The Sims 2 - University

It is really no surprise that The Sims 2 game became an instant hit, what with the overwhelming popularity of The Sims and its seven expansion packs. Of course, The Sims 2 did not disappoint in that department. The Sims 2 - University was the first expansion pack to this popular and wonderful game.

With University came plenty of intriguing new objects, interactions, and decorative options. The most drastic new change that came with the expansion is what the title implies: college. Your sims now have the option to enter college after their teenage years, adding a completely different experience to the game. You can send your teen sims to college at any time during their teen years. In fact, you can send your teen sims away as soon as they turn into teenagers, if you so desire. If you would rather play through your sims' teenage years and send them to college a day or two before they reach adulthood, you can do that, too! You do not have to send teens to college, if you do not want to. Simply let them age naturally without having them apply to college. Not every sim has to attend college.

To apply for scholarships, go to the phone or computer and select college - apply for scholarship. A dialog will then appear showing how much money your teen will have when they enter college. Higher grades, more skill points, and good job performance ensure more money for college. If your sim has failing grades, they can not enter college at all; however, poor grades (while not failing) can still land you a spot in college, you just will not qualify for an academic scholarship. To move a teen to college, select "college" on the phone or computer, then click "move to college". A taxi will pick up the sim selected to go to college immediately, and they will be placed in the sim bin in the university neighborhood of your choice.

The University expansion comes with three universities. You have the option to assign one of these to any neighborhood, or you can create your own, just like you can create your own neighborhoods. All of the university neighborhoods are pretty similar. They all contain several dorm buildings, a handful of sororities and fraternities, a secret society, and various other community lots, such as a campus gym and a library. There are also several houses your sim can live in by themselves or with roommates, although these are a bit more costly.

When you move your sim to college, your first task is to find a place for them to live. The dorms are the least expensive option, since these are free to move into. You can not move a sim directly into any of the Greek houses. When you move a sim into a dorm, you must choose one of the many dorm rooms (which are all pretty much the same), and "claim" the door. That room is then theirs for the remainder of their time in the dorm, and you have the option to lock it if you want to. You can also buy new things to put in the dorm rooms (although the space is quite limited), but "build mode" is not available in the dorms. Therefore, you can not expand any of the rooms to make room, unfortunately. NPCs (non-playable characters) will then begin to fill the dorm, claiming the rest of the rooms. Do not worry, though. If you choose to move a new sim into a dorm with another sim, one of the NPCs will move out to create room for them.

The new expansion comes with a new life stage. When a sim teenager moves to college, they become "young adults". Realistically, this stage is somewhere between teen and adult in appearance. Sims will remain young adults until they graduate college, or drop out, whichever you wish to make them do. Unfortunately, only college students can be young adults, so if you decide not to send your teens to college, they completely skip this stage and go from teen to adult, like before.

There are also many other nifty additions that came with University. Your sims now have a "lifetime aspiration". Your sims still have all the wants and fears just as before, but they now have one aspiration that is a much bigger goal. When your sims achieve this goal, they will have a platinum aspiration from that point on, for the rest of their lives! Sims that attend college can also have more "want" slots. When college sims graduate their sophomore years, a want slot is added to the original four. When they graduate college completely, another want slot is added. Sims that have completed college can have up to six want slots, and are able to "lock" two wants at once!

When a young adult sim graduates their sophomore year in college, you have the option to change their aspiration if you want to. Once you change it, however, there is no turning back. Sims who graduate college also have more career options. I find that this adds to the realism of the game. The new career tracks that come with University are natural science, show business, art, and paranormal. When a sim enters college, you are asked to declare a major for your sim. These majors can prepare young adults for future careers by requiring certain skill points in order to excel in college. This is very helpful, and also very realistic. There are eleven majors, and each major give a brief (but entertaining) description and a list of careers that would go well with each major.

If you want your sim to join a Greek house, you must use the phone to apply for a membership. Applying for a membership does not guarantee admittance. When you ask for a membership, the existing members of the selected Greek house will pay your young applicant a visit. You then have a time limit in which you must win over the members of the Greek house. The better the impression you make, the better chance you have of admittance. When the time runs out, you are given a brief dialog saying whether or not you have made it into the Greek house. If you did not make it the first time, do not fret. You can try again as many times as you wish.

There are many benefits to joining Greek houses. The houses themselves (if you choose to move to them upon becoming a member) are spacious and quite nice, especially compared to the modest dorm accommodations. Much like the dorm, you can pick a room and claim it as your own, but you only have to share housing with up to eight members of the household. All of the sims in the household are playable, and if you are not used to playing multiple sims at once, this can be quite challenging. While in the Greek house, your sims can order pledges around, have wild toga parties, and sometimes "visit campus" of their own free will. Often a visit to campus will result in a sim returning with a box of pizza or a grimy old couch you can either sell or set out on the front lawn.

Another new and very useful addition to the game is influence. Your sims can now gain "influence points" by fulfilling certain wants. The more friends your sim has, the bigger their influence bar becomes. Certain wants then add influence points to your meter, when fulfilled. Not every want is worth influence points, however, and some wants are worth more points than others. You can have your sim use their influence points by selecting another sim, then selecting "influence to...". You will have a list of helpful and sometimes wacky things you can influence other sims to do. The more points you have, the more options you have. As far as I can tell, when a sim is influenced to do something, they do it whether they want to or not. This can come in handy when your party-loving college student realizes that they are nearing their final exam and they have yet to begin writing their term paper.

The Sims 2 is fantastic, and this expansion pack makes it even better! University contains all of the above, and more! Every Sims 2 fan is sure to find something they enjoy about this expansion pack, even if they do not want to go to the trouble of putting sims through college.