Standing at an electronics workbench, a Sim wipes the sweat from his brow. Later on, he'll open his electronics store and sell the robots he's building to his neighbors, but before he calls in his employees he has to create his merchandise. Across town, his sister is running a gym out of her house. She works as an athlete by day and opens her gym when she comes home at night. Sometimes she schmoozes with her customers to get them to stay longer, and sometimes she just goes to bed while they pay her for every hour that they stay. Easy street? Not really -- building your own business in The Sims: Open for Business is a real challenge, but in the end it's worth it for all but the most casual of players.

Open for Business continues a great run for Maxis and EA. While the expansions to the original Sims were hit and miss, so far each of the three packs released for Sims 2 have been well-conceived, with each adding significant content to the core game. While we definitely have some reservations about Open for Business, ultimately it passes the test: It provides a ton of player-driven content and gameplay with the same style and humor that makes the franchise such a riot for casual or serious players.

'Miss, I think you would look good in this car.
And your money would look good in my wallet.'

We should note that for GameSpy testing purposes, we played the game with all three expansions installed. If you've just bought the original game and you're looking for what to do next, we'd consider Sims University a must-have. Open for Business works best in tandem with NightLife to give you more business options; we wouldn't recommend grabbing the latest expansion until after you've purchased NightLife. The content from each expansion builds on the earlier games almost exponentially.

What's New?

Where the NightLife expansion allowed Sims to go out on the town and party in clubs and restaurants, Open for Business allows Sims to build and run those same nightclubs and restaurants. Your Sims can also create small home-based businesses or retail megastores, either building their own merchandise via new workbench items or buying things wholesale to sell at retail prices.

Basically, it's possible to take any community lot idea you have and turn it into a business. Want to make a bowling alley? Buy a bunch of lanes and charge admission. Want to build a home and garden center? Arrange a bunch of plants and garden gnomes on your lawn and start selling. Want to run a nightclub? Start blasting music and serving drinks. If you have NightLife installed the types of business you can run grows: Car lots! Poker halls! Fine dining! The real strength of this expansion is how it opens the door to create just about any business. You can also hire and manage employees to do the work for you, and even managers who can manage your properties for you while your Sim is away. See our special SimPrentice series (Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3) for details of all the new features.

125 new items are available, most related to the types of businesses you can run. New items include an array of small robots capable of doing chores, a series of toys that can be built at a workbench, cash registers to ring up business, and a makeover chair allowing you to perform cosmetic overhauls on your neighbors. New building tools include elevators, shelving, and risers.