What exactly is 'Generations'?

"elelunicy;c-17713504" wrote:

"@So_Money;c-17713482" wrote:

"TamakiSakura84;c-17713477" wrote:
Generations is a family player's dream pack.

Some of things included:

• imaginary friends
  
• prom
  
• daycare active career
  
• slumber parties
  
• bachelor/bachelorette parties
  
• teaching teens to drive
  
• canes for elders
  
• midlife crisis
  
• boarding school
  
• strollers
  
• treehouses
  
• weddings
  

? Wow. I didn’t play much TS3 but this list really puts in perspective how lacking TS4 and its expansions have been.

Lol TS3 was a game in which you needed to buy Generations just to have wedding cakes and wedding arches, something TS4 had in the base game since day 1.

Yeah well, TS3 had personality from day 1....and open world and a color wheel for skin tones, and toddlers, and garages, and pools, and ghosts and family trees, etc...so....don't really try and mock TS3 when 4 is an even bigger disgrace.

Teens are pretty well fleshed out Sims 4 with parenthood and while they seem like adults if you control them directly, they'll act markedly different if you let them do their own thing. I think babies and elders do need some attention though. I'd like elders to have a lot more unique conditions like old age quirks like bad back(walking with a cane helps) or joints ache when it rains, etc. Right now, they're just fragile sims that you just more or less leave alone or else they'll get exhausted.

"TamakiSakura84;c-17713477" wrote:
Generations is a family player's dream pack.

Some of things included:

• imaginary friends
  
• prom
  
• daycare active career
  
• slumber parties
  
• bachelor/bachelorette parties
  
• teaching teens to drive
  
• canes for elders
  
• midlife crisis
  
• boarding school
  
• strollers
  
• treehouses
  
• weddings
  

ALSO, it had sim video cameras, which enabled you to record moments, save them to a sim hardrive and put on sim's TVs for them to watch, sand boxes, hopscotch, see-saws, pranks, bunk beds, the teacher career and body hair. Dates also came with Generations for TS3 after they introduced group gatherings on Late Night as well as personal sim bios, the reputation system and memories. Some of these were patched.

"catmando830;c-17713855" wrote:
I miss the boarding school.

Was that not a rabbit hole?

"crocobaura;c-17713859" wrote:

"catmando830;c-17713855" wrote:
I miss the boarding school.

Was that not a rabbit hole?

Yes, but it was still fun to role play as a strict parent and send your teen kid to a military school. Plus, it was a way to avoid their teen dramas, although they'd get a bit pissed about it.

That's a really good question. People have these big dreams of a Generations pack fixing all kinds of those deep problems in The Sims 4, but... You have got to get down to reality and remember The Sims 3 Generations. While what it added was pretty neat, it was a tiny EP that did not add a whole lot and most certainly wasn't worth the asking price. Now if you realize that content amount in each pack has decreased versus The Sims 3, you should not get your hopes up for Generations at all.

"crocobaura;c-17713859" wrote:

"catmando830;c-17713855" wrote:
I miss the boarding school.

Was that not a rabbit hole?

That was fine with me, it was the only way I could deal with the kids and school.

"Sigzy05;c-17713864" wrote:

"crocobaura;c-17713859" wrote:

"catmando830;c-17713855" wrote:
I miss the boarding school.

Was that not a rabbit hole?

Yes, but it was still fun to role play as a strict parent and send your teen kid to a military school. Plus, it was a way to avoid their teen dramas, although they'd get a bit ???? about it.

Lol, that's not very funny. You could still make a military school if you want and move your sim child out of the household for a while. I think Strangerville has a lot big enough for a school. :)

"crocobaura;c-17713881" wrote:

"Sigzy05;c-17713864" wrote:

"crocobaura;c-17713859" wrote:

"catmando830;c-17713855" wrote:
I miss the boarding school.

Was that not a rabbit hole?

Yes, but it was still fun to role play as a strict parent and send your teen kid to a military school. Plus, it was a way to avoid their teen dramas, although they'd get a bit ???? about it.

Lol, that's not very funny. You could still make a military school if you want and move your sim child out of the household for a while. I think Strangerville has a lot big enough for a school. :)

Yes, but with generations you didn't have to play them, just an occasional pop-up asking about an interaction. It was the only way to play with kids in the family,IMHO, it left you with time to focus on the adults and their careers and fun time.

They need a patch to add that.

~~~~don't worry IRL I don't have any kids~~~~

The major problem with Generations was the extreme randomness that could screw any plans you have for your sims. Most of the features acted in complete randomness with (almost) no way to affect it.

Midlife crisis? Random, though it was like a 90% chance for males and 10% for females. If it was, at least, based on traits or something (and TS3 did well on traits) - I'd be okay with it, because, in real life, this is personality-based.
Imaginary friend? A baby born randomly got it or didn't, and you couldn't change that without cheating. You couldn't get rid of the IF without cheating if they annoyed you (and as someone who doesn't understand that trope at all, they bugged the hell out of me - it was what brought me to actually use any other cheat than MOO).
Prom? You better have a partner for your teen secured or you may as well end up with your heir in a same-sex relationship (and thus either spend a lot of time dealing with a random event on roll back a save - in a game that could easily save/load 10+ minutes and crashed even unmodded that not saving every 20 minutes was a major risk)
Canes for elders sound good on paper but they walked so slow that they needed over an hour of game-time to cross a 64x64 lot. If you wanted to only send them between the fridge, bathroom, and bed - okay. If you wanted them to actually do something that involved moving more than 10 squares... take a week off.

So, the only failproof feature were the treehouses and maybe the new party types.
And the boarding school option was nice if you hated playing with kids - or if you were (un)lucky to have twins/triplets and wanted to alleviate some of that.

(Edit: typos)