I heard one simmer using a maxis downtown as a vacation destination, another one business district as a military base, the other as a alien planet where sims we're abducted too. I had used one for deceased sims to move/cross on the other side a.k.a The Afterlife, and one for time travelers to visit the past (medieval neighborhood) and the future (techno-advance run town) versions of the base main hood.

I make a countryside and a “downtown” under the business place since I want a big city look to!

One of my business hoods is a rundown desert town, the other rural and the third coastal upper class.

Since my main 'Hood is a tropical island and is set to Summer for all 4 quadrants, I thought of maybe adding an All-Winter subhood. I am not sure yet!

Just be prepared to want more winter cc clothing. I decided I wanted winter back (main hood is tropical so lots of summer and beachwear) so I added winter to my rural hood and now I am tired of my few pieces of outerwear.

It appears like many here I use the "business districts" simply as additional neighborhoods. I currently have the standard Downtown, which is the current low income housing area but is supposed to become more emtpy and commercialized with time.And 3 "business districts" 1) Old Town from sims 1(without the sims), which I'm planning to slowly let to fall into decay as the other districts gain more prominence and eventually turn into a low income housing area. 2) A still largely empty Bluewater Village where all the families associated with the Landgraab clan are supposed to settle down and a desert neighbourhood called "Xanadu" (after the poem) which is developing into a dwelling place for bohemians, artists and eccentrics.

My subhoods are handled per theme and season basis. I have my base 'Hood (Paradiso de Manana) that focuses on the generic USA suburbia theme that Maxis created. Many small starter bungalow style homes are found here, and the full season cycle is in effect. Then my subhoods:

Nhw-Wr [read: Nowhere] - A Modern Egyptian city inspired by Cairo and Aswan that takes place in an endless cycle of spring and summer.
Azalea Acres - A rural American farm community that features many TS3 lot recreations that takes place in Continuous Spring. Inspired by Riverview.
Hillsborrow - A small industrial center renovated into an urban community with lofts and art galleries that takes place in Endless Summer. Inspired by Urbzville.
Jamesbrook - A Euro-centric seaside fishing town whose buildings take inspiration from various buildings in England and Canada that takes place in Forever Autumn.

As you might guess Paradiso de Manana is the only 'hood that gets snow. I find giving a 'hood each its own individualized theme allows me to focus game-play on a central concept while having each place feel different and having them all still tied together chronologically. Subhoods are pretty much the only way I play as I don't like creating a new 'hood and having it not connected to a larger Sims world.

I consider all my downtown, shopping district, and main hood contained within one 'region' (like a state) but they don't have a local government even though they are separate towns/cities. I have two custom city-type down towns, a desert town, and then a tourist coastal/beach spot as my shopping district. The university subhoods are just campuses near to each main downtown and the vacation hoods I consider part of 'other sims regions'

They are provinces in the big countries I have. some are special, like the prison hood. some are economically challenged.

Most of my subhoods are just Maxis neighborhoods as shopping districts and for the most part, they're cities in unnamed states. Pleasantview is the main suburb with Downtown being being the urban portion. Bluewater Village is supposed to be about 20 minutes away, and Veronaville is about two hours away. Riverblossom Hills is a wealthy area about 2,000 miles from all of them, and nestled under the hills is the working class Desiderata Valley. A magic town, restricted to supernatural Sims is in the works.

currently can make downtowns and universities. have yet to get Open For Business and Bon Voyage.
downtown/university; so far have added them to just temporary neighborhoods. in AnyGameStarter, sent sims to a number of the pre-made Downtown community lots.

I just make them into one big kind of 'state' - it's like they're all villages or towns in a similar area! :D
Maybe I'll draw up a map one day. I see the river in Pleasantview as eventually thinning into the river in Veronaville, and other stuff like that

Forgot: In my Post-Apocalyptic Neighbourhoods (which I haven't been feeling like playing lately, for obvious reasons...) I usually start with three "districts": The Civilian Security Area, where the civilians start out in their bunkers, the Military Base, where the military and conscripts live and an Outlaw Town where the outcasts and mutants live.
My planned Medieval Hood/Kingdom was supposed to have different duchies.

Anybody ever had a setup where the subhoods are different civilizations that go to "war" with one another?

I'm also intrigued at the people who have their subhoods split into seasons, I don't think I'd manage to keep that up, I rely too much on the seasons to keep track of my rotations.

It depends on the hood. In Sheffield, I have a business district serving as military base, and downtown is where lower-income Sims live in apartments; it's all basically the same area. Same in Greater Pleasantview: the subhoods are just different areas of the same town; Crumplebottom Heights is the very poor area, with a lot of factories and the jail, but it's still the same town as the nicer areas.

In Carr's Crossing (BaCC), the downtown is considered to be a separate city a long way off, so Sims living downtown aren't affected by the rules of the main hood but they can communicate with the Sims who live there. In the Riverblossom Hills apocalypse, downtown is again the big city a long way off, and any additional subhoods will likewise be separate cities.

In Belladonna Cove, the subhood is a farming district.

Sub-hoods serve three very different purposes in my game. Some are districts of SimHampton*; at the moment, SimHampton and Polgannon are assumed to be next door to each other (but have very different laws and governances), and SimHampton University is always assumed to be adjoining whichever side of SimHampton is nearest the Palace.

There are also sub-hoods that are meant to portray locales near SimHampton but not actually part of its district. The elven town of Télanen and the community of the Drioru Forest are both about an hour's drive from SimHampton - far enough to be rural but close enough that it is plausible that visitors would interact. Sometimes holiday destinations are a little further away than that but still definitely driveable, the classic example being the beach resort Throne-O'-Sims. Of these, only the latter has different season pattern to the main hood - Throne-O'-Sims gets two summers and no winter. All three are, in different ways... ...particular about who may live there, but welcome all visitors.

However, some sub-hoods are considered space locations. SimColony was first, and it is supposed to be on the nearest naturally habitable planet to Earth. Most people were born and raised on that planet, but some people immigrated. It has two summers and two autumns. Alegnia Viaduct's Urban Zone is another planet as well (two springs and no summer), as is the wild wooded world of Borealis (two springs and two autumns). The existence of easy and cheap space travel via the Spaceport system explains why the visitor lists feel very much like home. SimColony

I had a setup at one point where, thanks to a complex plot, all of these different places were acting as separate, competing mini-civilisations. They never went to war, largely because they were all too busy attempting to survive the Paleolithic Era. However, SimHampton did have a three-day war with SimColony back in the Sims 1 era, leading to SimColony requiring a background check of anyone from Earth wishing to live there.


* - Or Polgannon, depending on who you ask. Technically, SimHampton is the sub-hood and Polgannon the main hood, but the people of SimHampton simply aren't used to thinking like that because in the past, SimHampton was always the main hood relative to everywhere else. (The people of Polgannon also consider their village to be the main hood, which is understandable as this is the truth )

since my main hood is an island, I assume that the rest of my subhoods are a bit far but still reachable with 30mins to an hour ferry ride or drive. That's not so far is it?
with an exception to vacation hoods, I assume that they're all within the same country unless I specifically say that they're not.

The main hood is town/city I'm focusing on, usually it has an important role either political (county seat) or economical (due to resources or major employers). The OFB subhoods are seen as smaller unincorporated settlements within the same county. The university is usually either a subhood on it's own (smaller town with a university attached) or within the main hood through mods. The downtown subhood is either the closest largest city or the state capitol, depending on how large my main hood is. The vacation subhoods are usually far away travel spots.

*gasp* But ol' Grimmie is a sweetheart! He's kind to animals, has a soft spot for children, is environmentally conscious, values his friends and loves long walks on the beach!

The hula zombie meanwhile? What do we know about her? For all we know she's a cat horder and plots the downfall of Simean civilization in her free time! For example, there's nothing in the games that provides any proof that she isn't connected to the sinking of Simlantis...
Also, according to SimPE she's a man (and her Aspiration is power...and power corrupts!) and the two hula zombies are really just projects of the same entity. So who knows what else she hides, or what her true form might look like...

I'm not really interested in simulating the Afterlives of my dearly departed Sims, it's their business what they are doing there.
But if you want to try it you might want to look into the Heaven and Hell functions by Chris Hatch which Ihatemandatoryregister and Smorbie preserved when Back Alley Sims went down.
I think with those you don't even need to resurrect dead Sims or use prison tokens.

I usually make all the seasons match for my subhoods but an all winter one sounds fun

As for having Grim around, there are a few imitation Grims hanging about, and you can easily make your own, so the authentic one is never disturbed. Just make yours immortal and you have your own Grim Reaper to play without any chance of corruption.

He can be the caretaker of the local cemetery. After all, he's close to death all the time-why not live there, too? One could charge the "ferryman fees' that allow the deceased to be buried there, thus making him self-sufficient.

But you don't want him hanging around in the neighborhood. Brings down the environment and happiness score.

In my current neighborhood Redwood Cove, the sub-hood Sea Island Village is played as a separate town within Sea Island. The main neighborhood of Redwood Cove is private lands owned by the Legacy Family. Only family members are allowed to live in Redwood Cove. Townies are allowed shop and frequent owned businesses like the fish market, farmers market, day spa, herbal store, coffee shop, take-out restaurant, bar and convenience store; but there some places that are kept private and off limits to Townies .

Sea Island is a small city that was once a fishing village that is now known for its night life and high-end shopping. It is also a very popular place for young couples with a lot of disposable income to raise their families. Sea Island is a very diverse community with restaurants, businesses and attractions representing its cultural diversity. I play with a mod that prevents Sims from Redwood Cove being walk-bys in Sea Island. I also use the visitor controller to kept Redwood Cove Sims separate from Sea Island. It's easier to ban them all and only allow playable Sims that I'm controlling to visit. I'm still able to have Sims from Redwood Cove go out to dinner or dancing as part of a group outing because the outing overrides the ban settings. Since Sea Island is a separate city that has its own weather, government and laws, the mods help to perpetuate that illusion by keeping my Sims separate.

Thanks to Lamare's mods I am building a college town in a new university neighborhood so that graduating Sims can choose to live there and raise their families if they choose.

I'm currently playing Pleasentview and have it broken down as such:
Pleasentview main hood: Suburbs - mostly houses, few apartments. All my families started here.
Downtown: City - mostly apartments, ranging from very low income (motels, rundown tenaments), to very high income (glamorous high-rises, townhouses). This has been where the majority of my sims live following college (what 20 year old want to move back to their home town, downt he street from their parents?).
Bluewater Village: Rural - focus on farming and agriculture. Most of the properties are larger tracts of land, also has some small shops in the center of town.

I'm also planning on adding another 'hood, which will cater to the super rich and mostly be mansions, yacht & country clubs (think Gated Community).

My megahood has a main town of Strangetown and "business districts" of Bluewater Village, Pleasantview, Riverblossom Hills and Widespot. They just add more Sims and space really. If I ever need more space i'll just create an empty business district (aka, new Sim town). I also have downtown.

I treat them as basically being their own towns but not too far from each other, they might be a bit of a drive but not too far as Sims freely go from one to the other. They are all different towns/cities in the same state in my head. Though in the Sims they only have one state to me (so I guess that's more of a country, or just the Sim Planet..)...just different towns within it. I'm not sure that makes any sense but I don't think about it too much, it works for me.

Veronaville, my main and oldest 'hood, has Maxis Downtown, and two shopping districts attached. The shopping districts are Tarlia's Bluewater and Monopolis, which is based on d_dgjdhh's Monopoly Game Town. I attached the latter when I was a participant in d_dgjdhh's Monopoly Game Town Contest, since two of my favourite Veronaville Sims (schoolboys Andrew Jones and Julian Moltke) were running the construction company that was building my houses for the contest. There is still a lot more to build there, and at the moment only three Sims live there, but one of the three is rich "Uncle" Milburn Pennybags, whose idea Monopolis is. (He lives in his fancy "Green House" in the middle of the town.

Veronaville with its 3 sub-hoods I regard as "Greater Veronaville". Sims living in Downtown give their addresses as "downtown Veronaville", while Veronaville "proper" is the historic old town. Downtown is just a short taxi ride away from old Veronaville. Veronaville's heyday was about 400 years ago when most of the Tudor style houses were built. After that the town entered a long period of slow decline. Sometime during the 19th century the commercial heart shifted to Downtown which had access to sea-going shipping. In recent years downtown Veronaville has also emerged as a centre of gay culture. Sims from old Veronaville tend to regard Downtown as exciting and a bit risqué. As Downtown is regarded as an integral part of Veronaville, it will not get its own Mayor. The post of Mayor of Veronaville has in fact been vacant since the retiral of Patrizio Monty, but there is a Downtownie called Kerie Hanby who is currently in level 9 in the politics career. I plan to make her playable and get her promoted to Mayor.

Bluewater and Monopolis are a bit further out, and may have their own mayors one day. After 5 years playing it, a backstory for Veronaville is slowly evolving in my head. I think I now see it as an independent city state (though we call it a "town", rather than a "city"). Constitutionally it is (or will soon become) a Grand Duchy with Grand Duchess Juliette Capp as its constitutional titular head.

None of my other 'hoods have sub-hoods except Baldrair Bluffs, which was primarily created in order to attach Peni's Land Grant University to it. Once I feel I've got enough experience playing university there, Veronaville will get a university too. Probably it will be Academy la Tour (which may get renamed "University of Veronaville").

I've traditionally treated downtown as... well, the downtown of a major city nearby, where all the cool nightlife happens. Shopping districts are also neighbourhoods that are located close to the main hood, typically in the same "county", though in different municipalities. Both of these types of sub-neighbourhoods also serve as additional real estate space when the main hood starts getting full.