Here it is! It’s a default replacement for the stealth hood that holds all the hobby lots from Freetime.
CC-free, clean & empty of sim references, run through HoodChecker, LotCompressor, LotCleaner, and playtested!
I didn’t want to include too many pictures, cause well firstly this is a lot of stuff, but also I think it’d be cool to sort of ~experience it firsthand~ like we did way back when with the original Freetime lots - Though hopefully with less disappointment this time lol
• A brand new style for the Hobbies stealth hood!
I added a TON of hood deco and rearranged the lots.
Now the more urban/industrial-themed lots look like they’re actually part of a city, and the more nature/outdoors-oriented lots have extra surrounding greenery.
The lots are also no longer invisible! So you’ll be able to see them from the lot your sim’s currently on. It doesn’t change anything gameplay-wise, but it adds to the style of the stealth hood so it looks like a legit place instead of an empty wasteland where nothing exists.
• There are NO townies or NPCs.
It’s completely clean & empty.
This means your game will randomly generate brand new Iconic Hobbyists in every hood you add it to. No two Iconic Hobbyists across different hoods will be the same!
• All lots are now 20x20. Yep, every single one.
I hate how large EAxis lots are, especially because bigger lot + more sims (which of course there are on community lots) = LAAAAAG.
So now instead of gigantic buildings with almost nothing in them spread out on huge lots your sims take forever to walk across, everything makes the most of the space it’s in.
This leads to a few tight-ish spaces in some lots, but I playtested and asked others to playtest for issues like that, and after fixing some that cropped up there shouldn’t be any more (let me know if there are though, it’s always possible I missed something!).
Of course traffic jams are still a risk, but I did what I could to minimize them by adding multiple doors and wider space around certain objects, etc.
• Every single lot was rebuilt from the ground up.
It was kinda necessary considering how drastically I resized some of the lots, but I also wanted to reimagine the lots in a more “modern” and interesting/fun way. If you’re going to Will’s Garage you expect it to look like a garage, not a rectangle with a hole in it lol.
There’s also a lot more incorporation of EPs/SPs and career objects that pertain to each hobby.
I tried to put every single object that sims can gain hobby enthusiasm from on the corresponding hobby lot - The only exception being that I removed the pool from Games of Glory so sims can’t play Marco Polo, but it didn’t really fit with everything else the lot has so I figured that was an acceptable sacrifice.
• I made some (very slight) changes to the names of the lots.
The names were pretty clear to begin with, but I like even more clarity than that so I added the lot’s associated hobby at the end of each lot name.
Example “My Muse II - Art Studio“ is now called “My Muse II (Arts & Crafts).”
It doesn’t change the function of the lot whatsoever. It’s just for the player’s ease of use if your sim has multiple hobby lot memberships when you’re choosing which one they should visit.
Place the F002 folder in the following location:
• For UC: C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection\Free Time\TSData\Res\NeighborhoodTemplate
• For Not-UC: C:\Program Files (x86)\EA GAMES\The Sims 2 FreeTime\TSData\Res\NeighborhoodTemplate
Move the original F002 folder somewhere else so that the two don’t get mixed together and so there’s only one single F002 folder for the game to access.
How to Add this to an Existing Hood:
Please **BACK UP YOUR HOOD** before doing this JUST in case.
1. Place my Hobbies stealth hood replacement in the NeighborhoodTemplate folder as described above
2. Follow this tutorial to delete your hood’s original Hobbies stealth hood
3. Re-enable the Hobbies Neighborhood Template that you disabled during the tutorial (just rename it back to NeighborhoodTemplate)
4. Open the game and load your hood - The game will automatically add the new Hobbies stealth hood to it!
• This was NOT made with Ultimate Collection.
Yep I still use my disc version of the game with each EP/SP installed individually. I have no idea if or how that affects those who do use UC and want to have this, I’m guessing it’ll work fine?
• Sometimes the Iconic Hobbyist will spawn in a weird spot when you load a hobby lot, like… on the roof.
The original hobby lots had the same problem. I think the game just picks a random spot for them to appear when you load into the lot so there’s a chance it could pick a “bad” spot. Just leave the lot and come back to make them appear somewhere else.
• Sims will hand-wave like they’re being blocked before successfully doing the “Work as the DJ!” interaction on the DJ booth in the My Muse lot.
This is caused by the DJ NPC being nearby the DJ booth. There’s no way to avoid it without deleting the NPC to get them out of the way (who will immediately respawn).
It’s a routing issue due to the DJ NPC being just close enough to the booth that your sim thinks they’re in the way, but they’re not in the way so they continue onto using the booth with no issue.
My only possible suggestion for fixing this is Walk Around Blocks to give the DJ more room to get away fast enough to avoid making your sim complain, but as this Hobbies stealth hood is intended to be CC-free I haven’t included them myself. Your sim will still use the DJ booth just fine either way, just not without a quick hand-wave first.
• Some deco is in an inaccessible spot, so if a sim tries to “View” it they’ll complain about being blocked.
This is mainly with one sculpture in the Aspirational Laboratories lot, but I mean it’s deco so it’s not really supposed to be accessible. Just a heads up though.
It also happens with the tree ring on the Peerless Park lot, but that’s more due to multiple sims trying to be in the same place at once and complaining when someone’s in their way. Which I can only do so much about lol.
@eulaliasims‘s hobby lot editing tutorial
@sunradersimblr‘s guide on hobby hood/lot editing, the info from their own replacement version, and their guide on cleaning & emptying a hood since I didn’t originally make this in a clean game intending to share it lol - also for helping me test it and letting me know what I missed!
@jawusa‘s clean/empty hood templates which I used as a base to ensure its cleanness/emptiness
annaxmalina
baratheonpilled
turnnoffyourmind
dededos
ellievsbear
discoholicmusic
jbbartram-illu
