But, do you want to know the saddest thing? When it comes to comparing TS2 and TS4 in terms of hardware demands vs. features offered, base game for base game and pack for pack, TS2 still comes out head-and-shoulders above TS4 most of the time.
The TS2 base game still offers more features and versatility in both build/buy and live modes than TS4's base.
TS2's "Pets" expansion still delivers more gameplay punch in terms of features, gameplay, and unlockables than TS4's "Cats & Dogs" expansion for the increase in hardware demands it adds to the game.
TS2's "Apartment Life" EP gives players witchcraft, ceilings and the ability to paint them, and the ability to build your own apartment buildings while TS4's "City Living" gives you apartments you can barely edit that only exist in one town with no ability to create your own apartment buildings anywhere else in the game, festivals, and a few activities and jobs which really could have just as easily been in the base game (one of which was advertised as a base game thing early on, messed-up enough).
There's no proper comparison in terms of TS2's "Open for Business" and TS4's "Get to Work" from my experience because they have radically different focuses. OFB is more about running a retail shop while GTW is more focused on the active careers, and neither of them really shines to me from my experiences. The best things from GTW are the Scientist career and aliens with the Doctor career being dull as dirt and the Detective career being fun if you're playing a bad cop but still painfully repetitive because every case is exactly the same, and maybe I'm playing OFB's retail shops wrong or something since most fans of the pack are quite taken with OFB's retail system, but I just can't get the hang of it for the life of me!
The only EP from TS4 so far that seems to be a remotely close power-to-features bargain to its TS2 counterpart is "Get Together", but that's only because of how nice Windenburg is, the addition of the Foosball table and arcade machine as activities my sims can enjoy together, how adorable my Teen vampire sim looks DJ-ing (He's so precious. It's priceless.), and how much the clubs system and certain new social interactions contribute to gameplay. However, "Night Life" did add restaurants, bowling, and cars, which still makes it the better deal in the end.
TS4 vs. TS2 is proof that it isn't the power of the system a game is made for that determines the quality of the game, but how well-planned and well-organized the game is on the development side. Heck, some might go, "But TS2 has less advanced graphics", but comparing TS2's graphics on the highest settings with TS4's graphics, the only things really different for me are the visual style and color palate...and the fact that TS4 generates pear people instead of dumpling-heads.
