put it back and do it all over again. Fun stuff! :P

Been working on that for a while (a few years, on-and-off). I've been chucking out some stuff I know I'm not going to use, renaming some files, recategorizing stuff so it makes more sense - like putting deco items in more sensible categories than everything in deco/misc/sculptures, adding shelf and AL-shift compatibility to objects so I need fewer OMSPs everywhere, occasionally removing shelf placement from some items that don't need it, repoing a few items, fixing some items, remaking clothing items that weren't properly made, editing some hairs to look better (especially with the bright CAS issue and some horrible necks/scalps, and maybe adding some ages if possible), even finishing a few old projects I'd forgotten (one project file had hung out in my DLs completely unchanged, just with a different name, ready to be tinkered with, hadn't even given it new GUIDs), and so forth. I still have a lot left, though.

Basically making what I have more usable, and removing some obstacles. I kinda like quite a lot of the old stuff I have, and a lot of it is hard to find now.

The story of my life

Wrote a tutorial on it :D

I make half-hearted tries at cleaning it out from time time then give up because "Someday I'll need that!"
It's useless..I keep everything until the game refuses to load because there's too much in the downloads folder.
Then I'll get serious for about 10 minutes and then the whole thing repeats.

It's only been 16 years. It'll get done someday...

I usually only clean content out if the set was updated or it's default replacements and they need to be swapped out.I've also got things divided into folders to redice how many loose files ar e floating in the downloads folder.It's overloaded with CC though my game loads fast with no problems at all even though I'm still adding more things to it and I'll be cleaning my hard drive up once I have space to store those extra videos taking up that space.

I guess a goal helps! I recently decided I wanted to go back to a “true” Maxis match game and got rid of everything non-Maxis, like custom meshes and conversions from The Sims 4. Even recolours had to go!

I really wanted to experience the game as intended for once and not be annoyed by objects and hair/clothes that looked out of place. I made sure to get the TS2 Life Stories build bundle, with lots of new floors and walls. Building and CAS is a challenge now but it’s actually way more fun! It makes me search for and compare Maxis objects more, instead of always using the same cc stuff over and over again because you know it matches.

I have also been doing clothing defaults for the first time. I only replace Maxis clothes with other Maxis clothes though, like with clothes that came from The Sims 2 store, shoe swaps, simple recolours or mesh edits. It’s not intrusive at all and I love it! My downloads folder is about 230MB now, which is the smallest it has ever been. Still a lot of mods though, I won’t be touching those!

I don't think I could delete stuff from my Downloads folder without consulting with my Sims first. I might be deleting somebody's favourite outfit.

I just hoard everything. What is this 'cleaning' you speak of?

also me: "why is this hideous photoskinned thing from 2005 an option in my clothing catalog?"

That's what my backup drive is for- I have two 3TB hard drives with sims stuff on them (one is a backup of the other). Both are very full! You didn't think I actually ever throw anything away, did you?

Just the mods folder? Or do you mean the entire download folder?
For my mods folder I would run one of the hack conflict utilities and see how many if any of those you have and go read up again on the mod and see about resolving conflicts. Write down in game what things you want fixes for and see if you can find those, see if there is anything already in game that you are not using and remove.

For my download folder, yes this in ongoing as I have multiple. It's the only way I can get most of the CC that i want without pink flashing everywhere. There you want to organize in such a way that you can find what you have- which may not be the same as how someone else organizes. But keep names short as you can and don't subfolder too deeply or use special characters in file/folder names. Then only keep what you love. If you constantly skip past an item because something about it bugs you, get rid of it because its just taking up space. If you tend to use a mesh often check and see if there are any more recolours around of that item rather than getting new meshes.The number of meshes may have more impact on pink flashing.

Don't simply delete your download folder, save it to some place safe as you never know what you may want from it that may not be available anymore.

I have all my mods in ABC order according to creator names I remember TwoJeff's mentions years ago how to set up your mods in that order of the creator name.
Most of the mods I have or download is mod that I really need to have for this and that. With other custom like clothes etc. You have to be sure your Sims is not wearing it at the time or have as an items of clothes.
Also you have to be very "careful" with deleting or cleaning out hair, eyes color, and skins tones, and Custom foods that can throw your game in an mess. So the best thing is to be sure you really want the items to keep. And number one thing Back up your game always, in case you change your mind, that way you will have an extra copy before all the cleaning out. Then back up after you made some cleaning on what you have decided to keep.

My method is pretty much:
Clothes:
Do I like this clothing overall? > Yes = keep it No = Delete it
Am I going to actually use it on some sim? > Yes = keep it No = Delete it
Do I like the shoes on it though? > No > Does it look like something I'm going to bother swapping better shoes to eventually? Yes > Move it my WIP folder No > Delete Yes > Keep for now
Does it have morphs? > No > Am I going to bother adding them/does the shape/polycount allow adding them? > Yes = keep but move to WIP folder No = delete
+ With separates: Is there a lot of clipping with most of my other bottoms/tops? No = Keep Yes > Am I going to fix it? > No = delete Yes = if I'm going to do that right away keep, if I'll "do it later" = delete

Hair:
Do I generally speaking like this hair? > Yes = keep it (if following criteria also true) No = Delete it
Does it have bad transparencies? > No = keep it (if following criteria also true)Yes = Delete (because I already know I'm not going to fix it anyway and then it'll just piss me off every time I see it)
Do I have other similar hairstyles to this? No = keep it (if following criteria also true) Yes = Compare it with the other similar ones on closer details (check polycount, transparencies, available ages etc) > Keep the best option and delete the other similar ones.
Is the polycount ridiculously high? > No = keep it Yes > Is the hair one of a kind, beloved one that I simply can't replace with anything else? Yes = Keep but use sparingly and keep an eye open for possible lower poly versions/attempt lowering the polycount myself No = delete it.

Makeup:
Does it look good on dark skins too? > Yes = keep it No > is it something I'd use on darkskinned sim though? > No = Keep it > Yes = delete it

Skins & Eyes:
Did I make it? > No > Am I actually using it for some sim > Yes = Keep it No = Delete it. Yes > Am I actually using/planning to use it for some sim > Yes = Keep it No = Delete it
Is the color something I'd use? Yes = Keep No = Delete
(Except for very rare few exceptions I only use eyes and skins I've made myself since I'm ultra picky about these for some reason ^^; I still often delete even the ones I've made myself though since my tastes change )

Buy & Build :
Do I actually like this item? > Yes = keep it No = Delete it
Am I going to use this item somewhere specific? > Yes/maybe = keep it No = Delete it
Is this item available in colors I'd actually use? > Yes = keep it No = Delete it
Does it have bazillion recolors though? > Yes = delete the ugly ones and only keep the ones I'll actually use No = does it have enough colors to justify keeping it thought? > Yes = keep it No = Delete it
Is the polycount ridiculously high? > No = Keep it Yes > is the item itself huge enough to justify the polycount? (like car or something else big) Yes = keep it if you like it No = delete it
Is it repositoried? > No = thank goodness! Yes > Am I going to remember which one is the master object and keep it? > Yes = Keep it No = Delete the whole set you know you're going to accidentally delete the *insert your choice of curse word here* master file anyway and then have multiple flashing blue objects everywhere to delete anyway.
(yes I know most people prefer repositoried items, I'm just not one of them since my special skill is to delete the master file every single time )

I've got a hoarding problem when it comes to CC, but previously I'd stuff it all into my Downloads folder, which explains how it got to be so massive.

Now I keep the stuff I download out of the game. Barely anything gets into the Downloads folder because I know I have all the stuffeths somewhere, so I'm not so obsessive about putting it into my game. Yes to "do I need it now?" means it gets put in, but yes to "do I need it at some point that isn't now?" means it continues to stay out.

Probably should adopt that one for my older downloads, too (but I need to know what my older lots were actually using, which isn't too easy to figure out, unfortunately).

My system is old-fashioned with things in alphabetical order, never mind if it is build or buy or makeup or clothes; while some fall under a folder with the creator's name and sets are just in their own folders and some stuff are just in thin folders.
No idea what Build/Buy stuff would do to my downloads folder. Probably just confuse the hell out of me
I can find them and all 5,04 GB (when did it become that big again?) show up fine in my game.

Ok, driven by guilt (and the foreboding thought that my computer will do something funny should I not do this) I started to clean up my downloads folder-now, I did not delete many files-many a couple-but the remainder I moved to outside the game into a folder in the EA Games folder for all those items I'm not using in either the modern game or the medieval game. This makes it possible to keep the stuff together and not lose it, while still keeping it nearby in case I really need it.

Because I don't trust my memory to find things again-I have backups and more backups of most of the stuff I have..including on disk, for heavens' sake-some of it is irreplaceable, and i shudder to think that it is impossible to find some of it.

Because people keep making really cool custom content, dammit!

Because what comes with the game is often crappy and many items were simply a waste of space.

Now EA could have streamlined things, for example adding more classic pieces of clothing that didn't date (instead of: socks in sandals and mid rise polo tops for men), a set of matching woods across sets, completing sets so say every bed had its own wardrobe and side tables but they didn't. Instead of giving nice kitchen wall cabinets they gave us odd ugly wall masks and odd statues never to see the light of day. Instead of plain classy curtain and bed recolours they added in ugly patterns.
I don't have 500 chairs but I certainly have at least 20. Then we download clutter and items that are situational that the game doesn't have at all, for example items for a police station, stable or hospital. Many of us like having realistic buildings you would find in an actual town.

To add to what everyone else said, I often have folders for specific households where I place CC I got JUST for that family or individual Sims in it. When I'm no longer using it I delete or archive that CC.

Sometimes I like certain files but haven't used them in a while. If it's something I'll probably use again, I don't delete them and just archive them instead by making a .zip and saving it somewhere else.

When I see a download but won't immediately use it, I bookmark the site or otherwise save the link, so I can decide if it's worth it or find it again when I actually need it in my game.

Because there are many, many creators who have surpassed the quality that Maxis and EA had in the original game. Better flooring, better walls, better skins, clothing, toys, you name it, the creators on MTS and other places have only improved the game since EA produced it.

They made it far, far better-and we won't even go into the hacks and mods that make it even playable! Pescado did the earliest modding, I do believe, and some of them area as old as the game itself-and I couldn't, refuse to live without some of them: "Nowhatsthis" to be particular and many others. I can't name all of the modders who have done so much for this game, and I don't mind at all wading through pages and pages of CC to see what I need.

So this is a love letter to all the creators, modders and hackers who have done so much for this game. If it weren't for them, you would not have the game you now are playing-literally.

I agree.

Besides, some people's playing styles NEED extra CC. I'm thinking of historical simmers who use a lot of mods to keep their game accurate to the era they're playing, for example.

The one downside of CC and mods is that EA has relied on them way too much for TS3 and TS4, but I really like adding random stuff to TS2 to keep it fresh.

Even modern, I try to make my game seem British and there's little-to-no ingame content that works! I NEED cc!