Given the unpleasantness of the present and the uncertainty of the future, I have decided that this might be a good time for a retreat to the past in my TS2 game rather than trying to continue enjoying my current megahood, which is stuck in a near-present of a disturbingly ominous nature. I have long considered that trying to play through actual history rather than in the eternal present would be interesting, but was dissuaded from trying due to the high ratio of fiddling around to actual gameplay. Given that I'm now finding that fiddling around is more relaxing than playing, I've decided to put the old megahood on "hold" (at this point, I'm not sure I'll ever go back to it) and give historical play a try.

My plan is to start in January 1901, in a Maxis hood made-over to suit the times. I'm debating whether to use the day=month or week=month realistic aging mods by Lientebollemeis (unless I can find newer ones that do the same thing -- I got the idea of this when they came out, so I may be behind the times!). The day=month one would make for quicker play and probably be more compatible with other time-related mods, but the week=month would be better for storyline purposes (because each household would get a full week out of each month to get things done, including events that should only happen on certain days of the week), would allow more gameplay between fiddling, and would give ample time for using Sun&Moon agriculture stuff, which at least some households are going to be pretty dependant on early on. This is not going to be nostalgia-filter history, and while I certainly intend to let every Sim be as happy as they can be, there is next to no chance of them actually changing set history other than being a victim or survivor of it! As this is going to lead to culling, it will make room for introducing other subhoods every few decades or so, and this is something I'd love input with. I'll be using the "fixed dead" meetme2thriver hoods, and am strongly considering starting with Pleasantview because I know everyone there very well from modern play and don't want to deal with Bella having a different name, though I may just use another hood as a base and deal with having to fix the name that so as to not have to move my Pleasantview-based megahood. Riverblossom Hills will go in early -- maybe during the Great Depression? -- and I know Strangetown would be perfect for the Space Race.

Provisional list of approximate dates and subhoods:
1901: Pleasantview
1921: Veronaville
1929: Riverblossom Hills
1960: Strangetown
1980: Desiderata Valley
1990: Belladonna Cove

I'd love any ideas anyone has about which hoods could best be adapted to which eras to fill in gaps in this! I'm assuming SimNation to be the United States, and yes, every -ism that can be put in the game is going to be there at the appropriate level for the time. (So yes, Pleasantview is even more of a time bomb in 1901, even in somewhere that looks to be California, and loaded with much worse than the soapiness of the original.) I intend to look into the medieval cast system traits to see if they're any use in the early 20th century. I'm also going to be in need of a whole string of default replacements to swap out with each other as the decades pass, and some serious consideration of ACR settings with regards to TFB and risky WooHoo given the era and socio-economic position of the Sims involved (I'm pretty sure town doctor Don Lothario would make sure to use reasonably reliable contraception with his many flings, but that's not going to be an option for the kid trying to keep his family fed while living in a shack next to the open cesspit his father drowned in...). So yes, this is a massive project that might eventually become a challenge, but that's probably a good thing right now! I've never seriously tried historical play, and would love to know the thoughts of those who have!

Well, for what it's worth, I've played around remaking all the premade hoods in my RetroSims game setup, and the way I did it was:

Pleasantview (with Widespot) - Generic Retro. I can dress anybody any way I want, as long as it's old-fashioned enough to look Retro to me. The Landgraabs look kind of 19-teensish, the Calientes look kind of 1950s ish, whatever.
Strangetown: The 60s all the way. Militarism, occultism, hippiedom, rebellion, repression, the Second Sexual Revolution, the military industrial complex, campus ferment, the whole nine yards.
Veronaville: The 40s! Veronaville is occupied, the Capps are on the side of the occupiers, the Montys are on the side of the Resistance, the War isn't here right now but who knows what tomorrow will bring? Severe career restrictions extending to townies, who are made up as either Occupiers or Occupied, Collaborators or Resisters.
Riverblossom Hills: The Great Depression. The town only supports one journalist, and it's Peter Ottomas because the person doing the firing fired women first. No music industry in such a small town, either. Lots of restrictions on available careers and who goes to college, who will be able to get a loan to start a business and who has to rough it, lots of emphasis on agriculture and hardscrabble entrepreneurship.
Desiderata Valley: The 50s. Very suburban, very repressed, very much in denial that there's more than one right way to do things.
Belladonna Cove: The 20s. The First Sexual Revolution, flappers, paper prosperity, jazz, jalopies, bright young things, gangsters, labor unrest.

The degree to which I've actually played any of these varies. Veronaville play has the potential to be intense. Riverblossom Hills is looser but provides nice challenges.

I was playing around with an idea for a 20th century challenge, with rules changing with the times, but it bloated up quickly and I can tell I'll never do it.

I've got a BACC in Dodge wihch is the empty terrain template of Stragetown set in the 1840's and have a homesteader's challenge to be starting in 1820 in Dakota with plans for a TOT challenge starting with early exploration and colonization in the New World aka North Amarica with my town being located in the site of what would be Maine in the 1520's long before it was ever made a colony or state occifially.I'll be using an empty terrain template for that one as well like I did for the other two since I can start my towns from scratch and watch them grow slowly over time.

@Peni Griffin -- Ohh, I like the idea of Desiderata Valley for the 50s! I've never actually played it because my megahood was way too big already by the time the UC came out, and I just guessed that hobby obsession would go well with 80s hedonism. However, it would be much better for the 50s, with all the wholesome hobbies, tidy families, and at least one spy and a probable enemy agent as well!

I've also never really played Belladona Cove, and like your take on it! I was thinking that it should stay near-modern because of logistical issues with all the apartments, but given that all subhood apartment residents have to start out moved out, renovations would be somewhat less of a problem.

Veronaville would be the right place for war in 40s Europe, but there's no way I want to try playing that. One of my alternate ideas for this kind of historical play would be a custom-built small (to start with) English village on the outskirts of London in a sort-of-BACC playstyle, but the prospect of the Blitz is pretty offputting and the fear of gas attacks and the consequent gas mask drills even more so, for entirely personal reasons. Continental Europe at that time is a hard nope. I could see the Montys and Capps as rival bootlegger gangs during Prohibition, and the wildly flamboyant Summerdream-Gossamers as speakeasy proprietors who use their outrageous appearance and conduct (and perhaps a touch of faerie glamours) to distract revenue agents. I can't really shake the idea of the feuding families as mobsters!

This is a huge concept, and one that I'd consider more a playstyle than a challenge. There is a challenge called the Decades Challenge for TS4 that provides some interesting guidelines, but it goes by generation rather than age-calibrated years (though those may not even be doable in TS4) and has some pretty sweeping assumptions about social mores. From some stuff I've seen on Pinterest, there may be others interested in adapting it to the much more detailed world that TS2 allows...

There's a TOT challenge already in place for TS2 and I've got one with modified rules starting in the 16th century exploration and colonization of North America when it was know simply as the New World.It takes the game from that era into the modern age.I was downloading empty terrain maps to have more choices for the main district and for neighborhoods when they get added.