I have both mostly done, just some more pics to add and proofreading to do.. so both will be posted tomorrow!  Oh yeah, and only 50 days left til sims 4! (and another yay, this is my 50th blog post on here!)

Oh, yes.. it’s coming. And am I ever excited about it. It has completely revitalized my Sims addiction, and I’ve been closely following it’s developments. (Mostly via SimsVip) I know a lot of people have been very polarized about it, many people are saying they’re not going to switch, they don’t like the changes, they don’t like the things that have been cut from the game.. etc etc. However, being the computer/game geek that I am, I have a bit of a unique perspective on those things. I know that changes are often good for a game series. Historically, the Sims base games have always been very bare-bones. In fact, it took me a rather long time to switch from Sims 2 to 3 just because I was waiting for more features to be added. In some ways, I regret missing the early days of 3.. but in others, it worked out. Every time Sims gets updated, there are things I have missed from the previous incarnations, but on the whole, the changes each time they upgrade the game have been extremely positive. So.. I’m ALL for this new iteration of the series. I know pools and toddlers aren’t in the base game.. and there’s no work or school lots.. and there’s going to be more loading screens with a less open world. Although I am disappointed with these (mostly about the toddlers and lack of work lots), I am very interested to see where it’s going. The new Create A Sim features and abilities look amazing.. and the Build Mode upgrades… WOW! – look amazing. I can’t WAIT to build houses with these new tools! The graphics look great, and I am SO very happy about the changes they’re making to build mode. There is absolutely NO WAY that I will not be getting Sims 4 and playing it! That being said, I have no plans to be completely switching from Sims 3 to 4 initially… as I already mentioned, the base game is usually pretty vanilla.. and I really like having lots and lots of options available during play, so I won’t be doing a final switch to 4 until more expansions are out. Which means I will still have plenty of time to play (and hopefully finish) my challenges in Sims 3 before I make an ultimate switch to 4. (Which is good news for anyone who likes the stories – including me!)

Some History

Sims 1

Yes, I started playing Sims way back with the first one… and I was hooked nearly right away. I still have the whole game, including all expansions, installed on my computer.. and I even occasionally load it up and play a bit! 🙂 Most of the time back then, my time was spent building houses and neighborhoods, but I did play with the simmies quite a bit too. I have lots of fond memories of the first game, and my addiction to the series has only grown since then!

Things I miss:

• Magic Town!!!!  Man, that place was the very best. The magic system really was quite a challenge! There was so very much flavor involved with the town, and having a completely separate “MagiCoins” currency was a fun idea. This is what I usually go back to Sims 1 to play – just to mess around. I loved the baby daffodil-munching dragons, and all the work involved in getting spell reagents… and the HUGE amount of work needed to actually purchase a Magic Town home.
• Superstar. Cliche, but I really liked it. The way you did the different careers were really interesting, in my opinion, and it completely over-rode my dislike of everything celebrity and “fashionable” in today’s culture.
• Pet Shows. Seriously, those were fun. The Unleashed pack really did add quite a lot to the game, and all the different things you could do with the little furry creatures was a lot of fun.
• Bella Goth. (Enough said.. lol)

Things I DON’T miss:

• Kids never aging up. This annoyed me no end. Really, I utterly hated the never-ending or progressing way the game handled.
• The graphics. Boy, does that game look dated now! 🙂

Sims 2

I was all-in on this game right away. I bought it right after it came out, and I really never looked back (except for the occasional re-visit to magic town).

Things I miss:

• Open For Business expansion – there were so many things you could do with this, and it was ALWAYS a big challenge. I thought it really stepped up the difficulty factor, as well as just being plain fun to actually own the city’s stores and lots and stuff.
• Strangetown – enough said. I think I actually ended up playing here more than Pleasantville. For some reason, I was never able to get into Veronaville or the other towns.
• Apartments – again, ’nuff said. It made building ye olde trailer park so much easier, and moving out sims SO much cheaper.
• Sims 2 aging – other sims not aging when I’m playing one family. Sims 3 is so much harder to keep tabs on what is happening in the rest of the town..
• More alien babies!
• The University system was so much better in Sims 2. Having to go multiple times in 3 is annoying (although getting multiple degrees is nice)
• Freetime Hobby system and clubs – those were fun, and being able to skill up in them was so much better than the way sims 3 does toy making and such.
• Sims being able to have different types of sickness and die from them. (Kill the sims and collect different ghosts was SO much fun in 2! – not so much fun in sims 3, playable ghosts make weird noises and move SO slowly!)

Things I DON’T miss:

• The weird good/bad/nuetral witch thing. It was so hard to switch between, and the constant glowy-ness always bugged me to no end.
• Trying to find the count or countess to turn into a vampire. It always took forever!!
• Sims 2 aging – just to be wishy washy.. in some ways I don’t miss having to play all the families in a rotation, it’s nice to have the rest of the town just keep rolling on.
• The “chemistry” system… it just never made sense in the coding as to which sim would like which. At it’s heart, it was nice to have attractions to other sims.. but, jeez.. be consistent!
• Not being able to control the pets.

Sims 3

It took me a really long time to switch to Sims 3. Partially because of budget, and partially because I really liked Sims 2, and wasn’t ready to switch to a game with less options and freedom. However, once I switched, I never looked back. There are simply so very many things to do in 3!

Things I love:

• Controlling the pets
• The very open world
• Being able to control what sims do at work
• Profession jobs and self-employment!
• Horses!! (and minor pets) – you can practically make a zoo now! (and yay! unicorns!)
• Supernatural’s ability to make starting sims be .. well, supernatural. (although I hate that not all of the supernaturals can be gotten this way, ie aliens, mermaids, plantsims, imaginary friends
• Gnome collecting! (although why is it so tough?!)
• World Adventures travelling and Tomb-hunting.
• Scuba Diving and boats.
• SO many different career choices!
• The immense variety of being supernatural – every type of sim is very different!
• Lots of different skills to work on!

Things I DON’T love:

• Into The Future and the early expansions having no achievements.
• Lag. Nuff said.
• Load times. Again, enough said.
• Glitches, crashing, and bugs.
• SimPort is great… when it works. But it doesn’t work very often.
• Being able to play as a ghost and bring sims back is great, but WHY do ghosts move like snails?!?!
• Not being able to make the “cultural” or “hidden” traits be given to new sims.
• Sim routing at buildings – it makes for pile-ups at the school and university classes.
• Many of the skills are not integrated very well into careers.

Bloopers page published!

Just for laughs, I tossed up a page of bloopers, glitches, cute and funny screenshots I found in and amongst my screenshots and memories. Everyone always needs a chuckle.. so why keep these gems for myself?! Each photo (or series of photos) has a description of what happened, and what game it was in, etc. I’ll probably add to it in time when I get more, but those are definitely the best screenshots I have now! 🙂 The link is in the top of page menu under “Fun Stuff”, the left side menu under “Ze Miscellany”, or >> here <<.  Enjoy!!

Bloopers, Glitches, Cute and Funny Screenshots

We’ve all had them. Those moments where something happens in your sims game that you just have to break out in laughter. Whether it’s a really funny glitch, or just something random that is really funny. Going through my screenshots and memories, I found quite a few pictures of moments like these, and thought it would be great fun to collect all of them in a post, adding to it as more of them happen. With each of them, I’ll add a little description of what’s going on, or how it happened. Anyway, there’s really very little introductions needed for these, so.. browse and Enjoy! Everyone can always use a good chuckle! (Some of these are actually a series of pictures, but that only makes them better.)

Just a quick aside that I just updated the “Home” page of this blog with lots more information. Added a list of current projects, challenges, and planned challenges, as well as a couple notes on plans regarding the soon-upcoming Sims 4. (58 days!!)

Also, I just posted a new chapter for Spectres, and am working on another now!

I’ve also done a re-vamp of the site menus, and added navigation links to the challenge blog chapters, so it’s easier to move around the blog. 🙂 Plus, there’s now a “featured posts” section on the top of the homepage where I’ll keep the newest chapters of each challenge, and any highlighted posts!

<< Previous

Katie’s Diary

Day Five:

Waking up today, I can truly say I felt a bit better.. other than being extremely hungry and lonely. I reflected a while on what I’d been through the past few days, and chatted with both myself and Norman. Things couldn’t be much drearier.. but at least I was alive… And definitely hungry. I waited as long as I possibly could before eating yet another cold can of soup – I still really wasn’t sure what to do with those supplies I’d pilfered from the bistro. With a satisfied belly, I set out for the junkyard to try to find some more tools for inventing.

Need some tools – but somehow, I doubt a pipe is going to help….

I found a whole lot of scrap, and an old screwdriver and claw hammer, which both seemed like they would be a big help… but not much more. With a determined sense of inspiration, I tried to invent something else.. anything would have been good.. but all I did was manage to set myself on fire again. Being that it was already dark, despite my now rather ragged clothes, no way was I going to go out to scrounge some new threads. Sighing deeply, I threw some darts at the wall for stress relief.. and then threw some more after I broke the toilet AGAIN! Well, at least I’m getting better at unclogging it!

Finally, near tears of frustration, hunger, loneliness, and a sense of pure hopelessness, I curled up in my little cot bed. I couldn’t even muster up enough energy to read the cookbook or a novel or play darts. I ended up simply crying myself to sleep.

Day Six:

So I guess it is true. Things somehow always look a bit better in the morning. Stalling for time before eating my one meager meal of the day, I once again pedaled through the fog and complete, eerie silence for the junkyard. It was practically becoming my second home! I managed to find a nice set of wrenches Ol’ Jim had apparently stashed in the bathroom cupboard (who would have thought to look there??) and quite a bit more scrap. I ended up taking three trips to bring home all the little bits of junk I found in my bike basket, and stored things neatly away in my invention bench. I also took a short trip back to my parent’s house to get some of my other clothes to replace the rather singed ones I had on.

Then, wearily, I sat myself down for breakfast, lunch, and dinner with my faithful Norman as my companion. He didn’t have much to say, but talking to him seemed to make me feel considerably better, and, after cleaning up my bowl again, I stubbornly set myself to the task of inventing.. anything. After yet another fire mishap (perhaps I should give it a rest with the gas powered blowtorch!), and the second shower in a can hastily employed in two days, I did finally give up for the day. I set myself down for an entertaining read of “A Magnetic Attraction,” which raised my spirits considerably. I then picked up the cook book and read as much as I could by torch light before finally being too tired to make out the words anymore. I did, however, feel that I finally learned some things about cooking.

Learned Cooking

How I wish I’d taken those cooking lessons my mother had always wanted me to take.. but there had always been tomorrow to take them. Now, those tomorrows were gone… and I was left to another lonely night of sleep.

Day Seven:

So… today makes a whole week of being in extreme survival mode – all by my lonesome. Well, except for Norman. But he doesn’t even move – or talk back.. so does he count? I suppose he has to, for what’s left of my sanity’s sake! After some deliberation, I decided that I wasn’t going to take my usual junkyard trip, but instead really dedicate myself to inventing something.. anything. So, to get myself started on my day in a better way, I decided to try making peanut butter jelly sandwiches.. on crackers. Tasted a little odd, but certainly better than the horrible canned soup. As a bonus, it was far more filling!

After a pep talk with myself and Norman, I set myself to “determined” mode, and practically attacked the inventing bench. I had plenty of scrap and tools, so those weren’t an issue.. and I was convinced that if I just fiddled around enough (and avoided the blowtorch for a while!), I’d have a brainstorm. Luckily, it turned out I was right.

Yay! A widget!

Turns out I managed to make some sort of Tentacled Wind-Up Thingy. Fairly useless, but cool nonetheless. Perhaps the next thing will fix phones and radios? Wishful thinking, but it’s all I have right now. I set back to work, and, with thoughts of being able to disassemble things a bit easier, I eventually made a Smasher widget – I’ll try it out later. With a little more tinkering, I even made a little doggy-robot looking toy.

Made a toy!

At least Norman won’t be all alone anymore! And I raised my inventing skill, as a bonus. All these successes left me feeling pretty good about myself, .. well, until I broke the toilet again. Fixing it was satisfying, however, and I feel much better at handiness. I celebrated by playing darts until I was exhausted, and settled in for as comfortable a sleep as I’ve had.. well, in a week.

>> Next

Being that I’ve been going through my screenshots and memories, it suddenly occurred to me that I have a whole lot of pictures of saves that – for whatever reason – I just haven’t been able to let go of, even though they serve no “real” purpose. Sure, they might occasionally pick up an achievement, but they’re not for any challenge or .. well, anything other than randomly playing sims for fun. –And some of them have stuck around for ages before getting dumped for whatever reason – or haven’t gotten put away at all! One such household is the Syun family, who have been around since shortly after Showtime came out. They were (I think) the second family I played, the first one created in the Starlight Shores Showtime world.. and they have somehow struck my fancy, and I just keep coming back to them. It started out pretty small: the dad, Xueiliang (since I don’t have sims up, I’m not entirely sure that’s how it’s spelled.. I’ll fix it later if I’m wrong..) .. who wishes to be a chef.., the mom, MeiRan (means beautiful orchid in korean), an acrobat, the daughter (started as a child), Danika, and the son, Jaysun, who started as a toddler. Things have changed since then.. but those four are all still around. Being that this particular save has been around since 3/12, some of the screenies aren’t the best quality, but oh well! I’m (obviously) not going to post all the ones I have, but I’ll try to pick and choose the best shots and memorable moments for this family.

Anyway, here’s some pics!

The first shot I have of “The Beautiful Orchid”, MeiRan, performing for tips.

Xue, signing up for the Culinary career.

.. Then, I adopted two cats and a dog. Squiggles and Lady (destined to be mates), and Dracca the dog. First thing off, Danika picked up fleas from Lady.. and so began Dani’s obsession with animals! (sorry this pic is dark!)

Then, Lady passed on her fleas to poor Dracca…

And Jaysun got potty trained!

Here’s a shot of Mei with Jaysun:

And Xue with Dracca:

Mei getting strong and a promotion to boot:

And at her very first audition for a gig:

Then, I got tired of that dinky starter house, cheated for funds, and moved them to a nice house on the other side of town… which they’re still living in (although I did move the house to a bigger lot in the last couple weeks.. the house still has the same general shape, although the decor has been upgraded a time or two, and after the lot move, a barn was built). Here’s Xue holding Squiggles (the male cat) halfway between the new kitchen and living rooms.

With their Asian theme, I put a martial arts academy in town, and sent Mei to learn SimFu:

Followed rather shortly by their first burgular:

Mei gets promoted again in their garage/ laundry/workout room:

Xue fixing the invariable toilet clog:

Yet another broken toilet, this time in the upstairs bath:

Mei’s first excellent gig:

Xue teaches Dracca to sit:

Jaysun, now a child, has an accident… lol! (guess that potty training needs a refresher course!)

Xue in the kitchen hitting level 5 cooking:

Mei becomes a celebrity:

Then gets another promotion:

And, finally, Lady and Squiggles are expecting!

..That’s all for this post – but never fear, there will be more!

Got five more achieves last night, including my third platinum.. yay!! Haven’t gotten any today (yet), but I did get considerably closer to several before my sim game decided to crash while putting on an addition to a house.  Luckily, I don’t think I lost too much. Anyway, that was just a quick update. On to more interesting things!

I’m busy working on and testing lot prices and upgrades and requirements for unlocking for a helpful table-type resource for NiF’ers. I have some early prototypes up on it on the mod the sims post on the challenge, but my goal is to have it on this website for everyone to be able to refer to. So If I don’t get to updating my challenge stories for a couple days, that’s where I am. Those are next on my list after this! 🙂

Just for the sake of my OCD, I sat down and took a long look at the way this blog is shaping up.. now that it is actually getting some  content, and starting to at least go somewhere. Last September (2012) I posted a brief outline of the challenges I was working on or planning to work on. Things are the same on some of them, but way different on others. So, for the sake of .. continuity..? .. perhaps, I’m going to run through a list of what I’m still working on, or getting started on. (some of these have been scattered through other blog posts on here, not just that September one.)

Beyond all that, my current goal is to make sure to post a chapter section in each challenge at least once a week. That being said, that goal will have to include “catching up” on the stories I already have started – because for most of them, I’ve kept playing even though I slacked off on blogging. I made sure to keep what I call “play journals” – notes of what was going on each day/week so I know where the story went, and can find the pictures in order through my memories and screenshots. The challenges not currently linked below… will be soon. All part of my “reorganizing sims” campaign I started on a couple days ago.. hehe. Meantime.. at least the few people who follow my blog will know where things are going!

Projects

• “Project One” – Cataloging and organizing all my items in Sims 3. I’ve finally gotten a fairly comprehensive set of “Collections” set up for these, and they’re about half full. It really does save me a lot of time when doing theme builds (which tends to be most of my builds)… so I do want to get this done. However, it’s extremely boring and time consuming, so I tend to work on it in little spurts when I get annoyed over not finding something or other. And the Sims Store keeps complicating matters by adding new content all the time.. 0.o .. so I keep having to add more stuff. This is not a project I have any intention of publishing or blogging about, just a little personal mission of mine.
• “Project Two” – Sunset Valley Remodel – This is a fun one, but again, it’s been very time consuming, so I tend to work on it in bits and pieces. I’ve put hours upon hours of work into it, however, so I have no intention of stopping until it’s done. I’m finally starting to get some of the finished product up onto the exchange, though, and expect to see more soon. I really like the look of what I’ve got done, and all the pending ideas for builds I haven’t finished or started are really exciting. (the not started ones are very few in number.. the town is mostly built up, I’m just doing a lot of testing and refining now…)
• “Shady Oaks Trailerhood” Project – this is a new project for me, and one I’m more or less just dabbling in at the moment. Whether it actually ends up in a publishable custom world.. well, we’ll see. Being a perfectionist has it’s downsides.. and if it doesn’t turn out well, it will likely just get scrapped. However, I figure I’d mention it, and as it’s being worked on, post some pictures and such.. just because I can.
• “Mystery” Project – This was mentioned last September too. I just have had it “shelved” for quite a while. That’s not to say I haven’t still been thinking of it.. I’ve got half a small notebook and a few computer files of lists of ideas for this, and I’m still working on it. Suffice it to say.. I’m dabbling with creating my own Sims 3 Challenge.. in the form of a story. And it involves Gnomes. Those are the only clues you get. 😉 I have recently resurrected the affiliated game-save file, though, and there’s a good possibility I’ll start blogging about it soon. (I just really want to get some other stuff caught up on here first.)
• More projects?? Nooo.. I have too many things going already!! However, I will mention that I am also still working on collecting achievements/badges. Have some 170ish badges left to go (I’ll update this with an exact number when I get back in game here in a few..)

Challenges

• “Spectres of the Past” (NiF/Apocalypse) – My most important/story driven challenge to date. It’s long overdue for me catching up on the story, since my game save is WAY ahead of what I have blogged (but never fear, I have it journal’ed and lots of screenshots taken to write with!)
• “Falcon Apocalypse” Challenge – Yeah, I know, this one should probably have a better name.. but I never came up with one, and have been calling it this for long enough that it just stuck. The family name is “Falcon”, and it’s a straight-up Apocalypse challenge, so that’s where the name came from. I’ve been playing it for quite a while now on and off, and have a nice daily journal on it in my sims notebook, so it shouldn’t be too hard to set up a mini blog following what’s going on with some pictures. Not going to write a story about it, but a gameplay journal with pictures is easy enough to do, and fun to look back on.
• “Castaway Shores” NiF Challenge – This is the newest of all of these challenges.. and one I’m really looking forward to. I’ve been missing the “NiF” challenges for such a long time, and the whole idea of doing one in the Island Paradise world as a castaway was too much to resist. I have the very beginnings of the story published now, and plan to continue with it as time allows.
• “Those Crazy Irish” MacRae ISBI Challenge – This is the oldest of all the challenges I still have running. Or, well, recently unearthed. ISBI stands for “I’m Surrounded By Idiots” and it’s a fun little exercise in being as “hands off” micromanaging my sims as I think I could possibly stand. Easy to play (except for always wanting to fix things going wrong when I can’t because the rules forbid it!!), it’s a good break from other challenges and daily life stresses, so I finally pulled the save out of my backup file and am busily updating it. Overall, it’s by far the funniest game I play, so it makes for a fun story with silly pictures.
• “All My UN-Natural Children” Supernatural Orphanage Challenge – the premise of this one hasn’t changed much in the last year. It’s a victorian-themed “Supernatural Orphanage” challenge – to be blogged in commentary style. Daughter picked this challenge out for me to do and helped make the characters – I wanted to really get to know the new supernaturals. Major goal is to survive generation one and get all the munchkins married off with an heir – but I may extend it to a 5 generation challenge just for fun. I keep having trouble getting my game to not crash with mods in the last few weeks (months) and since it’s an over-stuffed household, it’s sort-of on “hold”. Fairly sure I’ve still got all the old pictures and such laying around, though, so I’ll see if I can’t get them posted here soon.
• “Gardner LTW” Challenge – This one I’m working on side-by-side with my daughter’s Sims 2 LTW Challenge, and scoring against each other, so I don’t work on this one all that much, just when we’re both playing together. I may end up posting a “little” scorecard for this, but it won’t be really blogged about. We’ve complete the first generation, and are just getting started on the second generation, so there’s a long way to go yet.
• Random Legacy Challenge – completely un-started, I have too much going on already. Since I plan to put it in Sunset Valley, this will not get started until my “Sunset Valley Remodel” project is fully complete (see above for more info on that).
• 50 Foals Challenge – This will be the next challenge I start when I have a slot open up for it. I keep myself to only five challenges actively running at a time (plus the one with my daughter).