Did the sims team remove whims?

I think they made them optional, so (I'm not sure about this, because I've only been building since the patch) you can go into game options and switch them on or off?

No, it's still there. To activate them, go to Options Menu, then Game Options, then Game Play. On there you will find a box to check that says Show Whims: By default, it is turned off. It is on the right side. Personally, I'm very happy they gave us an option of if we want it or not because most of the time I don't bother with them, and now I have less stuff cluttering my screen. :)

Wow, I'm shocked. I haven't updated because I want to keep my mods, but I honestly did not expect whims to be made optional. I love having them, except when it's stupid things like "buy a 1x1 pool" every sim day. Having said that, for those people who don't care for whims, it's great that they can be removed. Options are great. :)

Have to say I am a bit puzzled by this change, since the whims were easy enough to ignore already. What's the advantage of turning them off?

I actually pursue the whims though. Sure, some of them don't make sense and some don't trigger properly (*coughmarrysimcough*), but they do give me ideas if they make sense and I'm in the mood.

And I just cancel the whim if it's something like flirting with your father-in-law, which is gross

Thanks! I don't actually mind them being off, I was just curious if I had a bug or not. (Didn't want to post in the bugs forum for something that is intentional :))

I have ignored them for a long time. I don't mind them being there visually, but I just don't need them for my game, so being able to turn them off is a good thing for a cleaner UI. I think they are too small, compared to TS3 where wants were a little bigger things to do, or at least they sort of progressed with the sim's development which made them fee personal. They seem to small and random in TS4, but as I didn't pay much attention they might of course have improved a lot as more packs are added. I only use them for "whims challenges".