I am using MCCs Population part. So that the unplayed people in my town don't just grow old and die, but marry, get children and so an. As I let the mod do it's job, sometimes funny things happen. For example Vladius Straud married the poorest women in Forgotten Hollow he could find - and moved from his castle into her starter home. When they even got a kid I decided to play them as well.
I can really recommend playing more than one family at a time. I always prefered the long life duration, as the normal one always was a little bit too short for me. But long life duration is so much longer, that now it is too long for me. The game always got boring as I finished my aspirations too early and as soon as you choose a new one the character of a sim changes also (what I don't want). But if you play like 3 families, you share the lifetime of your sims and don't fulfill each ones aspirations that fast.
Within one family or sim I also focus on that gamepack. So if I play the Vatores or Strauds, I focus on Vampires (an on Get Famous, as Caleb Vatore got an actor). My next Sim likes Star Craft, so when he is travelling there with his father or twin sister, I fokus on that pack (while his father - cooking aspiration - is heading for all recipes there).
Now it's the next fun part as I have to decide who my sims will marry. As I didn't check the aspirations of the future groommates before, there will be some surprises as soon as the kids of my favourite family move out to start a new life.
And always when I planned some stuff, MCC is changing everything for me (e.g. the women I wanted to marry just married someone else).
