Monday, February 3, 2014

Reviews of The Sims 2: Nightlife Expansion Pack - PC

The Sims 2: Nightlife Expansion Pack - PC
Customer Ratings: 4.5 stars
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I picked up my copy of Nightlife yesterday, as well as Prima's Nightlife Strategy book. The game is great. With this expansion, your sims have the opportunity to have enhanced social interactions with other sims. You can now see what sims are attracted to your sims. There is a new item in the relationship panel called "chemistry" and the sims with whom your sims have chemistry with are rated with a lightning bolt system 1 bolt being low, 2 bolts being average and 3 being high. This helps if you're trying to get your sim a good match. You can also ask people about their skill levels, which will be helpful for me because there is nothing worse than picking up a sim who has low skills and thus contributes nothing good to the household.

You can now go out with groups of people instead of just one sim. This functions similarly to "throw party" in that the group outing is scored. (FYI-Dates are also scored) You can create and manage groups so whenever you want to go out with groups of people, the group is already preassembled.

With a new aspiration reward tool your sims can change aspiration. In the past this could only be done with a young adult sim while they were in college. However if your sim uses this object under the gold range their aspiration will automatically be change to "grilled cheese". They will only want to make, eat and talk about grilled cheese.

With respect to objects and building: I haven't used anything yet, however there are now 1/2 walls that you can build to break up a room a little bit, however it does not function in the same way as a full wall does i.e. if your kitchen has rotten food on the counter top and is separated from the dining room by a half wall, the dining room environment score will be affected. There is also a new driveway tool, new doors, windows etc.

I don't really like playing with cheats, but there are some new ones:

1 You can give a newly created family additional funds without having to play with them. In the past you had to buy a house lot or a house, move them in and THEN use the motherlode cheat. So if I wanted to give Don Lothario $10,000 the cheat is "familyfunds Lothario 10000". You can insert a minus sign before the simoleon dollar amount to reduce a family's funds if you want.

2 Give a family ALL the career reward items with "unlockCareerRewards".

3 Maximize motives with "maxMotives"

This expansion pack is an "enhancement" pack. It takes simming to a whole new level.

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As depicted in our earlier previews, Nightlife offers a new downtown/city area that you can associate with your towns. There's only one, but it's loaded with new buildings, restaurants, stores, and entertainment centers. 125 new objects are available, most focusing on social interaction or community lot decorating. Sims can now build driveways and own their own cars, and they can form social groups or go out on dates. In addition, the inclusion of Vampires almost makes the pack.

Graphically, there are some new perks. Although it doesn't directly impact gameplay, you can now see neighboring lots from your own house -this makes the game more immersive, since it doesn't feel like your house is floating in space anymore.

A new "Pleasure Aspiration" is now available as a Sim's life goal. Typically Sims with the Pleasure Aspiration live for the moment, their wants changing rapidly based on the situation, eager to do whatever fun thing is at hand. They're pretty easy to keep happy, but not very deep, which makes the new aspiration less interesting to play than, say, a family or popularity aspiration.

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When I first bought this expansion pack and played it for a few hours, I immediately came on the amazon site and rated it at 4 stars. After playing it enough to feel comfortable writing a review, though, I find I have to give it 3 stars. Let me explain.

What I liked:

*New and useful objects

*Inventory slots! Want to keep something when your SIM moves out? Put it in their inventory and take it out when you get to the new home!

*Cars! Miss the bus or carpool? No problem! Hop in the car. Don't like the waste of valuable time that waiting for the taxi has become? No problem! Hop into the car!

*The New Pleasure Seeker Aspiration. Actually not a very difficult person to keep happy and it adds a bit more variety to a game that already has tons of it.

*The New Downtown Neighborhood. Just as the University Expansion Pack had you choose a University neighborhood to associate with your normal SIMS neighborhood, Nightlife has you choose a Downtown neighborhood to associate as well. There is only one Downtown neighborhood to choose from, but it is great as is! You can still create your own if you so desire, though.

*Vampires! Beware of night trips to Downtown! You never know when the local Count is going to search for entertainment in the same location that you choose...

*Group Outings and Dates. These add new activities to run your SIMS through which adds yet more variety to an already great game. It takes a while to get a feel for how to make them successful, but learning is half the fun!

*Turn ons and Turn offs. These add a little depth to your SIMS personalities. This enhancement had me a little worried at first, because I was afraid of how already existing SIM families would be affected. It turns out that when you install this expansion pack, already existing SIMS have a potion put into their inventory. Drinking this potion allows you to set the turn ons and turn offs so you can pick those traits that will keep your SIM family together (or tear them apart if you feel evil).

What I didn't like:

*All of the bugs that I observed after the University Expansion are still their with Nightlife.

*If an already existing SIM owned a cell phone, handheld device, or other electronic gadget then this disappears after installing the Nightlife expansion pack and you have to buy new ones for that SIM. THAT is an inexcusable bug!

*If you create a new family in the Downtown neighborhood and then want to move them into the regular neighborhood, well, there's no ultra easy way to do it (like the drop out of school option or graduation in University). The work around, I guess, is to make them friends with someone in the neighborhood and have that person invite them to move in.

*The price. Despite the quality of what is added, I still feel that this expansion pack is overpriced, especially in light of the bugs that didn't fixed.

In Summary:

If I rated the new additions on just the fun and value they add to the game I would give it 5 stars. The unresolved bugs cost at least 1.5 stars though. I took another .5 for the price. It really does pain me to give this only 3 stars, but being too forgiving won't encourage game developers to put forth the extra effort to make their products bug free.

Honest reviews on The Sims 2: Nightlife Expansion Pack - PC

I purchased the Nightlife expansion pack after using the University expansion pack for several months, and I have to say these add-ons keep getting better! Anyone who plays Sims 2 knows how limitless the game is in nature, but these packs add so much more to the game! This edition especially shows how receptive EA Games is to its customers. A few of the great additions this pack offers are...

-Chemistry: Sims are now able to match based on chemistry. You are able to pick your sim's turn-on's and turn-off's and "scope" rooms for other sims who match basic chemistry. Then, as relationships progress, you can track chemistry levels which will make or break the relationship.

-Pleasure Aspiration: A new aspiration has been introduced to create even more possibilities for your sims new party lives.

-Vehicles: Sims are able to buy cars which makes going to community lots more fun and realistic. Also, you can now build actual garages with driveways. Cars can also be equiped with alarms for an added effect.

-Community Lots: Now, you will be able to change community lots with extreme ease and speed by simply clicking on a lot across the street from the one you're currently at. This is far quicker than having to return to your sim's house and then out again to a different location.

-New objects: This will be very exciting to any avid Sim player! EA has obviously done their reseach and discovered people were trying to make their own sectional couches or boothes for dining. Now, these items come standard with no hassles required. Many new objects await that should definitely meet and exceed your desires.

There are many, MANY more reasons for this expansion pack to receive 5 stars, but I'll save you some surprises! Don't wait; Get it now!

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While I am generally opposed to the "expansion pack phenomenon," I am at least tamed by cool stuff. The Sims 2: Nightlife Expansion Pack is so far my favorite addition to the series.

Of course, as with everything, there are pros and cons. Let's start with the positive, shall we?

PROS

1. Having your own car is sweet. Besides just being able to drive to work (late, if you want to), you can also cruise around in it (increasing your fun level) and performing the Woo Hoo. It makes for a central idea when going on a date, as you might imagine.

2. Did I just mention... you can go on dates now? It's a cool little feature of this expansion pack. It is basically a scenario process with a new interface. It is pretty cool, but is designed for only one thing, of course: romance. If you are dating around while married, you are indeed having an affair! But there are cool things you can attain from this interaction.

3. Nightlife also includes the non-romantic gatherings concept. You can formulate a group for the sole purpose of just hanging out or actually having a designed night out. In either situation dating or group get-together you can go out to dinner, go bowling, or go clubbing. These are the kinds of new aspirations and wants for the new aspiration: Pleasure.

4. Yes, the new aspiration, complete with lifetime wants and the daily fears. You will see that much like the whole nightlife lifestyle, it pretty much just coincides with the Romance aspiration, but requiring less Woo Hoo and more dating. But plan on being a Slacker or a heavy dater, nonetheless.

CONS

1. There are two special Non-Player Characters (NPCs) that pop up in the new Downtown neighborhood: a count vampire (usually named Count Jesse Hutchins, but there are countesses as well) and Mrs. Crumplebottom. If you ask me, both are relatively worthless. If you own the Open for Business expansion pack, my advice is not to construct a business in Downtown that has all the facilities you need to operate it 24 hours a day (like a shower, oven, etc.). The reason is that Mrs. Crumplebottom won't let you or your employees bathe. Oh, and she won't let you in a spa, either. (Bathing suits.)

2. The expansion pack will set you back some decent chump change. Why not wait until The Sims 3 comes out and then get The Sims 2 Complete Edition? It will only cost you $50 then, I would guess, and you get every expansion included. But if you can't wait that long and you don't need the cash, The Sims 2: Nightlife will keep you "busy" for a ton of hours.

Have fun.

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