Gamertell Quick Review: The Sims 2 FreeTime
Title: The Sims 2 FreeTime
Price:$29.99
System(s): PC
Release Date: February 26, 2008
Publisher (Developer): Electronic Arts (Maxis)
ESRB Rating: “T” for crude humor, sexual themes and violence
Pros: New hobbies, new items, the genie returns, a new neighborhood, new jobs
Cons: No new creature sim or sim species, not many new hairstyles or outfits, secret hobby clubs are lackluster
Overall Score: 6/10
The Sims 2 FreeTime is an odd little expansion that will likely only please half of the Sims 2 community. There are two kinds of Sims 2 fans: ones who like to focus on the big picture and creating massive stories and ones who like to focus in on single families at a time. While the last two expansions, Seasons and Bon Voyage, contained additions to please both groups, FreeTime is primarily geared towards people who like to build super Sims.
The new main focus is on a Sim’s natural abilities and talents, and now a number of hobbies are included for them to become fanatical about. The 10 new hobbies are music & dance, arts & crafts, sports, fitness, science, nature, gaming, cooking, mechanics and film & literature. As Sims get better in a hobby, they are able to pursue it in new ways, like instructing, blogging, reading about it, discussing it or joining secret clubs. Most hobbies also build skills, which works out well. If a Sim is naturally talented in one area, they’ll do better more quickly.
Due to the nature of the expansion, most of the new objects all have to do with the hobbies. Some of the highlights include a repairable car, a sewing machine, a pottery wheel, a violin, a synthesizer, a basketball court, an exercise bike, a ballet barre and an ant farm.
New jobs are also added in, and all of them are pretty cool. In fact, if you’re a big picture Sims 2 fan, you might want to pick up FreeTime for the architect, dancer, entertainer, intelligence and oceanographer jobs. Each has its own new reward object as well, the oceanographer koi pond is especially nice.
The only other things worth noting are the genie and secondary lifetime aspirations. If the Sims on a lot manage to have 16 hobby enthusiasm points combined, a gypsy will drop off the genie lamp. Also if a Sim has enough aspiration points, a second lifetime aspiration can be added on.
There are also the requisite expansion properties. There is a new neighborhood, Desiderata Valley, some new clothes, some new buildings and some new walls and floors. I wasn’t too impressed with the Desiderata Valley neighborhood, but some of the new clothes are charming. I liked the flamenco dancer outfit in particular.
Circuit City has FreeTime on sale for $12 off the original price this week, making it only $17.99. For that price, it is worth it. It isn’t really worth the regular $29.99 expansion price though, when you look at everything included. You could pick up similar items and careers on Mod the Sims for free.
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Hi, i bought the sims 2 free time, and love it :)
I was just wondering what is the monster u can turn into?
sims2 - Aliens
Nightlife - Vampires
University - Zombies
OFB - Robots
Pets- Warewolves
Seasons - plant sims
Bon Voyage - Bigfoot
thanks :)
on March 17, 2008 at 09:51 PM - LINKHey Jordan!
There is no monster sim in Freetime, which is one of the big letdowns of this expansion. Instead the genie returns if your sims get enough hobby points and he can grant your sims wishes each day.
on March 17, 2008 at 09:59 PM - LINKOk, thanks
on March 17, 2008 at 10:13 PM - LINKFree time is great! :)
they should soo make a sims 2 similar too “Makin’ Magic”
on March 17, 2008 at 10:18 PM - LINKit was the best!
Actually Casey, if you’re a member of Mod the Sims 2, there’s a great fan project there called the Harry Potter Project. It is filled with Harry Potter sims, magic careers, magical items and locations from the books. There is so much there in fact, that it could easily be its own unofficial ‘stuff’ or ‘expansion’ pack.
on March 17, 2008 at 10:21 PM - LINKyou mean like a download?
on March 17, 2008 at 10:23 PM - LINKActually it is a series of fan created downloads. You can pick and choose to get only the aspects you like.
http://www.modthesims2.com/showthread.php?t=145882&c=1
Mod the Sims 2 is a free forum for Sims 2 fans to join, discuss and share fan created items.
on March 17, 2008 at 10:28 PM - LINKto jest super
on March 24, 2008 at 04:07 PM - LINKHow do you use the secret club memberships.
on March 27, 2008 at 06:32 PM - LINKOnce you’ve been given a membership, you have access to a ‘secret lot’ that is the headquarters for that hobby group. You can call a taxi to go out on the phone or take a car (if you have Nightlife) and choose to go there.
on March 27, 2008 at 06:40 PM - LINKThanks a lot it rilly helped. ._.
on March 28, 2008 at 04:04 PM - LINKDo you have any more tips for my on free time.
on March 28, 2008 at 04:08 PM - LINK@ Nick - No problem.
A good tip for finding out desired hobbies is to use the kaching or motherload cheat, then buy one of each of the hobby items. Have the sims try each one for a few seconds to learn what their innate talent is. :D
on March 28, 2008 at 11:20 PM - LINKthanks but i all ready know that but thanks for trying
on March 29, 2008 at 01:04 PM - LINKIs it good to be in the zone?
on March 29, 2008 at 01:05 PM - LINKIt is good to be “in the zone”, because then you gain hobby points and skill points faster.
on March 29, 2008 at 04:43 PM - LINKis there any new hair styles? oh and my sims is retarded coz wen i get on the neighbor hood ground flashes pink adn black and the walls of houses blink red and black!!!!! i dont no how to fix it some one plz help!!! oh also i downloaded new hairstyles and none of them come on my game! does anyone no????? plz help me@
on May 14, 2008 at 09:35 PM - LINKHi Anna,
Yes, there are a few new hairstyles. I can’t recall exactly how many, but I think it is like 3-4 for each gender.
As for your Sims 2 program - it sounds like you might have some corrupted files. I’d suggest going to your Documents > EA Games folder and rename your The Sims 2 folder to The Sims 2 Backup. Then start the game like normal. The game will automatically generate a new The Sims 2 Folder, and will start the game fresh. (None of your homes/families/custom content/etc will show up.) If there are no pink and black or red and black blinking, that will confirm that those issues are caused by custom content.
To fix, you’d have to go through the files individually, loading the game with custom content added one by one, to see which item is causing the issue.
Now the hairstyle problem - did you unzip the files and put the .package files into the Downloads - EA Games - The Sims 2 - Downloads folder? If you did, then they should appear in the game.
I hope that helps you out!
on May 14, 2008 at 10:51 PM - LINKI’ve been watching videos on youtube showing sims doing ballet. It’s so dodgy. I’ve done ballet for 8 years and it was painful watching them. I was wondering if they dance that bad all the time or if they improve? If they do improve, I’m a little confused. The steps they do are more advanced but they appear to not even be able to do the simple ones. I’m just a little disappointed because I thought that they would have done better. Everything else seems fine...I thought that when people made computer games and movies and stuff that they did research on everything. It seems that the makers of the Sims 2 free time haven’t ever seen real ballet. There is no need to reply to this or anything. I just feel like saying something and maybe seeing if anyone else feels the same way.
on June 13, 2008 at 10:23 PM - LINKHey i was wondering in some of the sim stories on youtube you can see better grafics like with new hair and stuff i was wondering if that is on this freetime or another one?
on June 24, 2008 at 03:22 PM - LINK@ kita
on June 25, 2008 at 11:51 AM - LINKya it is, you can see it on free time and the other ones to. :)