I'm kinda playing a legacy family and currently I'm on the third generation. The whole thing started off with two sisters, Rosemary and Emily. Rosemary got pregnant during college and had Hugh, her son after graduating. Emily waited longer to have children, almost half way through her life she gave birth to her twins. Then, after her husband had an affair with some random dude (Thanks ACR...ruined a birthday party!), she got knocked up by a coworker that somehow ended up being the mailman but also worked in the education track? Anyway, she gave birth to her youngest, Tammy.

Both Rosemary and Emily are dead, and so are the fathers of their children. Hugh moved out and got married to Lilly, a roomie from AL and they had twins, Janet and Electric. I decided that since Janet, Electric and Tammy were ready to ship to college, why not have them dorm together as a family? I move them in, and I checked out their family tree. For some reason, the game does not recognize Tammy as Janet and Electric's cousins. I think they're second cousins because Hugh is Tammy's first cousin, and Janet and Electric are Hugh's kids. Tammy does show up as being Hugh's cousin though.

So my question is, does the game stop recognizing relatives after a while? Is it even possible to marry second cousins in The Sims? I've never had this situation arise before, and I'm quite curious. They're both wealthy families because of their parent's careers and life insurance policies, so the idea of keeping the wealth among the family sounds interesting but weird at the same time lol.

The game doesn't recognize second cousin's and yes they can marry and have kids.

Interesting!

"Removed" cousins don't count in the game either. For example, I have sisters in my game named Skye and Josephine. Skye was born the day before Josephine was set to go to Uni, and had just turned child when Josephine's daughter Penelope was born. Skye and Penelope are much more like sisters than like aunt and niece. Skye's children will be Penelope's cousins, but are likely to be much closer in age to Penelope's children. Skye's hypothetical daughter (let's call her Violet) would be Penelope's first cousin. Violet and Penelope could not get married in-game, thanks to normal game mechanics. However, Penelope's hypothetical son (let's call him Ulysses) and Violet would be first cousins once removed. Violet and Ulysses could totally get married in-game if they wanted to.

EDIT: "Greats" don't count either. If you use a lot of elixir, great-grandma could totally marry her great-grandson if they were both amenable. Also great-aunts or great-uncles. This never comes up the way I play, but it does for some people.

EDIT 2: Rearranged word order for greater clarity and avoidance of accidental implication of incest.

I have this come up in my game and I use the Sim Blender to set them as "Cousin" whether it's second cousin or first cousin once removed. The grandparent thing is trickier to fix, but I fix cousins all the time. I don't want Lucy Burb's kid and Angela or Lilith's kid getting involved in romantic ways.

It makes sense, actually - if you like to play only one family, and no townies, you''ll have to get marriage prospects somewhere.

But Violet would be his mother.

No he wouldn't. Ulysses would be Penelope's son, not Violet's. Perhaps a better word order to make that clear would be "However, Penelope's hypothetical son (let's call him Ulysses) and Violet would be first cousins once removed." Violet and Penelope are first cousins, so the child of either is the other's first cousin once removed.

Ah, I misread it as 'Violet and Penelope's' son.

Yeah, after I read your comment, I could see how the word order was ambiguous. I was tired last night and lost my usually precise control of the English language. Sorry.

EDIT: I've edited my original post to make that clear. Thanks for pointing that out!

You can set Family flags in SimPE (and presumably with SimBlender) without specifying relationship.

Nifty! I'll have to check that out.

I actually set out to work this out - I wanted a pair of cousins to marry and was annoyed when they couldn't. Second cousins (and first cousins once removed, as you describe here) can marry. I had a couple who did: John and Linda were brother and sister, John had a son Peter who had a son Henry while Linda had a daughter Harriet who had a daughter Isabella. Henry and Isabella fell in love, married, and had eight children.

Actually in most of the world first cousins can marry (though it's not usually common nowadays outside of the Middle East). If third cousins have a child together the chance of genetic abnormalities is no higher than any random couple, and even for first cousins the chances of a genetic problem are no worse than having a baby at 40 rather than 25. In fact, first and second cousin couples (on average) find it easier to get pregnant and have more children. Problems start to appear if you have a baby with a parent or sibling (though even then the baby could well be perfectly healthy) or if first cousin or closer marriage happens over many generations so the parents are more closely related than first cousins normally are.

The reason most people find cousin marriage disguisting is that you generally don't find people you knew as a small child attractive. So a pair of cousins (or just friends) who knew each other well when they were four probably find the idea of romance as adults disguisting. But a cousin you didn't meet until you were both at least teenagers might seem sexy. So for sims, maybe keep track of when they meet, and if they're both older... why not have a pair of second cousins marrying? Some of your ancestors did.

Maybe someone can help me understand this. I know who my cousins are: they're my father's brother's children. They live in Brazil, speak Portuguese, and I've never met them. (My mother's brother was killed in an air crash, and my father's sister never married, so [as far as I know] they're my only cousins.) If I understand it right, they're what we call "first" cousins. But what on earth are second cousins and third cousins, and "twice removed" cousins? I've now reached my Elder lifestage (in Sims terms), and I still don't know what these terms mean. Could anyone explain them to me?

Your cousins in Brazil are your first cousins and any children they have are your second cousins and so on. I'm not sure about the removed part.

@joandsarah77 That's a common colloquial usage, but it's not quite right in genealogical terms.

@AndrewGloria Your cousins in Brazil are your first cousins.If you have children, your children and your cousins' children would be second cousins to each other. Your grandchildren and your cousins' grandchildren would be third cousins. Your great-grandchildren and your cousins' great-grandchildren would be fourth cousins. (Continue until you a. lose count, b. reach a closer relationship through intermarriage, or c. hit 52nd cousin, because mathematically speaking, it's impossible to be further than a 52nd cousin from anyone else on the planet.)

The "removed" part comes in when you are talking about people from different generations. Your cousins in Brazil are your first cousins. Their children are a different generation from you. (Your father and his brother were the same generation, you and your cousins are the same generation, but your cousins' children would only be the same generation as your children, not as you.) The relationship between you and your cousins' children is therefore at a "remove" -- you don't line up on the family tree. Your cousins' children are your first cousins once removed. Your cousins' children would be second cousins to your children, and second cousins once removed to your grandchildren. (Continue until you a. lose count or b. reach a closer relationship through intermarriage.)

When you have large families with a wide spread of ages (say, the oldest is 20 years older than the youngest), the generations can get out of alignment very quickly. My mother's cousin had a family reunion once that brought together all the descendents he could find of my great-great-grandparents. That made me a "Generation 4" (0. original couple > 1. great-grandfather > 2. grandfather > 3. mother > 4. me). However, I cam from a line where everyone was either the youngest or close to the youngest, with a wide age spread. There were people in the room who were descended through the eldest line, and they were Generation 7s. I couldn't tell you the genealogical term for their relationship to me, but it would involve several removes.

Does that make sense?

Yes, good job Esme.

A quicker way is to count as follows:

First cousins share at least one grandparent.
Second cousins share a great grandparent.
Third cousins share a great-great-grandparent.

And so on. This assumes that their common relative is in the same position generationally.

Tammy's grandparents are Rosemary (and Emily)'s parents. But Emily (and Rosemary)'s parents are J+E's great grandparents. So while they share a common ancestor, that ancestor is not the same relative to both of them. This is where "removed" comes in.

First/second/third etc comes from the closest common ancestor. In this case, a grandparent of Tammy, and a great-grandparent of Janet. Grandparent is closer than great grandparent, so they are first cousins.

Then, there is one generation difference between a grandparent and a great grandparent, so that means they are "cousins once removed". First cousins, once removed.

If the common relative was a Great grandparent and a great-great-great grandparent, the relationship would be second cousins (closest common ancestor), and twice removed because there are two more "greats" (or generations) in the second relationship than the first.

If Tammy has children, her children will share a great-grandparent with Janet and Electric, so her children and J+E will be second cousins, without the "removed".

In reality, anything further than an aunt or uncle is a cousin. The distinctions are only useful if you are a geek about such things

@esmeiolanthe

Thanks Esme! I think I've got it. Tell me if I'm right.

My grandfather had a much younger brother who had children (2 boys) about the same age as myself. They never lived in the same town as we did, but on family visits I used to play with the younger one. Even though he was about my age, he was the same generation as my mother, so he and his older brother would be my second cousins once removed? They both got married and had children. Their children, although much younger than me, are the same generation as me, so they'd be my full second cousins. Some of them have I now also got married and had children, so, if I follow right, they will also be my second cousins once removed, but this time with me as the older generation? Thus:
My Side
Generation 0 - my great grandmother
Generation 1 - my grandfather
Generation 2 - my mother
Generation 3 - me
Their Side
Generation 0 - my great grandmother
Generation 1 - my (great) uncle Rod
Generation 2 - Jim and Will (the boys I knew as a child)
Generation 3 - Darren (Jim's son)
Generation 4 - Darren's children

I have no children, but my sister's children would also be Generation 4. So they'd be third cousins to Darren's children? Have I got all that right?

I think I'll create them all as Sims in a special 'hood so I can see how the family tree works out. But I'll change the names, especially the surnames, otherwise it would be a bit too creepy having all my relatives and ancestors in my game -- I'd feel they were watching me. (Visions of the Ruddigore ghosts coming out of their picture frames for the ghosts' high noon -- Esme will know what I mean even if nobody else does!)

Here's a handy chart

In keepin track of relations, does anyone use an actual, umm, family tree program? Or just keep notes and/ or spreedsheets?

I use FamilyEcho to keep track of relations in my main Sims 2 hoods.

Personally I use a combination of visual (powerpoint) and written spreed sheets (wordpad, excel) to keep track of family relations....although, this method can make your head goes nuts when seeking for a mate for your sim, ESPECIALLY if you have lots of sims or sims with many siblings OR having marriage rules.
Because unless the sim dont have any sibling, you have to look at both mother and father side of each generation (depending on your rules on how close related your sims can be, my sims can only marry if they are 3rd cousins ). Since my own hood is created with an alphabetic naming system and having only one martial structure (patriarch in my case), that help me to keep track because I only need to write down their last-names.

Visual Example shown in spoilers:

Heaton is Henley's son, Henric grand son and Henry's great grandson.
Heaton's mother (Madeline) is coming from Millers on the mother's side and Collins on her father side.
Harry Jr is Heaton's 1st cousin, Hilton is his 2nd cousin.
Heaton is Hayden's first cousin once removed or his second nephew. (Henley and Hayden are first cousins).
If Heaton has a child. That child would be Hayden's first cousin twice removed, but Harry Jr's second cousin once removed. (Heaton and Harry Jr are second cousins)

All 4th generation children (the one Heaton is in) from the Collins and Millers families could be either 1st and 2nd cousins because some of his relatives married Madelines relatives (i.e. his uncle Hans married the sister of Madeline's father... Heatons grand aunt, I think?).

I still have to figure out which families would 3rd cousins if Heaton (or any other members) had a child and which of Madelines relatives are 2nd cousin with this sim..
This is one reason why I hate when sims marrying in-laws and 2nd cousins. It get too confusing. Ive no problem with understand once removed cousins and 1st/2nd cousin terms, but Im still not used to the terms where---- for example two first cousins marrying two brothers of an other family or marrying their cousin in-laws.

Edit: Adding a good link about cousin terms, which I always go back to when looking at my sims relation. Having the family tree sketched out does help understand the terms better!
Http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cousin#Cousin_chart

@AndrewGloria That's very close. You are second cousin to Darren and second cousin once removed to Darren's children. Your sister's children are third cousins to Darren's children. However, Jim and Will are first cousins to your mother, and so they are your first cousins once removed (not second). And if you don't want all the portraits of your (Sim) family watching you all the time, you could always give them to the National Gallery.

I use TribalPages for the family tree (or thicket) for my sims. It doesn't have room for many pictures, and it doesn't allow same-sex couples (boo hiss!) but it does have a really awesome tool that if you plug in two names from the family tree, it will tell you exactly how they're related, with a little chart and all.

Dear god this got so complicated. x.X But I LOVE that graph that explains family relations. I FINALLY know what cousins removed means. Thanks!