I was fortunate enough to receive the latest Sims 2 expansion pack, ‘Seasons’ a week ago, as a present from Kheri. Weather and changing seasons have been a fairly constant part of many of our films, through the magic of pre-production tools or just plain “cheating” with themed custom content, so we’ve been really excited about this particular EP.

As is usual with the release of a new EP, Kheri and I spend time playing the game to get acquainted with all the new animations, content and quirks typical to the Sims. Might be a surprise to some, but I play the game in my playable ‘hood almost hack and cheat free, as opposed to my movie-making ‘hood, carefully raising six challenge families! No longer ghetto trash, my Simmies have moved out of the downtown district into a serene coastal town, complete with fields and farmland.

As I’m sure most people know, it’s got everything from snow, rain, hail, lightning, falling leaves and activities such as fishing, growing your own farm produce. As is typical of previous EPs, we have new ways to kill, torture or maim our Sims.I’ve yet to see it myself, but they can spontaneously combust (see the pic from Kheri’s game after one of her sims stayed too long in the hot tub!) if they overheat or freeze, get struck by lightning or even freeze to death. Each aspect of the new gameplay is amazingly well developed. I really marvelled at the snow…first it began with a gradual light dusting to the full Christmas card look, with the roof covered realistically and Sims having to trudge through the drifts, leaving a trail as they go, while the wind howls outside.

Down to the nitty gritty of what’s in it for Sims 2 machinimators…I have to put this one up there with Nightlife, as an essential to the base game for movie-makers. Seasons not only gives us weather, but it alters the lighting according to season. The skies and sea darken during a storm for example, the lighting changes and it’s especially noticeable I think during Autumn, the sky has that autumnal tinge to it and the light changes again. I didn’t uninstall Gunmod’s Radiance Lighting mod, so I can’t say how this affects the changes, but it’s still working in my game even with the mod installed. It’s easy to rave about these seemingly unremarkable changes when you’ve been used to filming exterior scenes with blue skies and sunshine, whether you wanted it or not!

Another great looking graphical touch that’s a big improvement (well, I’m assuming it’s new, as I hadn’t noticed this before I updated my drivers), but the pool water now has reflections and the pool walls can be easily painted without using boolprop. Apart from one new cheat in connection with the bug jars, I haven’t discovered any new cheats to help with movie-making, aside from some shortcuts for the boolprop/moveobjects on..they may have been there already, I’m not sure, but they’re very useful and the list of cheats be found by typing in help in the ingame cheat window.

Sims 2 modders are busy updating existing hacks or releasing new Seasons specific ones. Two excellent mods I’ve come across are:

Jaydee’s Seasons Animation Box..similar to her excellent OFB animation inducer

contains 140 interactions from the Seasons EP - fishing, playing catch, snowball fight, skating tricks, new pool interactions, reacting to weather, freezing & much more. (Usable only by adults, teenagers and elders)

The second is from Sim Wardrobe. Sims 1 players most likely remember Paladin from Sim Wardrobe for his wonderful Sims programs that transformed the game for so many of us and it’s great to see he’s now creating content for the Sims 2.
The Seasons Weather Controller allows you to change the current season and the season’s length. There is also an option to make weather and even turn weather off altogether.

The only disappointment I have, it’s really minor, but what a pity you can’t tame the penguin and make him a family pet

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