I just found out LazyDuchess is apparently 23, which makes me feel like a total slacker. I also think of people as their avatars. Which is silly, because I don't think my own avatar represents me, I just picked something in my recent pics that fit the tiny size requirement. Speaking of which, I keep thinking I should probably update my avatar, since the sim in my avatar is now a mother of 2.


Even with all the tech issues being reported, it has been nice to see so many new (or old) players coming back to the Sims 2 and enjoying it. I was scrolling through TikTok and there have been so many people playing Sims 2 on Live lately. It used to be a rarity to come across.

Gosh the bird AI... it drove me nuts. I had a parrot and that parrot occasionally flied around the room. But then it froze right by the door. Wouldn't move and blocked access. I had to nuke the spot... and lost the parrot. Twice.

Those were fun days, when a new EP was released and before it was patched. The modders on this site and elsewhere worked hard to fix all the bugs (such as the bug where the remote controlled car NPC would become corrupted), and then a week later EA would release a patch to fix it, which would work but would also break a whole bunch of other things.

They always seemed to mess up piano fun; that was broken and unbroken time and time again! And we had to constantly update mods and cc... now with the legacy version it's like deja vu!

I hope the UE version got the dang parrot patched.

But at least there used to be (roughly) one patch per pack/EP, and not a new patch every other day or so

I'm still wondering if EA is incapable of playtesting their games/patches/changes. I can understand there are going to be the odd bug that happens once in a blue moon when stars align just so - but the amount of bugs that easily could've been discovered on a simple playthrough with the LC is just crazy. Seems you don't even have to play for very long to encounter them.

Back in the old days it wasn't easy to patch the game. I don't think I ever patched the Sims 2. I do remember my excitement when there was suddenly a sledgehammer tool! I installed some stuff pack and there it was. I remember patching Warhammer 40k and Company of Heroes manually by downloading from Patches & Scrolls. No auto-updating. Warcraft III only updated if you logged onto Battle.Net.

For TS2 I think they just released patches as EXE files (installers of sorts) you could run. They weren't difficult to use. They're still available for download.

I'm not sure I patched my disc game, but I honestly can't quite remember. It's been too long... Probably didn't on my first laptop. The only bug I 100% know I had that could be fixed with a patch was an issue with some overlays on the drawing board that came with FT. If the table had been in use, pictures taken ingame (C-button) would have an ugly overlay on them.

The UC comes pre-patched, so didn't need to do anything there.

If you installed any EP past NL you patched the game.

EA installed patches on the EP's after and they were automatically applied.

Not necessarily. Could depend on install order, and which packs you had. Skipping packs, installing out of order, or not having the newer packs could mean the patches weren't installed properly. If you for instance had FT as the newest by release EP (I did for a while, because my old laptop would've likely caught on fire if I'd tried installing more on it), then FT wouldn't be patched (hence my issue with the FT drawing board - I didn't install the FT patch). I think the FT patch might have been included with AL and possibly M&G, but I don't think AL and/or M&G had patches for themselves.

Apartment Life was the highest expansion I had as a kid, if I recall correctly. So I probably did have the patches. I did get the UE when it was released for free so I should have had most patches. Not that it helped the parrot.

Family Fun Stuff had a particularly nasty bug, where clothing items would vanish from the CAS catalog when your sims purchased them. As far as I know, that patch wasn't included in the later EP patches as it is a stuff pack.

I didn't have that stuff pack. I think I had like H&M and IKEA as far as Stuff packs went.