- Site: The Sims 2: Pets
- Publisher: Aspyr
- Developer: Maxis
- Genre: Simulation
Game Media
- View QuickTime trailer
- Download the patch
- iTunes Store: The Sims 2 soundtracks
- The Sims 2: Bon Voyage
- The Sims 2: Nightlife expansion pack
- The Sims 2: Open For Business expansion pack
- The Sims 2: Seasons expansion pack
- The Sims 2: University expansion pack
- The Sims 2 Family Fun Stuff
- The Sims 2 Glamour Life Stuff
- The Sims 2 Happy Holiday Stuff
By Brad Cook
You create a Sim family and watch them grow. Mom and Dad produce a third offspring, adding even more tension between two siblings competing for their parents attention. The oldest child, already a teen when the baby arrived, soon becomes a young adult and leaves to attend La Fiesta Tech, happy to be free of the drama.
Mom opens a business out of the house, enabling her to earn Simoleons while watching the baby. The move comes in handy when Dad comes home after long hours at the Crypt O Night Club, announcing that hes fallen in love with The Diva. Devastated, Mom finds a companion of her own: a black kitten named Buttons. The children rejoice. Dad feels a bit jealous. The saga continues.
Can We Keep Him? Can We?
Direct a Sim to pick up the phone and dial the Pet Adoption Service, where theyll have plenty of cats and dogs to choose from. You can also create your own unique cats and dogs through the Create a Family screen, where size, color, body type, markings, and personalities can be tweaked to your hearts content. Choose from dozens of pedigreed breeds.
In addition, your Sim might find a stray cat or dog wandering around the house and develop a relationship with it, which will convince the animal to stay around for a while. Eventually, it will become a member of the household. This option is recommended for cheap Sims.
You can buy cats and dogs at a downtown pet store, the same way Sims can purchase clothes, furniture and other items. If you have the Open For Business expansion pack, Pets also allows players to open their own pet stores.
No matter how you obtain them, your pets arent just ornaments. Sims interact with them, teaching the furry critters commands and tricks while praising good behavior and punishing bad actions. Pets even develop overall relationships with their masters that are similar to the way Sims build relationships with other Sims.
Your pets also develop relationships with other animals in their household, as well with neighborhood dogs and cats that might wander through. (Depending on its personality, your pet might wander away, but if its wearing a collar, another Sim will likely return it when found. If its not wearing one, use the Report Lost Pet option on the phone and hope for the best.) Pets with particularly amorous relationships might even mate, producing kittens or puppies that you can keep, give, or sell to another Sim, or find good homes for through the Adoption Service option on the phone.
Theyre Just Like Furry Sims
Like their owners, Sim pets come with their own needs and motives, many of which you must help them fulfill. If you dont, theyll take care of them on their own, which could result in raiding the garbage for food or going to the bathroom inside the house. Each pet also has a unique personality that affects how it behaves when you interact with it, so it may take more training to get a cat or dog to do what you want, if its not very smart or its really lazy. Use the Obedience Trainer option on the phone if youre frustrated with the results.
Well-trained pets can embark on careers in security, show business, or service, clawing their way to the top of their fields while bringing home some much-needed Simoleons. As with their masters, pets personalities and skills help determine their success. Your pets leave during the day to perform their jobs, but make sure you stay on top of their training when they return, or that high-flying career could come crashing to earth.
Your pets successful careers also accumulate codes that unlock a variety of content you can use while creating new cats and dogs, such as different types of special collars, bandit masks, unique fur colors and patterns, and more. See our sidebar, Cheat If You Must, below if youd like to unlock those items now.
Even More Playthings
If youd rather not saddle your Sim with a high-maintenance dog or cat, you can always enter Buy Mode and purchase birds, fish, hamsters, and rodent-like Womrats. You dont need to worry about training them, since they wont develop relationships with their owners. On the downside, they cant breed or get jobs. Theyre mostly for show.
Of course, this wouldnt be a Sims 2 expansion pack without plenty of new stuff to buy, and Pets allows you to peruse high-end food and water bowls, the Scratch-O-Matic Scratching Post, pet pillows and houses, and more. In addition, your Sims have new furniture, planters, high-tech telephones, and other goodies to enjoy, along with new building tools and materials for making their homes more comfortable.
The new Collections function lets you organize your favorite items for easier retrieval, and the new Game Tip Encyclopedia contains all of the in-game tips, as well as some notes that dont appear during play.
Ambitious Sims may want to take their digital lives in new directions by becoming werewolves. Wait for a wolf with glowing yellow eyes to appear on your lot. Treat it well and build a positive relationship with it, using the Give Love command as often as possible. Allow the relationship to blossom and the wolf might nibble on your Sim one day, transforming it into a werewolf that can train pets faster than regular Sims, turn other Sims into werewolves by fighting with them, and more.
And you thought cute little Buttons was the only new animal to join the household.
Game Hardware
Check out our systems for your best gaming experience.
The Sims 2
Learn more about The Sims 2 by reading our previous feature which covers the original version of the game. The Sims 2 features not only a new 3D graphics engine but also the ability to track Sims lives from birth to death as they reach for their aspirations and experience a multitude of wants and fears.
If you liked this game, check out:
System Requirements:
- Full version of The Sims 2
- Mac OS X version 10.3.9
- 1.2GHz PowerPC G4 or Intel processor or higher
- 256MB of RAM (512MB recommended)
- 32MB video RAM (ATI Radeon 9000 or NVIDIA GeForce FX5200 or higher)
- 2GB hard disk space
- DVD drive
Cheat If You Must
To unlock the bonus pet creation content in The Sims 2: Pets, click on Game Options and then select the key icon in the lower right corner. Youll notice another key, with 0101 below it, in the lower right corner of the dialog box that pops up. Click it and enter a code to unlock the content. Unlocked items will show up under the list heading Unlocked Sims Gift Codes.
The Codes
TB6IPB1IAFDMRIQT6DG Bandit mask for cats
EEGJ2YRQZQARQ9QHA64 Bandit mask for dogs
EEGJ2YRQZZ1IQ9QHA64 Black dog collar
ZZZ11ZZZ9QAAQ91ZB1A Black smiley dog collar
ZZZ11ZZZHZ11Z91ZB1A Blue bones dog collar
ZZZ11ZZZHZ1AQ91ZB1A Blue camouflage dog collar
EEGJ2YRQZZAIQ9QHA64 Blue cat
EEGJ2YRQQQ1IZ9QHA64 Blue fur
ZZZ11ZZQHQ11Q91ZB1A Blue star collar
ZZZ11ZZZ9Q11Q91ZB1A Black dot cat collar
EEGJ2YRQQZ1RQ9QHA64 Black smiley cat collar
EEGJ2YRQZZARQ9QHA64 Blue bones cat collar
ZZZ11ZZZHQ11Q91ZB1A Blue camouflage cat collar
EEGJ2YRQQZ1IZ9QHA64 Blue star cat collar
EEGJ2YRZQZAIQ9QHA64 Green flower cat collar
EEGJ2YRZQZ1IQ9QHA64 Navy hearts cat collar
EEGJ2YRQQZAIQ9QHA64 Orange diagonal cat collar
EEGJ2YRQQQARQ9QHA64 Pink stripes cat collar
EEGJ2YRQQQ1RQ9QHA64 White paws cat collar
EEGJ2YRZZQ1IZ9QHA64 White zebra stripe cat collar
EEGJ2YRQQQAIQ9QHA64 Deep red cat
ZZZ11ZZQHQ1AQ91ZB1A Deep red fur
TB6IPB1R1FDMRIQT6DG Star the Dalmatian
EEGJ2YRQZQ1IZ9QHA64 Goofy cats
ZZZ11ZZZHZAAQ91ZB1A Goofy fur
ZZZ11ZZZ9QA1Z91ZB1A Green cats
EEGJ2YRQZZ1RQ9QHA64 Green flower collar
EEGJ2YRQZQAIQ9QHA64 Green fur
EEGJ2YRZZQ1RQ9QHA64 Light green cats
ZZZ11ZZZ9Q1AQ91ZB1A Light green fur
EEGJ2YRQQZ1IQ9QHA64 Navy hearts collar
ZZZ11ZZZHQA1Q91ZB1A Neon green cats
ZZZ11ZZZ9QA1Q91ZB1A Neon green fur
EEGJ2YRQQQAIZ9QHA64 Neon yellow fur
EEGJ2YRZZQARQ9QHA64 Neon yellow cats
EEGJ2YRZQZ1IZ9QHA64 Orange diagonal stripes collar
EEGJ2YRQZZ1IZ9QHA64 Pink cats
EEGJ2YRZQZ1RQ9QHA64 Pink fur
ZZZ11ZZZHZA1Q91ZB1A Pink stripes dog collar
EEGJ2YRQQZARQ9QHA64 Purple cats
EEGJ2YRQQZAIZ9QHA64 Purple fur
EEGJ2YRZQZAIZ9QHA64 Star coat markings
ZZZ11ZZZ9Q11Z91ZB1A White paws dog collar
ZZZ11ZZZHZ11Q91ZB1A White zebra stripe dog collar
EEGJ2YRZZQAIZ9QHA64 Zebra stripes