Inventory

Inventory is a feature that enables Sims to store and carry around a number of items out of existence. The feature is available in The Sims: Hot Date, The Urbz: Sims in the City, The Sims 2: Nightlife, The Sims 2 Pets for consoles, The Sims 2 Castaway and The Sims 3.

Inventory is a very useful feature to save some space in the lot without selling them. This allows Sims to keep their objects intact when they're not being used. Some objects however cannot be placed in inventory. Most games have no limit of how many objects can be placed in inventory, but some others do, including The Sims 2 Pets for console.

The Sims: Hot Date
Some items can be placed in a Sim's inventory by interacting with the item, but most cannot be. Items which a Sim obtains on community lots are directly placed into their inventory, and items received from other characters may be. Makin' Magic added categories to keep track of the spells in a Sim's wand and the magic ingredients they have.

Items cannot be manually removed from inventory. Many can only be given as gifts. Some will automatically be taken out of inventory when the Sim returns home from a community area. Small pets can be removed from inventory by interacting with an appropriate cage or tank. Vegetables from Unleashed will remain in inventory until they're either sold at market or stored in a pantry. Seeds and plant tonic from Unleashed, and ingredients and wand charges from Makin' Magic are used directly from inventory.

The Urbz: Sims in the City
The Urbz: Sims in the City includes an inventory feature that is divided into 3 sections (first for objects, second for build items, and third for Power Socials). The Urbz: Sims in the City only allows 12 different objects in each section of the inventory, and up to 99 of the same item. Having two different colors of the same object will count as two objects instead of one.

Objects in the district (Including the Cheat Gnome) are Public Property and cannot be stored in the inventory except for walls, wallpaper. and floor titles.

The Sims 2: Nightlife
Inventory feature was introduced in Nightlife, and carried forward into later expansion and stuff packs. Prior to Nightlife, purchasing some objects in community lot, such as magazines, groceries, cell phones, mp3 players, and handheld games will automatically place these objects in Sim's temporary inventory. Once Sims go home, they will immediately place the bought magazines to any tables and groceries to the fridge. Other personal objects will stay and attach to the respective owners.

Inventory can be accessed in the Rewards panel, with the backpack icon. Sims can place almost everything in their inventories with some exceptions. There is no limitation of the number of objects that can be placed in inventory. Each Sim has their own personal inventory, and only them can access their own inventories. Objects that are bought from community lots now will stay in inventory, though Sims will still autonomously put the grocery away to the fridge.

With Seasons or later, Sims can give items from their inventory by giving gift to another Sim. Sims will particularly want to give gifts in Winter, which will boost more relationship and be more likely for acceptance. Sims cannot give gift if their inventory is empty.

Placing Objects
To place objects in a Sim's inventory, simply click and drag them to the inventory panel. With Pets or later, pressing I key will automatically place the grabbed object to the inventory. With Seasons or later, similar objects can be stacked when stored in inventory to save space. The number of how many objects are stacked in one place will be shown, as seen on the image above. The objects don't need to be in exact state; the objects will stack even if they have different colors, quality (garden produce), or are dirty/broken. This is especially handy when Sims craft many objects or harvest many fruit, so the players no longer need to scroll endlessly.

When objects are in Sim's inventory, they will be considered "in limbo". This means that the price of the inventory will not depreciate (or sometimes appreciate for art objects), and food will not spoil. Also, inventory is the only way to preserve career rewards and most objects upon moving, so they will not be sold. Although even really big objects (e.g. helicopters, roller rinks, or pirate ship) can fit, some objects cannot be placed in inventory, including:
 * Bills
 * Homework
 * Old newspaper
 * Most Build Mode elements
 * Food ingredients in the middle of preparations
 * Community objects while in an owned community lot
 * Turned on electronics (TV, stereo, computer)
 * Currently used appliances (toaster, stove, dishwasher)
 * Ringing telephone and alarm clock

Business Purpose and Shopping Cart
Crafted objects (toys, robots, flowers, pottery, and sewn items) as well as food immediately go to the maker's inventory if they use the "Make Many..." interaction. If the crafting is done in an owned community lot or home business, the crafted objects will appear in the owner's inventory whether it's crafted by any employees or household members. Caught fish, harvested products, and magic reagents will appear in the inventory of anyone who catch, harvest, or brew them.

Business owners require the crafted objects, food, fish, products, and reagents in their inventory in order to restock them. Otherwise, the items will remain out of stock. Retail items that can be purchased in Buy Mode, however, will not be taken even if the owner has them in their inventory.

To avoid confusion, the following terms "Purchase" and "Pay" have the different meaning. "Purchasing" means taking any objects mark for sale to the shopping cart, while "Paying" means handing over the money to the cashier to possess the purchased items to the inventory

Sims who travel to a business lot can purchase items for sale. The items will appear in their shopping cart, which is below the inventory tab. Players can only view or remove the purchased items in the shopping cart, because the items don't belong to them yet. Sims still need to pay the items in the cash register. Once they pay them, the objects appear in their inventory. Customers or visiting Sims who also purchase any items in a business lot will have them in the inventory. Because objects do not depreciate in inventory, they will be fully refunded if they sell them right away when being played.

Sims who purchase items but not pay them will not possess the items when they get home. It will stay in their shopping cart instead. When they return at the business lot, they can pay still can pay the items they purchase. When the customers appear as visitors, some objects aren't actually bought. Clothes (not sewn outfit), video games, personal electronics, and magazines don't appear in their inventory when they purchase it.

Other Notes
Sims can access inventory while on community lot or hotel, but they can only view the contents, and not take anything in or out of it. Oddly, Sims can access and use their inventory in secret society lot, and probably benefit it by stealing the furniture. However, the progress is saved, and the next time a Sim enters the secret society will not see the taken objects. Inventory is also unusable when burglar appears or the house is on fire.

Previously, Sims can give their handheld to children with "Give Handheld" special interaction. This interaction, however, is removed if any later expansion or stuff packs are installed. This is because Sims can take out the handheld from the inventory and place it to other Sims' inventory, as well as the gift giving feature from Seasons.

The game disables the players to access some Sims' inventories. While going on a vacation, the family who brings along other Sims cannot access their inventories. The player cannot see what they have with them. Also, roommates' inventory will be replaced by Roommate Satisfaction Meter, making the player unable to see their personal belongings.

Some special objects will or already appear in some Sims. Townies, NPCs, CAS Sims, and pre-Nightlife Sims will have a bottle of ReNuYu Porta-Chug, as well as children who grow up to teenagers. Bigfoot, Witch Doctor, and Wise Old Man have 5 maps to their secret vacation lot, and the latter two have voodoo dolls and Dragon Scrolls, respectively. All hobby instructors have their own hobby plaque. High witches and Sims who are turned into one have a cauldron and a spellbook.

The Sims 3
In The Sims 3, a Sim's personal inventory is where books and collectibles are stored. It is more limited than in The Sims 2: it can only contain objects that a person could realistically carry. Certain objects such as guitars and laptops, when placed in a Sim's inventory, allow that Sim to use them wherever they are.

In the Windows and Mac OS X versions of the game, each Sim has a separate inventory; in the PS3 and Xbox 360, the Sims' inventories are shared.

Unlike The Sims 2 and The Sims Stories, food placed in the inventory in The Sims 3 (and The Sims Medieval) will eventually spoil.

Family inventory
Each household has a family inventory, which can be accessed in buy mode by clicking the cardboard box icon. When moving house, if the player decides to 'pack furniture' from their previous dwelling, the furniture is placed in the family inventory. Unlike the individual Sims' inventories, it can store practically any object in the game.

If the Food Replicator or Teleportation Pad are purchased as lifetime rewards, they will be placed in the family inventory. The same applies when buying large furniture (e.g. tents, Sheng Hai Training Dummy, Board Breaker) in markets in Shang Simla, Al Simhara, or Champs Les Sims.

Inventario