During April 2008, The Sims 2 website announced that 100 million copies of The Sims series had been sold. As of July 2012, The Sims 2 has sold more than 20 million units worldwide and is the best-selling PC video game of all-time. The Sims 2 was an instant success, selling a then-record one million copies in its first ten days. Veronaville's characters are based on Shakespearean characters. Strangetown's storyline is based on the supernatural, and is loosely connected with Pleasantview. Pleasantview is based 25 years after the town in the original The Sims. Although gameplay is not linear, storylines exist in the game's pre-built neighborhoods. The Sims 2 builds on its predecessor by allowing Sims to age through six stages of life and incorporating a 3D graphics engine. All Sims age, and can live to 90 sim days depending on the degree to which their aspirations are fulfilled. Sims have life goals, wants and fears, the fulfillment of which can produce both positive or negative outcomes. The Sims 2, like its predecessor, The Sims, does not have a defined final goal gameplay is open-ended. The Sims 2 has the same concept as its predecessor and sequel, The Sims 3, players control their Sims in various activities and form relationships in a manner similar to real life. A sequel, The Sims 3, was released in June 2009. Mobile manufacturers such as Nokia offer The Sims 2 from the Ovi Store. Though not commonly known, The Sims 2 is offered on mobile platforms. In addition several console versions have been released. Eight expansion packs and nine stuff packs were subsequently released. A port to Apple Mac OS X was released on June 13, 2005. It was first released on Septemfor Microsoft Windows. It is the sequel to the best-selling computer game, The Sims, which debuted on February 4, 2000. The Sims 2 is a strategic life simulation computer game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts. OS X, Windows, Mobile, Nintendo GameCube, PlayStation 2, Xbox, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable Barrett, Jenna Chalmers, Shannon Copur, Michael Cox, Seth Olshfski, Amy Dallas, Kevin Gibson, Daniel Hiatt, Kevin Hogan, Hunter Howe, Creighton Hurt, Trevor Jalowitz, Charles London, Lyndsay McGaw, Ashley Monif, Solveig Pederson,Todd Reamon, Kana Ryan, Lauren Wheeler, Jeannie Yang, Stuart McArther, Will Wright Maxis, Ideaworks Game Studio (Mobile Version)

The sims 2 characters