Playstyle
Warning: boring long ranty post about myself. May not be interesting for anyone other than me.
I’m a very goal oriented person, so I used to have a lot of difficulty with the Sims 2. Well, actually, when the game first came out, I loved it. There were no goals, so I could play with freedom and follow sims’ wants, and generally have a lot of fun.
That changed with University – suddenly there were “lifetime wants” – achievable end goals that I just had to complete! I started pushing my sims hard – not a toddler became a child without getting at least 8 Charisma points, and by the time a sim had reached halfway through being a teenager, they had A+s, 8 points in every area, and were getting a job so that they could become an overachiever.
I played like this for a while, and then became relatively bored – and then became fascinated by watching my sims do weird things, and really letting randomness take over (the game is pretty random anyway). I’d allocate my sims personalities (although occasionally they’d do things that were out of character).
At this point, I still had relatively little CC, and late last year, decided that the brokenness of the game was too much for me, and started downloading hacks (I’d only really downloaded CC/hacks very sporadically up until this point). Then I started reading other people’s sims stories, and discovered that other people had fascinating ways to play their games – lots of people were randomising things (which I found really helped my gameplay), and then I discovered The Isle of Thyme, and economic integration (I’d run several businesses, and had quite happily let sims live off the profits of these – but I’d never thought of having this all completely within the hood).
Anyway, I decided to change my playstyle a bit – it’s much more interesting to have sims buying things from each other. But my biggest inspirations really came from Zazazu (from MATY), and her system of randomising, and Strand Island (by Lion, who is also a regular poster on MATY).
I decided to set up a hood where people could only live off the items that they’d bought from each other. Furthermore, I’d randomise EVERYTHING. (That way I couldn’t make all my sims be perfect A+ students – they’d have to find other ways of getting through life). Obviously not everything is randomised, but as much as I can manage is…
I also decided that Maxis jobs were generally too easy for sims to earn money. I now apply a dice roll to see if sims will be allowed to get a Maxis job (weighted so that only 10% can – I may revise this later), and if not, they are forced to earn money some other way. I also attempt not to let sims earn money from the Void (so no selling paintings/craftables/harvest to invisibility). I have allowed one exception to this – the Genie lamp. It’s magical anyway, so I guess they can have money from it. (I also allow them to get inheritances from death, because I decided it would be too difficult to regulate it and stop it some other way).
On top of this, I don’t like giving the sims free rides (much like in Strand Island – linked to earlier), and so I’m adding my own tax on top of the normal bills that come with the game. The game is boring if they have too much money, and it’s too easy for them to get there. They are allowed the $20,000 when they first move to the island, but they must pay it back completely within the first year, or else there is a hefty interest attached. I haven’t quite decided how I’m allocating taxes yet, but I think I’ll charge them each season. I want them to struggle, dammit! Having very little money made it nigh impossible to decorate or build houses, but I’m okay with that. Once Forgotten Island gets on its feet, they’ll be able to decorate their houses. But only with things they’ve bought from other businesses, or are willing to sell themselves…
Four families is really not enough for a neighbourhood to grow from (especially as it’s townieless), so I’ll be rolling and adding a few more families at the end of the first sim week. I may add some pets too (although I did really hate that EP, it might be nice to USE it for something!)
I’ve also decided to be flexible with my rules – if something isn’t working for me, I’ll drop it. But I’m going to endeavour to stick with it this way as best I can. (Previous hoods have suffered from me sticking too strongly to the rules, and then I get bored and don’t want to play).
Also, I must say that I love plasticbox. With all my heart. Every house on Forgotten Island is made by plasticbox, with hardly any changes thus far.
And it looks like I’m on a 3 day updating schedule, through no decision of my own.
Boring rant ends now.
Kowalski – Family Concerns
The last family to disembark were the Kowalski family. Lance’s wife had recently died, leaving him in charge of their twin sons, Demario and Reilly. Lance loved children, but two on his own were quite a handful. Reilly always wanted attention, whilst Demario was forever crawling off on his own to go and splash in a nearby puddle or possibly crawl across the road…
Lance cared a lot about his children, but had realised before coming to the island that several families starting out in a new place would mean many children, to populate the town. As a result, he’d bought a great many items that he thought the other young families would like to buy. Not unexpectedly, Shayne and Miriam turned up, and bought lots of items – more than they could possibly need for just Ena. Edgar also arrived wanting to buy lots of baby items, but became angry at the sight of the Sahrs and left without buying anything.
Shayne and Miriam had brought their daughter, Ena along whilst they shopped – she quickly found her way inside to play with the boys! All three children got along so well that Shayne and Miriam left Ena to play for a few hours, as they had to go home to “continue unpacking”.
Lance loved having the three kids play together – and he was well reimbursed for his time watching Ena.
Notes: I’ve been wanting to set up a daycare in the Sims 2 for YEARS – but I’ve never really been able to. I found that this one worked rather well, but was so excited by testing it out that I didn’t get very many pictures of the toddlers playing together before they grew up. Maybe sometime in the future once there are more kids in the neighbourhood…
Ferber – Beginnings and Endings
Rheta Ferber was moving to get away from her past – she hoped life on the island would be a pleasant change to a simpler life. Her two children, Erika and Ian got along very well – most of the time. Of course, a twelve hour boat ride does strange things to people, and Rheta could only look on in sympathy as Erika noogied Ian for his fifteenth stupid joke about farting.
Eventually though, she made them give it up and go inside while she checked out their nice new garden. Erika decided that she’d be nice to Ian and read him a story about bears (and an evil child named Goldilocks). Ian loved stories – especially ones where villains get their just desserts! (Goldilocks got THREE servings of dessert!)
Unfortunately, at the most exciting part of the story, there was a sudden noise outside, and both Erika and Ian ran out to see what was happening. They encountered Death, looking puzzled and staring at a pile of ash…
Erika, quicker on the uptake than her brother, begged Death to not take their mother. “We won’t have anyone to look after us – she’s all we have in the world! Please, you can’t take her from us!”
Death, still slightly confused, responded, “I’m sorry, Erika, but your mother’s time has come. I don’t really have much choice in the matter. Good luck – until I see you next.”
Ian, who had been hopeful that his sister would save the day, was completely overcome. He’d never felt so alone.
Erika, in a state of shock, wandered inside to stare at the bookcase. She wondered idly if she would be able to find a book to help her bring her mother back.
While Ian, outside, cleaned up all that remained of their mother.
Bonus Pic: Once Erika lost her plea with Death, she put on the best sadface. SADFACE!
Don’t you just want to give her a hug?
This entry was really quite difficult for me to write, and I’m not sure I addressed it in the best manner. I’m aiming for a cross between reality and the Sims 2 world, and I’m a little concerned that I’m not quite getting the right spot.
This is the third family – the introductory post on the last family should be posted in the next few days!
Sahr – a different kind of family
Warning: The final (fourth) image in this update is possibly not work or child friendly.
The second family to move in were the Sahr family. Miriam has dedicated her life up to this point to the pursuit of pleasure, while Shayne enjoys the odd romance. However, they have produced an adorable daughter together, Ena, and both decided that it was time to start a new, more stable lifestyle in a new place.
Shayne spent the first few minutes on arrival wondering if he could see any of the rest of the Confederacy from the island, and even got out his binoculars to check, whilst Miriam reassured Ena that this new place would have all her old toys.
Shayne quickly stopped being distracted by thoughts of the Confederacy, and swept his young wife off her feet so that they could romantically cross the threshold together.
Shayne whispered something to Miriam about organising one of the other new arrivals to take care of Ena for a few hours while they took care of each other…
Miriam interpreted this as being able to take a break from child care for once, and eat some lunch. Over lunch, they discussed how long the boat ride had taken, and what they thought of the other new settlers of Forgotten Island.
Eventually though, Miriam understood what Shayne had really meant by having some time for themselves, and they retired to their new bedroom.
As she and Shayne realised that they’d have to replace their mattress, Miriam wondered about whether moving to this new place meant anything would change. Moving to a new place was meant to be a fresh start for her and Shayne, but she’d realised coming across on the boat that their family was…different to the others, and this concerned her, as some more traditional citizens of the Confederacy did not take well to those who were “different”.
Notes:
Ena and Miriam are my favourite sims. Actually, I really like all the ones that I’ve created for Forgotten Isle thus far, and so I’m getting waaaayyy too attached to all of them. Ena didn’t really go off to play at another family’s house (well, she did from that family’s point of view) – but I didn’t get any more photos of her that day, so I pretended that she had.
Weirdly, the Confederacy has already built up into a monster that I hadn’t really intended originally in my mind. Of course, there are always people who hate difference, and I tend to associate people like that with organisations, corporations and governments. (Even though I created the set of families involved here…)
I didn’t really realise when I was making them that I made 3 completely white families, and only one who was more…colourful. But this actually turned out well for me from a storyline point of view, as Edgar turned up on the first day and immediately started poking and shoving both the adults in this family, while he seems to get on rather well with everyone else.
Genaris – the First Family
Edgar Genaris was a well educated young man, working his way up the political career ladder. He hoped one day to become a senator, or even a mayor. The Confederacy saw great potential in this young man, and requested that he be one of the first to help establish a thriving community on Forgotten Island. As well as potential, it was recognised that he wouldn’t question some of the queerer orders that occasionally came forth from the Confederacy. (Edgar’s wife, Alyssa liked to call the Confederacy the United Anarchy of Domains, but Edgar hoped she was only joking, or had got the real name wrong.)
The Confederacy provided the first few families with housing and some money, at least until they got on their feet. Unfortunately, as food was growing scarce throughout the Confederacy, the people of Forgotten Island would have to find their own sources for food. Edgar envisioned his garden as feeding all of the occupants of Forgotten Island – and also thought it made for a good metaphor for the seeds he was planting for the generations ahead who would benefit from the colonisation of Forgotten Island.
Edgar hoped that he would be able to help the people of Forgotten Island to grow into a thriving community, even though they were all from very different backgrounds. He thought of himself as the leader of the ragtag bunch he’d been assigned to.
Alyssa, on the other hand, he expected to produce children, and in general be everything a good loving wife should be. They had married immediately prior to moving to the island. Alyssa had seemed pleased with the pink on pink kitchen (although truth be told, she really liked pink), and had immediately sat down to learn about how to cook Edgar’s favourite meal, pork chops.
Notes:
My roommate wants me to call the Confederacy the Free United Confederacy of Kingdoms – obviously he finds the acronym entertaining, but I thought that maybe it was a little too over the top for a name! Also, I think Alyssa’s name for it is a little more indicative of the kind of impression I want to give of my SimGovernment – not malevolent, more useless and bureaucratic, which can lead to the wrong decisions being made.
Presenting… Forgotten Island!
So I finally found a good neighbourhood that I liked, after much searching. For the last few weeks, I haven’t really had much time to play the Sims 2, but when I did, I was busy playtesting this nice neighbourhood, adding houses, and creating some families and backgrounds.
Obviously I’ve already played a few rounds (although it adds up to less than a week per family), but I think that I’ve found a workable neighbourhood that hopefully this time I’ll finally keep – I’m already attached to it, which makes me happy, and I’ve got some good story elements that seem to be popping up already.
The concept that I’m going to go with is that of slightly dystopian universe, with overcrowding over much of the known areas. As a result, the Confederacy (government) has decided to populate areas that were previously deemed pointless or worthless. The original discoverer of Forgotten Island has long been forgotten (surprisingly enough), and the area had not been thought about for years. Forgotten Island is therefore an area where a few groups of families are being sent to as part of the population crisis.
It will be played similarly to a Prosperity Challenge (with rounds, because hopefully that way I won’t forget to play anyone – I actually don’t mind round based play for that reason…otherwise I end up with people being discordant ages etc), but also have its own economy (and I must give Jade credit for that, as well as pbox). As part of this, after the first day, people are not allowed to buy things for their houses from the catalogue – they have to buy them off each other (which I’ve been finding difficult as everyone wants to buy ten million copies of the same counter, but not one crib for their babies!).
Here’s a picture of it taken just a few minutes ago:
Anyway, hopefully I’ll be able to play this without it breaking for a while, and also (hopefully) rediscover the creative writing talent I had a few years ago, before embarking on the crazy mindnumbing boringness that is my current life.
Also, I made progress on my calendar… and then went backwards, because I didn’t really implement it ingame. I’m not too fazed though – there are only four families at the moment, and I have a feeling I’ll mess up their ages a bit so they don’t all age up at the same time. I think it’s one of the things that I’ll work out as I go along.
