I love playing as young adults! Children/teens not so much. Gotta keep the game going though!

EnjoyfulSimmer

I love playing as young adults. I have so much fun. Developing their skills so that they can use them to advance their careers or make money. And the many different social settings. I dont have much of an incentive to play with the children and teens. My sims will have kids just to keep my game going , I dont want aging off. I want progression. But I will always prefer playing adult sims. Maybe that will change when the lives of children have more depth and more things to do. Rather than just go to a rabbit hole school , that in the end means nothing and does nothing.

jacknchloe

I couldn’t agree more! I play with the long lifespan (actually a little longer bc I have MCCC) and used to wait until my teen aged up to YA on their own but now I age them up once they have an A in school. I have my YA lifespan set to 100 days cause I love playing them so much.

EnjoyfulSimmer

I create my own life span settings using Sims4Studio. I have my YA set to 56 days and adult set to 56 days as well. So 112 days in all for YA-Adult @jacknchloe

NorthDakotaGamer

I changed the life span settings via MCCC. But I did find that I hate playing with toddlers. I am fine playing with kids and teens as well as young adults. I just make sure to finish at least two childhood aspirations to help the sim advance better as a teen and then young adult. The traits gained can help them advance faster in careers without all the extra work so the sim can have more free time for fun.

katrinasforest

I like the teens. Though between holidays, vacations, excuse notes, and just plain skipping school, they're home more often than not. ^_^ But I like the idea that they start working towards their life goals before they're actually ready to move out on their own.

I didn't used to like playing as kids so much, but with Get Famous, I find I'm enjoying them more. I got tired of their aspirations, though. Now if they max out a skill, I just cheat the associated aspiration. It makes more sense logically, anyway. If you can compose an original song on the violin as a child, you're creatively gifted. Even if you didn't get around to playing with three toys or drawing every picture type on the art table.

The toddlers are adorable. I enjoy doing playdates and things like that, but once they start actually demanding things, I'm like, "Guess what! It's your birthday! Now you can go to fridge and make yourself a sandwich!"

Nindigo

My favorite ages to play are also YA. Sometimes grade school children, but only in moderate amounts. I think teens are horrible in this game both in the way they usually look (pencil shaped bodies) and animate - I cannot relate to that phone obsession either. Toddlers can look very cute, but I don't care much for the gameplay attached to them. Infants are just boring furniture to me. I really dislike the way Adult faces get baggy around the nose and mouth. Otherwise, that would probably be my preferred age group to play. Elders have a ridiculous walkstyle if you ask me, and I don't appreciate the complaining and back creaking animations.

So yeah, little praise and much whining. But hey, then I'm not so different from anybody else. /sarcasm

EnjoyfulSimmer

Honestly I like the adults show age. Humans age. And Im assuming the adults are 35-40 years old. A lot of people in real life certainly have a worn look to them by that age. I dont like for my sims to look the same age as their teenage kids. So I welcome the age details @Nindigo

WildIrishBanshee

I like them all, though my YA's definitely seem to get more love. Mostly because that's the stage where they get married, can have a "real" career and start pumping out babies. I have doubled all the ages but baby to get more time with my sims, and I'm always maxing out toddler skills...not always child skills, mostly because I don't want samey same kids. But I do try to max the skill that leads to adult skills that they're going to need so that they get a headstart on them. And I quite enjoy getting Parenthood traits, but I don't necessarily go out of my way to max them all, again, samey same. Teens generally get a headstart on their aspiration, or complete the first one (if they can) and move onto another one. I'm a bit of a trait hoarder, so my sims start collecting reward traits as early as possible.

Also, as far as school goes - those with an A I believe start higher in the career. But I could be mixing that up with something else, I haven't had enough coffee yet.

LadyKyn

I play with them all. I think children and teens helped to definitely got more rounded with the parenthood pack along with more things in the kids room stuff pack for children as well. The void critter game that came with KR stuff is good. Since my sims can go searching in trash cans for booster packs and cards can even upgrade the cards to get their void critter stronger. With Seasons and GF they're getting more after school activities (can't wait to see more come). I always work on my children's skills to try and max them out because it does benefit them when they get older.

Younger sims like toddlers and children are always going to be limited in terms of what adults can do always has been in every game. (Way worse in the first sims game as kids didn't have much of anything to do.)

I make use of the get together club system. Having study/homework groups, playing video games at their local arcade as well as skating. And kids can even make their own videos with the GF video station which is pretty cool to me that they're able to use things like that.

I always welcome more things for teens and children alike any day of the week. Especially in terms of hobbies.

ListentoToppDogg

That's not surprising considering the game is clearly focused towards YAs. Younger life stages have barely anything to do in comparison.

floridameerkat

Rather than making your sims have kids, you could just have a friend move in with them, so that you have someone to play when your sim dies. I've done that before, as I don't always feel like having to play the younger life stages and having to deal with school and homework and phases. In one of my saves, my sim went on vacation to Selvadorada. While there, she met two locals whom she quickly befriended. When she returned home, they both moved in with her and are helping her run her vet clinic.

bshag4lv

I like all stages equally and for me, there are too many things for kids and teens to do for their age lengths. I've just recently gotten into families more as I usually played singles or couples without kids. Although that is a fun gameplay, it gets old and I found myself looking into raising full families and try to at least get to the 3rd generation for crying out loud.

To me, the quality of the gameplay and animations became remarkably better with the release of toddlers. I don't remember having this much fun with Sims 2 or 3 tots.

@LadyKyn, I love the kids club idea...going to steal it.

MissyScabtree

I play a little bit of everything. Mostly I do start off with young adults, because I find it a tad easier to create background stories with them. I have played families before and I loved it! I love the interactions between parents and the kids.

I do play with aging off, but my workaround for progression is I bounce around my households and add more to their stories and/or get them to have kids, so it feels a little bit more in depth when I can see my sims bff's show up pregnant or with something new going on in their lives.

EnjoyfulSimmer

I am so uninterested in playing with kids/teens , that I am trying to think if it makes sense to play the game without having any.

aaronrulz

I wouldn't mind teens so much if I felt they were teens (a bit shorter than YA) and had more teen stuff to do.

izecson

When I get attached to sims I usually actively play them since they were kids, I dont have problem with these ages but one could always hope these childhood and teenager would have more depth

Hermitgirl

I play with young adults and older way, way more than babies, toddlers, children and teens. I did this in past games also so it has nothing to do with how they are done this time around. Not that I don't want more for them as time goes on. When I do play them I like them and think they are done better than in past games... especially the toddlers. I just am not drawn to telling stories about children or even family life.
Now give me some good creepy kid options, some telekinesis, pyromania or mind control. Let me make the kid from the Bad Seed movie.. and yeah I'd tell more stories with rugrats. Otherwise they fit in when they fit in to my gameplay.

invisiblgirl

Actually, your YAs benefit a lot from things they do as kids - they build skills faster and start their jobs at level 3, if they've gone to school and done their homework. If they get the empathy trait, they can comfort other and share their burdens, and if they get the resonsibility trait, they don't have to take work home at night. (That's quite nice if the 'homework' is annoying, like the requirements at the diamond secret agent level.)

When I bring a spouse into the house, I'm always a bit frustrated at having to start from zero. I'm just not used to playing Sims I haven't overparented from the potato stage.

Francl27

I don't mind kids, even if it's pretty repetitive to do the same aspirations over and over again. I typically take a break when I get a teen though because they are just too boring.

citysimmer

I agree. I prefer teens to children though, they are more complex and more like adults.

Stina1701A

I am the same up to a point. I prefer the YA (and up) and even the teen stage but as I play rotationally and generationally as well, I need offsprings. What I find help, is to visualize the story. The future of the little sprogs, the personality and hobbies, the relationship with their parents; are the parents good parents or bad? Strict or loose? Evil or good? Does that influence them in anyway and if so, how? Who are their friends and what are they like?

Traits: Which traits should the child first start with and what other traits should they gain as they grow up? Will the kids inherit one or some of the parents traits or just get a whole new ones? If its the latter why? Is there something that influences that? Aspiration: Now you are a teen so which aspiration to choose? What affects the decision making? Hobbies, goals, personality or future job potential?

EnjoyfulSimmer

Thats some good advice! And sounds like something that could actually work! @Stina1701A Sure because I need them to matter and to have a reason for adding them into my game .Thanks for the inspo!