Who do you choose??

Hey everyone,

I just started this post as I'm curious as to how you choose to play your family on the sims 3.

I'll start by explaining how I play my family, as this is a rather confusing question.
Usually I'll start by having a couple, then they'll have some children (usually around 2-4) then often when the sims reach their young adult years I'll move them out of home (into share houses, friends and boyfriends/girlfriends houses etc). But the dilemma I have is, how do you choose which sim/house hold to play from there? Say the parents are old, and retired and keep the family home (like the often do) and all the other siblings have gone their own way, so I have a few options.
a. Play the retired couple, which will eventually die, forcing me to choose which child to play.
b. choose one of the 4 children (who are now young adults) to play.
I find often I split up my house hold, the parents keeping the family home, then all the children moving into separate homes, rarely do I move all the children out into the one home.
I often find I choose one of the female sims (as it allows for more options like kids).

So my question to all you simmers is, how do you decide what sim you're going to play (male or female, have favorites etc )? Do you split your up family?

It depends on how I'm playing. I had this one "legacy" that I've been playing since I got the game in April 2012, and about 8 generations down I usually just have a couple, make them have kids, and choose one of the children I like the best. I usually choose who my "heir" is before they're even born because I already knew what I'm going to make them like. I put quotations around "heir" and "legacy" because it wasn't actually a legacy, it was just me playing, but was very similiar to one. I kind of alternating between boy and girl though.

On the last generation of this family, I decided that I would stop just having kids and moving on because I would sort of get attached to a character, then just end up leaving them. So I set the age to epic, and I decided to split the family up, changing things up a bit. The first household was the parents, and their youngest child, the second household was the oldest child, his wife and kid, and the 2nd youngest child. And the third household was the 2nd oldest child, her boyfriend, his mom, and their twins. Ironically, I got tired of seeing that family and stopped that file around December. Last time I even opened that file was in January.

Recently I've been focusing on a traditional German family in Aurora Skies, and now the two sons are in University, and ones trying to become a rock star. I plan on them moving to Bridgeport later on.

Sorry if I rambled on though

Edit: Spellcheck

yeah.. It's depend on how u want to play it..

for me, each of the sims (daughter or son) have their own character..
so, just pick which one u prefer.. or just play all of them (keep in one BIG house...hahah)

or, u just change the active sims if u bored with ur sims.. i always change my active sims.. hehehee