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

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

From what I've read, there is trend toward the LTW running in families with that hack, and I also think that it's very cool. It's pretty funny to get a pleasure sim with a career LTW, though, since they often roll the want to stay home from work. The poor conflicted things.

Oh man, the pet LTWs bother me too. Ophelia has one, and I think I'm actually going to change it. I was thinking that I'd get her into some dog breeding, but that idea is less appealing to me all of the time. A little wouldn't be bad, but 20 puppies? It's so extreme. You have to be a crazy recluse for that to make sense in the story (how else would all of the dogs even fit in the house?). I think I'm going to reroll her for a child-based want, whatever that may be. Or if she gets the golden anniversary, I'd take that too. But the pet thing... I think it just has to go.

I agree. I mess with social and fun a lot, especially to force prolonged conversations and dancing.

Oh, but there are SO MANY vampires with full face makeup out there! *snort* Some of those turn ons have a very limited appeal. I really wish that eye colour was one of the options, since they have hair colour (and it's not as risqué as skin tone). Did they add attraction to aliens in BV/FT? They've done most of the other special sims, right? I'd love to see attraction to aliens.

[madame-ugly.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Ophelia as a pet breeder is all wrong. I could see Nervous as "pet obsessed" though. He already has one dog and said dog was his only companion for a while. He'd want to preserve the line. The pet best friend one pisses me off more than the breeding one. What kind of weirdo wants pet best friends? And what a pain in the ass that must be? It's not like you can call up the neighbors cat/dog. Dumb, Maxis, DUMB!

(as for completing the "pet breeding" LTW, I think you only have to get the pets to adult, then you get rid of them--and have your sim crying about it if they got attached during the puppy/kitten days--I can't handle sims crying over pets, it's annoying and just too sad).

I have a question about the "golden anniversary". That's based only on having an anniversary party, right? So if one sim is elder but the spouse is still adult, will it work (I'm thinking about it for Paul, he's going to elder way before Aggie and I don't want him not to get his LTW).

I don't think they added alien attraction with BV. All the other "weird" sims but not alien. I guess alien walks the line of "race" so best not to go there (since the other "weird" sims are reversible).

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm going to change her. Nervous can do some breeding with the dogs they've collectively taken in, but Phi needs to forget about pet breeding. She already has her gardening and flowers, so that's enough of a hobby for her. (Speaking of which, does gardening relate to any of the hobby interests? I guess not, since they try to make the EPs not rely on each other.) Also, she might want to concentrate on having some babies of her own.

Pet best friends would work for a crazy cat lady. But yeah, that's about it. So dumb.

I'm not sure about the golden anniversary, since I've never fulfilled it. I'm not sure if it works when just one of them is an elder. If the option is there for throwing a party, then it would probably work. You might need both of them to be elders, though. I do know that it is okay if they cheat (not an issue with Aggie and Paul, I know), as long as they don't get caught.

You're right. It does walk the race line, so figured it got left out because of that. I'd still like to see it, though.

[madame-ugly.livejournal.com]

With FT, the "not relying on other EP's thing" is really being pushed. I was looking at the prima guide (unreliable but entertaining) and it listed all the items that can help build enthusiasm for different hobbies. There are quite a few that are EP dependant (though no one hobby is completely EP dependant). I went through and saw how many had BV only stuff and it wasn't significant enough to make me want BV.

Ooh, Bjorn and Bottom are unequal in years. I'll see if Bjorn has the "throw anniversary party" option.