Best Buy has the official release date listed on February 28th, Monday - so does Amazon. I’d assume that I’d be able to pick it up at Best Buy on Monday if it’s listed as being available then. I hope. I really want to get it on Monday, just to annoy my husband since he’s been listening to me obsess about it for weeks. I passed up Oregon Trail 5.0 last night because I’m holding out for University. If I can’t get this until Tuesday, I may just go out and get Oregon Trail anyway.
After much calling around today, nobody had it.
I asked them why it was already listed as available now on the websites and they explained that the sites listed it that way on the ship date. :rolleyes:
Got mine from Best Buy last night with no problem - the shelf was still pretty much full. Haven’t done much with it yet, City of Heroes is still taking up a good chunk of my free time.
I know there are some new objects like the guitar that people were missing from the original. There’s also a plant that resembles a cross between Audrey II and a cow, its one of the new rewards and its function is to slow down aging. Sims with a degree get on an advanced track in an existing career path or one of four new ones. Those are Paranormal, Ecology, Showbiz, and Artist.
This expansion also announces the next one - Nightlife - due out in fall. Looks like it will do for Sims 2 what Hot Date did for the original.
I have mine on preorder, but KellyM bought me a copy and the guide at best buy. We are starting from scratch because we had terminal flakiness going on. I started with the Broke family, making Gnose Broke to marry Brandy. things are going much better for all involved. I am planning to feed Angela to a cow plant at first opportunity.
P.S. The guide has an index!! I am quite pleased by that.
I got mine yesterday!
It’s glorious.
No problems so far and I’m loving all the new interactions.
I did kind of over do it for my first time playing; I moved in a family of 4 brothers and a sister, and one of the Townie teens (that basically everyone in Pleasantview has gone out with at one time or another to fill their “first kiss” and “go steady” wants ).
For some reason, one of the things I got most excited over so far is the Sims being able to buy and use cell phones! The first time I saw the machine I thought to myself, “Now why would I want to buy a one-time-use cell phone when I can just use the pay phone?”
I don’t know why I was thinking it was one time use. :rolleyes:
It’s cute when they use the mp3 player…I can totally see myself acting like that.
I like how they included the treadmill like in the console game…makes things less confusing for my husband. He’s forever looking for it to put in his sim homes.
I’ve already started one of Betty’s great grandkids down the Paranormal path so I can eventually resurrect her using the new Paranormal Career Reward.
So far, all six have made it through their first Final Exam. All passed with an A+ except for one, who got a B. That’s kind of confusing though, as it appeared that all of their meters were topped out. I’m thinking it’s not related to their moods because the first one to go and get an A+ about pissed himself and passed out when he returned, he left out in such a foul mood.
Anyone else think that the Young Adults walk funny?
Clarification: All their school meters were topped out…not mood meters.
I did try to get all the mood meters up, but the first one snuck up on me while I was shopping for cell phones.
Which reminds me…if you try go anywhere during the time the sim has to be in class, they apparently still go to class. :eek:
I didn’t notice the time and sent Simon to fool around at some shops, but when he was supposed to arrive there I couldn’t find him. I finally realized what had happened so I just waited it out to see if he would come back to the store area after his class was over.
He did.
I’ve got it - installed it last night and removed all of my downloads and hacks:(. I have to put some back in - I miss my hairstyles and funky clothes.
I have to admit, I am completely underwhelmed by the new objects and hair. I was really looking forward to having new stuff, and I’m kinda pissed we didn’t get it. I’ll have to go back to my hacks and downloads.
I do like the college thing, though. My Eliza Crichton (okay, so the first new characters I create are always in relation to Farscape - sue me) is now a sophomore with lots of grant money. I’ve decided to have her pledge a sorority this year and try to get into a band. We’ll see what I can do tonight.
I was just glad to see the pink shag hair style.
Just what my Kelly Osbourne needed.
Anyone else get a laugh at the fact they’re already advertising the next expansion pack on the back of the cd case?
Looks like a Sims 2 version of Hot Date.
We started from scratch with a fresh install
I have Dustin Broke ready to go to college. He has a 8 creativity, and is working on his 6th mechanical point. We will be sending 3 or 4 of our sims and 2 or 3 townies to college soon.
Random pranks. No, I don’t. I don’t like silly slapstick stuff IRL and I don’t like it in-game.
Influence. Honestly, peer pressure to do assholish things is one of the bad things in life - why on earth would anyone want to incorporate it into a game? It’s like my Sims are living in a START post.
2a: I made sure my Sims could afford a maid in their rental place at Uni - so why are they obsessed with telling other Sims to go clean for them?
I can appreciate that while staying in a Dorm you’re going to get people from other dorms wandering in and setting off fire alarms, and other irritating things. But when my Sims are renting a home that is unconnected to any dorms, I think the burglar alarm should catch any people letting themselves in and the police should treat them as criminals. That would be far more amusing to me than having some idiot in a costume race in and do something annoying to my Sims.
Things I do like:
The mobile phones and other electrical gizmos from the vending machine.
The new window/door and other building mode stuff.
I might have just been lucky, but the pre-generated Sims on the university campus seem less ugly than the ones in town.
It’s good that study of skills done during childhood and high school pay off with financial benefits for university. All my ‘kids’ learn how to cook really well, and also play a lot of chess.
The ability to work for cash at the drop of a hat is handy.
What I don’t get about this expansion:
It’s been pretty well established that the prime marketing base for this game is mostly teen girls and stay-at-home-mothers. (Or, in my case, stay-at-home-depressive-semi-agoraphobics, but I doubt that’s a major demographic!)
Last I checked (and admittedly, I’m not a mother), mothers spend a lot of time training their kids not to pull stupid pranks and act destructively. Where’s the appeal in a game that presents it as being great fun and a normal part of teen life? Before people pile on here with a related argument - I’m not suggesting that games like GTA cause kids to go out and steal cars. But the big difference is that real-life stealing cars and killing people is illegal and immoral and kids know that*. Non-psycho people can tell the difference between game fun and what’s just plain wrong when translated to the real world. However, pranks are neither illegal nor immoral, they’re just stupid - and teens are frequently attracted to stupid.
What’s the next expansion? Sims2: The Jackass Edition? Impress your SimFriends by performing more and more ludicrous stunts?
Basicaly, I’m:
Overwhelmingly not impressed with this expansion, though most of it is okay and I’m working around the bits I don’t like. Certainly I’m feeling disappointed after having looked forward to it so much. Basically I’m just hanging out for modthesims2.com to release a hack to allow me to lock the door of my house against any non-invited guests (they already have one for the Young Adult ‘funny walk’, btw - and it works without causing game problems as I’m using it myself).
*Speaking of which, I’d find it really funny if the jerks doing the fun-buzzer handshake type stuff happened to be sitting in a pool of water from a water balloon and electrocuted themselves and died. Or, as mentioned before, the crazed mascots got picked up by the burglar alarm and carted away by police. Or people putting detergent into the fountain found out they’d killed fish in there and had a breakdown. Consequences! That’s what this game is lacking.
Bites When Provoke, you don’t have to use your influence to be a jackass. I use it mostly to matchmake, getting sims to talk to other sims at parties. I can attest as someone who actually uses influence to get someone to clean and cook for her that there is something to being able to do that.
Things I like:
[ul]
[li]Life goals and permanent platinum. I love that since Dave Lister became Captain Hero he can always make smart milk. [/li][li]I like that there are more interactions. I think pranks are a bit annoying, but is is a motivation to have nicer sims. [/li][li]The band and additional instruments. [/li][li]That you can make money easily, even if it is not very much.[/li][li]I now have ways to get visiting sims to do things. That would have been very useful the first time around when I was working Brandi Broke as a single mom. This time I maried her off to Gnose Snifter right away. Everyone is much happier.[/li][li]Skill building in childhood has more of a reward. My sims usually have many skill points by the time they are adults. That has meant that they get to the top of their careers quickly, but it was kind of dull. Now it has rewards.[/li][li]There are reasons to have sims have their own friends and not just family friends.[/li][/ul]
Things I don’t like:
[ul]
[li]I can’t turn the cell off when my sims go to bed. Afternoon naps are impossible. [/li][li]Visiting sims who decide to perform even though they have no talent. [/li][li]My flashing blue custom objects.[/li][/ul]
giggleDave Lister as a hero? Now that’s a concept!
I do have a suggestion for the mobile phone problem. MTS2’s J.M. Pescado has a fantastic file you can pop in your downloads folder - it’s called the Phone & Taxi hack. It’s self-contained (like all their mods) so if you want to remove it at some stage you can delete it without impacting anything else. For the record, I find it better to rename the files with a consistent prefix - all the hacks/mods I’ve put in are always prefixed with HackMod_(filename) or HackObj_(filename) so I can find them in the event that something I install causes a crash. So far, I haven’t had any problems with any of them.
But, back to the phone hack. The following is a part-quote from the description:
My Sims have a phone and a mobile, and I’ve set the main phone to never ring. So consequently, the mobile never goes off either. They can still dial out perfectly well though. Oh, and you can change the settings at any time, so if you only want to turn the ringer off while your Sim snoozes, that’s perfectly do-able.
Pre-University I also had a nifty Caller ID thing installed, which told me who was calling and who they wanted to speak to. I’m looking forward to the EP version.
Is anyone else having a problem with extreme slowness? It seems like it takes about 15 minutes for a house to load now that I’ve installed University, and the gameplay is never entirely smooth. I had some slowness problems with Sims 2, but never this bad.
carterba I have noticed it is freakishly slow- particularly when I create a sim and try to move them into a lot.
Over all, I like the new stuff that comes with the Univeristy; I am underwhelmed, though. I expected LOTS of new content, but there isn’t too much.
Things I like:
The college students can woohoo.
In a dorm, there can be unlimited people, but you only have to control one.
Prepared food in the dorms.
Different parties.
Streaking (hilarious).
Things I dislike:
In a sorority, you have to control all the members living in the house (unless I’m missing something). I would like the sororities to be like a dorm.
EXTREME SLOWNESS. It’s probably just my computer, but jeez. I had to uninstall and reload the program twice because it kept freezing over and over at random spots.
My sim got in a fight with the cow. It made her sad. When my sim is sad, I am sad.
I haven’t played enough to give a detailed review, but I do agree the kids all seem to be more attractive.
I like the whole concept of the game, and I enjoy pretty much everything, except that the semesters are entirely too short. not even a full 3 days per semester? shit, my sims spend the entire TIME writing the term paper, doing homework, in class, or kissing a teacher’s ass. no parties. no fun. I could probably let them go out once a semester if I wanted them to get Cs rather than As or Bs.
I don’t use cheats, but for once, man, I really wish somebody’d come up with one to fix this. some sort of freeze-time function, like the “Aging Off” thing, only for semester-time. otherwise, it’s really just kind of a chore.
).
I’m thinking it’s not related to their moods because the first one to go and get an A+ about pissed himself and passed out when he returned, he left out in such a foul mood.
