I have been playing Angela Pleasant, now Smith, for a while. She's a happy mother of three children, two of which are about to turn into teenagers. With the current sale I have been considering buying High School years and turn my attention over to the twins for a while. I am, however, hesitant, because I have heard so many negative things about HSY, including people wishing they had never bought it, so now I'm asking. With the patches and fixes that has been so far - is it worth buying or is it like Dine out so riddled with bugs that I should give up on the idea?What are your experiences? Good and bad, should I buy the pack?

I never planned to use most of the High school pack. I bought it after watching a werewolf teen video on youtube, and also for the build items. I ended out following a teen to school, out of curiosity, and I am glad that I did. I still have not had interest to fully explore the game play and the world, but it has become a critical supplement to my other worlds. It was the last expansion/game pack that I purchased, but it would be one of the first I'd purchase if I had to start over again. I highly recommend it, for people that can afford it.

Honestly, my favorite aspect of the pack is having access to my teens throughout the day. Active high school only has 2 hours of classes out of a 7-hour school day. So for a player who tends to focus on their teen sims a lot, it's great to be able to go with them to high school (which we can custom-build like crazy) and, during those 5 hours they're not in class, work on relationships or skills or generally just develop them as characters. Graduating early is a nice option for similar reasons. Being able to go to university as a teen provides a nice balance for the amount of lifespan that university can take up.The pack provides many more opportunities for teen sims to meet other teens too, whether at school or a boba tea shop or prom. Rabbithole school is still available when desired.The premades are cool.My real-life human teen loves the build/buy. And the boba.A lot of the other stuff that came with the pack - Social Bunny, Trendi, the pier (what's a beach-style pier doing in an old mining town anyway?!), the whole influencer thing, pillow fights confined to one bed object - got old really fast. Edit: For your question about bugs, you should see the current list of HSY bugs here.https://answers.ea.com/t5/Bug-Reports/READ-FIRST-Compiled-list-of-reported-Issues/m-p/11673025#M223852The truly objectionable ones (like adult-child romance bars developing) have been fixed. People randomly wandering into my house to demand to be best friends or go to prom is something I find a little annoying, and is not fixed yet. If the high school graduation event were important to me, I'd be annoyed, because it often just doesn't happen, and even the designed timing is odd-- it's like the first or second Sunday after the student ages up to young adult, which could easily be after the sim is already married with kids.

I love the concept of the high school and was excited for it. It’s just not as engaging. I use the build stuff frequently but since Cassandra Goth got expelled during a scanario I just haven’t played it again. If there’s a teen in the household I just select ‘send alone’.

I mean...On sale, I guess it's worth it, the pack does not have any larger bugs as far as I know. If you like to make outfits with trendi, use the gen z inspired clothing and also want more rabbit holes for your teens (jobs and after school activities) and maybe you would like to build some rooms for your teen sims and maybe build high schools then it's worth it.But the actual high school gameplay is very simplified and repetitive and it doesn't help that prom is happening every week. The social bunny app is just posting the same messages over and over as well.

I like playing around at the Thrift tea store. The teens create fun fashions and sell them. Like a mini entrepreneur game. The pack is at better then the snooze fest of university. I think the team listened to us. I haven’t experienced any bugs. Like most packs, I’ve played a few times and then got bored and went back to my regular play style. I think it’s worth it on the current sale.

High School Years - yes or no? | EA Forums

36 Replies

Sharooonia
Seasoned Ace
3 years ago
It's the worst expansion pack for me. Gameplay wise it's fairly barren and what bit of gameplay there is, it mostly functions quite poorly. The CAS, World and B&B are all nice though.
PenguinFoop
3 years ago
I too was hesitant about it but the body hair is what really sold me. I like the idea of going through body changes. It adds some depth to the struggle that teens face. Speaking of face, acne, am I right? Anyway, so following them to school, interacting in their daily academia and molding them are fun.

A negative is all the prom! In my opinion, prom should be held way less frequently! Prom every weekend??? That takes away the significance of it. Of course, doing prom without seasons could be difficult if it wasn't just a Saturday thing because there would be no season to associate with. And you can't have high-school without prom.

Other than that, I really do enjoy this pack.

Remember, there will always be those that regret buying something. It's called Buyer's Remorse and it is a real thing. So my suggestion is listen to the why, not just the what. And, always wait when a new pack drops. There will always be bugs in the new pack since most often corporate wants them dropped quickly to get the return on investment, players are no longer just players, we've become unpaid (and worse we pay for) testers. So you have a 1k people (just a number example) buy the game, play the game, find the problems and in a perfect world, you then fix the game. The problem is, the rushed sale leads to more and more bugs not being caught before release.

And the devs are caught in the middle. Corporate says hurry up and release then players say hurry up and fix and devs get overly stressed. It's not a Sims thing, it's a gaming industry thing. Corporate-funded games cannot possibly be fun to work on. Sorry, ranting now.

But yeah, HSY is a fun pack.
LaunchSneezes
Seasoned Ace
3 years ago
"PenguinFoop;c-18276976" wrote:
Speaking of face, acne, am I right? .

I also disabled acne lol. I think it's funny (not a bad funny, just funny because we have different perspectives) that you want the teens to go through real life struggles - the teen years were terrible for me irl, even decades later I cannot bear to relive those years. :# My issues had a lot to do with early-onset mental illnesses, which a lot of kids did not have to experience, though. But still, I don't need any reminders... :D
PenguinFoop
3 years ago
"fujicakes1;c-18276988" wrote:
"PenguinFoop;c-18276976" wrote:
Speaking of face, acne, am I right? .

I also disabled acne lol. I think it's funny (not a bad funny, just funny because we have different perspectives) that you want the teens to go through real life struggles - the teen years were terrible for me irl, even decades later I cannot bear to relive those years. :# My issues had a lot to do with early-onset mental illnesses, which a lot of kids did not have to experience, though. But still, I don't need any reminders... :D

Yeah, my HS experience was bad too which led to a crippling anxiety disorder with acute panic debilitating dysfunction so I know somewhat where you're coming from. But I don't think this is the time or place for me to go into it. So suffice it to say that HSY is a welcome change from what my experience was and that's why I enjoy all of the aspects of it... except prom every freaking weekend and Heaven forbid you decide to skip one time because your bf/gf will hold a grudge!

"Malcolm, it was one prom and three weekends ago! Let it go already! Sheesh! And let me remind you that you didn't invite me to it either!" ? ? ? ?

Anyway, sorry for the interruption.
LaunchSneezes
Seasoned Ace
3 years ago
@PenguinFoop No sorry needed from you, I'm sorry for bringing that up - I didn't think about it sounding serious until I just re-read it. :# Oops!! So sorry. I thought it would be funny because I am super sleep deprived lol.
PenguinFoop
3 years ago
"fujicakes1;c-18277045" wrote:
@PenguinFoop No sorry needed from you, I'm sorry for bringing that up - I didn't think about it sounding serious until I just re-read it. :# Oops!! So sorry. I thought it would be funny because I am super sleep deprived lol.

Ah yeah, fatigue loves to play with the mind. Lol

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