Story Progression Toggle: Is it borked?

[Inge]

It's pretty RIDICULOUS for the lifespan slider to only affect the sims you are playing (I did read that it's a per-sim setting) because the whole POINT of the whole hood getting on with their lives is so that people are growing up at the right time to match your in-play sims.  If not, we're no further on than we were.  Unless of course we always play with default lifespan.

[alphagirl]

It's pretty RIDICULOUS for the lifespan slider to only affect the sims you are playing (I did read that it's a per-sim setting) because the whole POINT of the whole hood getting on with their lives is so that people are growing up at the right time to match your in-play sims.  If not, we're no further on than we were.  Unless of course we always play with default lifespan.

This made me think. Has anybody tried to see if the Story Progression button is made to be set per household as well? Maybe Story Progression and/or autonomy has to be adjusted in every single household to stop the random babies and fluctuations. If not, then hmm...

[blackcat]

It's pretty RIDICULOUS for the lifespan slider to only affect the sims you are playing (I did read that it's a per-sim setting) because the whole POINT of the whole hood getting on with their lives is so that people are growing up at the right time to match your in-play sims.  If not, we're no further on than we were.  Unless of course we always play with default lifespan.

This made me think. Has anybody tried to see if the Story Progression button is made to be set per household as well? Maybe Story Progression and/or autonomy has to be adjusted in every single household to stop the random babies and fluctuations. If not, then hmm...

It says that the neighbors will stop doing things on their own, not your family. To be sure I checked and yes, it is global.

[jolrei]

See, I kinda like that realism - people in meatspace move away all the time. Though I think it should be NPC famblies only, not a fambly you've made.

This will play merry hell with trying to do a MATY hood, if all your MATY townies just progress, move out, die, etc. before your playable family has time to even meet them.

Still it solves the problem of the townies that live forever and the Jefty-is-five6 issue.

[Soggy Fox]

Is it a per sim setting, for the aging scale?  I haven't noticed children aging faster than mine, where I'm testing how child play works.  I know I'll adjust it to default when I test things like toddlers and such, but my child with epic lifespan is friends with Mortimer, Bella and some other children and they are still children halfway through her 100 days a child.

Perhaps it is either a bug that it is acting universally for me, or not acting universally for others.

[MacJake]

This is outside of the main topic, though, and we already have a random gripe thread. On subject, I'm now doubting the newspaper headlines. On a Sunday, I was told that the Wainwrights had moved out. On Tuesday, first spawn brought Hilda Wainwright home from school. A quick check shows the Wainwrights sitting pretty in their old house.

I can confirm that. I had a headline announcing a certain couples marriage with one type of ceremony and few pop-ups later the same couple had their marriage announced again with a different type of ceremony. Lucky them. I'm not convinced that the newspaper is giving you real information as to what's actually happening.

Just to add to the confirmation queue. I have Story Progression turned off in two different scenarios and my hoods are being littered with spawn. Given that situation, I'm starting to get a bit edgy about how many character files are being created with the birthing of babbys, townies coming and going, a different maid showing up everyday and God only knows what else. I'm keeping an eye on the size of my saved games files. They're growing after each session with almost no purchases aside from books and food. Food gets eaten and books get resold so I'm assuming the growth is character files. However there's no way to tell. I have little faith that there's not massive redundancy happening.

[kalina]

I did the same test as Zazazu (but was unable to post earlier), so the information here may be redundant.
I had Story Progression unchecked, Free Will on High and life span - Long and played one CAS made sim for a week. I checked the thumbnails for all populated houses in the town at the start of the week and at the end of it. At the end of the week there were the following changes:
- Alto household: three new adults were added to the household (I really don't know how this happened. I opened the lot to try to figure it out, but couldn't).
- Goth household: + one toddler
- Ursine household: + one toddler
- Wan-Goddard household: + one baby
- Bunch household: + one child
- Keaton household: + one toddler + one baby

The following households were new (I am not sure if the sims come from the bin):
- Marin household: 3 adults
- Pagehousehold: 3 adults

There is something strange that I noticed in one of the first games that I played: I created a sim in CAS and moved her into a house. After a while I sent her to the library, where she met an exact copy of herself (the names were the same too). This probably happened because there was a copy of the sim in the sim bin (as by design), but is this supposed to happen?

[kazebird]

Yes, sims in the simbin are townies until placed, the same as TS2, though I am not sure if TS1 had this feature.

[rufio]

In TS2, sims in the bin stay in the bin unless they are 6s and 12s, or you gave them jobs, in which case they occasionally get brought home as friends.  But you never see them wandering around community lots.  I actually have an extra Pescado sim in my game, somehow, who is sitting jobless, in the bin, and I have never seen him except in the phonebooks of sims with the call-everyone-in-the-neighborhood perk.

[TashaYarrr]

Lucky them. I'm not convinced that the newspaper is giving you real information as to what's actually happening.

This was something I was gonna ask (although it seems to be disproved elsewhere)--any chance the newspaper announcements are somewhat akin to some of the random, repetitive news ticker stories in the SimCity series?

[vagabondher]

One thing that bugs me is coming back to a certain character to find her with a newborn baby girl, but having no way of knowing who the father is. I think it's kind of whack that it doesn't list the father, even if it was just a one night stand. I've had it happen with two characters - one, I could assume who the father was because, well, she had a boyfriend and everyone else was barely acquaintance, but the second character...she barely had one friend. Who did she woo hoo with? Or did she adopt? How am I supposed to know?

[Madame Mim]

Actually that's a relevant theory on the cloning spawn. Maybe they are adoptions rather than pregnancies (it may even explain the wierd time lines involved). Maybe one of Pescado's first moodlets (or whatever they are being called) should be an adoption killer to test demon spawn origins.

[vagabondher]

Yes, the time-line is very off. As in, I leave a character alone for a few hours and come back and they have a baby. So it must be adoption. That part doesn't bug me, I just wish I could know which it was and who the father is. I realize why they couldn't include memories, but I feel like it should be included in a child's family tree who both of their parents are, even if the two aren't married.

Another thing - and if there is a way around it, please let me know - filling the entire neighborhood with characters I've personally created and having story progression on to let them advance when I focus on one household for a while leads to...a whole SLEW of new characters, not created by me, entering the neighborhood. I wish there was an option to prevent this.

[simsdesperado]

One thing that bugs me is coming back to a certain character to find her with a newborn baby girl, but having no way of knowing who the father is. I think it's kind of whack that it doesn't list the father, even if it was just a one night stand. I've had it happen with two characters - one, I could assume who the father was because, well, she had a boyfriend and everyone else was barely acquaintance, but the second character...she barely had one friend. Who did she woo hoo with? Or did she adopt? How am I supposed to know?

You could check the baby's family tree and see who his father is. If the mother is not your sim then maybe it's safe to assume the baby is adopted. Unless the game makes no distinction between adopted and biological parents.
EDIT: Nevermind, I see from your post above that they're not listed in the family tree. It makes no sense considering they were born in game. Maybe they have no father and are just the result of the game generating new sims to keep the population constant. Think of the father as a spermbank donor. 

[vagabondher]

The post I made above you already stated that it doesn't mention the father in the family tree, and that's what I'm frustrated about. I've yet to officially adopt a baby so I don't know yet if the baby shows up as the mother's kid or if it makes a distinction that she isn't the real mother.

[Quinctia]

They couldn't all be fathered by townies that later up and "moved" and now don't actually exist?

[vagabondher]

It just bugs, bugs, bugs. They weren't kidding about enforced Legacy play. I made my entire neighborhood up of Lost characters and I come back to find that Kate has a baby girl who she leaves screaming on the ground while she goes and works out and I have no idea who the father is. She has no friends, who could she have possible woo hoo'd?

[Zazazu]

Lucky them. I'm not convinced that the newspaper is giving you real information as to what's actually happening.

This was something I was gonna ask (although it seems to be disproved elsewhere)--any chance the newspaper announcements are somewhat akin to some of the random, repetitive news ticker stories in the SimCity series?

Some of them, yes. I'm specifically doubting the move-in, move-out ones. Not the births, as I've confirmed seeing babies or toddlers of the name given, and have been watching them grow up from afar. In fact, one was born on the exact same day as the eldest spawn of the family. They have hit age transitions at exactly the same time (and are now dating, which is besides the point).

I also have seen newly pregnant sims after two weeks of playing. I saw them before, normal. Now pregnant, then a couple days later a birth announcement. Then a couple days even later, walking around carrying the spawn. I watched Sofia Moon go through the whole process.

[Mr. Snooley]

This Story Progression Bug realy makes this Game unplayable, if you want to play with more than one Household.

Let's say you make 1 Household. Play with it a bit, then make a Second one and switch to that one. The original Household you don't play only needs to be left alone for 10 RL Seconds, that's enough for them to move out of town and dissapear forever. (That's what happened to me)

I found out that the Game makes no differences between the Sims, it doesn't matter how rich a Sim is, what kind of House, Friends or estate he has, and what Job he's doing.
It just seems (like someone else posted this before) the game randomly selects some Household and tells them to adopt some Child or leave town.

This Game is useless with this Bug, because it basically means you can only play with one Household.
Why the heck take the risk of creating new Households, building Mansions and all, when they can instantly leave when you turn your back to them? This annoys the crap out of me ...

[vagabondher]

I wonder if there's a workaround to it, possibly, with a hack/mod. Hmm.

[Insanity Prelude]

Mr. Snooley, please Quit randomly capitalizing Words. It's becoming Quite Irritating.

[Mr. Snooley]

Sorry dude, but English ain't my first language.

I'll try my best though ... 

[Insanity Prelude]

Heh, English is a tricky language even for native speakers sometimes.

[Lerf]

So the game is randomly creating unwanted, ugly, random Sims and tossing them into families.  Then it suddenly looks at the numbers, decides there are too many Sims for your system, and deletes ones you've made.

What the Fuck are those idiots at EA smoking, inhaling, injesting or shooting up? 

[Mr. Snooley]

Okay check this out:

Another Sim of mine mysteriously dissapeared!
But this time I was on the lookout and always read the news papers ( I know that they might give you false info ).

It said, that my Sim drowned in a god damn public swimming pool!
And some stupid other random Sim with a baby (what a surprise) moved into the house of the dead Sim.

She was a young adult and athletic, how the **** could she have drowned?!

EDIT: Like I said before, how are we supposed to play this game when everyone dies / leaves town / adopts a child? XD