Friday 28 November 2008

Mr and Mrs Benton

Round 8: Days 36-40

After Xanthia's graduation, she and Stan move to suburban Sullivan, an area new to the both of them. Instead of buying a home, they opt to rent a townhouse (the purple one, to be specific) in the same complex as Kristina and Alexandra.

About this blog

Sullivan is my attempt a having a TS2 hood with some kind of cohesiveness. Previously, I enjoyed my hoods but once the kids moved out of home, they focused on their own families and there was hardly ever any contact made with siblings or parents. I frequently had those relationships drop to zero, just through neglect. That wasn't realistic to me: most people keep in contact with their siblings and parents. I wanted to change the way I played and I'm trying to do that with this neighbourhood.

The ease with which Sims make money and build immense amounts of wealth has also always bothered me. Free private school, free university tuition, no taxes - I wish real life was like that but I found it boring for my Sims. Inspired by some of the economic hoods around (which I've linked to in my sidebar), I decided to make up some rules for my game. My system is nowhere near as detailed as some I've seen but you have to make these things work for your gameplay style or else it will fall by the wayside.

So as in real life, some Sims in Sullivan have struggled quite a bit financially (the Lachances, for instance) and others have never had to give money a second thought (the Clarkes, for example).

I will probably write a post detailing some of the rules later on but I just wanted to give you an idea of what I'm trying to accomplish with Sullivan first.

All entries here before 25th November, 2008, were previously posted in N99's picture section. I've changed some of the text but the basics are the same. The entries will probably get a bit longer from here on in. At N99, I posted all the pictures for each rotation in one or two threads, so what I said about each family was quite short by necessity.

Wednesday 26 November 2008

Round 7 Summary

Births: 6 (Arianna Weaver, Caterina Nihill, Adam Gottlieb, Hanna Novak, Augustin Novak, Ben Nihill)

Deaths: 0

Engagements: 1 (Stan and Xanthia Benton)

Marriages: 2 (Isaac and Petra Gottlieb, Elias and Nathalie Draper)

Break-ups: 1 (Sacha and Emmy Lachance)

Graduations: 1 (Xanthia Benton)

New residents: 1 (Floyd Lane)

Total population: 41 (19 male, 22 female)
Babies: 4
Toddlers: 2
Children: 2
Teens: 6
Adults: 17
Elders: 9

Tuesday 25 November 2008

Galen moves to college and completely avoids his big sister

Round 7: College
Not having enough money for a house and not wanting his style cramped by his big sister, Galen decides to move into one of the new dorms at Suffolk University.



He quickly gets to work racking up the woohoos. It won't be so easy once Georgette starts classes next rotation.

He loves the pool at the dorm. He's a Fitness Sim, so he's happy for all the gym equipment too.

Part of the way through junior year, his sister Xanthia gets a little tired of dorm life and decides to get her own place.

She also gets sick of waiting for Stan to propose and takes matters into her own hands. So if all goes to plan, Stan and Xanthia will marry as soon as she graduates.

Drusilla makes a "friend"

Round 7: Days 31-35

Meanwhile, just across the road, Nelson and Gina's daughter Drusilla has moved into her own apartment. She's actually living downstairs from Steffi and Anton Collins.

She finds money to be much tighter than she expected, so she places an ad for a roommate. She randomly (or, I randomly) picked Floyd Lane. Here's another instance where I'm glad I take notes because I'd completely forgotten this guy's name. Hey and there's Steffi heading off to work in the background.

Drusilla and Floyd become friends very quickly.


Poor old Curtis Marley isn't so lucky. Floyd does this all the time, and they're now enemies. I expect a dust fight any day now.

It doesn't take long for things between Floyd and Drusilla to become romantic.

Coming back from his errands one day (in his PJs), Floyd finds that Curtis has decided to stand up for himself.

And that the landlord isn't too happy about Floyd harassing his tenants.

So once Drusilla asks Floyd to officially move in, they decide to get away from it all with a trip to Cape Elizabeth. Floyd brought $9000 with him, so they could afford it easily by then.






Sunburn aside, they have a great trip and return much more relaxed.

Nelson and Gina get old

The Clarkes were my youngest adults when they moved in but they have now joined the rest of their peers in elder hood. From their balcony, Gina can see the natural foods supermarket (the building with the arch) and further off, the restaurant/coffee shop Orchard.

Galen finally got a Rock God type want and wanted to buy a guitar.

Nelson and Gina have been playing it way more than he has though (I love Nelson as an elder).

Galen is too busy dealing with a raging case of acne to rock out.

Kristina and Alexandra continue their completely drama-free life

Round 7: Days 31-35

Kristina and Alexandra are still very happy in their little townhouse.

Another baby for the Nihills

Round 7: Days 31-35

I am so sick of this! These are attic style rooms but there is a ceiling over them. They should not freeze if there's a ceiling! I've been advised by Anilyn over at N99 that I need to replace the gable walls. Gah - I hope I don't ruin the roof in the process because I suck at roof building.

Twilight Senior Living Complex

Round 7: Days 31-35
Sacha hasn't been left with much money after Emmy kicked him out, so he doesn't have much choice but to rent. He decides to move into the newly built Twilight Senior Living Complex.

He also decides to move Noelle in as a roommate (AL roommate, to be clear - she's not officially part of the household). For the meantime, I'm allowing non-elders to live here, as long as they're spouses or partners and not children. I might change that later.


He hasn't learnt any lessons from his divorce though. He has slept with two other women since Noelle moved in.

Thanks to GoldenBuffy at N99 for the name change idea!

Sullivan's first divorce

Round 7: Days 31-35
Over at the Lachances, Emmy has had enough of Sacha's cheating ways!

She kicks him to the curb.

Sacha begs for another chance but Emmy has made up her mind.

Emo.

More emo. I always put my Sims to bed before I leave the lot.In this case though, all my Sims have been reset because I added the teen woohoo hack recently. So everybody was up at 2am. But anyway, even though they were all witnesses to it, Vivienne seems to be the only one who was at all distressed. The other ones just stood there waving and grinning.

Oops, scratch that. It all hits Emmy a few minutes later.

Pascal the Romance Sim has been kind of low on aspiration, so I quickly make him friends with Fug Townie here and he gets his first kiss.

Now, for the past few rounds, the Lachance house has been pretty sparsely decorated. Sacha and Emmy were both making good money but because they had the kids in private school, it was all getting eaten up by fees. All their money worries are over now! Emmy has reached her LTW (Criminal Mastermind) and got very lucky with a chance card. I can't remember if she got either $50,000 or $80,000 but it was more than enough to add a few more fun items to the house and to pay the kids' school fees. Emmy will also be able to send them to college without taking out a loan. All the girls want to go and have been accepted. Pascal doesn't want to go and as of now, he wouldn't be accepted even if he did apply.

And Leontine finally gets the guitar she's been wanting!

In the city

Round 7: Days 31-35
Nathaniel and Joanne are both elders now, so Brandon will soon be the primary caretaker of the farm. For now though, he is focusing on his relationship with Vivienne.

Yet another wedding

Round 7: Days 31-35
Elias and Nathalie have also bought a house downtown, just around the corner from Petra. Elias gets the want to make their relationship official almost as soon as they move in.

Raffaella disappoints her parents

Round 7: Days 31-35

Presumably anyway. They weren't happy about Simona living in sin but have kept mum so far with Raffaella. Maybe Simona has paved the way.

I don't know what's up with my Knowledge Sims. None of them have wanted to get married.

Lukas and Raffaella have moved into the townhouses across the street from his mother and start their family with a kitten. Raff was desperate for one.

Isaac and Petra get married

Round 7: Days 31-35

Last update: Isaac/Petra

I still don't quite know what's up with a Romance Sim and a Pleasure Sim being so eager to get married but Petra and Isaac tied the knot. Just about everyone turned up for the wedding. They own a little house downtown now so they got married in their backyard.

Jonah and Simona become parents

Round 7: Days 31-35


While a showdown between the cop and the burglar was happening on the front porch...

Thursday 20 November 2008

Round 6 Summary

Births: 0

Deaths: 0

Engagements: 0

Marriages: 0

Break-ups: 0

Graduations: Nathalie Draper, Petra Gottlieb, Elias Draper, Raffaella Novak, Lukas Novak

New residents: 0

Total population: 35 (15 male, 20 female)
Babies: 0
Toddlers: 0
Children: 4
Teens: 6
Adults: 17
Elders: 6

Wednesday 19 November 2008

Petra loses her motivation

Round 6: College
(Nathalie, Petra, Elias, Raffaella, Lukas, Xanthia)


Back at Suffolk University and Petra was attempting to finish her last two years but had absolutely zero interest in going to class, doing assignments, term papers or skilling. It was like she just remembered she's a Romance sim. She was all about men this rotation. I'm amazed I was able to get her to graduate at all (my Sims have to have the want to skill and do assignments at college). She would have flunked her final exam but she got the want to do an assignment that morning and that nudged her just enough over the edge to pass. I have never had a worse student!

In between boys and almost flunking out, she did find time to befriend Xanthia, this rotation's only incoming freshman. Drusilla wanted to go to college but got demoted on the day she was due to leave, so she lost her fourth scholarship and no longer qualified. Lucky she didn't have the fear of not going, because that's a 10,000 point aspiration hit, I believe.

What'd I tell you about the hula? The Morettis really did spread it to everybody. Here Raffaella makes sure I'll have no reprieve from it even from dormies.

Xanthia seems to be settling in well. She met Stan on her first day and they hit it off. She's Family and she was almost in love with him so no wants to get engaged yet.

Just a quick one of the resident artists, Elias and Nathalie (who has gone back to her natural hair colour). Both have Arts and Crafts as their OTH but Elias never had the money to pursue pottery very much as a teen. With all the grant money he got from his grades, he was able to buy a pottery wheel and supplies and now has a gold badge. I'm going to have him open a shop eventually. I hate home businesses, so it'll be a community lot one.