The Einstein Effect

[kazebird]

I don't know where to put this, so I hope no one minds it's here.

       The Einstein effect is what I call the effect in the game that can cause a sim's child to get older than themselves. I call it the Einstein effect, because of Albert Einstein's theory of relativity. For those who do not know, it states that time is relative to the speed the object is traveling at. After thinking about this I realized in neighborhood view the map rotates around the center of your view. So I thought "that must be why sims on other lots never age, there moving faster than the lot you are on." Obviously the reason they never age is the way the game is programmed, and the hood would have to move a lot faster, but I thought it was an interesting coincidence. Any one else find any odd coincidences?

[Zazazu]

That's not really a coincidence, that's inconsistent play.

Now townies....townies suffer from Jeffty is Five syndrome.

[Gastfyr]

I've never actually had a sim's child grow older than his or her parents.  Now, I suppose this could be quite easily possible if you were to play a female sim and have her get impregnented by a male townie who you never made playable or aged up allong with friends (freetime feature).  I personally would never want to do this as it would make for a very odd and confusing nhood.

One of the things I love the best about freetime, actually, is the ability to age up townies, especally child townies who otherwise can never be made playable and thus suffer from the Peter Pan syndrome I guess.  I guess uni is actually more important for allowing teen npcs/townies to be sent to uni allong with their sweethearts.

[Bugger]

I don't know where to put this, so I hope no one minds it's here.

       The Einstein effect is what I call the effect in the game that can cause a sim's child to get older than themselves. I call it the Einstein effect, because of Albert Einstein's theory of relativity. For those who do not know, it states that time is relative to the speed the object is traveling at. After thinking about this I realized in neighborhood view the map rotates around the center of your view. So I thought "that must be why sims on other lots never age, there moving faster than the lot you are on." Obviously the reason they never age is the way the game is programmed, and the hood would have to move a lot faster, but I thought it was an interesting coincidence. Any one else find any odd coincidences?

This is supposed to be one of the major changes that takes place with TS3... neighborhood townies and other sims will age appropriately.  I don't know the details on it, but sure you could find that info if you googled it.  I sometimes wish that townies would age, but I think it isn't worth buying TS3 for.

[Gastfyr]

I sometimes wish that townies would age, but I think it isn't worth buying TS3 for.

Yeah, I can make playable and age or kill any I really want to as it is.  I personally HATE the idea of my other playable sims screwing up thier lives because they're still aging while I play another sim.  I just don't see how the whole neighbourhood automatically getting married, taking jobs, decorating thier houses, having kids, growing old, and dieing without any input from me (and without me even seeing it!) could be a good thing?   

[Dragon Slave]

I think it *sounds* like a good thing, but won't turn out as it seems. I've seen how horrible a job random selection does with the townie pool, I can't imagine the atrocities that would occur if that force guided their lives.

Of course, it may not be random at all. Maybe it would calculate relationship what would happen based on personalities and relationship scores. But even still, that's gonna take up a lot of memory. Something has got to compensate... and I fear the game will be lacking in other areas.

*sighs*

I am going to miss being able to control more than one sim. Maybe it will allow us to frequently switch between controllable households?

[maxon]

I'm not going to miss being able to control more than one sim at all - I'm not buying Sims 3.

[gali]

The option to choose 3 townie kids to raise with your controllable sims is redundant, because I do it now to all townie kids with the "moveinall" hack. In this case, the game generates more kids, thus all my new-borns can have new friends.

But, if I send all the teen townies to college (and I did) - my hood is empty of teens for good. I can match my teens only in the college. This issue needs an urgent fix.

I agree with SimBliss about the common aging - I am against it too. I imagine myself playing Brandy Broke during 28 sim days, until she is elder, take her out to some community, and meet the old Cassie, or Komei, or Brandon Lilard - it will ruin all my pleasure of the game.

The more EA tries to simulate the real life in the game - the more they ruin the fiction; and the fiction is the cause we play this game, isn't it?

 

[kemowery]

I think it *sounds* like a good thing, but won't turn out as it seems. I've seen how horrible a job random selection does with the townie pool, I can't imagine the atrocities that would occur if that force guided their lives.

I don't even want to imagine the hideous spawn of any two random Eaxis sims.  Making sure my sims meet sufficiently attractive NPC sims to have kids with is the hardest part of the game.

[Witches]

I think if you view sims 3 as being a whole different game from sims 2 it might be OK. I like the idea of personalities as opposed to aspirations and the greater variety of appearances of the sims, although they all look too much like Pixar characters for my taste. (Wall-EEE.) As I am sick to death of townies, I think it would be cool if Sims 3 had an option that let you create your own entire town, even if you only ended up playing one or two of the sims.

But I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be giving up my sims 2 even if I get sims 3. It would have to be a pretty absorbing game for that to happen and even though I find having to play every freaking sim in my neighborhood more than a bit tedious just so everyone ages together, I'm not sure I want to go to the other extreme and only get to play one sim. Also, if the game is allowed to determine the fates of anyone I'm not playing I shudder to think of the results. I think I'd end up not caring much about anyone except my own sim. I have a lot of questions, for starters, do the other sims have kids, so your neighborhood keeps growing until it becomes unplayable? Or do new townies sprout up when the old ones die? If everyone ages you need to get new sims somehow.

One thing I'd like to see is social consequences. Like, if you're a grouchy old lady your neighbors avoid you. Or if you're famous you get chased by screaming fans occasionally. Or if you break some guy's daughter's heart he comes and punches you in the nose. One thing I don't like about Sims 2 is the fact that no one's even slightly afraid of werewolves or vampires. All they ever make people do is pee their pants, which frankly is damned annoying. It would be great if some of the childishness would go away to be replaced by something approaching realism, but I'm not holding my breath.

Of course, I'll need a whole new computer to play this game so it's going to have to be pretty amazing to get me to shell out that much $$.

And, oh, getting back to the original question, when I first started playing Sims 2 I had a daughter get old while her mom was still an adult. This was because the mom became permaplat, which meant she could have all the green stuff she wanted while the daughter, a family sim, had 10 kids which was about four kids too many and was so depressed about it she got old while the youngest was still a toddler. Nothing I could do, as I didn't know about hacks way back then. So yeah, that was a little weird, and hasn't happened to me since because I am a much better player now.

And, I hear you, Kemowery. I've started making attractive sims for my college aged sims to marry because the guys, especially, are just too fugly.

[Dragon Slave]

I try to play my hood evenly, and those I prefer playing the most I do so with aging off from time to time. Then I forget which families are behind, because I don't remember who should be what age when... so I stop aging the hood all together


I know lotsynctimer is supposed to help with this, but from what I understand, it goes by times. I need something that calculates ages, since turning aging off would make times irrelevant. I'm in the process of making a huge database of all my sims and their ages so that I can keep up with it better, because things have gotten real stale in my neighborhood lately.

But I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be giving up my sims 2 even if I get sims 3. It would have to be a pretty absorbing game for that to happen

Yeah, I see myself playing the TS3 just to see what it's like, till the newness wears out, then going back good ol' TS2. This is because my current reaction to the the trailers and previews is nothing like what I felt when I first saw things for TS2. Back then, it seemed to good to be true, and even now, I am still just as much enthralled with it all as I was the day it came out.

I think alot of this is because TS2 had everything TS1 had, plus all the things you wish it had. Because of that, I never looked back on the first game. TS3 has yet to show me it will do the same. If anything, I've found myself more and more disappointed with each new thing I read. No gradual aging? Come on! They should be past this by now!

[Faizah]

My reaction to the Sims 3 promotional stuff is only slightly less bored than my reaction to the Sims 2 promotional stuff, which is to say I never found Sims 2 all that impressive compared to Sims 1, until I played it. I am planning to give Sims 3 a chance, it's not like I've got anything to lose.

Also, I believe the 'one sim/household' rumour is garbled, and the truth of it is that you can only play one household at a time, but you can switch households whenever you feel like it, exactly as you can with Sims 2.

As to the original topic, in the family I started when I got FT, there are currently three generations. There's the deceased(old age) CAS sim and his elder ex-hobby-instructor widow, their three children, two just back from uni, while the third (and youngest) just hit elder on another lot, right before I installed AL. I play where I feel like, as it gives me a headache trying to keep the ages straight across different lots. (Especially as 'young elder' had a veritable clowncar of children, who I'll probably never play again after they graduate from uni...)

[Zazazu]

But, if I send all the teen townies to college (and I did) - my hood is empty of teens for good. I can match my teens only in the college. This issue needs an urgent fix.

Not if you age the existing child sims. In past 'hoods, I aged townies on a rotation using a combination of Inge's teleporter kitty and the in-game Sim Modder. Then spawned townie children with the in-game townie gun.

In my current 'hoods, I either have a fair number of townies, most of whom I totally ignore (grr AL spawn) or a grand total of 12 townies. Actually, it's down to 9 now as I've married 3 in.

[Kyna]

AL has given me a different perspective on TS3.

I built an AL lot which is three houses with a nice community area (almost a mini-community lot) designed for families - playground, exercise bikes, chess, stereo, bbq area, and photobooth for ACR woohoo.  I put three families in there, and while I'm playing one family, it's fun watching the other two families socialising in the community area, or wearing themselves out on the bikes or by skipping.  If TS3 is like this, where they can socialise, but don't age, get engaged or married, or fall pregnant, then it won't be as bad as I first thought it would be.

I must try this lot with a couple of families where I've dragged the kids' sliders down to dislike each other.  Will be fun watching them fight instead of play together.

[kaitco]

But, if I send all the teen townies to college (and I did) - my hood is empty of teens for good. I can match my teens only in the college. This issue needs an urgent fix.

You can also simply respawn townie teens using boolprop. I do it all the time because I tend to marry off/whore off all my adult townies as soon as I see new ones and, with face replacements, the fugly teens are no longer a threat.

[Gastfyr]

his elder ex-hobby-instructor widow

Totally off-topic, but can you marry hobby intructors without cheats?  When I first installed freetime I had Louis Aspir fall in love with the Cuisine instructor because they had great chemistry, but I was unable to ask her to move in or propose marriage.  I havn't played the Aspir's since installing AL, so was this fixed?  Otherwise, what sort of cheats or combinations of cheats are required?  Make her selectable or add her to family with boolprop and then marry her?  Now that I think about it, until AL we weren't even allowed to invite hobby instructors over to the playable sim's house.

As far as the Sims 3 goes, I thought it was pretty clear in the early promotional stuff that the whole neighbourhood would be growing, aging, and changing around whichever sims you were currently controlling.  I can't seem to find much to back that up, but that's what I remember seeing/hearing.  In fact, I have a pretty clear memory of one trailer saying you sim's neighbours would get jobs, get promoted, get married, and have kids all while you were playing your own sims.  Anyone else remember that?

As far as sims aging before thier parents, I guess in some cases it sort of makes sense.  The sims are supposed to live longer if they stay in platinum, but those that become depressed and never get anything they want will get old before their time.  Real life is kinda like that sometimes too, since there are 50-60yr olds who look and act like 30 yr olds and are extrmemly healthy, while there are depressed, unhealthy 30yr olds who look more like 50yr olds and probly won't live very long because they are so unhealthy.  Just something thought of while reading this thread.

[J. M. Pescado]

I know lotsynctimer is supposed to help with this, but from what I understand, it goes by times. I need something that calculates ages, since turning aging off would make times irrelevant. I'm in the process of making a huge database of all my sims and their ages so that I can keep up with it better, because things have gotten real stale in my neighborhood lately.

LST goes by ages. If you turn aging off, the LST stops ticking until you turn it back on. If you are playing with Aging Off, the day timer does not advance automatically and is frozen just like sim aging.

[Faizah]

his elder ex-hobby-instructor widow

Totally off-topic, but can you marry hobby intructors without cheats?  When I first installed freetime I had Louis Aspir fall in love with the Cuisine instructor because they had great chemistry, but I was unable to ask her to move in or propose marriage.  I havn't played the Aspir's since installing AL, so was this fixed?  Otherwise, what sort of cheats or combinations of cheats are required?  Make her selectable or add her to family with boolprop and then marry her?  Now that I think about it, until AL we weren't even allowed to invite hobby instructors over to the playable sim's house.

Uh, as far as I can recall? I summoned her on TwoJeffs' Crystal Ball, most likely. (It's how I often find sim partners.) She seemed to marry in just fine fine, I've never used any engagement/marriage related cheats. I can't recall if I moved her in first, or if I moved in on marriage. It was pretty soon after installing FT (She married my CAS 'test' sim) so the details are a little ... forgotten. I do remember that she was a dance instructor, though I don't know if that makes a difference.

[J. M. Pescado]

Hobby Mavens do not have any special sim templature, so it is entirely safe to move them in, they are not special in any way.

[Gastfyr]

Hahaha.  I guess now that I have AL and you can actually contact hobby instructors via the phone (!), Luis Aspir is hearing wedding bells.     See, until very recently, I had never installed a single hack and very rarely used any cheats, so when the game was throwing a brick wall up in my face (while on dates with her, he wasn't ever even allowed to "ask back to my place"), I got frustrated and gave up.

lol  See, this is another reason I just can't get too excited about the Sims 3; I feel I've barely seen a fraction of what the Sims 2 has to offer!

[Dragon Slave]

LST goes by ages. If you turn aging off, the LST stops ticking until you turn it back on. If you are playing with Aging Off, the day timer does not advance automatically and is frozen just like sim aging.

Hot Damn!  That's just what I've been needing!  I've had the wrong idea about it all along! Now I just need to get everyone in my neighborhood at their correct age and I can start playing again.

[Sagana]

The lot sync timer is a deceptively simple little wonder.

[marjchaos]

Of course Synctimer continues to tick along just fine with Inge's special no days added patch and heirloom cake (aging on of course).