I've never played a teenager sim. So far I've only been focusing on building the skills of my young adults without aging them. If what you say is true, I agree with this.
I absolutely love all of these ideas! If they made a Teenager Stuff Pack and included all of these features, I would not hesitate to buy it! Wish they made this instead of the new bowling pack, to be honest!
One of the best non mainstream ideas I have seen. I'm not huge on toddler...but I love the teen life span(I'm not sure that is worded right, but you know what I mean). My own teenage sim player LOVES this idea. All of it is spot on and would add great depth to the game.
Yes! I'm totally down for all of these ideas! I don't want another age group added in. I'd rather have teens differentiated from young adults. I'm more in favor if teens size being scaled down.
Today my teen sims were discussing neighborhood property values because they didn't have much else to do. Yawn, TS4 teens are essentially the same as adults, but with homework. So I started jotting down concepts of what could make them more youthful, lively and enjoyable. These are just a few of my silly whims-- I'm here because I would love to hear your opinions and fun ideas for teens too!
New Activities:
Cheerleading
Rock band
Skateboarding
A sport team (Soccer? Or maybe a new sport made by Sims)
Simblr social network. Post thoughts/photo/recent event/relationship/achieved whims to Simblr
Video game console
New Events:
Prom
Sleepover party
Science fair project
Standardized tests (for chance of scholarship)
New Interactions:
Learn to cook with parents
Learn to drive with parents (yes in a car, no snark intended)
"Tell-off parents" to blow off steam when tense
Ask parents for permission to stay out late (answer depends on parent's mood and if teen has completed homework)
Sneak out (with a random chance of getting caught)
Receive random "Where are you?/Who are you with texts?" from parents with option to lie
Hook-up (a more intense make-out, TS2 snog style )
New Popularity System:
A subtle 3-tier ranking (nothing over-the-top like TS3's celebrity system or social groups). Some sims want popularity through whims.
+2 Popular (Popularity gains a positive moodlet and an increase in invitations to hang out.)
+1 Semi-popular (there has to be a better name for this lol)
0 No ranking (base, hidden)
-1 Invisible (negative popularity from no friends, may have negative moodlet depending on sim's traits/aspirations)
Sims become more popular by
having popular friends, or A LOT of friends
being in a popular GT club
being involved in cheerleading/a sport/ a band
maxing a skill
Simblr posts earning a lot of likes
by some random, obscure event
attending more parties
New Relationships:
Have crushes. Sims should get nervous, blush, etc around crush
Have role model (an adult sim whom the teen admires, teens has chance of receiving the role-model's traits)
Hormones:
Acne
Mood swings
Random whims to do rebellious activities
Braces
Tweaks:
Teens (and child sims) go to school wearing a backpack
"Make friends" at school increases relationships, not just meeting new sims
"Make friends" will not meet child sims at school
Remove discuss property values chat
Rename first Mess Around to "Experiment"
Remove climax-like animation at the end of Mess Around to make it a tad more PG (this probably doesn't bother anyone else, but the thought that my 13-year-old sis's selfsim could be shaking the bed gives me a headache lol)
Return of the curfew ((with a random chance of getting caught, chance starts low and increases throughout night)
Ideally, if we had pre-teens some of these would go into this but I don't want to ask for too much considering toddlers=shooting for the moon.
I wanna hear from you though! help me add to the list
I love these ideas!!!!!! I would seriously love this! Could have not said it any better.
Ear buds for teens to zone out and ignore their parents. More mirror interactions: girls primping, putting on makeup, boys checking their hair, practicing asking someone out and both taking a lot of selfies.
Toddlers and children both have ways of "preparing" for adulthood. They have separate aspirations which later affect their adult success. Teens have this somewhat from teen jobs, but it feels more like the teens have already hit adulthood based on the way the aspirations and skills work.
I think a lot of the ideas listed have potential for seriously building up the teens' social skills before adulthood. In reality, one of the most important learning goals of pre-teen and teen life is learning to interact with others. Which is why popularity and making friends is so central to the life of a teen. It'd be nice if TS4 reflected that more.
^Primping, putting on makeup, checking hair, practicing asking someone out^ All unique ways of building teens' charisma. Building charisma could be implemented in other ways listed, too, like possible prom interactions (asking to prom, interacting at prom) and at after-school activities like cheerleading or sports teams.
A popularity system could affect adult charisma in the same way that toddler and child accomplishments already do. For example, if you reach 2+ popularity in teen years, your sim gains charisma skills faster in adulthood or is able to build adult relationships faster.
One last thing: If the ability to run away was introduced for teens, they should also offer the ability to "drop out" of high school. Possibly this option only becomes available after 6 days (or whatever amount) of being a teen, already. After dropping out, they could get an adult job and work full-time. Not sure what kinds of implications this decision might have on long-term career success? In reality many drop-outs struggle in adulthood, but many other famous and successful names have excelled under these circumstances.
I could've used this when my teen girls were orphaned and were forced to live off of part-time teen job funds!
I love the idea of making teens better! I haven't read all the awesome suggestions past the first page, so I apologize if these have already been added to the list.
I would love to see them be able to have wild parties again. I think it would be great, bookish sims could have a quite game night with friends and their parents could be thinking that the house will be completely trashed while party animal teens can throw a massive house party and their parents think their little angels are home reading. Each can end with books or game pieces all over the floor or lots of red cups and confetti.
It would be cool if they could join clubs at school again. Drama, band, art, book club, cheerleading, sports, debate, cooking, etc. Each club could help them improve a skill.
Why does this make me want to cry tears of joy! We could bring back several old locations for the teens to go on date like the roller skating rinks and teen clubs. Also having them bring back the "Sneak out" option like in the Sims 3! This idea is truly amazing!
I love these ideas! I've been playing around more with teens lately, and finding that there's not a lot of teenager-specific things to do. If these features were added I'd have almost too much to do
And here I thought I was the only one to have a notebook off to the side while playing so I can write down what I miss (when I remember) and a separate list of everything new I love in sims4! I absolutely love this list and many, many things are on my list with respect to teens.. chill out/ hang out on swings (swings in general haha) or monkey bars, sun bathing on a sun bed with a group of girls (not technically strictly teens ofc) this list has gone over and above what is missing. Prom was my first item listed when I started my list. And I'm not saying Sims 4 isn't amazing, I'm a Sims lover til the end, and the fixes/additions so far are great, but I made a note on my list that says 'it's like they put so much great detail into some things, like being able to have all candles lit (small detail I know) but the big guys told the developers not to have overtime in other areas or something' Anyways, I remember bike rides I loved to do, and the teach driving (I dislike how the cars, buses etc. are just the toys with shift] used to enlarge them. That kind of weak detail is what bothers me throughout the game) Well, I meant to just agree with your list and say i think teens are worthy of being teens in sims4 and it would be great life skills for future (hopefully fingers crossed) college life...?? *puppy eyes, pretty please* one can hope!(This is my first xcomment, sorry if i did it wrong or is in the wrong topic or something)
Yes, yes, yes! I love all of these ideas. I really hope we get another generations ep that includes a lot of these ideas because we desperately need something like this
These are all fantastic ideas. I like the popularity scale and more gameplay involving socialisation, since that's a Big Thing for teens. They do just feel like young adults... and look almost identical.
I'd like them to be a bit smaller, but that's a whole other thing. As said, I'd rather we improve teens than squash in another age group.
Anyway, yeah. Also +Embarrassment whenever they get acne, need braces or glasses, or when someone "Makes Fun of Outfit" (which could be a new interaction in Mean). After school sports clubs, rallies, and games can be attended; depending on a Sim's club, their popularity could increase or decrease.
Maybe introduce the Unconfident trait. We have Assertive; Sims with that trait could be unruffled about their reputation and maybe other Teens could think they're cool. If Unconfident, they're more easily embarrassed than other Sims.
Give parents the option to "Attend Child's Performance/Game/etc" depending on their extracurricular activities. Maybe also have them attend parent's evenings. Teens could get report cards and detentions.
Prom would be great. Sims could vote for Prom King and Queen, sabotage ballots, pull pranks, etc. We need more Teen-ish formal wear... also Graduation would be awesome! And it could be hosted anywhere.
It'd be nice if we could adjust their height too. Well in general the biggest problem I have with sims 4 is the fact that I can't adjust their heights.
Comments
Teen only hangouts. Yessss!
Toddlers and children both have ways of "preparing" for adulthood. They have separate aspirations which later affect their adult success. Teens have this somewhat from teen jobs, but it feels more like the teens have already hit adulthood based on the way the aspirations and skills work.
I think a lot of the ideas listed have potential for seriously building up the teens' social skills before adulthood. In reality, one of the most important learning goals of pre-teen and teen life is learning to interact with others. Which is why popularity and making friends is so central to the life of a teen. It'd be nice if TS4 reflected that more.
^Primping, putting on makeup, checking hair, practicing asking someone out^ All unique ways of building teens' charisma. Building charisma could be implemented in other ways listed, too, like possible prom interactions (asking to prom, interacting at prom) and at after-school activities like cheerleading or sports teams.
A popularity system could affect adult charisma in the same way that toddler and child accomplishments already do. For example, if you reach 2+ popularity in teen years, your sim gains charisma skills faster in adulthood or is able to build adult relationships faster.
I could've used this when my teen girls were orphaned and were forced to live off of part-time teen job funds!
I would love to see them be able to have wild parties again. I think it would be great, bookish sims could have a quite game night with friends and their parents could be thinking that the house will be completely trashed while party animal teens can throw a massive house party and their parents think their little angels are home reading. Each can end with books or game pieces all over the floor or lots of red cups and confetti.
It would be cool if they could join clubs at school again. Drama, band, art, book club, cheerleading, sports, debate, cooking, etc. Each club could help them improve a skill.
KaraStars on the Gallery
I'd like them to be a bit smaller, but that's a whole other thing. As said, I'd rather we improve teens than squash in another age group.
Anyway, yeah. Also +Embarrassment whenever they get acne, need braces or glasses, or when someone "Makes Fun of Outfit" (which could be a new interaction in Mean). After school sports clubs, rallies, and games can be attended; depending on a Sim's club, their popularity could increase or decrease.
Maybe introduce the Unconfident trait. We have Assertive; Sims with that trait could be unruffled about their reputation and maybe other Teens could think they're cool. If Unconfident, they're more easily embarrassed than other Sims.
Give parents the option to "Attend Child's Performance/Game/etc" depending on their extracurricular activities. Maybe also have them attend parent's evenings. Teens could get report cards and detentions.
Prom would be great. Sims could vote for Prom King and Queen, sabotage ballots, pull pranks, etc. We need more Teen-ish formal wear... also Graduation would be awesome! And it could be hosted anywhere.
I'm rambling, but yeah. Super into your ideas.
Agreed!! My Teens are just miniature non-legal adults. Bor-ing! This list is an excellent starting point for Sim teen improvements.