This thread brought to you by: RESTAURANTS.

It takes forever. Ordering is annoying. Half the time the waiter spills food in my lap. I think I would be less annoyed if that happened to me IRL, because, look, my dates are on a time limit here.

Also: grills on public property. I swear to god, if I have to look at another platter of burnt hot dogs making its rounds around the park.

I recently figured out the ordering at restaurants thing. I forgot I knew this before, but as soon as I place my sim's order I go back to click on the waiter and select Done Ordering. He'll then finally write down everyone's order and get food out quickly. Also agree about the grills. I usually remove them. Who needs a grill at the back of a clothing store??

There is at least a mod (with different speed options) that gets customers seated faster in restaurants http://www.insimenator.org/index.ph...dr9p7jr2sgt6rk3.

It's an older mod, but I use it (the 50% one) with all EP's and SP's, a bunch of other mods and have not had any issues.

I don't play restaurants anymore. Part of the reason is that I usually don't play community lots. But restaurants, in particular, really bug me. I never could figure out how to get the people to sit together.

To get them to sit together, the group has to be on an official outing, either a date or a group outing, which can be either timed or "just for fun." The key is that they have to be in a defined group. Otherwise, the game doesn't know that they're together. Of course, if it's a large group and the restaurant doesn't have any big tables, they still won't all be seated together in one big group, but they'll be clustered in smaller groups at smaller tables. So, if you want a couple and their kids to go to a restaurant to have a meal, you have to set them up as a group at some point before anyone requests to be seated. Then, they will be seated together as a family.

As for features I'm not really big on...Wedding parties. It's probably because I'm big-splashy-wedding-averse in real life. To me, they're just more of a pain in the butt to set up than they're worth, especially if you're doing it to take pics, and you want guests to behave and sit in chairs while the wedding is going on rather than...Oh, I don't know, maybe having a pillow fight in the aisle. So yeah, pretty much all of my "weddings" are private ones. Often they take place in bathrooms with the partners in various states of undress.

On the other hand, I really like pixel wedding dresses for some reason. I have a big collection of them in my game that never get used in an actual wedding; I just occasionally dress someone up as a pretty-pretty-princess kind of bride and take pictures of them. My brain is a weird place.

But but but.... the hot dogs are not ALWAYS burnt....
and the waiter seems okay if you order for all - gets mixed up with too many orders, I think

and I love both of these

Zombies.
Pregnant male sims. ((Pascal is always the exception - but I just pretend the baby was dropped off on the doorstep since I can't unpregnant him and still keep his alien sprogs)).

I just can't. I mod both out of my game whenever possible.

The supernatural sims (zombies, witches, etc). I want to like them but they're so very underutilized and incomplete. Some of them don't have full age states. I love the supernatural stuff in the other games, but TS2 it's hard to enjoy.

^ this;
though I really dislike the whole "supernatural" stuff and clean any game from this as much as it is possible in either S2 or S3.
I understand why it is there and that it can be for many players an attraction, just not for me. It never really fits in my gameplay, and whenever I actually would have some use of "supernaturalities" the way how they're portrayed and played in games is just so wrong on so many levels (procreating dead corpses - like vampires ? It's completely new level of Fear the Walking Dead) that it's pointless and futile. My tribal witches/sorcerers/shamans are just sims with particular occupation and influence, like chiefs or hunters, not an actual "species".

Just a reminder: servers don't have to approach your Sims to get an order. Just click on them.

I don't let anyone else get alien pregnant either. Not 'cause I hate aliens, but mostly the means how it was done. I guess technically you could terminate his alien baby with the sim blender as soon as the lot is first loaded. Never did it myself.

Not that I want to drag this off-topic completely, but I'm curious as to the "how it was done" bit. I know the game implies "probing" because that's a pop-culture joke, but it would obviously have to be far more than that, changing male internal anatomy entirely since they have nothing like a uterus. (Unless, of course, Sim internal anatomy is completely different from human internal anatomy.) I've always imagined some sort of magical chamber where the person's body is rearranged and implanted with a zygote created in a way that doesn't involve copulation. Now, I suppose if that process was done without consent, that'd be objectionable, but there's no way to know about that, so....I dunno. In the end, I like seeing Sims waddle around regardless of sex, so I'm OK with all of them potentially doing it. But, you know, to each their own.

Another thing I'm not entire fond of in the game: Dating. Not the concept in general so much as the execution in-game. I don't like that they're timed so that there's this pressure to move them along to the next level quickly. But I really don't like that they all end up being alike, if you go by wants. There's the first stage where there's chatting and joking and playful interactions, then you get the dancing wants, then there's the flirting and kissing and backrub wants, and if you get past those, there's the making out and woohooing ones. All the same. I dread getting the "50 dream dates" LTW because after like 5 or 10 all-the-same dates to get it up to "Dream" level, I want to spork out my eyeballs and chop off my mouse-hand fingers. I tried to change things up by turning dates into two-person, just-for-fun outings, but then the more romantic wants don't roll up, so it doesn't really feel like a date and they don't count toward wants/LTWs that way, either. Sometimes I'll do a couple outing-dates and if the pair seems compatible I'll then send them on a "real" date...but then it's back to the same-old, and...ugh.

Honestly, I kinda prefer those neighborhoods I have where there is no dating and all relationships are randomly-assigned or arranged.

Uni. Takes way too long, way to boring and repetitive. I skip it.

Apartments, waay to buggy for me.

Roomates, A.I. controlled Sims are an instant NOPE.

Vacation. Every now and then it's fun, but it's such a bother that Sims don't age while on vacations.

Restaurants I like, I just don't like running them. It's near impossible for a restaurant to break even for the day, much less pay back the investment in the lot. That being said, I'm forcing myself to finally reach level 10 with a restaurant. Keeps my skills sharp, I guess. I'm also hoping I'll find a way to make them easier. In this particular restaurant's defense though, I really like the lot itself so I kinda tolerate it. It's Art Déco, of course I have to like it.

Day i-lost-count-too-long-ago of waiting to reach level 10. I'm currently at level 7.

Seconding for the Roommates - I never use that feature. When I want two sims to be roommates, I simply move one in with the other. I hate how roommates are uncontrollable, and you can only interact with them in a limited fashion. I like to be able to control alllll my sims - probably why I play so slowly.

I haven't played with roommates in a while, but IIRC, controlpets works on them as well.

The hobby chance cards and "this sim lost interest in this hobby". I DON'T CARE WHAT THEY'RE FREAKING INTERESTED IN!

Yes, it does. Apparently, the same AI is used for both. Of course, that might not help people who don't have Pets installed because I don't think that cheat was "carried forward" with later EPs. But maybe it was; I really don't know.

With owned restaurants, I think the problem is that people start too big. They build/place a fully-kitted-out large restaurant, have a Sim buy it (putting them into massive debt, if one does loans and the purchasing Sim isn't independently wealthy), then hire a bunch of employees. That doesn't work at all. Especially in the beginning when you only get three customers at a time and they can be harder to convince to take a seat. Then you have employees that you're paying to do nothing. I think the only way it really works is to start small. Just a couple tables. Have the owner (plus his/her household, if any) do all the jobs. Employees suck the profit right out of the whole thing. Even if the owner has no household that can help him/her, they can do all the jobs at first if you keep things small. Sell a customer on taking a seat, seat them, then take their order, then go cook it, then deliver it and while they're eating schmooze the next person into taking a seat, etc. It works pretty well. Then, once you gain a few levels, expand the restaurant a little and hire ONE employee to do one of the jobs. (I usually hire a server, because they seem to expect the lowest pay.) Have the owner still do the other jobs. Then once you gain another level or two, hire ONE more employee. The second one I hire is usually a host. Keep doing that until you eventually have that big, fully-kitted bar/restaurant.

But I, personally, never hire cooks. The owner always ends up doing that job, because in my head that's WHY they opened the restaurant, because they're into cooking. I can't imagine any restaurant owner being really "into" being a server or a host or a bartender. Well, OK, maybe I can see them being into being a bartender (in the real world, anyway, not so much in the game where there's no socializing as part of bartending), but the other functions? Nah.

Always order "Chef's Choice". The Chef picks out everybody's favorite food, and it's 1-click shopping.

The thing i find irritating about weddings is the toast. There's just WAY too many servings to that bottle, and they NEVER stop toasting, making it very difficult to get through any of the other wedding traditions. It also always irritated me that there's no father-daughter dance option. Sims can't slow-dance with relatives, cuz it's considered "romantic". But a father-daughter dance at a wedding is almost required.

I also can't stand how frequently the grand vampires bite NPCs. Most of my sims carry around vamprocillin-D just in case... but I STILL have no idea what makes some sims susceptible to be influenced to drink it, while other sims are not.

I think the BIGGEST irritant, to me, is the amount of fist-fighting going on on community lots, disrupting everything I'm trying to get my sims to do. I hate when i have a tired sim FINALLY make it through the queue to order espresso, then as soon as he sits down, Allyn McCauley bitch-slaps Lilith Pleasant, and my sim chugs his coffee to watch these broads manhandle each other. Cancel, cancel, cancel... it respawns. Now my sim just blew §20 on coffee that he chugged and he's way too tired to buy another cup.


-gE
>=)

The most common advice I read about owned restaurants is that it needs to be a family/household business to be really profitable.

Have you ever seen the description of the '50 Dream Dates' memory? They knew it was a slog. :D

I won't have zombies in my game, I really don't like them.
I don't really like most Family LTWs or big wants either, most seem to be a bit selfish. So many are about their kids needing to do something, like go to University, marry or having kids themselves. You could also argue that having 6 kids or more can be bad for the children themselves, since the the parents need to divide their attention through so many and the eldest children often need to help their parents raise their siblings. Good thing psychological issues aren't a thing in the Sims 2.

I'm not very happy about parties and outings because of the scoring system. Instead of opportunities for socializing and fun the best strategy is to invite people who are already friends and have no fun stuff around unless it also builds social. Sims end up not liking outings or parties no matter how much fun they had if they didn't socialize enough. The household also ends up doing a lot of boring social interactions instead of having fun, which is maybe realistic but doesn't seem like a Sim way to do it for me. On outings, the best places to go are parks without a lot of chess tables (it builds social but you can't control who plays against who, often they play with someone not in the outing) or very simple lots. To be fair, treating everyone to a meal on an Outing does seem to raise the score and I just pick 'Chef's Choice' or give everyone the same meal to keep the cost reasonable.
And a small complaint: the Influence system. It works fine for making sims clean up or go take a shower, but suggesting to do anything social is horrible. Almost without fail the influenced sim will pick a Talk or Joke option that offends the sim they barely know.

I"m sorry to have to inform everyone that I am that weirdo who does not really like Pets?
If the animals were more realistic than EA did, it would have helped, but the range of motions, etc is just so darn limiting.
Not to mention boring.

Have no desire to play supernaturals, I just can't muster up any excitement for it and it's been 15 years.

Birthday Parties - I don't throw these anymore, I never really liked them. If I want to have a bunch of sims celebrate a birthday, I just invited them over/teleport in the close friends or family (for a child or adult - teens go off to college and don't have birthdays anymore) and have them blow out candles on their own time and not the time limit or the judgy scoring. Hey my party has a cake and that's good enough for me!

Scored Outings - I always do just for fun, it's more natural to me to play while not being timed/scored.

What does it say?

I think Pets are a MAJOR BORE! They're irritating.They annoy me. i have a dog, IRL and she's been one of the best things in my life. I wouldn't trade her for the world! But Sims' dogs? Ugh. Every Sims iteration, the PETS version is always the BIGGEST disappointment!

As for outings, the "ask" feature seems to boost your score rather rapidly, for some reason. Ask a sim 4x "what do you want?" and you should get to, or pretty close to, the next level. Somebody interrogating me would not increase my fun level... i'd feel kinda violated. But sims seem to LOVE it! "Let's go downtown and play 20 Questions!" YIPPIE!!

I find the best place for outings is a bowling alley with a restaurant. Usually pretty easy to up the score, as they socialize while bowling, then get hungry and socialize while eating. Just make sure after you eat, you go pee, and wash your hands til everybody has a chance to go.

New Years Parties SUCK, because somebody ALWAYS turns the stereo on between 10pm and midnight, and the cops come and kick everybody out. It's New Years Eve. If somebody calls 911 about noise, tell 'em to get bent!

I could SWEAR, that at one time EA's manuals had a thing you could register for, where they would send you a "tip" for your game via email, and that one time I read something about throwing parties on community lots. Unfortunately, i can't find the email or any evidence that any "register for game tips" thing ever existed, nevermind finding the email or being able to move a party to a community lot. But why the hell CAN'T they have a birthday party at the bowling alley or the roller rink?


-gE
>=)

I don't think Pets were fleshed out enough to be worth the hassle (and don't get me started on that dog that's forever trapped in that pen). If I didn't have UC, and if it weren't for the control pets cheat and toddlers being able to use pet beds, I'd uninstall the pack. The control pets cheat is important because vacation guests don't always try the new activities on their own. You accepted a free trip and flew all the way to Twikki Island, you have a want to swim in the ocean and you're currently at the beach, but you're going to play red hands instead? So, that's another feature I don't really like but at least it's fixable.