I am going to admit I have sinned: I tried TS3. Actually, I don't believe I did it, but I bought it along with 3 EPs. TS3 has some good things regarding building and decorating, but it lacks "soul" and "character", and I find the general game-play annoying, irritating and horrible. In short, I am still playing TS2 and have a blash. It might be that I am attached to my own Sims and their stories, but I do think TS2 is a great game, and Sims' animations -the animations I have watched one million times before- always look new when performed by a different Sim. And always make me laugh to tears.


 

For the laundry part of your request, you can also check Mango-Sims here: http://mangosims2.free.fr/
Go to "Others", on page 3 and you will find "Set PML", a set for creating a laundry room. You can use an OMSP to place one on top of other. SilentLucidity's set at ModTheSims is excellent.

Check Chagasi's Face Kit here: http://simplelife.chagasi.com/

Actually, they put their fingers in their ears when the other Sim is talking about a subject they don't like in the least, *not* when they don't like the Sim. I have two brothers who are very, very close and love each other very much, and still one of them did this "I don't want to hear a word!" animation while his brother talked about something that didn't interest him. They also yawn or look their nails when the subject in questions is boring.  Personally, I like these reactions, they are hilarious. LOL

Thank you, theraven! How long does it take it to load the neighbourhood screen? I'm curious because since I've got a new pc and my Downloads folder went up to 5.50GB, now it takes a while to load compared to XP (I have Win 7 64-bit). But maybe it's the fact I changed from IDE to AHCI mode.
There is a thread about Sims 2 and Win 7 for anyone who wants to discuss about changes. In your shoes, I'd go for more RAM too.

The problem usually is either bad custom content or conflicting/badly coded hacks.
Glad you finally solved your problem. Well done!

UPDATE:
It has happened again, and I'm furious [no, not really, but certainly very sad] as one of my adult Sims had three of his portraits (as a kid, as a teenager and as a young adult) disappeared. I googled again searching for a solution and found an old post by Simsample here: http://www.modthesims.info/archive/index.php/t-302371.html

What she says: For the portraits; the photobooth images and any custom paintings done on the easel are stored as images in the lot file. So if they have come up blank, are missing or have reverted to a default then this indicates file corruption/ data loss of some kind. Why it happens? There are numerous possibilities, ranging from software (antivirus programs damaging files for example) to hardware (disc errors/ damage). How to fix it? Restore a backup, or else try to splice the images from a backup into your current lot using SimPE.

In short, she confirms my suspicion about corrupted data, but I still have no idea what causes it. And certainly there is no disc error in my case. *sigh*

I had this problem once while two of my Sims were on holidays: They couldn't get a taxi no matter what. They went back home only to discover they couldn't drive their cars either.
After two days of screaming and cursing I found out that it was a custom car responsible for that. Once I took it out everything worked fine.

Most likely it's a custom content, since it started after putting fresh custom content in. It doesn't matter whether your game crashed immediately or two days later.
Test without any cc to be sure. Backup your "Neighborhoods" folder; cut/paste Downloads folder to your desktop; start the game. If you play fine for a couple of hours without problems then you know.

I am curious to know your system's specs. LOL

Thank you very much, Joy!
It would be helpful if we could determine what causes it in a first place, so as to know what to avoid. I'd be greatful if I could get a solution, too. That would be the best.

Prudensh,
Yes, it seems like an inventory glitch or some corrupted data.
Sometimes I feel reluctant to take the painted portraits out of their inventories once they move, because if my Sims need to move out again the possibility of them turned into garbage Maxis paintings is highly increased -- and some of my Sims will take a divorce or two, or their lot might become corrupted, as I keep playing the same 'hood for almost two years now (one and half to be precise). So a move out is a must, in which case they will take only the essentials: Uni diploma, a few photos and their portraits. 

Hi, Joy!
Yes, it's fully and completely patched.
-- Although EAxis hasn't patched every glitch in the game, like the one where student Sims receive a negative (red) memory when engaged, as if they were romance Sims. It was either Pescado or TwoJeffs who fixed it.

Thank you for replying, Prudensh.

I don't think it has to do with camera mods, because I have none of those in my game. The first time it happened, a couple of years ago, I had only Pescado's mods/hacks, and I know they are perfectly alright. So, mods/hacks is not the reason either. I take it then as one of the game's glitches.  Such a pity, especially when the portraits of my Sims' kids painted when they were still children turn into Maxis paintings.

Hello everyone.

I have an issue with some of my Sims' painted portraits and I was wondering if it is something wrong with my game or a game glitch happening to others players, too.
The issue in question is that sometimes [not always] when my Sims move to a new house and are about to bring their portraits out of their inventory and hung them on the wall, the portraits will change into some common Maxis paintings. A couple of times the same has happened to the photos they took in photobooths, only that the photos will appear completely black.  Whether it is a portrait or a photo, I find it sort of heart-breaking, role-playing wise speaking, because some of these portraits and photos come from their childhood and can't be replaced.

This issue has occured twice with young adult Sims who had finished their Uni studies and moved back to their home (their portraits were made during their student lives), and a couple of times with Sims from my regular neighbourhood when they moved to a new house.

I was wondering if anyone else has experienced the same, and if you have any idea as to the cause of it. My best guess so far is that these objects become corrupted over time, but I don't understand how. If, for example, it has to do with how long I have been playing with a particular Sim, or if there is a bad saved file somewhere. Any suggestion will be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks in advance!

Hi, everyone, and [a very belated] Happy New Year. *group hug*

I am resurrecting the thread to share another success story.  I have --finally!-- built my new computer and installed all of my The Sims 2 games, up to Mansion and Garden Stuff pack. 
My system is AMD Phenom II 955 x4 [true quad] <--- Although there had been reports saying there were some problems when running TS2 in dual-core machines, (according to what I have read over the internet, not from personal experience) I can assure you that The Sims 2 run excellently in quad-core machines.

I installed Windows 7 64-bit Ultimate; I run a fresh install of TS2, applying the patches after each EP. From my old machine I copied my TS2 userdata to a DVD and transferred them to the new machine. When I started my game the only difference was the loading times: super fast, and the game runs better than never before. After all these years I can play with shaders turned on.

Paden,
This is for you: You should definitely make the switch. I never tried Vista, I just went from XP straight to Win 7, and I can tell you that Win 7 is probably the best OS by Microsoft. If you have the 64-bit OS, Win 7 will recognise automatically which of your applications, programmes and games are 32-bit and make the necessary adjustments so as to provide the right enviroment. 

Another thing I noticed: I installed Win 7 on a SSD and connected a Samsung HDD 1TB for other applications and programmes.  Back in WinXP, whenever I had tried to installed TS2 in another partition than the one my OS was installed, the game would cause any kind of problems. Not anymore. I installed the game in a different disk (in a partition of the Samsung HDD) while the userdata were correctly installed in My Docs (on SSD).  Everything is working perfectly well. Win 7 do all the necessary adjustments and create the right compatibility environment. By the way, when I inserted the base game disk for installation, there was a message saying "there are known compatibility issues with this programme". I just ignored it, and I have been playing the game for 4 hours with no issues at all.

So, for anyone who is still skeptical about Win 7 or quad-core machines I have to say your fears are completely groundless. TS2 run just perfect. Go for it!