Time machine

A time machine is an object in The Sims 3: Ambitions. Except for the mishap that brought Don Lothario to Riverview, time travel has never been featured in The Sims series before, but the first trailer for Ambitions shows an inventor walking into the machine and then coming out in "rags", with spears shooting at him.

According to an attendee at a UK hands-on event, "Grant Rodiek said that your sims can “woohoo” in the time machine, and if a child is conceived it may come out older (or younger) than your couple!"

The Time Machine is a Rabbit Hole similar to the Mausoleum. A Sim can return with various items including a caveman gnome much as the original Mysterious Mr. Gnome is discovered in the Mausoleum.

It's possible for Sims to meet their previous selves and/or previous companions, and tell them to stop fighting and focus on love and family. If this happens, a Sim may suddenly have a child, but the child may not have a mother. When a Sim travels to the past, he or she can accidentally knock over a job board. If that happens, when the Sim returns, one of his or her housemates will have switched careers. (This may be a reference to the movie Back To The Future.) Occasionally, traveling to the past will result in a message about the Sim using the machine having saved a child in front of his or her past self. This results in a new child being added to the household.

The exterior look of the time machine is most likely based on the one seen in Blackadder: Back and Forth.

Traveling to the past can have huge consequences for a Sim's household (new job, new friends, new Sim in the household), while traveling to the future seems to be more harmless, though the Sim sometimes comes back with an object or moodlet. It is also possible for a Sim to return from a time travel trip with a new outfit related to the time period he or she traveled to. There are 4 unique outfits for each gender.

Moodlets
After traveling in time, a Sim will get either a -25 or +20 moodlet called Traveled in Time, which will last 4 hours. There is also a chance your Sim will get another random moodlet.