fatrockstar

I've been pouring my weekend into The Sims 2. Recently I bought the Pets expansion pack and have been reacquainting myself with the characters in the base game. I haven't done much with the actual animal/pet part of the game other than make a SimGrady. Everything else has been just dinking around.

Actually, "dinking around" is a misnomer. I've been going through my original Prima Guide and walking through the introductory scripts for the pre-made families. Each family's situation highlights a different aspect of the game (aspirations, relationships, rites of passage, etc), so I've been learning about everything from social interactions to alien impregnation.

I completed all the neighborhood scripts from Pleasantview a long time ago (pre-Pets), and decided to go continue to Strangeville after installing Pets. Installing the expansion pack changed things a little. I was still able to learn, but none of it would have made sense without the book telling me what I should have expected.

So, making a long story longer: Brandi Broke is the daughter of Bob & Betty Newbie (from the original Sims game released in 2000). Her story begins with a surly teenage son, a toddler, and the realization that she is pregnant again -- right after her husband, Skip, has died in a mysterious pool ladder accident. Yay! I got caught up in this sim's life and played her until her surly teenage son grew up and moved into a place of his own. Now I play her son in his new home. I married him off to his high school sweetheart and now they want a baby. If they succeed it will be the first time I've played through to a third generation of sims. Brandi Broke will be a grandma, and she still looks 25!

Anyway, the SimBlues are Brandi's neighbors. I played them a lot when I was having issues with Garret and went all over the map with them. SimWynne and SimGarret have three boys: Woody (now a teen), and Henry & Alfred (grade-schooler twins). SimWynne & SimGarret became elders (got old) soon after the twins were born. Woody reeeeeeeally wants a girlfriend. The twins are excellent students. SimGrady completed the set.

I stopped playing the SimBlues when it dawned on me I would probably watch them die. Yes, sims die in The Sims 2, and from a dozen different things. My wish would be from old age, but it could easily be from a satellite falling out of the sky. Or electrocution. I screwed up my courage and started playing them again...

...but not before going back to the Prima Guide scripts! I learned a few new things about playing the game that I had been neglecting. If they're going to die, they're going to die happy.

Right now SimWynne & SimGarret are both about 61 days old. Henry & Alfred will become teenagers the next time I fire the game up. Woody.. well, he just met a girl. He'll be grown in 4 more sim days, and she won't age with him. I think that's sad.

While you can control the Sim people in the game, you can't control the animals. You can make your sim train an animal, but that's as much as the game designers will allow. There's a cheat out there I'm sure, but I'm not gonna use it. Animal relationships follow a different set of rules. When your sim becomes a friend of a dog, the dog sees your sim as a "pack member." When your sim becomes a friend of a cat, the cat sees your sim as his property.

( Wynne Became Mine )

Since this screencap, Woody and Alfred have also become Grady's.

This is what I've been doing all weekend. I can't stop before at least two hours have passed. There's a funny smell in the room I can't put my finger on, but I think it might be really bad cologne or something (Garret did have a friend over this afternoon, and he was wearing an unfortunate scent).

Oh, and I have to upgrade my computer soon. Like, now.

Crap.