It’s official: I am in love with CTNutmegger’s Simsville. Part of it is the nostalgia factor – it’s a hoot to visit these 3-D renditions of the Sims 1 homes and think back fondly on the fun I had playing that game. But all nostalgia aside, Simsville is just a beautifully-crafted world, with many of the features I wanted to put into my own world before I settled on making an island. It has distinct residential neighborhoods, a very urban-feeling downtown, rivers, bridges, coastline, woods (even a cabin in the woods!), farmland, and about a bazillion lots, which is nice for builders.
I don’t usually play with the pre-made Maxis Sims — at least I didn’t in TS2 and TS3 — but I wanted to explore this town properly and figured I might as well populate it with 3D versions of the old TS1 families. I downloaded some of the households created by Simbil and put them in their respective homes: the Goths in their beshingled home with the graveyard, and the Newbies in their little brick number. Remember that one?
Also finding their way into Simsville were the “bin†families from TS1’s first incarnation: the Pleasants, the Roomies, and Michael Bachelor. Good old Michael – I remember playing him. The Goths, too. Young Cassandra Goth became a piano virtuoso since there was nothing much else for her to do but play that blasted thing all day long. Poor girl couldn’t even grow up; she was stuck in childhood purgatory forever. (I miss pianos, though.) And of course I played the Newbies. Almost everyone played with them; they were the tutorial family. Bob and Betty Newbie taught me how to play The Sims.
So, for old times’ sake, I just had to play them in The Sims 3. And I got totally hooked. I like the traits that Simbil gave the Newbies; it makes them a fun and likeable couple to play.
CTNutmegger, Simbil, and Klnl from Neighborhood99 took great pains to re-create the TS1 homes in Simsville. The Newbie House at 7 Sim Lane was created by Simbil, and despite the limitations of TS3 content (no big square table, darnit!), I think it’s a wonderfully accurate representation of the original.
My sister was sitting with me when I first played Simsville, and she wanted to see a bit of World Adventures, so I sent the Newbies on a little trip. I had used the “freerealestate†cheat to move all my families into their respective homes, so they still had their starting funds, and there was plenty of money for a short vacation. Bob had a wish to visit France, but my sister voted for Egypt, so Egypt it was.
Betty has the Coward trait, which I’d never really played before. It doesn’t seem to affect her too much except for the occasional wig-out like above. Plus she doesn’t like being outside at night without any lights around. I can’t say I blame her.
Betty also loves the outdoors and wanted to fish, so I sent her to a nice little spot by the river while Bob signed up for an adventure.
Couch Potato Bob isn’t really the adventuring type, but I wanted to show my sister what the tombs were all about. As you can see in the snapshot, he’s not too impressed with this tomb business and would rather be in France. Sorry, Bob. Maybe next time!
Bob’s a wee bit off his rocker, so he enjoys talking to himself. Which usually leads to strangling himself. Bob is not very kind to Bob. And I shudder to think what Betty is dreaming about that involves flies.
Betty wanted to woohoo — actually, she wished to “have a child” — but Bob was having None. Of. It. Aw come on, Bob, wouldn’t it be cute and kind of romantic to conceive your first kid in a mysterious desert land? Are you worried about getting sand in your pants? Are you still bummed that you’re not in Champs les Sims? What?
So Betty sat down over breakfast and had a little talk with Bob. She explained calmly that, despite Bob’s sloppiness and his tendency to wear inappropriate clothing at times, she really wanted to have a baby with him. Whatever she said, it worked, because they tried the hanky-panky again, and this time, Bob complied. The tent spun around and hovered in the air, baby chimes played, and there was much rejoicing.
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What a fun looking hood! I’ve heard about Simsville but I’m yet to try it out but I might have to now. I’ve been playing a bunch of my own Sims in a hood I downloaded called Fort Sim.
I always liked the Newbies. I remember making over that little house so many times! I don’t know why I restarted the hood so often but I’d always make over that patio to be a second bedroom as well. I don’t think it was ever as nice as your makeover here though!
Ooh, Fort Sim! I’ve installed that one but haven’t checked it out yet. It looks epic, though. Ehaught is a fantastic builder. Thanks for the nice comments, Carla!
Um, Jen… that creepy kid is staring right at me… Still, she’s only creepy-looking. One of mine looked like he was a cross between Freddy Kruger and something that had been put through a meat grinder. Great update, though, and I love the term ‘crazycakes’! I may have to borrow that :)
LOL, Freddy Krueger? Oh dear…that’s bad. I honestly HATE the toddler/child years in TS3, which is why I tend to stop playing families once they have a kid at that age. :-p But I want to see Brandi grow up, so I’ll just bop around to other families while until she’s out of the creepy stages.
Yup, he looked more like Freddy than the Freddy skin that used to be available for sims 2. And, he just got worse as he got older. Or perhaps I’m being insulting to poor Freddy?
I never played the pre-mades much either, but this does look like so much fun!
Maybe it’s just me, but it sounds like “Bob and Betty Newbie taught me how to play The Sims” would be great on a shirt, lol.
And TS3 toddler and children are very creepy.
I know, I never thought I would have so much fun with the pre-mades. Maybe it’s because these versions aren’t Maxis/EA. :-) (Did I already say that in my post? I’m tired today. :-p LOL)
Totally agree on the high creepiness factor of the TS3 kids. I keep hoping for a family/kid-themed expansion and a total overhaul of their looks/animations. :-p
Tehehe jen, I love your commentary :D
I remember the newbies all to well. Yes they were the first family to introduce me into the world of the sims (darn bob and betty, they got me addicted!). I’ve got simsville but haven’t really explored it (just opened it up to see if it was worth keeping around, as I do for most hoods I download) but now I’m almost itching to snag those origional sims and go nuts. It’s funny though, I’m going to want to give everything a makeover right away. No offence to the wonderful creators at all, that’s just what I do with maxis/EA stuff, and I suppose it’s because that’s what they’re based on. I’m currently enjoying the Neverglade hood by Pyronium (well apart from building my school), I love creating cabins and the whole ‘mountain town’ theme. Thanks for those links too! Deleting that cache file does fix my edit-in-game issues, but I’m going to try your method of loading the hood with the actual game because I need my CC too :)
Haha, yes, I blame my whole Sims addiction on Bob and Betty…if they hadn’t taught me how to play, maybe I would have taken up gardening or something more productive instead! (Just kidding, I can’t keep a plant alive to save my soul!)
Wow, Neverglade looks amazing! There are just so many nice worlds popping up now, it’s hard to keep up with them all. I’ve never seen such nice mountains, though. I’ll definitely have to check that one out.
Excellent! I’m loving this! I have Twallan’s Story Progression (got tired of the error message that you get with Awesomemod). But alas … I haven’t played my game since installing it. I wanna get that super ‘puter, too. :) This neighborhood you mentioned sounds interesting. I may have to look into that.
I didn’t really play Bob and Betty much in Sims 1. I did boot them out of their house, though, and used their house for my sims. It was one of my first renovation projects, lol!
I hate Sims 3 pillbug babies so very much. And the ugly factor of the toddlers (Sims 2 toddlers looked so cute!) and even the kids. Which is pretty sad for me, since I’ve always loved Sim kids and have done about eleventy thousand “Have 10 Kid” wants in my playing through of Sims 2. I’m dying for them to add new things for kids/toddlers (and PETS, dangit!) but it looks like anything for them will be several months off, still. Ugh.
Nice revisit of Sims 1 sims, though! I’ll have to consider getting that neighborhood into my game.