I'm like some others here. Depends on the save. If it's plot, then yes. Everything from what MCCommander has to offer to bringing up 'testingcheats on'. If I'm just playing, then I try not to.
I have no memory of this place. Time to start anew I guess
I cheat with every family I play from the very beginning. Sometimes I tell myself it'll just be a tiny bit to get things rolling, but it's a slippery slope.
I sorta cheat... I have a community garden lot that I place in Newcrest. It has all the plants and my sim harvests there to get all the gardening plants. Then she plants them at home and makes loads of money off of them. She does work, but the bulk of her wealth comes from gardening. Other than that, the only times I cheat are when glitches happen - my sim gets stuck and I have to reset her, etc..
Oh - I did use a cheat to make sure she had twins - one boy and one girl - after she got pregnant! LOL
I use free real estate to place families I'm not going to play in houses so the game doesn't have any room for its own ugly sims. I occasionally use the fill needs household cheat, mostly in rotational play when I switch houses.
Unless i am doing a challenge which doesn't allow me to use cheats i always use the motherload cheat XD. I did start a family where i decided not to use any cheats whatsoever and, i didn't realise how much stuff cost lol.
See, this is why I don't participate in challenges and the story boards. I have yet to find one that gives a thumbsup on cheats.
Okay, so. I want to know how many people cheat and how many don't. Sure, im not looking for an exact number, but Im curious how many people dont use any sort of money or needs cheat. Personally , I will never use a cheat that modify's my sims needs , because I feel like that is not for me to decide and defeats the entire purpose . I am also sort of uncomfortable using money cheats. It's doesnt fully bother me, but I would prefer not to.
Your play and my play style are like the Republicans and the Democrats, opposite ends of the same game.
I love my cheat codes, big fancy builds, tons of toys, and my absolute favorite thing about Sims - rearranging the furniture and redecorating to my heart's content.
You could let the individual family dictate how you play with cheats on or off. I play a vanilla game for my legacy family. Another save game I play a wealthy family that has the best of everything and uses mods, cheats and CC's in the game. Everyday is different, one day I want to play the lavish life, then other days I want to endure the struggle in paying the bills, otherwise the lights get turn off.
When I'm actually playing the game I don't cheat at all.
Usually when I'm building a pretend apartment and wanting some Sims to live there I do as it helps more for storytelling purposes for me. Usually freerestestate for the apartments and depending on the sims I take away more money from them so they live a bit more realistically. Never use need cheats at all.
I used to play more legacy style games and never used money cheats because of the nature of the challenge. I usually find the family is rolling in simoleans by the third generation anyway. Since I started a rotational style game, it just depends on the household - and it's usually not a money cheat but free real estate to put them in a home that I think fits with what their background is and what they're supposed to be doing. What I DO use that's cheaty is various mods that adjust gameplay to either add some things I want to see or reduce things that bother me. For instance, I have one that makes plasma packs and plasma fruit fill the thirst need to a greater degree than normal. That's really cheating (although I suppose an argument could be made for it not really being different than sucking down three or four in a row, but still. Those things get expensive. :P ) But it takes care of a minor thing in the game that I find to be annoying, as opposed to challenging.
I sometime use MCCC's relationship setter to set relationships to where I think they should be based on past interactions but aren't. For instance, I had a set of twins who each grew up and started their own families across the street from each other in Oasis Springs. In my "story" their kids grew up running in and out of each other's houses and playing with each other all the time, but in reality they barely knew each other because there was simply no time to drag everyone back and forth every day before they all aged up. So I just set them all to friendship level. That's just an example.
Otherwise, the only thing I consistently cheat on is that everyone in the household gets their needs fully filled at the beginning of a wedding party. It's my gift, hehe.
I happen to cheat from times to times, because i don't wanna be bothered and i wanna do what i want, for example, if they're going out in the city for a long time, i'm using a cheat to make their needs full because i dont want to bring them back home too soon.
A french girl who's been hanging out on the english sims forum for a year now.
Only to get my sims where they need to be. I have several characters that start off Wealthy and established.
and then Skills.
There are the Characters like Merlin(Sorcerer), Vivian (Fairy), Lucifer(Daemon(Vampire)), Adam and Diane (Werewolves), these are the people I am going to have to Cheat, to be at the top of their Life States.
I treat some (reward/Bonus) traits like genetic traits.
-High Metabolism, Steel Bladder etc, traits like these I cheat because they're more like traits you are born with.
And I create my own "NPC," (Because When Maxis, Premades, and Just simple Townies interfere in the affairs of my story, I get Angry) So I created sims Just so I have familiar faces around town, I've assembled my Police Force, Hospital Staff, and Working on Scientists. I'm Setting Up a few Stores, and Restaurants.
So yeah for the Story's Sake, I cheat a lot, and proud of it.
I use some cheats -- mostly FreeRealEstate and some money cheats to get a household established. It's really dependent upon what you enjoy in the game. I like to have a background for each household/family. Some of them are rich and live in mansions, so they get their mansion right off the bat. Others are struggling to make ends meet or climbing their way up, so they might start out and have to earn every Simolean. It's all about what I want to play/depict with that household. And if things get frustrating and I find I'm not having fun, maybe I'll cheat something in. Generally, after the initial set-up/getting them established in a home, I try not to cheat and work on earning things, but if and when challenge becomes tedium, it's time for a little nudge.
The way I see it, it's a -game- -- it's all about having fun. The only real 'rules' are that you should be having fun. If you're not, and you can change something to make it fun, then that's good -- go for it.
Fun, of course, is subjective. So what's 'right' for one person might not be as good a fit for another. In the end then, I think it's best just to do what's fun for you and don't worry overmuch about how anyone else would do things.
I use "cheats" -- I think of them just as non-UI-based game controls, because it's not like there are any rules to break in Sims or a competition to win or lose -- to create the starting points I want Sims to have. If I'm starting a household as an Adult and a Teen and a Child, the Adult in particular hasn't just popped from the womb in my imagination: I give that Sim skills and a career level, furnishing appropriate to their standing in life, relationships and relationship levels that are "right" (I use Clubs to quickly introduce them to people their age they might have gone to school with, coworkers, neighbours..., and I make some relationships stronger than others).
And because I play the whole world to some degree -- I'm the God here, not any story progression -- I have aging off and now and then go through the town and, sometimes using "cheats" of some kind or other, age Sims up, marry them off, promote them, etc. (Often I just play them for a bit.)
When I'm actively playing a family, the only cheat-like things I use are to forget friendships/dislikes that developed while I was rotated away or to solve the occasional glitch.
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I have used cheats since I started playing Sims 2. Didn't with 1, didn't enjoy it very much. I'm more focused on the design aspect as a general rule and don't fancy the real-life stress of lacking money, so money cheats are pretty standard in my game play. I use motives cheats, but not frequently. The game glitches in 4 have called for a lot of motives cheats though- especially with toddlers and the game's tendency to go crazy when trying to feed them in a highchair. I do try, every now and again, to play without any cheats. Doesn't hold my interest for very long.
If I can't make something happen without a cheat, then I will. I like to tell stories, too, so if a sim is supposed to die, well, it's really difficult to kill sims in TS4.
I do use cheats since it's easier for me especially if I have a big family, which include children and toddlers + a pregnant mom so yeah. which can be hard to track. ;) I might try a save file with not cheat again
Comments
I have no memory of this place. Time to start anew I guess
Oh - I did use a cheat to make sure she had twins - one boy and one girl - after she got pregnant! LOL
See, this is why I don't participate in challenges and the story boards. I have yet to find one that gives a thumbsup on cheats.
Your play and my play style are like the Republicans and the Democrats, opposite ends of the same game.
I love my cheat codes, big fancy builds, tons of toys, and my absolute favorite thing about Sims - rearranging the furniture and redecorating to my heart's content.
Usually when I'm building a pretend apartment and wanting some Sims to live there I do as it helps more for storytelling purposes for me. Usually freerestestate for the apartments and depending on the sims I take away more money from them so they live a bit more realistically. Never use need cheats at all.
Feels like the challenge is gone when I do.
I sometime use MCCC's relationship setter to set relationships to where I think they should be based on past interactions but aren't. For instance, I had a set of twins who each grew up and started their own families across the street from each other in Oasis Springs. In my "story" their kids grew up running in and out of each other's houses and playing with each other all the time, but in reality they barely knew each other because there was simply no time to drag everyone back and forth every day before they all aged up. So I just set them all to friendship level. That's just an example.
Otherwise, the only thing I consistently cheat on is that everyone in the household gets their needs fully filled at the beginning of a wedding party. It's my gift, hehe.
Me too! Only, I'm not kidding.
and then Skills.
There are the Characters like Merlin(Sorcerer), Vivian (Fairy), Lucifer(Daemon(Vampire)), Adam and Diane (Werewolves), these are the people I am going to have to Cheat, to be at the top of their Life States.
I treat some (reward/Bonus) traits like genetic traits.
-High Metabolism, Steel Bladder etc, traits like these I cheat because they're more like traits you are born with.
And I create my own "NPC," (Because When Maxis, Premades, and Just simple Townies interfere in the affairs of my story, I get Angry) So I created sims Just so I have familiar faces around town, I've assembled my Police Force, Hospital Staff, and Working on Scientists. I'm Setting Up a few Stores, and Restaurants.
So yeah for the Story's Sake, I cheat a lot, and proud of it.
My Mood:
The way I see it, it's a -game- -- it's all about having fun. The only real 'rules' are that you should be having fun. If you're not, and you can change something to make it fun, then that's good -- go for it.
Fun, of course, is subjective. So what's 'right' for one person might not be as good a fit for another. In the end then, I think it's best just to do what's fun for you and don't worry overmuch about how anyone else would do things.
And because I play the whole world to some degree -- I'm the God here, not any story progression -- I have aging off and now and then go through the town and, sometimes using "cheats" of some kind or other, age Sims up, marry them off, promote them, etc. (Often I just play them for a bit.)
When I'm actively playing a family, the only cheat-like things I use are to forget friendships/dislikes that developed while I was rotated away or to solve the occasional glitch.
I do try, every now and again, to play without any cheats. Doesn't hold my interest for very long.
For what it is worth, I cheat all the time and sometimes intensively.
Most of all, I use money cheats to make the story lines going.
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