I discovered that your sim doesn't really have to have high logic skill to get abducted by aliens. My sim (knowledge aspiration) had only 2-3 logic skill points and used that expensive telescope - HE JUST TOUCHED IT and got abducted.. returned pregnant when his fiancee (currently wife) was pregnant too.

Don't let them eat any cheesecake!

The only thing that's needed for alien abduction is the expensive telescope and it being nighttime, nothing else even influences the likelyhood, not how high up the telescope is placed, not aspiration, not character, skill points or interests. Everything that says otherwise is just a rumour, likely from the early days of Sims 2 before people managed to look into the inner workings of the game.
Only the highest Knowledge Lifetime Aspiration Benefit (Summon Aliens) influences the likelyhood, and it's pretty much a "Get Alien Pregnant Now" button. And only Sims that have already been abducted can be abducted in the Dancing Sphere.

Wow, I actually didn't know that your Sim had to be abducted before to be abducted in the Dancing Sphere! Learnt something new today! :O

I didn't even know they could get abducted with the Dancing Sphere!

If you have Freetime installed, your sim can be abducted from any telescope. It doesn't have to always be the expensive one anymore.

I thought that was only with "Summon Aliens"?

I learned that even after 10+ years of playing the sims...i still have not opened a business or do anything with businesses in general or even taken my sims on vacation.

That's a good point and confusion is understandable. Here's what sims.fandom.com said about it.

https://sims.fandom.com/wiki/Alien_abduction

If this is right and I understand it correctly: any telescope has a chance of random alien abduction while stargazing, but you need either the Knowledge aspiration perk or the Science hobby enthusiasm benefit to deliberately try to get abducted (makes the chance of it happening much higher).

That is indeed a valid interpretation. However I just took it to mean that the new itneractions that came with Freetime (Search Constellations, I think?) also carry a chance of abduction, but still only with the expansive telescope. But you are right it's phrased in a way that doesn't make it clear which one they mean.
Gotta experiment with the cheap telescope now...

After John Mole went on a date with Klara Vonderstein, he went to work - he came home with a promotion and a message saying it was due to his friendship with Klara. Never had that before!


I had both Loki Beaker and Francis J. Worthington III get abducted using the "search for constellations" and "search for UFOs" interactions. If I recall correctly, Francis was using the cheaper telescope.

Is there a way to check in SimPE to see if the regular telescope can cause abductions?

I found 4 adult anims, it starts with a2o-telescopeCheap-abduction-start and end with a2o-telescopeCheap-abduction-end
I think the cheap telescope is not safe as we thought...

about "Summon Aliens"; I recall somewhere telling that it guarantees alien abduction but pregnancy being random from it.

dance sphere; abduction happens at highest speed. no memory from that abduction for either the sim or the witnesses.

I discovered that Sims can roll the want to sell a pet. I never saw that want for the whole 5 years I've been playing this game.

I discovered that ghosts spawn from gravestones when the tomb is hit by lightning. In broad daylight!

Adult may sing The Smurf Theme song, at least, the beginning of it, while they *play with* a toddler on the xylophone. Ok...

Child Daisy Greenman, while visiting the Gavigans, sang the nursery rhyme with one of Isaiah's toddler sisters! I knew they could do that autonomously with their own little siblings, but not with one they had no relationship with!

If my Sims rolled that want, they'd be in a pool with no ladders.
Few days ago I discovered that Capps don't get a pop up message like other families when first played. Then I found that they did have a message pop up in game files, it just doesn't show up.

What's the pop-up message?

Juliette really wants to make things official with Romeo, but her grandfather might not approve. Can they pull off Going Steady without Consort noticing? (found in objects.package)
In the Maxis podcast Lyndsay Pearson explained how they had to be careful while setting up the families not to break the scripts. I suppose they weren't careful enough with this one.

That aliens don't tan :-(

Makes me wonder... Is it possible to make your own popup messages for your own families?

I think it is, because jfade created a custom scripted object for Larksville neighborhood that has a storyline similar to The Sims Stories. The object would trigger pop-ups and instructions as the player progresses through the story. Unfortunately, I have no clue how to make it for my hoods, and I'd love to do it for a hood that I am attempting to create and possibly upload (if I ever finish it).

Sims can be burgled while at uni.