That Sims fans download a lot of items to plug into their game is nothing new. However, managing all those downloads isn't always an easy task, if you have a lot of them. For the Sims 1 there were various fan-made content managers, but for the Sims 2 Maxis made their own tool. The Content Manager allows players to enable, disable and remove content. An update to add some new suggestions in the program was released in September.

Just like last month, a survey gave some insight in what Maxis has in store for us. Again there was the choice for several expansion packs, but right after that question, the biggest topic seemed to be Sims running their own businesses. What we now know will be the name for the expansion pack, "Open For Business," was also listed as a choice for the name of the expansion pack. This survey gave the first clue towards expansion 3, well before the second was even released.

The news that there would be a patch for the Sims 2 University was already mentioned last month, otherwise it would be second place here. The biggest news of the month though - and possibly the year - is that Miami attorney Jack Thompson told the media that the Sims 2 was not suitable for children or teens, because of full nudity and even genitals being visible in the game. After being told a player had to download such items to make it available, he claimed EA fully co-operated in fans making those downloads (illegally) available. This opinion resulted in big discussions, not only in the Sims community, but in the entire gaming industry. Thompson later said he wasn't sure whether to push the ratings up for the Sims. After all the discussions nothing much had really happened to the Sims 2. The only real change was made in Nightlife, when a cheat to remove the blur that covers Sims when they're naked was removed.

August was quite a boring month this year, with not too much big news. There were mostly the usual bits of news: screenshots, previews, and a lot of repeated information. Nothing really stood out, but if you have to pick something, then the news that the patch for the Sims 2 on Mac was released is worth mentioning. The game had been out for just over a month, and a few flaws were solved through the first patch. Two more patches would follow in October and December, both also fixing just a few issues.

Another bit of Mac news, which isn't very special but worth keeping in mind, is the announcement that University would be released around November. The first expansion pack had made it to the PC earlier already. In the end it took a month longer, but finally 6 months after the original game shipped, expansion pack 1 also made it to the shelves. In August the expansion was still in Early Development, but even then The Sims Zone naturally tracked the game to keep you up to date with the latest news on it.

Nightlife was also well on its way, like the ton of screenshots showed. In August Maxis revealed that if you would pre-order Nightlife you could get a special extra gift, but in the US only. There was a special Hot-Rod car and some music from the expansion pack. The Hot Rod became widely available through the Exchange quickly after the release of the game, and pretty much everybody is able to get it now.

September is the time when things tend to slowly get back to normal. With the Sims 2 for consoles getting closer to its release, Maxis announced an official release date. Late October would be the time to get the Sims 2 on various new platforms. In the end the games were released early November in Europe, and the PSP and mobile versions were delayed a bit more. But the games have all been finished now, and Maxis is probably already working on next year's game by now.

When Nightlife was released, the game had several bugs that occurred a lot, including one that made the voices for the Karaoke machine disappear, or that Mrs. Curmplebottom shouldn't be bitten. Fast as they are, fans made a fix for the Karaoke problem in just over a week, solving the problem. To help Maxis finding what's wrong with the game, they also started asking for bug reports. After the first official patch things went silent though, and there has been no talk about a patch since.

A lot of news throughout the year is about expansion packs, and specifically announcements, released, and big information stands out when it's about those. Similarly with Nightlife, the third expansion pack, "Open for Business," was also announced in the case insert of the expansion pack before it. Even before Nightlife was released in most territories, some people had already received the game and posted information about the insert on the Internet. Once released in the US as well, the insert appeared with the English text on it, and the working title for the third expansion. It was more or less official now.