I think us rural folk are winning by a streak

Oops, somehow replied to the wrong thread!

My next-gen kids are starting to grow up and go to college. Here's a look at my Strangetown families.

Esme Beaker, adopted daughter of Hela Beaker and Jayden Smith--She is a fun little Romance Sim to play. As a teen, she has made a lot of friends with Downtownies, even Mr. Big, so I'm thinking she's going to move to the city after college. Beowulf Beaker has just returned to town after a long time away traveling and has taken a room in the Traveller motel; he may be looking to settle down and start a family. He's much younger than Hela, and extensive traveling seems to have prolonged his youth.

Taj Traveller, son of Tina and Lazlo, Knowledge, dated Esme in high school but also went steady with Jackie Smith. Of course he got caught cheating and lost both girls. His little brother Tahoe, Pleasure, is gay and going steady with Wayne Grunt. If Tahoe and Wayne stay together, they may also move downtown since there's a stronger gay community there than in Strangetown.

Smiths: After Jasmine died and was resurrected by Isaac Curious and then basically abandoned her family for him, Adrian had to raise the kids himself. James, Fortune, is almost a clone of his father; he has gone to college and is looking around for a potential wife. Jackie, Family, is also looking for potential husbands; after breaking up with Taj (she had the want after she caught him cheating), she started seeing a store clerk named Vince and wants him to go to college with her. Little Joseph is the youngest child in the neighborhood, but his big sister takes good care of him.

Grunts: Duke is having an affair with a townie named Adriana that Stella knows nothing about because she's so focused on her very well-paying career as a symphony conductor and her painting. Duke is a house husband and well kept. Oldest son Wayne, Popularity, is going steady with Tahoe Traveller. Youngest daughter Mae just became a teen (Knowledge).

Curious: Octavia died in a huge yard fire that also trashed the house, leaving Trent to raise Connie alone. Connie, Fortune, is seriously the strangest looking of all the kids. She has almost no nose or mouth, and she freaks me out a little--I wonder how those genetics will go. Trent also just passed of old age, so Connie is orphaned and has to move in with her half-sister, Tina. With Octavia and Trent gone, my werewolf population is down to one (Lila Grunt), and I'm glad because the werewolf wants really clog up Knowledge Sims' panels. I think I'm going to limit myself to one werewolf in the neighborhood at a time from now on.

Froggy Neighbour got to meet his father Batty's love interest Reine after the latter had stayed the night and they walked past each other on the way downstairs the next morning. Not the introduction I had planned, especially with how shy Froggy is, but Batty made them all breakfast and it seemed fine. Besides that, Batty kept working at his library, and also invited his brother Monsoon over for Froggy's birthday.



Picasso Melinder was close to death just one promotion shy of fulfilling his lifetime want of reaching the top in the criminal career. To ensure him going in platinum, I instead had him embrace his secondary aspiration, romance, and spend some time going on dates before passing away in the company of his friend and roommate Justice Neighbour-Larsen in their flat.


After becoming an adult, Tankette Smith moved in with her biological parents Circe and Loki Beaker in Bluewater.

Tessa Ramirez moved into a quasi-apartment complex in Downtown, which has unofficially become a communal living space for women with mostly the romance aspiration. She's one of the few straight women living there so she only made friendships with the other residents, but thanks to Chloe Curious she got to know Ripp Grunt and had a strong start in her romance game with him.


Nervous, his husband Saturn and their daughter Supernova moved into the old Tinker house.

Juliette Capp tied the knot with Castor Nova, and it was a wedding to remember. Burglar set fire to the upstairs, Juliette died, got saved from the Grim Reaper by Hermia, while her Aunt Regen and cousin Hal died. Happy Wedding Day, Juliette! :lovestruc:

I recreated the Will Lloyd Wright Dollhouse from Sims 1! I've seen a lot of folks doing the dollhouse from Sims 2, but have yet to see someone try to recreate this one...

I got into my game today and began to recreate the Old Town using the blank terrain map and called it Portland after Portland,Maine as it was in it's 1575 RCC origins according to TS2's historical records.I'll recreat the TS2 colonial origins of the town as it was in the spring of 1575 and start building it up and growing it from there starting with ancestors of the Old Town families as my own recreations and renditions.I'll slowly add the couples in one at a time and play as I add them into the colonial settlement.

Romance.

Bella Goth and Chap Curious spent some time together at Café Petite.


As did Chap's neighbours Cricket and Jason Larson.



Twins Selma and Joakim Picaso both had their first flings and kisses. Selma with Jonas Caliente:


And Joakim with Egoraptor Schwissenbaum. Egoraptor kept calling Joakim so I figured he wanted his attention.

Every time - every single time - I send the Bellum family to the Enclave Shopping Center, which is one lot over around the corner from them and the obvious and only place for them to shop for anything, the lot crashes. It crashes for other people, too, but usually after a lapse long enough for me to accomplish something. For the Bellums it crashes immediately.

Last night I got fed up with it. I had sent Carol Bellum to get her elder wardrobe last session, and it crashed, and it was too late to load the entire game just to outfit her. So when I opened the game, I sent her. The game froze on a screen that was all black except for her UI, then crashed just before I despaired and turned the machine off and on again, which is the only way to clear the game if it freezes the whole machine (and no, CTRL-ALT-DEL doesn't work; it does no good to open the task manager if the machine won't toggle over to it). So, I loaded the game, bulldozed the lot - which I must have modified trying to make it more playable/get rid of whatever bad CC might be doing this a dozen times - and built a new fancy shopping center. It's gorgeous. I like it. The lot is smaller, but it fits a sidewalk cafe, a grocery store, a newsstand, an arcade, a salon, and a clothing store. I send Carol, and it crashes. Well, I'd spent a long time building it and my game does crash sometimes, especially in the summer. There's only so cool I can get the room so overheating happens. I load the game again. I send Carol, again. She buys her wardrobe. She gets her hair done. She shows me a couple of design flaws. She leaves the lot. And, the game crashes.

Is it possible for a spot on the map to just plain be bad? Nobody who's downloaded Bigg City has ever told me they had a problem with the shopping center, and this is a draft Bigg City, not properly leveled and so on - maybe, I don't know, there's something about the map? Should I just use fewer mirrors? Did I use something terribly hi-poly? I used to have a grocery shelf that rendered lots unusable - maybe I accidentally downloaded it again and used it? I really want grocery shelves with detergent and tampons and things on them that I don't have to build one piece of clutter at a time, so I could have glommed onto the same one again?

I don't know. it's driving me batty.

I also think that sometimes some lots can cause problems if they are on very rare or uneven terrain. But no idea.

Uneven terrain causes my sims to reset every now and then. That's why I use the flatten lot tool before building on any lot because I like my lots well.....flat.
That way there I can build foundations without sloping ground and keeping the lot even and spacious enough to build on and add on to if I chose to renovate and improve the lot later on.

Not much. Just been 'improving' Farpoint. Eventually all the lots will be renovated and then some little buggers can move in them. All in due time.

I'm trying an experiment with Pleasantview. Can I play my usual wants-based but not have the same old couples, i.e., no Dirk and Lilith, Dustin and Angela, or Lucy and Alexander? I'm thinking I might send them all to college at the same time but mix up the dorms so that no one in a potential love match is in a dorm together and also add some of the bin students for some alternative choices. I've already had Lucy do her part by taking the Romance aspiration and flirting with Dirk in front of Lilith. Lilith was not happy about that. Dirk and Lucy have a lot of chemistry.

Oh, I also tried a new thing where I moved Lilith in with the Oldies. I really liked playing her without all the slap-fighting with Angela. She seemed to do better too--she's getting better grades and wants to go to college, although she did sneak out with Dirk before she got mad at him.

I played around a bit in Desiderata Valley for the first time ever. Poor Rick Contrary kept trying to get his father to play with him but he refused every time, as did Hannah Bell, leaving Rick to entertain himself by jumping on the livingroom sofas. Edward Contrary was poked mercilessly by another sim while I was with Natasha Una in the art gallery. Luis Aspir resurrected his wife.

I also played some with the Veronaville residents for the first time in this save i.e for the first time in more than fourteen years. Things went about as well as one would've expected. Both Tybalt and Consort followed Juliette to Romeo's, where Tybalt fought with Mercutio and Consort with Isabella. The latter two have two bolts with each other which I find quite intriguing. Romeo apologized to Consort after kissing Juliette.
At Juliette's, she and Romeo went steady, he went to poke Tybalt in the chest after having made out with Juliette, and then they had a fistfight, leaving Juliette trapped in the bathroom with them. Aside from gossiping with Consort claiming Mercutio has cheated on Hermia, Tybalt spent most of the evening and following day stalking Juliette to poke her or be poked by her, save for when she snuck out with Romeo. Even Hermia involved herself at one point yelling at Tybalt.
The Summerdream party started well and eventually turned into a shitshow, despite Puck's and Titania's efforts to influence the guests to be nice to each other and keep them busy. Oberon and Titania got engaged. Tybalt and Mercutio had a fistfight, after which Romeo and Juliette temporarily showed some family loyalty with Romeo going after Tybalt and Juliette Mercutio. Tybalt and Romeo had a fistfight. Tybalt and Juliette had a fistfight. Bottom had a great time watching. Puck and Hermia had their first kiss, and since I have an anti jealousy mod, Mercutio just kept on chatting with Oberon without a care in the world.

I finally decided to remove all the old clothes from my downloads folder. I spent all night downloading conversions. Now I have to decide between millions of colors.

The first 3 families for Farpoint are out of the bin and ready to roll;

Spinner
Important
Babybat*

*Not the same family that was in Plot of Land and before. Totally new family.

I would like to keep population growth under some kind of control in my new Pleasantview save, and I've instituted some rules to help do so, such as only allowing try for baby when the woman has the want, unmarried can only get pregnant via risky woohoo, etc. Miracle of miracles, Brandi met Darren when he walked by her house early on, they hit it off and became friends, and upon opening his house one day, he actually had the want to get engaged! So they got married and Brandi, Beau, and little Bobby moved into Darren's house. Brandi of course got pregnant right away, and I'm thinking they might have one baby on top of her other three. Nope, she had twins, both girls: Delilah and Daisy.

In other news, Don did not leave Cassandra at the altar, but their marriage was stormy and short. They have a baby named Calvin. Don flirted with Nina in front of Cassandra. Then Cassandra got revenge by flirting with Darren at his own wedding! Fortunately, Brandi did not see it. Don left Cassandra and moved in with the Caliente girls. Cassandra moved in Bella to help with the baby (and I made her an elder because I hate seeing her perpetually wandering around as a townie--she's the only part of the clean Pleasantview I don't like; in my head canon this time, she didn't get abducted but just abandoned her family and is now trying to make amends). Dina thought Don was moving in to be with her and even planned a wedding, but Don is just very into Nina and maybe thought it would all be some kind of weird open relationship with sisters, which was NOT Dina's understanding. The wedding was a disaster, and now I have to think about what to do with the three of them. Nina just goes with the flow, by the way. Nothing seems to faze her.

I am playing Veronaville for essentially the first time (with ALT students and Tricou teens added) - the originally Veronaville teens have just returned to the main hood after graduation:

Tybalt is out of a VC Andrews novel and has a relationship with Hermia, who just gave birth to twins

Juliet had a fling with Romeo (resulting in an illegitimate daughter), but plans to marry the more stable and family-focused Phin Furley

Romeo and Mercutio live in a bachelor's pad apartment on the Monty side and work in the family business (run by Antonio who lords on Monty Ranch and is remarried to Marla Biggs) - they are still sowing wild oats but under increasing pressure to settle down.

Puck and Miranda live in Summerdream Villa with Oberon, who has regressed into wild ways since the unexpected death of Titania during a difficult pregnancy. All three couple with each other and others in town with abandon and throw almost nighty parties, which has, admittedly, done much to sooth Capp-Monty relations (outside of Tybalt, at least)

Hopefully, I will be back playing by the end of this week (RL a bit hectic right now) - I miss my pixels.

Nothing in terms of gameplay, but I was able to do a recovering of some of my CC that was on my older failed drive. Don't ask how I did it. Anyway I wasn't able to recover it all but about 3gb of the 8gb wasn't corrupted, so I've been sorting through it all. I've got enough now to at least achieve the visual look I like in my game.

As for any 'hoods I may create and want to share, I'll probably just do a batch backup upload of all my CC to SFS as sort of a "HarVee's Collection" and call it good. All this CC sorting and less time spent playing rattles my brain.

I managed to get my Pleasantview families set up without any of the usual suspects in couples together. I let everyone choose their own partner based on wants.

Angela married Erik Swain. She quite liked Jimmy Phoenix in college, but he only wanted to be friends, while Erik pursued her rather aggressively. Angela has become fairly conservative and wants to join the military, so a family man better suits her anyway. I gave Erik a mustache and shorter haircut so I can tell him apart from Dirk.

Dustin fell for Sam Thomas in college and married her. He went into medicine and is now best friends with Don too. He and Angela remained friends, and when she and Erik were over for dinner, he caressed her cheek outside when they were taking out the trash, rekindling his old feelings for her. He's trying to be faithful, though.

After a while being a single adult, Lilith fell for Jimmy, and he asked her to marry him. He was also having a thing with Lucy Burb and wanted to marry her too, but Lucy is not the marrying type. They are holding off on the wedding because Jimmy has a cold. Lilith really wants to get a job in Athletics like her father but hasn't found one yet. Jimmy is fundamentally uninterested in work.

Dirk and Lucy are a regular couple, although Lucy also had a romance with Erik in college and then one with Jimmy before he got engaged to Lilith. At least she hasn't broken up any marriages yet. Dirk is already fairly high up in politics, and Lucy is of course in the slacker career. Neither one wants to get married to each other or anyone else.

When Alexander got to college, all he wanted to do was study. Jared Starchild wanted to fall in love but had negative chemistry with all the girls, so I had him start checking out the boys. Two bolts with Alexander. He immediately went into flirt mode, and Alexander fell right in love. They got married and moved back into the Goth house. They will probably adopt a homeless child from the orphanage, although it's always possible Alexander could have a baby by alien abduction. After Dina's disaster with Don, she went back to her original plan of getting pregnant by Mortimer and then getting him to marry her, which he did, so she is now living in the Goth house as well.

Also, John and Jennifer Burb had a second daughter who looks exactly like Lucy. I would think it was first born syndrome if Lucy wasn't premade. This daughter will not be Romance, though. John fell out of love with Jennifer because she told him she didn't want any more kids, but he decided to repair the marriage instead of leaving, and now they are going strong again.

The Travellers, Gavigans, and Newsons all live on the same street in Widespot and are played in that order. Tina and Isaiah have been going steady for years, but both are caught up in helping out at their parents' businesses and it's been awhile since they actually dated, nor do they spontaneously canoodle anymore when not being played, though their friends make a point of inviting them to the same parties and on the same outings. Gallagher has been quietly pining after Tina for several rotations, but he's friends with both and also cripplingly shy, so he did nothing about it. Last rotation, though, Tina came home with a Newson outing, Isaiah didn't, and she waited until she and Gallagher were alone, and walked up to hold hands with him. Immediate love hearts and Gallagher gets his first kiss, but at what cost? Tina promised she'd break up with Isaiah and then they could date.

Well, this rotation was the birthday of the Traveller twins, so there wouldn't be time for anything else. Tina threw the birthday party, inviting Gallagher and Isaiah. Gallagher spent a lot of the party discreetly watching TV with Trent and Trisha (thus boosting the party score, getting to know her parents, and avoiding trouble), while Isaiah ignored everyone to talk to the parrot. If thoughts of leniency had crossed Tina's mind that took care of them. It took a little maneuvering to get everyone into position, but during the last half hour of the party, when the score was nice and high, she initiated a slow dance with Gallagher, took her slapping without retaliation, and broke up with him. The party still had a "good" rating when the timer ran down.

It is unfortunate that Isaiah had a fear of breaking up with Tina at the time, so he's a lot more broken-hearted than you'd expect. I haven't played him yet, though I looked in on him, so we'll see how he bounces back. They all have four days left to adulthood and are slated to all go to college in a bunch, but maybe I should send Isaiah a little early. He's Knowledge, so that would definitely cheer him up.

After the rowdy Summerdream party, Tybalt rolled a wish to apologize to Romeo, and then to apologize to Juliette. I keep thinking about what could've caused this - whether he figures he went too far, took some time to think about things and felt he was in the wrong, or if something happened on the way from the party. Hermia meanwhile felt like playing and joking with Tybalt. In the evening she cooked spaghetti for everyone, Tybalt and Consort became besties during the meal, and once he was done eating, Consort just strolled off. I bet he thinks the food magically appeared on the table, too. Tybalt caught Juliette as she got up and apologized. They're still enemies, but the evening and following day were calm - they only tried to mess with each other twice, and both times the action got cancelled out by other things appearing in the queue. Hermia had already started to put away the dishes, Juliette took Tybalt's plate for him, and he in turn cleaned the countertop. It was good to see all three work together in peace for once.
The next day was a schoolday. Hermia and Tybalt both invited people home from school, though Tybalt had to leave for his first day at work in politics. Juliette became one of the top students. She wanted to invite Romeo over, and did so. She was the one cooking today, while Hermia and Romeo watched tv in Tybalt's room. Consort and Tybalt came home in time for dinner. They seem to have had to come to terms with Romeo being around by now. Tybalt apologized to Romeo.

I imagine the reason Mercutio didn't even react to Hermia kissing Puck at the party was because he'd already decided along with her that it was better not to go anywhere with their feelings for each other (which would be one reason he's so pissed at Juliette and Romeo as a couple - if he and Hermia could make the hard but responsible decision, why can't they instead of making it everyone else's problem?), but now that doesn't really matter anymore as his crush is gone and he's instead started a fling with a friend he brought home from school. His aspiration meter is going nowhere fast, though. When Tybalt walked by the lot he challenged him to a fight to fulfill the want of besting him in one, but he lost once again. I did notice his lifetime want is to become mayor, and was extra inspired to pursue the politics career track seeing as Tybalt is already in it, so now Mercutio's looking for an opening.
Romeo wanted to become friends with Kent Capp. He called him up and got it done. I really like that, especially since Kent's also friends with Juliette and uninterested in fighting with the Monty's according to his bio. I imagine he's the trusted adult they can turn to without judgment.
Patrizio had a want to kiss Isabella, which rekindled their love. While the teens were at school, the two of them spent their time playing chess, talking and telling jokes until the evening when the grim reaper came for Patrizio. Isabella had an aspiration failure and was inconsolable all evening. Romeo was heartbroken as well. Mercutio just got home from work and hasn't really had time to react, but he's already depressed as it is. Both he and Romeo have wants to eat salmon, so granny's cooking up some in the hopes of making them feel better. As for herself, Isabella's already dreaming of falling in love and getting married again, as well as having another grandkid.

I'm not sure what people who disagree with posts in this thread are disagreeing with. Do they disagree that this is what is happening in your game, or do they just dislike what is happening?

Anyway, unlike in Strangetown, the paranormal in Pleasantview is more theoretical and not an everyday occurrence. There are no werewolves in Pleasantview, although there are plenty of wolves in the nearby woods and some people would like to become a werewolf. Also, resurrection of the dead has not occurred or been proven. This has become more than hypothetical for Alexander Goth, who lost his new husband Jared to food poisoning shortly after they adopted a homeless child named Manuel. (I didn't realize Jared Starchild was so sloppy; I don't think I've ever really played him before.) For a long while, Alexander wanted to resurrect Jared and looked for a job in the Paranormal career as a result, but eventually he got wants for other jobs, and I think he has moved on emotionally from that loss. (Many of my Family Sims have jobs in Paranormal, though, which they found when they just needed any job to pay the bills, so I think it's likely more scams and infomercials than anything real--at least so far.) Likewise, aliens are just hypothetical at this point. Alexander has stargazed many times and seen nothing but planets, although he has to admit that Dina's son by Mortimer has a rather greenish complexion; perhaps the child is just sickly--who knows?

Babies! There have been a few. Manuel was adopted as a child so he will be in the same cohort as Ashley Burb and Bobby Broke. Then there is Don and Cassandra's son and Darren and Brandi's twin girls. Following them are: Dina and Mortimer's son (who has alien skin inherited from the Caliente side); Dustin and Sam's son; and Angela and Erik's son. Finally, Lilith had twins with Jimmy Phoenix, both boys as well. She must have gotten pregnant via risky woohoo because they weren't married yet, but they had a quickie elopement once she got her baby bump. They had to spend the rest of the pregnancy in bed because I'm trying to get them over their cold and keep it from spreading further in the neighborhood.

Speaking of paranormal, no one in Pleasantview knows about the strange group of Sims living in a tiny house in the woods. They call themselves the "garden club" and they worship (and occasionally feed) a very odd plant. They all look very normal, so of course no one would suspect them of being up to stuff.

Created a new SC4 terrain based off the "Crystal Springs" map. I've always loved this map but the road layout and dumb trees ruined it so I went into SimCity 4 to rectify this issue. As it sits now I have a new 'hood called "Happening", which I am hoping will eventually turn out to be more than just a fancy looker but actually get use as a playing 'hood too.

Breaking News: Isaiah refused to roll any useful wants and smashed his sister's dolls, though he took a telephone call from Gallagher and seemed pretty chill, so rather than deal with him trying to poke people for the next three rotations I sent him to college, and he feels much better now. He's gained a little weight but eh.

Gallagher was still in platinum from kissing Tina last rotation and probably from dancing with her at the party (that kid doesn't go to community lots unless I drag him), so I dealt with other members of his household during the day. He wanted to call Isaiah, so I let him, and they became friends again. In the evening, he invited Tina's entire family over for dinner. He asked her to go steady and she said no! Suddenly, he wasn't platinum anymore.

Isaiah showed up while they were hanging out on the play equipment and Gallagher tried to understand. He walked straight up to Tina and hugged her, then spritzed himself with some cologne he'd bought in her mother's store at some point. Then he hugged Gallagher and everybody trooped inside to dance. Everyone else slapdanced, but Gallagher and Tina danced together.

My interpretation is that Tina decided that going steady was too much pressure and kind of silly given how close they are to college (they'll both go next rotation), but does want to date Gallagher, so they'll do that next rotation and then I'll probably send them off together. And we'll see how things shake out from there. If he'd taken her on a date she probably would have accepted, but I guess a family dinner wasn't what she had in mind!