Product Description

The Sims 2 is the next generation of the bestselling PC franchise. For the first time, players control their Sims over an entire lifetime from womb to tomb. Every choice you make has a relevant and dramatic effect on the life of your Sim. More life-like Sims, all-new gameplay and the ground-breaking addition of genetics gives players a more vivid and in-depth Sims experience.

Guiding your Sims through "Life`s Big Moments" takes on new importance, as players now get a "Life Score" to measure how well they are playing each individual Sim. The decisions that players make throughout the lifetime of their Sims now have an impact on their long-term success or failure. A choice made as a toddler has a direct effect on the teen and adult Sim they become. Will players be able to successfully lead their Sims through such important events as a first step, first crush, or marriage proposal, all while the clock is ticking?

The Sims in The Sims 2 are more aware and responsive to both other Sims and their surroundings. Sims truly come to life expressing moods and feelings through more realistic body animations and for the first time facial animations. They form complex relationships and are able to distinguish between family and friends, platonic friendships and romantic love. Sims in The Sims 2 now have DNA. Passing along physical characteristics and traits to their offspring, Sims both resemble and behave like their ancestors. As in real life, the appearance of the Sims now changes over time. In addition to getting older, a Sim that spends too much time on the couch will develop a paunch and a Sim that works out will enjoy rock solid abs.

An entirely new 3-D engine makes the world of The Sims 2 more life-like and dynamic. The Sims 2 will also introduce an all-new "Create-a-Sim" feature. This allows you to customise the facial features of your Sim with a few simple clicks, to a level of detail never realised b

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1051 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Electronic Arts
• Released on: 2004-12-03
• Platforms: Windows NT, Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows Me, Windows XP
• Dimensions: .26 pounds

Amazon.co.uk Review
The original The Sims is the best selling PC game ever but after four years and seven expansion discs it's finally starting to look a bit long in the tooth. As the first official sequel almost everything in The Sims 2 has been expanded and improved on from the original, even if the basic idea remains the same: to create and control the lives of your virtual characters.

The entire scope of the game has now increased--your characters age and give birth to children. Sims remain children only for a few weeks, before spending most of the game as adults and then eventually dying and the game carrying on with their children and grandchildren--if they have any. Another big new feature of the game is the introduction of specific "aspirations" for your sim, which can be anything from a specific career to marrying a particular person. Each sim also has their own "fears", which can be anything from living alone to losing their hair. Which of these situations end up coming true becomes the main influence on whether your sim is happy, the attainment of which is the only true goal in the game.

Apart from all these new features the graphics have been severely overhauled are now in full 3D and more in line with the recent console spin-offs. This is a must buy for anyone that's ever enjoyed the original titles, but the new features should also be enough to entice sceptics to the fold as well. --David Jenkins

Customer Reviews

Excellent fun, but you need a powerful PC!!
After resisting the temptation to rush out and buy the Sims 2 on it's day of release, I have at last given in and bought it.
And I must say, I'm very impressed. The makers have broadened the game out from the Sims 1, thier life seems so much more realistic, and with the Aspirations the Sims seem to have meaning to their lives. In the Sims 1, you could play a family for weeks at a time and not really feel like thier lives were going anyhwere. Now, with the life cycle and the iminant prospect of death on the horizon, it really feels like you're Sims are alive, thier lives have 'meanings'.

There are loads of new build and buy options (is it just me, or are the American makers obbsessed with 'colonial' style furniture?!). You can also customise most objects - changing the colour of lamps, for instance. The Sims can also do so much more with thier objects - for example, the can sit, lounge, nap or bounce on thier sofas, or 'gussy up' in the mirror. They can also cook specific meals - and there's more choices available to them each time they gain a skill point. Adult and elder sims can now, to the delight of many, I'm sure, play in bed (or 'whoo hoo!) in any bed, as well as Make Out,and Kiss. Naturally, they can also try for a baby.

Back to building, one of the things I love is the ability to have basements and attics -although I have to admit building realistic and athestically pleasing attic conversions is quite difficult. You can also have many floors, and roof terrences!
The catalogue is better organised -floors and walls are separated into different catagories, e.g. papar, paint, brick, or carpet, stone, tile etc.

The downtown, vacation islands and studio towns are all gone (as are pets, come to that) but the community lots are still available. Although these lots I have to say are rather boring - you can only build grocery and clothes shops - rather than the eleborate resurants, libraries, clubs and bars you could in the Sims 1. But hopefully they'll improve these factors a bit when the expansion packs come out.

The Create a Sim part is incredible. You can completely design your sims's face, to thier hair style, to the size of thier facial features and shape of thier face! There are also many clothing options available. It's disapointing though, that there are only the 4 basic hair colours available - black, brunette, blonde and red - you can't customise thier colour (I really wanted a purple headed punk for instance!) and you can't give them freckles!! I designed a house of my friends and designed 'us' all so realistically, apart for my freckled friend!

One thing I better warn buyers of though it the graphics and of course the high spec the game needs. I play the Sims 2 on my laptop, and I know it's not exactly a hardcore gaming machine, but the graphics do look good. However, my laptop only just meets the spec requirements, and I have to admit the game is very slow. It takes a while to load, to play the game, to zoom in and out etc, and that's with the lowest graphics settings.
However, when i play on my bro's top of the range computer, WOW! The settings look amazing, incredibly lifelike, and when you zoom in it's like being in the room with the sims! The game is also them gloriously smooth and jerk-free.

All in all, the Sims 2 is a great game, far better than the orginal in also every area. But you do need a decent computer, otherwise you'll soon get frustrated with the slowness and the jerking.
Another warning - don't play the game if you have work to do in the next few weeks because I guarentee you won't be able to tear yourself away from the game!

Not just an excellent game, but a brilliant architects tool!
What can I say? The game is even better than all the hype made it out to be!! Ok, the controls might be difficult for some to master, but the ability to build three floors, decks, re-colour objects to fit a theme, and the ageing and "genetics" features make this so much better - obviously those who aren't hardcore Sims fans may be unaware that there is a cheat to turn off ageing (Ctrl+Shift+C, type AGING OFF)

Incidentally, the powerful building and landscaping tools may serve another use if you plan to remodel your house(!) and may even spark an entire generation of young architects! The ability to completely customise how your Sims look is inspired by player feedback from the original Sims and allows you to recreate - if you so wish - your friends & family, and transplant them into a virtual reality! Also, the compatibility with SimCity 4 allows you to easily customise new neighbourhoods, but the in-game neighbourhood tools are pretty good too.

Five stars does NOT do this masterpiece justice - lets just hope Maxis and EA don't let the quality slip when it comes to the expansion packs (Superstar and Makin' Magic spring to mind...)

BUY THIS GAME!!

It's just like The Sims - but better!!
I have bought The Sims 2 and after a weekend of play I have to say that it is superb. So far, everything that was poor in The Sims 1 has been sorted out. These Sims don't get stuck when trying to get around furniture and other Sims. They have so many more interaction options and more complex characters. The graphics are amazing and building new Sims and neighborhoods is great. With sequels, you think that they can't improve on the original - but EA games have!

One WARNING that has come up before and needs mentioning again:

Check the system requirements!!!! The graphics are so much better than in The Sims 1 that you can't expect to get away with running it on a low spec PC. My machine is quite new (<1 yr old) and it needed the very latest graphics drivers for the game to run without hanging. If your machine is getting old, you may have problems, which would be a real pity, as the game is great.