The Sims II - Legacy Challenge

mondays suck · Apr 28, 2011

I had already written about 90% of this post, accidentally hit Alt+H somehow, returned to this page and everything was gone. Painful.

So, what I was going to say is that there are bad news. My uncontrollable scrolling problem became worse and worse recently, to the point where the screen was constantly moving. I literally screwed around a bit, it didn't help, the issue kept returning. So today, I decided to declare my mouse dead.
I do not intend to plague myself with the horrors of playing the game with my laptop's touchpad. Especially with the three toddlers the household was not very far from being home to anymore that's a no-no.
Getting a new mouse - I am certain I will not find an old but still functioning one in the attic, I'm pretty they all were PS2 mice; and my laptop lacks the ability to connect with a PS2 mouse - might take a while, the closest place where I can get one is roughly equally far away from my home as the dreaded Iron Curtain - You know, that scary border with the former soviet sphere of influence we all (myself included) only know about from history classes and documentaries. That border behind which the governments are even eviller than home. That border everyone west of hates Karl Marx and everyone east of is a disgrace to Karl Marx. Poor guy.
Anyway, if I am lucky I can get a new mouse this weekend, if I am not, I might have to do some thread necromancy later on - I'm pretty sure the rules I read before making this thread actually allow necromancy under certain circumstances in this subforum, but let's hope I won't have to resort to it.
I might try and do another LP in the meantime, I already have an idea, I am just not sure how well I will be able to execute it yet.

Daydream said:
Notta and an Alien baby! Yay. :D

I see zombie-nanny Allyn in the future. o_o

Speaking of necromancy! Yes, Allyn is a tempting choice for a future zombie. I just hope she won't lose her permanent platinum status so she won't refuse to do anything when, say, there are puddles (not necessarily water puddles) in the room.

QuilavaKing said:
I've honestly never played, nor even seen any sims games.

lol

Thank whoever you believe to for not being exposed to this source of addiction yet.

elarmasecreta said:
Wow, I've never played the sims like this, I like to move around a lot.
Your LP's real cool man, keep it up!

EDIT: Okay I've finally finished reading everything, the last part was hilarious as !@#$! And grown up Ioducus looks badass man!*

Spoiler:

I've never seen aliens before... And I've been playing this game for years. (I did know they existed, just never had an abduction)
*before episode XV that is.

Yes, the architecture part is certainly one of the most fun bits of the game, and because tearing down a house takes a while, the game favors moving around, especially since the inventory was introduced which allows preventing to lose huge chunks of money when moving. I only stopped doing that when my "Peasantview" neighborhood became too crowded.

And Ioducus is my favorite character as well, so fun to play. The day he dies is going to suck. Oh well, at least it will allow me to finally play my planned boring eventless years of nothing.

Misheard Whisper said:
Alien mpreg baby . . . nice.

Just read all the way through this in one sitting, and it was most amusing, if a little slow-paced to begin with. Still a good laugh, especially with the constant shenanigans that at least one of the family is up to at any given time.

And is it just me, or does Ioducus look like a real smarmosaur? Especially with that facial hair.

The problem is that increasing the pacing would mean decreasing the shenanigans. But eventually I will have to... :(
What's a smarmosaur by the way?

Arma · Apr 28, 2011

I wouldn't play with the touch pad either. I hope you get a mouse soon, can't wait to continue reading.
Btw, I used Peasantview too (though they call it "Droomzicht" = Dreamview in dutch) , but I moved almost all of the custom sims there to a custom neighborhood.

Say which expansion do you need in order to work as a spy and for the Lifetime aspiration benefits?
I hope you don't mind me asking, but from which country are you exactly?

mondays suck · May 22, 2011

Still no update, but:
While I still don't have a new mouse, thanks to having too much free time on my hands I've been practicing with the touchpad and started to memorize keyboard shortcuts (ridiculous, I know, but...) and the result is that by now I'm getting along just fine, at least as long as my hands aren't sweaty. So, I might try and play the Loner family some more, the first few days are going to be rather painful but once all these potential heirs grow up to children I should be just fine. Really, the only thing I can't really do well at all is the architectural aspect of the game, and apart from a future second attempt at running a business (I'll be running some off-screen tests in other families before that though), I'm past that in this case.

By the way, my proudest result of the past month:

Spoiler:

Somehow I managed to create this abomination. Some random guy who was sitting in the University's 'family' bin at the beginning of the game first turned from some average Joe into a serial killer warlock (this one is a while ago though, happened before I started this), then became a plantsim and now got bitten by a wolf. My first ever of each, by the way. Well, the latter is not entirely true, but the game crashed shortly after one of this guy's daughters turned into a werewolf yesterday evening.

Anyway, more on life state shenanigans later...

Btw, I used Peasantview too (though they call it "Droomzicht" = Dreamview in dutch) , but I moved almost all of the custom sims there to a custom neighborhood.

I did it exactly the other way around, I moved all premade sims (only from the original 3 neighborhoods though) into P(l)easantview and later restored the other two when I found out the game actually has backups of their original states hidden somewhere in its subfolders. Makes the data somewhat messy because most of the premade families are already at least in some way related, and for each household that had a memory or family tree entry of a person, that person got duplicated.

Say which expansion do you need in order to work as a spy and for the Lifetime aspiration benefits?

To be honest; I have no idea because for most of the time I only had the basic game and when decided to acquire the expansions I got all at the same time.
Some research says both the 'Intelligence' career track and the Lifetime Aspiration stuff were included in FreeTime though.

I hope you don't mind me asking, but from which country are you exactly?

Your mean eastern neighbor ;)
Here it's called "Schönsichtigen" btw, not right now though since I currently am using the English version.

donavannj · May 22, 2011

Oh, wow, that's some crazy luck for that sim. I wouldn't wanna be his neighbor.

Arma · May 25, 2011

Dayumn, he reminds me of Scarecrow from the Batman series... Creepy fella.XD
Also thanks for answering my questions, the only expansions I don't have are apartment life and free time.
Hope you get the next update up soon!

mondays suck · Jun 12, 2011

TS2 Legacy Challenge - Part XVI - Touchpad plus mass toddlers equaaals....?

Spoiler:

TS2 Legacy Challenge - Part XVII - Waaay too many people, what am I doing?

Spoiler:

Seriously now, stop it. This is the third time a vampire walks into a community lot and first of all bites a random person. Apart from the earlier witch, both of them were cashiers and both of them were never seen again... They did take no damage from the sun though, cashiers must be immune to need drops.

Not sure if I mentioned it, but at some point Ioducus' wife switched from the scientist career she already started on top of to the business career. The reason is of course once again a lifetime want, and while she hasn't gone all the way up yet, she did earn this by now. Completely useless to me, both the money spamming thingy from the law career and the pimped out bookshelf from the education career are vastly superior. Still nice to have, it's not like I didn't have any empty space in the house left.

Soo... A couple sims aged and the rarely ever mentioned Jadran is off to college.

Yet again some idiot managed to set this damn toy railroad (why did I even buy it?) on fire. Unlike the previous one, he died. And I forgot to sell the urn and kept being harassed by his ghost almost every night. What a jerk.

Trees and things that count as trees will constantly be struck by lightning. Annoying, because it often will set them on fire and everyone who notices it will have their action queue deleted, stand near the (when caused by lightning actually harmless) fire and scream. And lose hygiene even if the burning tree/whatever is far away.

So, an eternity later Jadran has graduated and instead of waiting another 72 in-game hours, I just use the telephone to get him back home. Didn't even know you could do that until recently.

Wait, did I say just Jadran? Well, not exactly, because only not the young man to the right who has inherited his mother's love for hats and his uncle's love for unnecessary formal clothing rejoined the family, there also is his wife, Brittany. Or Britanny or Brittanny or whatever the correct spelling is. Maybe I should Alt+Tab back to the game and simply look it up.
Anyway, since - probably - the university expansion non-player teenage Sims can be integrated into families by sending them to said university, and that's what happened here. The advantage here is that the time can be used to build some skill points, and while B. does not have as many skill points as Ioducus' children will have at that point (they are growing up with the uber bookshelf after all), she is decent. So, unlike Allyn who only started to shine at a much higher age, B. will probably be climbing career ladders quickly. Especially since the house is at the maximum of 8 inhabitants again, so children will have to wait until someone dies.

Sooo... while there's not a whole lot of plot progress in this update, this seems like a better cutoff point than the still quite far away death that is most likely going to be Francisca's (she had perfect mood during the adult->elder transition, that means a long life) or the point where Ioducus' children enter University (or not, they will return). So, until next time.

TS2 Legacy Challenge - Part XVIII - Rearranging some family structures

Spoiler:

By the way, is there a way I can change the thread title from [LP]TS2-LC to a more correct [AAR]TS2-LC or will I have to bother Yuoaman? I tried, but didn't find any yet.

donavannj · Jun 12, 2011

I'll be back to read those, but to answer your question, yes, you will have to bother Yuoaman for a title change.

mondays suck · Jun 14, 2011

TS2 Legacy Challenge - Part XIX - Never trust a computer...

Spoiler:

donavannj · Jun 15, 2011

Have you learned your lesson yet about not paying attention while playing? :P

Ioducus is a sly guy.

mondays suck · Jun 20, 2011

donavannj said:
Have you learned your lesson yet about not paying attention while playing? :P/QUOTE]
I'm an r-strategist in that regard

There more children I have, the less an unwanted death hurts. Easier than constantly paying attention. And if too many survive and the house becomes too crowded, there are always the pool, the cowplant and a lot of more fun but less convenient other means of depopulation. And killing people is a big part of the game anyway.

TS2 Legacy Challenge - Part XX - This weeks craze: Brainwashing

Spoiler:

When she finally got around to look into a mirror, Kay noticed what a hideous abomination she had become and decided to wear this thing as a consequence. I'm not sure if it's a ninja suit or a burka, and I don't think it makes her look less suspicious as well, but it's her decision, isn't it?

Because his newest almost-wife was temporarily dead (

), Ioducus has an opportunity to remarry Kay and uses it. Her little affair with Seth that cost her her first life is long forgotten, and Ioducus is getting too old for his usual shenanigans, too. He suspects that what went wrong with Zuriel could have been not growing up under normal conditions, he only had one parent who, admittedly, didn't have a lot of time for him. This aren't not going to be normal conditions either, but it's as close as it could be.

These stupid puddles that one water ghost keeps creating are starting to tick me off, so I sell them.

Zuriel seems to accept his fate... Or this just going to be like this as long as Ioducus is still alive?

Yevgeniy (from here on abbreviated as Y. because the name is just too annoying to type repeatedly) grows up to a toddler, and ugh, I don't like that character. As I said before (or at least I think so), I value the Neat and Nice traits highly, am indifferent about Outgoing and Playful and really, really dislike Active.
Francisca's line seems to be getting way better characters, Jadran has a wonderful spread and Serafima, while a little worse, has no character to complain about either.

Characters can be changed, though. Here, the woman only known as the wife is instructing her youngest and only remaining child Serafima (who inherited both her dyed hair thing and Francisca's and Jadran's thing for hats; damn, keeping thése quirks up is going to be complicated in the long run) to be lazier. This is pretty much the only thing other than retiring and dying elders can do better than adults, the greater the age distance is, the more efficient it becomes. Unfortunately I only remembered the option now when Sera already is a teenager.
Anyway, my plan is to have my lazier, nicer and neater household members spam these interactions on Y. once he becomes a child. I bet I'll forget about it though.

Look at the result: It was tedious (because for some reason it cannot be queued, that would make things much easier), but spamming the interaction again and again did lead to Sera losing three of her originally four Activity points.

Not sure if I can take away even more though since that would actually exceed her mother's laziness.

YOU, of all people, are trying to teach Y. to walk? Hahaha, you can't even walk properly by yourself!

Hmm, turns out completely eradicating activity from Sera's personality did work! Hahaha, no more faster Hunger and Energy drops, no more slower Logic (more useful than Body which Active boosts) skill learning! And all that at the cost of just one evening and the ability to run. And that Body skill gain thing, I guess, but it's still easy to max out with that wonderful bookshelf.

"I have decided to announce my retirement."
She has an awesome personality point distribution, I'm going to make use of that. Certainly a better idea better than making even more useless money.

I'm not quite sure if I'd want to eat from that hand...
This is actually one of the advantages of sloppy sims (since I've already been talking about personalities so much this time, might as well add this...) though, it's WAY faster than regular means of eating.

Every now and then, even with Free Will disabled, Kay will autonomously decide to bite someone's neck when she isn't occupied with something. So far nothing happened yet...
Because I know Toddlers can't be bitten, I didn't cancel the action this time, and what happened? Relations rose. Nothing else. Not even a move. Just ++ relations. Weird.

But later, when I randomly looked at his memories, I saw this. I am now officially confused. Verily.

Umm... What kind of school are you exactly visiting there, Sera?

Francisca got 100§ from a random event about a costume I foolishly didn't ignore (then again, at her age losing the job won't matter a lot anymore), and it counts as a big bonus

Probably a built-in gag though.

Jadran has become a megalomaniac architect, he is the next Albert Speer. I always thought better of him

Craaap. Kay, without her ninja burka this time, managed to sneak in a bite. I wasn't even that absent-minded this time.

This is the result.

This time I'm not just buying one of these potions.
Fun fact: Kay did actually have a wish to devampirize Ioducus. It must be the decay the brain has suffered, it must be the decay.

I think Sera's brainwashing is finished. It's a whole lot different from her original character, so brainwashing Y. is going to take a longer while... Anyway, she'll have an easier life from now on and, as an elder (if she survives university) will be an awesome brainwasher herself.
And yeah, as I said, I don't care about Playful a whole lot. Outgoing... I renewed my knowledge of what it does, turns out it's actually useful. Social decays faster but easier friends. Right now, almost all of the family's friends are Ioducus' friends, so there will be a need for more soon enough.

Because of the continous water ghost harassment that causes me to have to delete the puddles again and again because they prevent me from putting anything else into the mausoleum, I have decided to get an external graveyard instead.

Unfortunately, I cannot put the portraits of the deceased on the walls without owning the Graveyard. So I have to buy it. It counts as a family-owned business.

Kinda stupid.

This is what it looks like when I considered it finished for now. Weird? What did you expect?

After getting rid of the old mausoleum and its moat, the corner it used to be in now looks like this. Drying out the moat is one thing, but drying it out that much...?

50k? The profits from this speculation crap that ruins everything IRL are getting sillier and sillier.

I heavily invested in adjusting Y's personality, because...

...I knew the reaper, predictable as he is, was going to invite some people - exclusively women, apparently he is intending to play the player - to his party... his party in hell. Oddly enough, he only invited Barbara (at least that's what he called her, no idea if that's actually the wife's name

) though. Unexpected, but nice for me.

Hmmm, apparently there was another party at the reaper's the next day, and this time Francisca was invited. She, too, never returned.

Of all people, Sera now owns the "family business" that is the graveyard next door. She only inherited the second largest amount of money though.

That one extra day with Francisca alive turned out to be extremely useful, Y.'s personality now looks like this. Quite a change, isn't it? Took quite a while, too. I just hope his original personality is not in his genes

donavannj · Jun 22, 2011

Oi! Don't diss architects!

I will be most tempted to point and laugh if his original personality is in his genetics.

mondays suck · Jun 23, 2011

What did I say against architects?

The only thing I remember was directed at the fact that the guy apparently builds entire cities. That's a bit much.

But yeah, if the personality is inherited at all in some way, it'll probably be the original one. But we shall see...

TS2 Legacy Challenge - Part XXI - The end of an era

Spoiler:

The Sims II - Legacy Challenge

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