Gameplay įrom the neighborhood view, the player selects one lot to play, as in The Sims. By March 2012, the game had sold 13 million copies over all platforms with over six million PC copies, making it one of the best-selling PC games of all-time. In April 2008, The Sims 2's official website announced that 100 million copies of The Sims series had been sold.

It was also a commercial success, selling one million copies in its first ten days, a record at the time. It has been cited as one of the greatest video games ever made. The Sims 2 was critically acclaimed, gaining a 90% score from aggregators Metacritic and GameRankings.

Although gameplay is not linear, storylines and scripted events exist in the game's pre-built neighborhoods. Genetics are also a new game mechanic, as previously children in The Sims did not always look like their parents. The Sims 2 was the first game in the series to incorporate a 3D graphics engine, which allowed the player to get 360º views of the game as opposed to the fixed 2D isometric view of The Sims.

Sims have life goals, wants, and fears, the fulfillment of which can produce good or bad outcomes. Players manage their Sims from birth to death, forming relationships in a manner similar to real life. Like its predecessor, The Sims 2 allows the player to create and dress characters called 'Sims', design neighborhoods, and build and furnish houses. A sequel, The Sims 3, was released in June 2009. In addition, versions of The Sims 2 were released on various consoles and mobile platforms, including the Nokia Ovi Store. Eight expansion packs and nine 'stuff packs' were subsequently released between 20. The game was released for Microsoft Windows on September 14, 2004, and a port for MacOS was released on June 17, 2005. It is the second major title in The Sims series, and is the sequel to The Sims. The Sims 2 is a 2004 strategic life simulation video game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts.

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