Have gone and checked - there is actaully no grill at the tent camp (Axe camping ground) - just a food stall. So the BBQ is probably not fitting in - camping without a BBQ? They can roast marshmallows at the camping fire, though.

One of the Maxis camping grounds has a grill, two I think.

gazania, are you fully patched? I'm guessing you would be, only you seem to be having more issues than normal.

Here is the problem I'm facing.

The first time ... Picture-perfect, Vending machines, grills ... No matter. My lot works like a charm.

Second visit (same Sim or different) ... The housekeeper walks on, acts fine, then freezes. Even if I take every food-related thing off ... Freezes. He or she stands in one place and doesn't do squat. At first, it was in one of the yurts. Now, it is in or near the lobby. It doesn't matter if you move or delete the Sim.

Maxis lots work fine, so it's not a mod conflict. There's something wrong on the lot, though I have no idea what. As in, I'm totally clueless. Unless there is some sort of unfinished business with the previous visit? Maybe I HAVE to use double doors in the lobby? That sounds stupid, but I've done everything else I can think of. Routing is obviously fine if the housekeeper aced it the first time.

And why the second time? I don't play any differently?

And yes ... All patches.

And I've replaced the hood four times already with the backup I might want to delete the groups.cache, though I don't think that's the reason.

What I might try is that second hotel. Generate still another fresh hood. No landscaping. (Could it be a custom plant?) No terrain. No flowers. Insert an ultra-simple boxy lobby, four units, and a game room. ONLY Maxis base game and BV content for now. Send a Sim twice. Will I get the same result?

Since this is another long post, let's see what is going to happen in the throwaway town of Workyoustupidthing.

I am going to look what that housekeeper is up to when not being locked out today.

What I'm finding out. A good hotel is obviously between "Just put the right door and a concierge desk in there" and hours of scientific calculation about routing.

Sorry gazania, I'm laughing over your post. Are you sure it isn't a piece of cc on the other lot?

It looks like the lobby is the key. You might need at least one actual hotel door (it's marked thusly). I'm not sure about that at all, though. I used Value doors on my original lot (and can assure you they don't work very well). If you don't need any BV doors, you definitely have to allow plenty of room.

So far (fingers crossed), I'm on my fourth vacation in my yurt camp and the housekeeper seems to be bustling.

Hahahaha I kind of like the ugliest hotel in Simdom - somebody should cater for cheap Sims! Never seen the housekeeper working like that. I guess that hotel door is named that way for a reason then.

I don't think my resort has the hotel door, if you mean the rounded 2 tile glass one? All the rooms have hotel doors. I'm going to have to take a few different sims to it and see how it works, I only took the one family when I play tested.

At the very least, a double door might be OK. But in any case, the lobby might need to be very spacious or the Sims to mingle. I expanded the lobby in my good hotel at least 2 - 3 tiles either way.

I left the cooking facilities under the tent in the package for my good hotel (outdoors, Sims must prepare own meals) and the vending machines, and the housekeeper is finally picking up the plates that my Sim left behind. So that's a good sign. The cooking/eating items don't seem to affect the NPC's progress; not even the CC ones.

I can't test too much longer because the holidays beckon in real life. But with the revised lobby, so far, so good (knocks wood). I might want to try several more trips, though, with different Sims and in different rooms to make sure. In addition to the lobby, I also removed several trees off the lot. Something was making my game lag. My Sims who crave a more simple life in tune with nature will have to crave it with less foliage. I hope I didn't just delete the animated owl, too. I forgot about it. I don't think that's an NPC, since it just stays in one place, move its head slightly and hoots most of the time and that's it, and I didn't see the owl when I culled my trees, but I'll put it back in there.

My lobby is pretty big I think? https://www.modthesims.info/d/479586 I'm looking at my overhead floor plan. I do have kitchen counter though with only 1 square out if the maid stands next to the bellhop or whatever the check in guy is.

More pictures.

Interesting, I really will have to test my hotel more and see what the maid does or doesn't do.

Turned out well, Gazania! I love the table outdoors and the chairs Looking very good overall in my opinion, and nice cc used.
(I know anti-box is very much the accepted way to build, but, for me, some boxes are very pretty - and generally more playable anyway

Now I'm intrigued. I'm fighting the urge ... but not for very long.

We know that you don't need a designated shower in a room. And I do see there are Maxis campgrounds that don't even have a bathroom at all for each tent. But do you need a male/female bathroom?

Answer; No. You don't. I re-vamped the Box Hotel, took out all the bathrooms, and put in a communal bathroom. The housekeeper did her thing just fine.

Next question: Can you have just a two-room hotel? I'm getting closer and closer to that really small B&B. This time, my poor test Sim Penny will have a designated bathroom for her box B&B. Unfortunately, she had to encounter a creepy Sim in the community bathroom. Sorry, Penny.

EDIT ... Yes. You can have a two-room hotel.

Allow me to present the Box B&B. It's a little fancier than the Box Hotel. It's got actual windows!

This time, I put in a regular double-door in the back. With the exception of the blinds, everything is Maxis because I don't know if the creators of CC want me to use their content to check out a boxy hotel.

The one rule I did follow was to allow plenty of room in the lobby. I learned that from experience, thanks. So the lobby is roomy.

I forgot the phones again. Oops.

Nice The small B&B is a great idea; I never thought of it. Less tourists all over the place that can get in the way

For the finale ... a small motel in a main hood.

I'll have you know that I did NOT spend six minutes designing this. It needs more decor and a little tweaking, and I'm cringing because I see the mistakes in the pics. but Penny has a presentable, and almost decent, place to stay at last. Now this place has a pool! And a kitchen (with the Uni NPC ... thanks for mentioning that mod, joandsarah77)! And a playground! And no creepy Sims in a communal bathroom! Penny may not be long for my Sim world, but at least one of her final hotels isn't that terrible. She might get a brief reprieve, though ... this hood terrain is fairly flat, and good for creating community lots, beach lots and hotels. I should make her a few neighbors, though.

I hit a momentary snag when I wondered just how do you get the Sim to the hotel. Phone to a community lot, by the way, for anyone trying this out for the first time.

Welcome to the Box Inn. A kind of kitschy establishment based very, very loosely on a NY place I saw in an image search. Very loosely. As in really, really loosely.



No, as Justpetro wrote, there is no tour guide. (This makes me happy.) And unless you have one of these lots that have lots of things to do on them, your Sim might get bored pretty fast. As Justpetro also wrote, you can't get the Sim off the lot for tours, you have to re-book if you leave the lot, and you don't get tour memories or perks (at least not in my game). If I have time after the holidays, though, I might design a mini-version of a lot inspired by a place I actually do like to visit. Lots of chill-out things to do on the premises. Penny stayed for part of an extra day, but there wasn't that much to keep her occupied.

One thing I forgot to check was the Sim's memories. Since the game treats the hotel as a community lot, I don't think that's an issue, but I should glance at Penny's memories in Sim PE and in the game just in case.

They can also walk there. I have to admit that I seldom check memories, but then I also have Boiling Oil's mod - so I doubt that there would be strange ones Good progress, Gazania!

I played my own hotel, Wet N Wicked that I have uploaded here. This is it fresh plunked down from the bin, so first visit.

Housekeeper shows up and stands there. She keeps making movements indicating she would like to be on the right of the bellhop. I am guessing the lamp is stopping her. Not that I care where she stands unless it affects how she works. While the foyer is large there is only 1 tile of room between the counter and the wall. This did not seem to bother her coming and going.

There seems to be a pattern where after a set amount of time she leaves the front desk and goes for a walk. In some of these she goes out to the garden and comes right back. Notice the puddle behind her. So it might not be there yet, but it was at some point. I have fire sprinklers in my splash pad and I had my playable sim set them off to see if that would draw her over to mop it up.

The housekeeper did not bother with the puddle but went right back to her spot at the front desk. The waiter from the restaurant came and cleaned it up.
Now it could be housekeepers are not programmed to clean up outside puddles. Certainly having a restaurant with waiters changes things in regards to cleaning as they are effectively another kind of maid so any hotel with a restaurant is likely to remain cleaner.

I made sure my sim left her bed unmade and on one of the housekeepers journeys away from the desk she went and made it. She also cleaned up one plate in the restaurant.

She also watered plants, something I wasn't aware that they did. Again every time it was on her timed walk around. The coding must check for things that need doing. Enough things done and it must cancel and she walks back to the front desk since she did not water all the plants. It's not just for a set amount of time because on the first day she would walk out and come right back.
That's all i know since my sim stayed only a few days. As soon as I find another family that can afford a holiday I wills end them to my resort and see if anything changed.

My playable had no issues with the vending machines. What was the trouble supposed to be? She bought, sat, ate and threw it away. I do use a wall trash chute though.

The only thing I could figure out with my vending machines is that there was probably a routing issue inside the original lobby. I put them outside in my second version, and the housekeeper had no problems, so it's not the vending machines themselves.

In my first version, it appeared that the housekeeper would move near the Sims who were around the vending machines, then freeze in place nearby.

I did notice that pattern as well with the housekeeper. First, the housekeeper approaches the desk after the Sims have checked-in. Then the housekeeper walks about. After a set time, he or she goes back to the desk, then starts another round. I still think the original problem with my housekeeper is that something in my lot's layout interfered with his or her routine, but rather than do the stompy bit most Sims do in that case, the housekeeper simply froze. I returned all of my original CC to that second iteration of the lot, if not all (I might have missed one or two items), so i don't think it's a CC issue. I did prune many trees off that lot. A tree might have blocked the routing as well.

Nice lot, by the way. Interesting that the housekeeper needs such a wide berth for the housekeeping routine. It seems there would have been room for her to go where she wanted by your concierge's desk. My housekeeper doesn't touch the plants, but I do have the Perfect Plants mod, so that's not surprising.

Concierge is that what he is? I only have bell hop stuck in my mind even though I know he isn't really a bell hop.

Thanks, I'm rather found of it myself, except for the lag. I may have built it but my machine can't really play my own large lots. On the first day when nothing was dirty she would walk from the desk through the restaurant and out to the mini golf or other times to the entrance of pirate cove which has a bridge. Perhaps on a smaller lot she would do a different kind of walk.

Interesting I still have to go and play and let the housekeeper into the rooms. To be honest, I have never really looked at what she was up to when not bothering my Sims

Even though she spends a lot of time by the front desk it seemed every time I took my eyes off her to make sure my sim was okay, had something fun to do (it was her holiday after all) she would disappear and I'd have to pause and go find what she was up to. Following a housekeeper is not what anybody would normally do lol but this thread has piqued my interest.

One other thing with a main hood hotel ... you cannot learn a massage. The only option i had was to purchase a Swedish massage.

A main-hood hotel does have its advantages, I admit. For me, it's kind of a laid-back version of a BV hotel. Since I saved a prototype of my Yurt Camp, I put the community lot in my main test hood, changed it to a hotel (since there are more things to do than my Box Inn), and let Penny spend a couple of days there. Everything seemed to work well. One thing I do notice is that occasionally, people call Penny on her room phone, but I don't find that bothersome ... yet. A main hood hotel does seem to be a hybrid of sorts.

I see people have been doing main-hood hotels for years, so I would THINK if someone had a problem with one, we'd know by now. I hope so.

So I disagree somewhat with this thread: http://modthesims.info/t/521435. You CAN put a hotel in a main hood (as far as I can see), and your Sim can have a great time. But it will not play the same as one in a vacation hood. Many features will be disabled. This does not make it unappealing. Just don't expect it to be the usual BV hotel. I might actually put a hotel or two in my main hoods, once I finish testing and checking it all out.

From the wiki:

Hotels were included in The Sims 2: Bon Voyage and appear in all three vacation destinations included (Takemizu Village, Three Lakes, and Twikkii Island). Although it is possible to create a hotel outside of a vacation neighborhood. It gives controllable Sims a place to rest and rejuvenate before going off to explore. (http://sims.wikia.com/wiki/Hotel)

My testing is in Twikii, has your testing been all in the main hood?