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Neighborhood
Neighborhood 2
The neighborhood screen for Neighborhood 2 in The Sims

A neighborhood in The Sims series is a place that consists of lots. Initially, neighborhoods were small (10 lots in The Sims base game) and consisted of only residential lots, but later expansions for The Sims allowed community lots to be added. This pattern was continued into The Sims 2, which provided the customization of placing down new and removing existing lots. In The Sims 4, neighborhoods are also known as districts and are organized together as part of a larger world.

The Sims 3 does not feature the concept of neighborhoods in the same way as other games in the series; instead, gameplay takes place in an open world where Sims are free to roam anywhere on the map.

Traveling[]

Within a neighborhood[]

In The Sims and The Sims 2 Sims travel from one lot to another, with nothing in between. The player will see them leave the lot they are on and disappear, after which a loading screen will appear. The player will not see them again until they reappear on the destination lot.[notes 1] This is the same in The Sims 4, but Sims can also travel to public areas in the loaded neighborhood. Visiting another lot in the same neighborhood, or going anywhere outside the neighborhood, brings a loading screen.

Between neighborhoods[]

Traveling between neighborhoods, in the sense of being able to go from one to another, then return home, is not possible in The Sims or The Sims 2. While The Sims 2 allows an inhabited lot to be placed in the Lots and Houses bin, and allows that lot to be placed in a new neighborhood, actually doing that is not recommended, as it damages both neighborhoods if any household members had relationships with, or any sort of memories of, Sims or pets outside the household.

In The Sims 4, Sims can easily travel and move between neighborhoods, but only those Sims in the active neighborhood can be fully controlled. Sims outside the loaded neighborhood can be partially controlled, however.[1] Households can be moved between different neighborhoods in the same world, or between different worlds, without issue.

To sub-neighborhoods[]

All games allow traveling between a base neighborhood and its sub-neighborhoods. The Sims 2 also allows direct travel between sub-neighborhoods that can be reached by taxicab, car, or walking. In most cases, traveling to a sub-neighborhood is as easy as traveling from lot to lot within a neighborhood or sub-neighborhood. However, vacationing, traveling to more exotic sub-neighborhoods, generally requires more planning.

The Sims Online neighborhoods[]

There were originally twelve neighborhoods in The Sims Online. Later, these neighborhoods were merged to become EA Land.

The Sims neighborhoods[]

Neighborhoods
Sub-neighborhoods

There is a technique that makes it possible to have an infinite number of neighborhoods, which involves copying an empty neighborhood folder from the Sims folder in "Program Files" and renaming it "UserData(any # > 8)

The Sims (console) neighborhoods[]

In "Get a Life" mode the neighborhood is SimValley and it feature several lots, for the progression of Get a Life, while in "Play The Sims" the only neighborhood is Willville, but unlike SimValley, Willville have only residential lots.

This is the first time that a neighborhood has a proper name, and not a generic name like Neighborhood 1, Old Town, Vacation Island etc.

The Sims 2[]

Loading Screen of Neighborhood

Loading screen of a primary neighborhood.

When a player chooses a premade neighborhood from the main menu to play in, the player is greeted with the story mode window that introduces the captured lives of every resided family of the hood. Custom neighborhoods can also come with a story made by a player, though the mode doesn't open by default after entering the neighborhood view.

Unlike in The Sims, all sub-neighborhoods, barring secret sub-neighborhoods, offer residential as well as community lots. Downtown and shopping district sub-neighborhoods are essentially treated as extensions of the neighborhood, but colleges and vacation destinations have the following restrictions:

  • Only young adults can live in college sub-neighborhoods. Only teens can move in, and this triggers the transition to young adult. Moving out of the college sub-neighborhood triggers the transition to adulthood.
  • Sims living outside of a college sub-neighborhood cannot enter it unless invited by a playable young adult.
  • Sims are unable to live full-time in vacation destinations, although they can own and visit a holiday home there.

Pre-made sub-neighborhoods are not attached to the main neighborhood by default, except for secret sub-neighborhoods. These sub-neighborhoods can be attached to the neighborhood at any time, and the player can optionally create new ones. Multiple sub-neighborhoods of the same type can coexist with each other. If Seasons is installed, the player can customize which seasons appear for each individual neighborhood, and in which order they appear in.

Sub-neighborhoods can be deleted at any time; all Sims in the neighborhood will be moved into the family bin. Players cannot delete a sub-neighborhood if it is the only one of that type. For example, players cannot delete a Downtown sub-neighborhood if it is the only one left; they must create a new Downtown sub-neighborhood in order to delete the existing one. Players should take care when deleting sub-neighborhoods that contain gravestones - if the nounlinkondelete mod from More Awesome Than You is not installed, they will not be able to resurrect the sims whose gravestones have been deleted. This does not cause corruption.[2]

Creating a neighborhood[]

The Sims 2 allows players to create all-new neighborhoods and sub-neighborhoods from scratch. Players can use neighborhood terrain templates that were included with the game, or can use SimCity 4 to create custom terrains. After choosing to create their own neighborhood from the existing terrain templates, the player must then give the picked neighborhood a name and select a terrain type (Lush, Desert, Dirt or Concrete). After the loading transition, in which stealth hoods are loaded with along, the player can then choose to give it a description in the main menu.

Players have much greater control of customizing a neighborhood to their liking. After clicking the button labeled as "Lots & Houses", the player can place down, move and rotate or remove a lot. Additionally, the player can decorate the neighborhood with trees, ponds, stones, landmarks, effects and more.

List of neighborhoods[]

Pleasantview 97ea8acd

Pleasantview, one of the 3 main neighborhoods shipped with The Sims 2 base game

Neighborhoods
Sub-neighborhoods
See also: Secret sub-neighborhood

List of terrain templates[]

  • Alpinloch.sc4
  • Arbordale.sc4
  • Aridia.sc4
  • BelladonnaCove.sc4
  • Bluewater.sc4
  • BrineyFjord.sc4
  • CrescentIsland.sc4
  • CrystalSprings.sc4
  • DesiderataValley.sc4
  • Driftwood.sc4
  • Duality.sc4
  • IslaSegundo.sc4
  • MoonIslands.sc4
  • OasisValley.sc4
  • Pleasantview.sc4
  • RiverblossomHills.sc4
  • sample.sc4
  • Sedona.sc4
  • Strangetown.sc4
  • TakemizuVillage.sc4
  • ThreeLakes.sc4
  • TwikkiiIsland.sc4
  • Veronaville.sc4
  • ViperCanyon.sc4

The Sims 3[]

The Sims 3 does not feature neighborhoods in the same sense as other games. Instead, The Sims 3 introduced the concept of an open world. Sections of the worlds may be informally divided into neighborhoods, but this is strictly at the player's prerogative.

A select few can be presumed to have some sort of developer thought behind them, though most other worlds can only really be divided into "Downtown" and "Housing". Among those few subdistricts with distinct designs, are:

There are some fringe cases whose status would be hard to determine:

  • Riverview industrial district (Very small size despite almost a dozen rabbit holes).
  • Roaring Heights Beach Drive (Community lots outnumber individual residents by more than 3:1. Would however likely qualify as a Streets category entry.)
  • Puddlewick, a peninsula in Twinbrook (Unofficially named for its lowermost street. Has no obvious non-villa facilities.)

The Sims 4[]

In The Sims 4, neighborhoods are considered to be smaller sections of the world they are in. A neighborhood consists of a number of confined lots, as well as an area that provides a few gameplay objects. Sims can visit a neighborhood by travelling to one of its lots. Neighborhoods themselves do not retain the open world concept of The Sims 3; Sims are able to move freely within the public spaces of that neighborhood, but visiting any lot will incur a loading screen.[1] Moreover, only one neighborhood can be loaded at a time; Sims outside of the loaded lots cannot be directly controlled. To a certain extent, tasks can be given to members of the active household that are not on a currently loaded lot; the tasks they can perform vary based on the Sim's location, and can range from building a skill or relationship, fulfilling needs, or changing one's behavior in work or school. The player can switch over to the lots that these Sims are on in order to control their actions more directly, or they can bring them to the current lot.

Neighborhoods provide a purely cosmetic atmosphere with their physical appearance and backdrops; however, these cannot be customized or changed in-game.

Willow Creek neighborhoods
Oasis Springs neighborhoods
Newcrest neighborhoods
Granite Falls neighborhoods
Windenburg neighborhoods
San Myshuno neighborhoods
Brindleton Bay neighborhoods
Selvadorada neighborhoods
Del Sol Valley neighborhoods
StrangerVille neighborhoods
Sulani neighborhoods
Britechester neighborhoods
Evergreen Harbor neighborhoods
Batuu neighborhoods
Mt. Komorebi neighborhoods
Henford-on-Bagley neighborhoods
Tartosa neighborhoods
Copperdale neighborhoods
San Sequoia neighborhoods
Chestnut Ridge neighborhoods
Tomarang neighborhoods
Independent neighborhoods

The Sims Stories[]

In The Sims Stories series, only one Sim is playable in the neighborhood until that Sim's storyline is completed. After that, every family in said neighborhood becomes playable.

Story neighborhoods
Free play neighborhoods

  

The Sims console games & The Sims Social[]

Notes[]

  1. Prior to The Sims 2: Nightlife, the player would then have to select their destination from a neighborhood view; Nightlife introduced the ability to select a destination in advance.
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Downtown, Vacation Island, Studio Town, and Magic Town are the same for every neighborhood in The Sims.
  3. Old Town proper is the same for every neighborhood in The Sims, but adding it to a neighborhood will not affect that neighborhood's version of Sim Lane.

References[]

See also[]

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