The old, but changing, lifespan debate: How old is a Sim?

I based my custom ages on some very specific math, and it works out really well for making sure families don’t drift too far apart in age, though it does make some of the younger stages more challenging to get anything meaningful done before aging up.

This is based around pregnancy where 1 trimester is approximately 3 months, so 9 months = 3 sim days, therefore 1 year = 4 days. Then I kind of divided all my sim life stages into how I felt best represented that stage. It’s a little stereotypical but it works.

But to save myself the boredom of having super long life stages, I cut all the numbers in half. (I.e. toddler is 3 years long IMO, but that would be 12 long days, so I cut in half to 6)

Newborn: 0-3 months = 1 sim day
Infant: 3 months-1 year = 3 sim days
Toddler: Age 2-5 = 6 sim days
Child: Age 6-12 = 12 sim days (I’m actually probably going to change this to 13 since that’s default anyway)
Teen: Age 13-19 = 12 sim days (this may also change to 14 to give an even 2 weeks for High School Years gameplay)
Young Adult: Age 20-34 = 28 sim days
Adult: Age 35-59 = 48 sim days
Elder: Age 60+ (U.S. avg lifespan is like 79?) = 38 sim days

This works for me because realistically we do spend a greater portion of our lives in adulthood compared to anywhere else. Having 21 days as a teen doesn’t really make a lot of sense except to stretch out the HSY gameplay.

It also gives sims enough time to complete University in either 3 or 4 semesters without aging up. If you finish early in 3, cool, you get an extra week of young adulthood.
If you take all 4? Well that’s fine. Some people go to college for their whole 20’s, especially if you’re in med school, law, or post-grad.

Here is how I perceive the different age groups. This based on the sims appearance and abilities, not the number of days in game.

Baby: 0 to 5 months
infant : 5 months to 2,5 years
Toddlers 2,5 to 6 years
children : 6 to 12 years
Teens : 15 to 18 years
Young adults : 18 to 40
Adults : 40 to 65
Elders : 65+

Note on teens. I left a bit of a gap between children and teens on purpose because that is how I experience aging in the sims at the moment. I think the teens in sims 4 are too tall and can do to much adult activities to pass as 12 to 14 year olds.

65 used to be the official age to retire around here for years (now 67) so I think that change in life seems fitting for the beginning of the elder lifestage but I think it can vary depending on the sim.

I base it on my kids and our family LOL

Newborn 0 to 5 months (eat, sleep and poop)
Infant 6 months to 1 year (I based it on the age of crawling, standing up and eating foods)
Toddlers 1 year to 5 years (based on from when they walk and talk to just before starting "big" school)
Children 5 to 12 ( based on our primary school years that are for children)
Teens 13 to 17 (Based on secondary school years and when the parents start getting gray hairs)
Young adults 18 to 30 (My daughter is very self sufficient and in Uni at age 18, sims start Uni as young adults)
Adults 30 to 60 (I guess that is when the bills start and hopefully end for the next life stage to be care free)
Elders 60 plus (Now its time to relax and enjoy all the fruits of your years of labor)

I'm amazed how many people think the child stage is as old as 12 or 13. There is no way that those kids look a day over ten to me. I think of them as occupying a very narrow age range from around 8-10. Maybe 7-11 at an absolute stretch.

Infants, so far, seem to me about four months to one year old, maybe a year and a half, based on both appearance and the milestones they are achieving. Toddlers seem to be roughly 2-4. So yeah, I feel like there's a big gap between toddlers and kids, and then again between kids and teens. Teens I think could be maybe 14 or 15, through 18-ish. Young adults seem to be roughly 18 to... maybe 28? Possibly even 30, I suppose. Because...

"Sim2Spore;c-18245191" wrote:

Some people go to college for their whole 20’s, especially if you’re in med school, law, or post-grad.

Sooo true. Literally me. Finished my last degree when I was 30. So I guess I was arguably not a full adult until then.

From there on, it makes more sense. Adulthood lasting roughly from 30 to around 60 seems reasonable. Also, unlike the younger life stages, there are more cosmetic ways to age up or age down your adult sims, with wrinkles, receding hairlines, etc., which can soften the transition from adult to elder, especially if you add them to your sim gradually over time. (Sobs again, also true to life.)

I'm playing tons of households on rotation, so the simyear had to be long. I guess this would be different if I mainly played one house. I have 1 series of 4 seasns each 4 weeks = 1 sim year (28x4=112 simdays).

I play with aging off, turning it back on for New Years Eve only, so I keep full control of their birthdays. Lots of cakes are consumed...

I go by these lifestages:

Newborn/Infant: Age 0-2 (depending on family)
Toddler: Age 2-6
Child: Age 6-13
Teen: 13-25
YA: 25-40
A: 40-70
E:70->

I don't own GrT (yet) so I'm not dealing with milestones, but even if I get the pack I will not care a lot about milestones, as I'm generally not a family player.

I try to stop by each house minimum every 3rd simyear. There might be new sims not really being played as newborn/infant at all.

double

newborn: 0
infant: 1-2
child: 10-12
teen: 17-18
young adult: 20-30
adult: 40-50
elder: 62+

They seem to have boosted every life stage to the end of that stage, which is kind of sad. It seems like chunks of time are just missing.

Toddlers age straight up to pre-teens, and teens are nearly indistinguishable from adults, except they still go to school. They made the infants stage to give us back that bit of really learning to do things which used to be part of toddlers (they used to crawl until they learned to walk, etc), but an infants stage still leaves gaps. It's jarring to age up to the end of the next stage instead of the beginning. Hopefully in the next Sims version they can work on that.

Based on how they feel ingame:

Newborn: 1 month (the "old man face" is a real 1-month-old baby thing)
Infant (basegame): 7 months
Toddler: 2 years
Child: 11 years
Teen: 16 years
Young adult: 22 years
Adult: 45 years
Elder: 75 years

baby: 0-1

infant: 1-2

toddler: 3-5

child: 6-12

teen: 13-17

young adult: 18-40

adult: 40 - 70

elder: 70 -100
probably immortal: 100 - ?