I'm really glad you found another copy, @FranH -- what a close call!

I've decided to institute some rules in my Pleasantview-Strangetown to help limit population and thus encourage me to play it longer as there will be fewer Sims to manage over time. I'm using ACR, and try for baby is only allowed if someone in the household has a locked want to have a baby. Also, try for baby has to be autonomous (not selected by me) unless there are very special circumstances (like I really, really want them to have a baby). Otherwise, the only way to get pregnant is through risky woohoo. So far, this seems to be working out well as only the Burbs have had a second child, and Lazlo and Erin had their twins of course. Everyone else seems to be sticking to one and done. Even Cassandra and Don! (She actually wanted more children but didn't get pregnant--maybe Don went and got snipped without telling her?)

I've also decided that male alien hybrids can get pregnant. This makes sense to me since their fathers gave birth to them. Female alien hybrids, however, have a very small chance of getting pregnant (i.e., only through risky woohoo). I made this rule after Dina and Mortimer had their son (who does not look alien), but I figured that since Mortimer was a mad scientist, he had access to advanced fertility treatments. But the game laughs at me because Nina, Lola, AND Chloe all got pregnant by risky woohoo. Nina had Don's son and had to flee to Strangetown. Lola met General Buzz through work--she consults with the military on how to deal with the alien experiments--and they started dating. She got pregnant first, then they decided to get married. They had a daughter who does not look alien. Chloe got pregnant on a date with the townie Abhijeet Cho. Chloe has been crashing in the Grunts' downstairs office since Lola and Buzz got married as she has no money and only a low-level criminal job, but she really needs to find a new living situation because she's not only pregnant but she and Buzz absolutely hate each other.

I've ended up loading Arbor Valley instead of Pleasant Valley and ended up adding a few items to both the service center and homestead.I'll be controlling the population increases in most of my towns by making TFB only non-autonomous in ACR and forcing me to manually direct them to do it when they were supposed to have a baby.

I rarely ever create Sims but I got a little tired of replaying the premades so I decided to create myself, my brother, his RL girlfriend and my RL friend. My brother didn't help me much in regards to his personality so I made it how I saw him *insert evil sibling laugh here* I'm really happy about how the Sims came out. They don't look like us but they sure do look unique!

I've played us for a while now and so far, my simself got married to Florence Delarosa and we both had an alien child each, of course my alien baby had green skin, no nose and human eyes and Florence's baby got all of the alien features with green skin.. Such luck! My brother got married to his RL girlfriend and have 4 children which isn't like him at all but shhh, it's my game! They're so adorable. My RL friend got married to a downtownie and they had 3 children. He was rather upset his sim version didn't marry me but I assured him that the sim world is full of endless possibilities, that there are parallel universes where he and my simself might get together.


I do regret that I created us in an Uberhood though. I'd have preferred just Strangetown because it seems to be a fitting place for me and my family. Thankfully, I loved how I created my Simself, family & friends so much that I've exctracted us all in SimPE and I'm going to clone them to keep them forever. I just need to note down all of the personality and interest points! :p

I thought it might be fun to update what's been happening with my Pleasantview-Strangetown families, starting with the two most iconic families, the Goths and the Pleasants. This is probably going to be long, so I'll put their stories under spoiler tags.

My epic battle trying to play with a new windows11. All my folder have been transferred to a new machine - TWICE1 This has caused a lot of damage to my CC. I re-downloaded some of my favorite custom populated hoods: two of them showed up with families on their lot - but the house was gone! Well, OK, I didn't like the houses anyway. Right now I'm stressing over the failure to get a camera mod - I've installed 2, neither works. Oh well, after not being able to play sims SINCE AUGUST! I'm happy I can play with my toys. Pleasantview "twist" is fun. But I just had eye surgery and can barely see this screen.Going to play Sedona anyway - got all 4 men and their 8 toddlers in one house...such fun chaos...

I've switched back to the modern game, and I did a naughty before I could even start-I didn't rename the folders, so the game loaded up a completely new instance, and boy was I ticked off at my own stupidity!

It took me about an hour to correct my mistake because in the process I deleted my damn folders in my modern game for downloads, etc, so I had to find all my backups (which I did have, thank heavens!) and put them bacj in.

I came back in tonight to the site so I can download some small trailers because I have a new idea for a neighborhood, "Whispering Pines" and I need them to work the neighborhood.

I love creating new neighborhoods because it's so demanding of my abilities to put them together.