Benny had a wish to play guitar at a party, so I decided to have a picnic/family reunion at the gazebo. All of the Shanleys and their spouses were invited, as well as a couple of Gibby’s classmates so he’d have someone to play with.
Some of you may recall that Travis had a daughter with his previous wife. When Travis moved in with Hope, I decided not to have that daughter move in with him, since there was so little room at Skunk Haven (which was later remedied by getting the Sultan’s Tabernacle tent). The daughter, whose name is Alaina, married a guy named Albert Keener and was pregnant at the time of the family picnic. In a funny bit of randomness, she hurled all over the floor of the gazebo, which I found to be humorous as well as disgusting. The Sims in her immediate vicinity, however, had absolutely no reaction.
That’s a pity, because I know if someone upchucked at one of my family reunions, it would be talked about for years.
In the picture below, Gibby is playing tag with his best friend, some girl whose name I forget, while plugging his nose, pointing, and thinking about his Aunt Willow. I don’t know if Willow forgot to shower that day or what.
It was fun to watch the Shanleys mingle and dance with each other. The blonde guy in the pic below is Mackenzie Cobb, Mara’s evil, neurotic son, and the lady with the mohawk is his wife, Sofia. The guy in the background is Garrett Church, Fern’s husband.
And here’s Sky Shanley, all grown up:
She would have been a cool heir, I think. She’s married to a guy with the last name Peppers, so she’s now Sky Peppers, which makes me chuckle for some reason.
Somewhere in here I installed Ambitions, and Vi had a wish to become an Architectural Designer, so I tried it out. Her very first client was her sister Fern!
Fern wanted Vi to create a painting studio for her. It was to consist of an easel, a painting, a rug, a window, and a dining room chair. The game whipped into buy/build mode, and I decorated her room. I didn’t go overboard, though – I used a room which was already a study and just added the proper objects. I recolored some things orange because I knew that it was Fern’s favorite color.
Fern walked around the finished room, checking everything out. Willow sat right down and read a book in the dining chair, while Fern’s son crawled around.
I thought I did a half-decent job on the room – I had the right objects, didn’t go over budget, used her favorite color – but Fern just thought it was “OKâ€:
Thanks for trying?? Sheeesh. After that, Vi did another job that didn’t go well at all – some guy wanted her to add some doors and windows to his house to “update†it, and he yelled at her no matter what she did. I decided to save figuring that career out for later on down the road and had her quit. She registered herself as a Painter instead, which is very cool because she can paint all day long, sell her paintings, and then receive bonuses after she has made a certain amount of money.
Georgia became a child, and I chose the Genius trait for her. I am hoping she’ll roll up a LTW like Perfect Mind, Perfect Body, but so far all I’ve seen is Chess Legend, which I already completed with Mara back in Gen 2.
So I have Georgia playing chess and working out a lot. Ambitions has a new laundry system, so you can see her dirty clothes on the floor – they appeared when she changed into her workout clothes. (All of the dirty clothes look the same, by the way.)
And here’s Violet collecting the laundry:
I think the new laundry system is fun, but I can see how having piles of clothes all over the house could get old. I changed one of Vi’s traits to Neat, though, so she enjoys doing the laundry. And the moodlet they get for having clean clothes isn’t too shabby (+15 with the expensive washer plus clothesline drying, and it seems to last all day, or at least long enough to get through work and school).
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I think my favorite part of Ambitions is being able to register your hobby as a profession. You can now be a painter, writer, etc and have it show up on your job tab! No more silly unemployment or your sim rolling up wishes for a job they probably shouldn’t want anyway. ;)
I LOVE what you did with Hal’s old garage apartment. That looks amazing! I like being able to customize everything in TS3, but sometimes I get lazy.
I really like Twinbrook, you just need to a bug zapper to get rid of the rampant fugly in that town. It’s not only overpopulated, every sim looks like they got beat with the ugly 2×4!
LOL, Mao! I’ve only seen a couple of Sims in Twinbrook, but one of them was definitely the ugliest Sim I’ve ever seen (Juan Darer, the inventor…yikes!!). I’m with you on being able to register hobbies — I absolutely love that option. That’s what Violet did, and she was able to pick up some extra cash that way. Plus yeah, no more rolling up job wishes. Very cool.
Yay for Ambitions! Oh, and thank you for enlightening me on the Twallan’s Story Progression Mod needing both v128 and v129 … as well as typing up how to change the settings to reduce the number of popups. You’re a peach! But back to your update. :O)) Are you ready for another long post? >:O))
Page 1:
I bow down to your decorating greatness, jenba. With TS3, I’ve barely scratched the decorating surface. Once I get back into doing my WLC (I gotta decide who my founder is going to be), I hope to work the Create-A-Whatever things to the limit (or something like that). :O) I really love the windows you put out … and you’re right … FABULOUS views. I’ll have to try to remember that about the merging of the households. Damn that Lothario nose!
Page 2:
WHY oh WHY is it that when things are going well for our sims, that infamous burglar shows up. And you know what I’ve noticed? I have yet to see any male burglars in TS3 … mine have always been female. What the heck is up with that?! I can’t wait to have a sim who is excitable … just to see the hilarity. Congrats to the happy couple and the impending birth. :O)
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Yay for (eventual) testosterone in the family! *cheers* Those violet eyes are PENETRATING ME!! Gibby? *snicker-snort* My condolences on the loss of Hope. :O( And now a baby girl! You shoulda named her Georgia Hope. :O)) Gibby … *snicker-snorts* Darn birthday cake fires … =__= Aww! Peekaboo! :O)
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Gibby sounds like Bibby to me. :O) Funny thing with the whole upchucking at the family reunion thing. What a nice radioactive green it is. *snicker* Maybe Gibby doesn’t like his aunt’s guitar playing? MacKenzie is CUTE. Seems a lot of people are having trouble with the Architectural Design profession. Either EA screwed up, or there’s a trick to it that non one has quite figured out yet. I, too, like the laundry system. I think once you get three sims and up living in a household, it might get REALLY old. But for now, I’m enjoying it. :O)
And last, but not least, Page 5:
I love doing Transfigurations. I’ve gotten several magic gnomes via that method. :) Gotta LOVE those soulpieces! :O) I believe the “Foundations on the Roof” thing is some sort of cheat code. I haven’t really read up on it much … but someone had posted about it on Mod the Sims. Lemme see if I can find the link. Ah! Here’s the link to the forum thread: http://modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=405419 … :O) That “Zac Efron” special hair works for him. :O) Love his new outfit, too. :O) Magical gnomes!! I can’t wait to see what strange poses it does. :O)
Thanks for another great update, jenba. :O)
Wheee, another long comment! I thoroughly enjoyed reading that, thank you. :) Ooh, and thanks for the link to the frieze cheat! I was wondering how they did that. Very cool!
I hate to pass judgment on those poor Sims in Twinbrook, but I don’t understand why they would fill that town with so many ugly people. Thank god for Twallan – maybe after a couple of generations of having NPCs marry in it will be diluted and I can find someone for my legacy to marry.
Also, in my play-testing, I spent a bunch of time with the architect and stylist careers and I was having serious issues with both. I got one review that was better than “ok”, and I still haven’t figured out how that happened. And the stylist career needs a better instruction manual with it. It will tell you to give them a new athletic look and a new everyday look, but the vast majority of the time I would get the client claiming that I totally failed the objective and didn’t give them everything they wanted. It was frustrating.
Given your extreme skill with decorating both homes and sims, I’ll be curious to see what you manage to do with the new careers and the problems we both seem to be having.
Good update, so happy to have checked in and found you back to writing stories!
Hi Megan, thanks for your comment! I agree about the rampant ugliness in Twinbrook…I know EA just wants to give their Sims personality and variety, but wow…scary. I’m thinking of dropping a few of my own families into town just to help the dilution of the gene pool, as you put it.
I haven’t tried the Stylist career yet, but as you can see my experience with the Architectural one was not so good. I think they might be bugged. Or I just suck at it, heh. We’ll see how it goes later on. ;)
Hey Jen, loved it, as always :)
Just like your Gibby, my 3rd gen heir (ok, one gen earlier, but still), got violet eyes too, without anybody in the family having had violet eyes before. And she has blond hair too :)
As you can see, I’m playing TS3 now with lots of fun, and the Wishful Living Challenge is a real blast! Currently I’m at teen-stage with my Gen 3 heir Alanna, who’s hoping to become a hit movie composer some time in the future. The spare heir, her brother Sebastian, is trying to fulfil the body/mind LTW, let’s hope he manages soon.
Thanks for your motivation! I won’t bother buying the EPs so soon – except if you’re too fascinated by ambitions ;)
I simply LOVE what you did with Vi’s new home, it looks sooo fabulous! I’m really not much into decorating and house-building, but as soon as Alanna has to leave her home, I’ll try with her new house (playing in Sunset Valley though).
Thanks so much!
Eva
Yay, Eva! I’m glad you’re having so much fun with your WLC family. That’s funny about the blond hair and violet eyes. I’ve been seeing that crop up in other families, too. Not sure why that happens! Must be some weird coding in the game. I don’t mind it, though — it’s nice to have surprises once in awhile. :) Good luck with your family, and I hope you keep having fun!
OMG I can’t tell you how much I love the new look of Hal’s house. It’s just amazing!
Aw, thanks, Hannah! :)
Great update Jen! I love how you decided on the name Gibson, very original and it really fits him. The new house looks awesome after its makeover, especially the outside. I would die to live there!
My WLC founder became an Architectural Designer too. Most of my renovations seem to be “just OK” also. She’s currently lvl 5, and she’s only had maybe 2 renovations that were better than OK. The owners tend to like it better when you add additional things like decorations or chairs (when they’re not asked for) and if you add personal paintings/sculptures that you made yourself.
I enjoyed this new career alot for the first few simdays, but the decorating is getting kind of old! Lol, I’ve never been much of a builder/decorator. But I have always enjoyed fiddling around with it. But doing 2 renovations a day for 5 days a week, gets a bit boring after awhile! And my sim is only at level 5!
Thanks for the tips on the architectural career, Mandie. It sounds like it’s definitely a challenge! I hope it picks up for you soon…it’s no good if you get bored with your founder! I’m not sure I understand the LTW for the architectural profession – achieve 100 top scores sounds impossible. But there’s always that “Change Lifetime Wish” reward if it proves to be too much of a pain in the butt. Anyway, good luck!
Oooh, nice update! I’m dying to get Ambitions, but I’m waiting for Amazon to drop the price (and hoping they’ll do so while they still have WA for $20, so I can pick ’em both up at the same time).
Gibby is adorable (especially as a toddler)! And that’s funny about the woman puking on the gazebo; I had one of my sims’ sisters over visiting the house once, and the sister went to go home, a cab showed up, a cab left without the sister, the sister vomited all over the sidewalk and then hailed another cab. It was both entertaining and bizarre. XD
Hi Audrey! LOL at the puking/cab incident! :D
Between your updates and Mao’s, I feel like I’m getting quite a good picture of Ambitions! Thanks for posting all these pics. :D This pack looks like a lot of fun.
Yeah, I’m having a great time with Ambitions so far. It’s not perfect by any means, but I am quite happy with much of it. And Mao is posting some great stuff!
Uh, yes, waiter, I’ll have the extra-hot chilli with special Sky Peppers, please! Seriously, though, Jen, your Georgia is the first Sims 3 sproglet I’ve seen that’s not erky looking. Nice one! I have to save some cash to get Ambitions now. And, who the heck is Zac Efron?
LOL, Scally! I don’t think I’ve heard the word erky before. Heehee. Oh, and Zac Efron is a 20something actor who is beloved by tweens for being in the High School Musical movies.
*quiet whimpering* I want that expansion pack so badly! It’s funny, it seems like EA is following in Windows’ footsteps: one EP will be crap (World Adventures) and the next one will be awesome (Ambitions). I’m going to cool my heels until the price drops, though.
Also, I love that the Sims 3 Lothario has as strong features as the Sims 2 one. That is one Sim where they managed to get things right, unlike the weirdness that is for example their attempts at the Goths or Kaylynn. Urgh.
I totally agree, I like what they did with the Don. Not so much with Kaylynn or the Goths — to me they look nothing like their TS2 counterparts. And I never played with the Grunts or Nigmoses, but I hear ya on that, it’d be cool if they did a Strangetown redux in a future expac (and brought aliens back, maybe!).
Also! I’m puzzled that we get the Curious family but no other Strangetown ancestors. I miss my Grunts and Nigmoses. :(
Wow.. you really did make that house look WAY nicer!
Okay, the Lothario nose doesn’t actually look that bad on women… and on Fern it looks even softer with the addition of glasses.
Wow.. so visitors can bring someone else’s kids along with them? I would have panicked too if I saw my heir’s intended spouse carrying a toddler. (Did EA ever fix that glitch where singles would randomly spawn kids with no other parent?)
AWw.. Benny looks like he’s head over heels for Violet. I love that photo where his hands are up near his heart and it looks like he’s sighing..and she’s in his thought bubble.
Oh..now that’s totally cool that gardens will spawn seeds..go money trees!
Giving birth in real life – epidurals are your friend. As in pain? What pain? (LOL)
Aww a Shanley boy! I like Gibson as a name..and of course I like the violet eyes. Brandon has them. ;)
LOL at Benny’s blasé “I’m gonna keep eating while you..yanno.. give birth and stuff.†And of course I like the name Georgia. Hehehe (Gee, wonder why?) The peekaboo pic is UBER cute!
Oh man… too right… if someone barfed at a family gathering in my family it would be talked about for years! If people can talk about family members cheating, you think they’d include something like that too.
I’ll have to try that with the gem thing..sounds cool.
And the mechanical gnome looks cool too!
I’d like to explore Twinbrook too but I don’t want the Mystics to lose their vacation homes.
Yeah, it’s a pain to lose the vacation homes…but since it seems like in my family at least, every generation goes to one of the WA locales at least once or twice, so it shouldn’t take too long for me to get them back. I don’t blame you for not wanting to move, though.
And Benny brought his cousin Deakin over because he was living on the same lot as him — I don’t think he would have brought him over had he lived elsewhere. The game must consider any adult on the lot to be a “caregiver” for any toddlers on the lot and treats them like parents. I dunno, it’s weird. I’m not sure if they ever fixed that glitch you mentioned…I haven’t played with vanilla EA story progression in so long!!
Not sure how i missed this update. ah well, i see it now and i love it. Such fun things to explore with a new EP and oooh i love Joe!!