X-Men Mansion - Charles Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters - NO CC

I've put up a supervillain's "evil tower of evil darkness and evilness" already, but I haven't given you anything for your super-powered Sims who choose to fight for justice and for right- UNTIL NOW! Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, I present to you the X-Mansion, otherwise known as Charles Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters! It took me a few more days to complete than I had hoped, so unfortunately "X-Men: Days of Future Past" has been out for a while already, but it still seems a fitting time to upload this particular creation. (and the new film doesn't really have much to do with the school anyways- still, go see it! It's good!)
The inspiration for this lot comes from all sorts of places, so I'll state right up front that if you're expecting a carbon copy of the school from the comics, you'll be disappointed. If you're expecting a clone of any of the mansions from the films, sorry, but you won't find one here. My goal with this was to create a lot that incorporated my favorite elements from all the different iterations of the building, as well as being useful for gameplay when it comes to your Sims. That last goal means that, since there aren't the traditional superpowers for Sims, I've tried to design a building that would cater to the various supernatural life-states (vampire, witch, PlantSim, and whatnot), and allow you to create your X-Men from among their ranks. I hope I've succeeded at all of these goals, though I leave that for you to judge.



I want to put pictures of the building as you'd see it in your game in the description, but with such a large building, and with so many different rooms, I also want to make sure I give you at least a little bit of an idea what I had in mind for things in my design (not to say that you shouldn't change things if you think them better suited for something else though!). To find a way to meet both goals, you'll find the floorplan shots early in the series of images for this lot, and you'll see that each floor (with the exception of the wide-angle shots of the 1st and 2nd floors) has red numbers marking each of the major rooms. (I figure you can probably tell what the hallways, bathrooms, and closets are for! )Bear with me, and I'll give you a quick rundown of what each key room on each level is intended for:





OK, that took a while, but now you should have at least some idea what each area of this X-Mansion is intended for. I don't think the bits that I left unlabeled really need any explanation- they're just bathrooms or corridors on the inside, and the outside is mostly gardens, with the obvious helipad, swimming pool, and soccer (or football, for those of you whose names for sports actually make sense) pitch being found here as well. Since the gardens are so extensive that even a hired gardener and butler together might have trouble keeping them watered, there are sprinkler systems that should cover all the areas that need them. These were the last thing I added to the lot, so you won't see them in the perspective screenshots, but the floorplan views show the areas covered, and also will allow you to remove them if you get tired of them breaking or putting such strain on your graphics. Since the lot is so large, I also have done my best to make sure that your Sims will never have a reason to need to circle around to the back (leaves shouldn't accumulate on the hills, and there are no interactable objects back there). If you find your Sims foolishly circling the entire Mansion for some reason though, just put a few stairways in various discreet places around the foundation.



One of the things I tried to do with this lot was keep things concentrated in logical areas- ergo, nearly all the superhero rooms are in the basement, with limited access, while the "building" portion on top is virtually all dedicated to the school and residential aspects. While this seems to work fairly well, it also had another result that may be of interest to some of you- it would be relatively simple to remove all the superheroic portions of the building, and leave the school itself largely untouched. For that reason, I wouldn't be hesitant about recommending this lot to those of you who just want an elite boarding school for a "normal" neighborhood as well. As long as you keep the enrollment limited to kids of the very wealthy, even the fact that there's a helipad is not too unrealistic! (Of course, I also tried to keep the building as "normal" looking as I could, so even in a non-supernatural neighborhood, it shouldn't look out of place. I actually am very pleased with how this lot ended up looking, both in the lot view, as well as the neighborhood.



Of course, as with most of my lots, this ended up being a LOT bigger than I had originally intended. The total value here is over $1,000,000, and while most of the areas you'll use most often are on the first few levels, it does extend upwards for many stories. On the other hand, all my lots also make no use of CC in their design, so as long as you have all the EPs and SPs (and yes, sorry, but I'm virtually certain it does use all of them), you won't have to worry about finding anything else.
As far as lot placement goes, this school is best placed in a suburban neighborhood, ideally a rather well-off one. While I assume that most of you, like me, would play adults on this lot as staff, I would also suggest ensuring that you have enough of an income here to hire all the staff you can. Staff or not, I have a hunch that most of you get tired directing your playables to garden and clean constantly!
This lot may play slowly due to its size, but my computer is far from being the fastest one out there, so it shouldn't be TOO slow for most of you! Finally, as always, if you run into any major issues in playing this lot, please don't hesitate to let me know, and I'll do my best to fix them!

I hope you and your mutant Sims enjoy this lot! Have fun with it!


Lot Size: 5x6
Lot Price: $1,004,657

Additional Credits:
Credit to Marvel comics for the original idea as well as many design inspirations, to 20th Century Fox for their various film interpretations, and to my comic-book fan friends for putting up with my incessant questions on what the X-Men should have at their disposal! Thanks also to Sophie-David for the creation unlocking the career and aspiration rewards for lots like this- it really adds a lot to several of the rooms!