Sims Talk: Free Time hobby determination

[strangetomato]

I'm getting pretty ready to install Free Time, especially now that InSIM SimPE has been updated (that was fast). I will, however, need a plan of attack for all of my story sims, and their hobbies. I have a little list going already, and maybe I'll post it later to think out loud. I just found a list of traits that determine a sim's "true hobby", so I thought I'd share, in case you haven't seen it yet. This gives me a good idea of what my sims might end up with, but I'm not really liking how this element of the game works.

So it seems that the pre-determined "true hobby" that sims are given with Free Time is based on a combination of personality, skills, and interests. And here are the categories (I swiped this from the BBS somewhere):


Arts & Crafts - sloppy, nice - creativity - culture, fashion
Cuisine - neat, lazy - cooking - food
Film & Literature - shy, lazy - charisma - entertainment, culture
Fitness - outgoing, active - body - health
Games - playful, grouchy - logic - entertainment
Music & Dance - outgoing, serious - creativity - entertainment
Nature - sloppy, playful - cleaning - animals, environment, weather
Science - neat, serious - logic - sci-fi
Sports - active, grouchy - body - sports
Tinkering - shy, nice - mechanical - toys


I'm not really into this idea. It's way too limiting and it creates these "types" for each hobby. (Oh, but why don't I love grouping people into limiting categories? It's so much fun. *sigh*) Like aspiration, why not let us look at the personality of our sims and determine the hobby interest ourselves? Or let it be random, or at least more random than it is right now. The way it's set up now, you can only be into certain hobbies if you have a certain personality, which is, quite frankly, bullshit. I know plenty of musicians that are not serious, plenty of neat artsy types (more than sloppy ones, really), and why on earth would you need to be grouchy to enjoy sports? Argh, I say. Argh!

Using Buck Grunt as an example, he could end up with cuisine (not so bad), science (errm...), or he could end up with tinkering. Tinkering, people! What happened to him wanting to be a "pet stylist to the stars"? I have no idea why shyness would be connected to tinkering, anyway. Seriousness would be more accurate, in my opinion. But how limiting is that?! I want him to have arts and crafts (and he'll have it, don't worry), but the game creators have decided that a neat sim wouldn't like sewing? This makes no sense to me. Have they never heard of Martha Stewart? She's not exactly a slob.

... and Nervous Subject will probably like sports? That just seems wrong to me too. Shouldn't outgoingness be a factor for that one too? (I think I'm leaning towards film and literature for Nervous, myself. I haven't decided yet, but he does seem to like to read a lot, despite the high energy level.)

I'm not sure what to think of it all, really, but I don't really like it. It's just too limiting for me (but at least gender was not a factor). I think I will be taking the hobby destiny of my sims into my own hands, in most cases.

So what do you think?

Edited to add: My brain read that as InSIM, but I should have said SimPE. Oops! I need a nap.

Comments

[simgarooop.livejournal.com]

Huh? Insim is already updated? That's awesome, because SimPe was also updated yesterday!


If you install Free Time, make sure you get this fix:

http://box156.bluehost.com/~aestudi1/forums/inteenimater/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=19

So far, this is the only "serious" bug that's appeared with Free Time, and only if you have sims with double aspirations, but so far I hadn't seen any issues in my game (but I installed it to be safe).

Hmmm... from reading the comments at this thread, it seems like all the Strangetown characters have the same predestined hobbies. Buck was science and Ripp was arts and crafts. And I've read in two different places about the Curious hobbies and they match too.

I think the way the hobbies are assigned is pretty silly! If I were a Sim, my hobby would be tinkering! :D I'm more a film and literature girl.

Good thing there's a way to change these predestined hobbies :). Good luck and have fun with FT!

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Oh, my mistake. I meant to type SimPE. I'll edit that. I think my brain just read it as InSIM. Wishful thinking, maybe? Wow. Maybe I need a nap...

Thanks for the tip and the link. :)

I guess Strangetown always would have the same hobbies, if it just follows this formula, since it seems pretty rigid in how it works.

I know. I don't think that I would get my actual hobby(ies) with this formula either. That seems to prove something to me, since many people are saying that.

I'm so glad that it's possible to change them. Thanks so much for that making that tutorial! It's really handy.

[amaryssobellus.livejournal.com]

NO WAY! Insim's already updated?! I JUST checked on it yesterday and there was nothing. I'm so excited to get home and download it. YAY!!!

Sorry for the spazz.

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Oh, sorry. I screwed up. It's actually SimPE that updated. It was just wishful thinking on my part. Reading what I wanted to read. I hope they follow the example of SimPE, though...