The Sims series is known for the inventive and compulsive way in which it milks the cash-cow dry of every last drop. In the case of The Sims 2, this means not only barrage of expansion packs (which, so far, have all actually been rather good), but Stuff packs. Basically, they locked one of the developers in an office for a couple of weeks, told him to create some content that generally followed a theme without messing around with the game mechanics, then sold it for a huge mark-up. 60 new items, clothes, wallpapers and floors. That's it. What constitutes just a fraction of what makes up a full expansion pack (which makes major changes to what you can do in the game and where you can go) is sold for more than half the price of a full expansion pack; 20% of the effort, yet 70% of the profit. Yes it is a sickening testament to the saturation of capitalism within the modern social structure.
But, unfortunately, the stuff is good. This particular set caught my eye because of the complete new modern-style (which is actually more art nouveau, but never mind) bedroom set. So far, the biggest downfall in the Sims is that hardly anything matches. Railings don't match banisters, stairs don't match floors, floors clash with walls and ceiling lights just don't go with anything. Finally, we could create a bedroom that was not only uniform in its style AND colour scheme, but actually looked good too (yet still, the ceiling lights didn't match a darn thing). Also, the clothes are great Long, elegant dresses for the women and smart shirts and suits for the men. No more plaid shorts and sandals!
Also, other reviewers have made the arguments that there is a whole internet of user-made content out there. True, but many of the people who play The Sims are not the types to go sifting through page after page of user-made content, let alone know how to find any. Also, except for rare exceptions, user-made content is, unfortunately a far cry from the level of quality and polish that is provided by the official content. The custom textures and/or mesh are usually poor, at best; the item will have no kind of unique secription, will not work properly, the sims' interaction animations won't look right, or it will be placed in the wrong section of the catalogue. Believe me, I have a hard drive full of downloaded content, and - not even considering the HUGE extra loading time all custom content lumps onto the initial load and all menu loads, there are very few items that I could say truly match Maxis original quality. Plus, most of these items require at least a couple of the expansion packs to work anyway.
So, user-made content is fine, but it doesn't hold a candle to what is officially released. It's a shame that EA see the game as little more than a money-machine (kind of like the aspiration reward found in the game, actually), but on the flip-side, their hunger for profits mean that we end up with more stuff then ever...