Custom Neighbourhoods

[mildlydisguised]

Does anyone know if there are any custom neighbourhoods available for download with playable families, lots and a back story already created, much like the three Maxis 'hoods that ship with the game?

I have seen the user created 'hoods on the TSR forum and I know there are some at GeneSims too but I can't seem to find anymore.  Are there any sites out there dedicated to these sorts of downloads?  Or is it that the restrictions of a lot of custom content creators have put people off sharing whole neighbourhoods?

[Madame Mim]

Well, I'm assuming you already know about SaraMK's Mingleville project and MATY city and Gender Reversed Pleasant View so I'll just plug Planet of The Cats and Sims 1 for Sims 2 (my own creations) at http://www.genensims.com/guest/MadameMim/neighbourhoods.htm (Pleasant Village isn't completed yet)

Edit: Oopsie, looks like you already know about mine - OK have a look around in Peasantry for Mingleville and Gender Reversed (neither of them are really NEW but both are fun). MATY city is around here somewhere too.

Edit 2: and it's not custom content but EA bugs that makes sharing Neighbourhoods hard. There's N### number conflicts and game version conflicts to start with, not to mention overwriting problems due to the game not releasing deleted Neighbourhood data properly. That's why Sims 1 for Sims 2 and Pleasant Village are being offered in parts for user assembly.

[mildlydisguised]

*nods* Yes these are the only ones I can find though, which I find a little odd.  It just seems like a whole avenue of creation that appears largely ignored by the Sims community.

It only really dawned on me when I found your 'hoods (sorry, I misquoted the website name).  Before that I'd only seen the commuity projects at TSR and figured it must be too huge a task to undertake on your own.  Does it take you long to complete the whole project? 

I'm quite interested in having a go at trying to complete my own.  I guess I just like the idea of dropping into the middle of a story, although having said that I never really played the maxis efforts and have deleted them a while ago.

I'm assuming that you manipulate sim relations, career etc in SIMPe prior to moving the sims into their respective lots.  Is there a way of creating memories too?

Edit - Maxis obviously don't make it easy to share these hoods.  It would be better if a new 'hood automatically assigned itself to the player's first available slot.   

[ElfPuddle]

Ah, but see, that would be logic. Maxis EA doesn't do logic.

[Madame Mim]

I've got a theory that you could use the template trick to add created Neighbourhoods as sub-hoods, but then you've still got the default townies in the main hood (which is part of what I wanted to get rid of).

I've also got a theory about replacing the default townies (just after they are created with custom overwrites - but I haven't tested it yet)

As for ease or difficulty in creation it depends on what you want to acheive. The first thing you need to know is that you either have to ship Sims in one household or as a complete (not self assembly) Neighbourhood or they'll loose relationships/all knowledge of known Sims and create false friend files (so you also need to check when packaging them - or before hand in SimPe - that they don't know people that they shouldn't).

The major limitation I'm experiencing at the moment is in the creation of toddlers for sharing. They have to have parents, not only to be created, EA limitation, but also to guarantee successful import into all game versions (Pets, for instance, has real problems with toddlers that I have deleted the parents from. So I'm packaging them with dead parents attached as the least of all possible evils.

[jrd]

There is no secret to townies: default townies are simply pulled from the N001 template. Replace this template, and you get different (or no) townies.

[Madame Mim]

What I was thinking of was more along the lines of for sharing. If the townies are always generated with the same numbers it should be possible to make a group of townies by editting the newly created townies of one Neighbourhood and saving them to dump on top of/replace townies in another Neighbourhood. Then I could have townies ready and appropriate to each Neighbourhood I am sharing in a user assembled format rather than being forced to package the whole Neighbourhood with all the associated problems that brings.

[mildlydisguised]

I only ever deal with a Uni subhood in my neighbourhoods and I am assuming if I use one of the blank templates from Peasantry and have nodormieregen that the default dormies will not be created.  I may be wrong on this but then I can create dormies in the same way I intend to create townies, using Jordi's tutorial. 

I like the idea of having a group of default townies although much less fugly than the original ones.  It would be much easier to just change names, personalities and relations for each hood rather than create about 30 new townies each time. 

I am thinking of creating a complete neighbourhood instead of self assembly parts as I like the thought of dropping into a different ready to go senario.  Am I right in thinking when I have every family in place and I've used SimPe to manipulate the relationships etc, that I can then play each family to a point where I want the story to start once the neighbourhood has been downloaded.  Hopefully that makes sense, I just don't want to create something that fubars itself almost immediately!

I want to create a Twin Peaks-esque 'hood, concentrating on the inhabitants' tangled relationships rather than creating a murder mystery (mainly because I'm not sure that would work), but I hope it's not going to be too complex for a first try.  Note to self, make sure all toddlers have parents to avoid complications       

[Madame Mim]

If I understood you correctly (given I don't know what a Twin Peaks is) you want to create, play to develop the correct history and relationships and then package the Neighbourhood?

Yes. You can do that, but only if you package the whole Neighbourhood. If you package it as lots they will loose their inter-relatedness.

As for dormie generation I use the empty templates and have made dormies by moving townie teens to Uni and then making them townies again. The only problem I am trying to track down is one where Cafeteria workers are not generated, but an error is. It obviously starts with the fact that no cook has been created, but I don't know if no redundancy or any other such is stopping the spawning, or if it is some other problem. It is only the one Neighburhood that it has occured in and the others I play do not have teens ready for college as yet. So I do not know if it was a single Neighbourhood hiccup or something else as yet.

[mildlydisguised]

Ahhh that's what I thought, I shall attempt to package the entire neighbourhood then.

I'm sure I've read something about regenerating cafeteria workers somewhere.  *racks brains and searches*  Nope, must have been mistaken, I can only find confirmation that one will be generated when you move in your first YA to the dorm.

(Incidentally for a Twin Peaks summary go here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_peaks - I don't intend to recreate it, just something in a similar vein i.e. the whole sinister underbelly of a seemingly idyllic town cliche!)

[lechapeau]

With our TSR neighborhoods I used the tutorial here by Nec, but know Jordi now has a newer version and helped me at the time in the older thread as well.
Beacon Falls went out with Uni and Downtown sub hoods attached  to it. I had notownie/nodormieregen in to stop any sims I didn't want being made and had no trouble with Cafeteria workers. You do need the correct items in the dorm though, the Uni stove is a must and maybe the counters. Our biggest problem there was me not realising a set of professors was generated as I made each of the groups of townie YA's. I left them in there, not wanting to cause anything to go wrong at such a late stage in the process so they needlessly added to the character files.
I didn't have no redundancy in, maybe that is affecting things for you. I used DAC to clear mine though so have never used the already empty neighborhoods either.
The advantages in making a group hood are others are involved in making the families and lots and that generates a buzz as they wait for the finished project. They are then part of the stories and planning the hood layout so you don't have to do as much of that part, ours took six weeks with a week of that in testing to see if any changes needed making. I also was a SimPE novice, so learned as I went along. A person already knowing how everything works may get it done more quickly and in hindsight can see things I'd do differently if I was making another one.
Memories weren't as hard as I thought they'd be, I was dreading doing them at the start but enjoyed altering them as I got more into it. Checking to make sure I remembered to apply them to the correctly connecting sims as a story was changed along the way was fun but worth it because for those interested in backstories they give a better picture of the whole thing.
The advantages to making it all yourself are not having to check other people's lots and having control over the stories and type of sims you include, but I liked the group project myself.

We send out differently numbered neighborhoods when they are requested, Maple Valley was N004 and Beacon Falls was N007. It's not hard to renumber them, but I also use  http://www.antp.be/software/renamer because someone recommended it and that's much quicker.
The size is a drawback as well, hosting it if you want it available to others can be a bother if it's really big unless you have a site of your own or one willing to take it. Custom content is a problem there, obviously it adds to the filesize and we chose not to include it because everyone likes making over the houses and sims themselves anyway when they get it into their own game.
The packs you use in the making of it have blocked some people from joining projects or downloading it later.
Morewood was made with the base game only, I only advised a little for that one and wasn't part of making it, but with only the base you are restricted with the type of things to include because the better items and options came with later packs. They made add on lots for that to let people to make up the sub hoods by themselves as they were needed.

I used the AgeSimsCheat to make adults then set them to teens with the cheat after moving them in, though that wouldn't work for toddlers but is useful for trying to have families with teens or elders instead of adults if you want that kind of variation.

[mildlydisguised]

I've just downloaded Beacon Hills today to see how it's all been done and for a bit of variety too!  I've just extracted and put N007 into the correct folder, I'm hoping I won't have to create dummy hoods in order for it to show up.  From reading the threads, I can see that a community project would be great for keeping motivation going.  However I think I may be too much of a control freak to let anyone else get in on my already forming storyline    Besides I refuse to use Maxis hair, so it looks like this 'hood won't be one I'll be able to share anyway.  I'm looking on this as more of a practice thing.  If it works out ok and I don't get too tediously bored of the whole process, I might do a second, no custom content version.  It just doesn't seem like there is a lot of call for ready made 'hoods, even though I can see the TSR ones have a great following.

The link for the renamer looks very useful, thanks.  I was thinking of making the various families in CAS, moving then in and then weaving the backstory with the aid of SimPe. However I'm wondering how far back I can go with that.  I'd quite like established family trees but not sure whether that means I'll have to create the grandparents in CAS and kill them off just so their grandchildren (which will be the adults/elders of my neighbourhood) can be linked via SimPe.  (Again not sure if that makes sense - I really need to work out my backstories first before getting too technical with it!)   

[rohina]

I have seen a number of shared neighbourhood projects on various forums - they seem to be quite popular on sites where there is a storytelling focus. SiMania has one in the works at the moment.

[lechapeau]

Some people need dummy hoods and some don't, I never have and have frequently swapped neighborhoods in and out with no trouble but it has to be said to cover our backs in case anything goes wrong for anyone else knowing some games do need them!

The complete family tree, it's all possible and makes perfect sense. If you're playing them and creating for yourself it'll probably be easier because then it's all your own choice. I found with our hood where people making the families wanted deaths, they were killed off at the start then the family obviously gossip about that in the beginning because it's basically all they've ever done in the game so far, which could get boring. And they mourned over them, their wants were to resurrect members or fear resurrecting them and such which makes for a fairly gloomy start.
In a Twin Peaks hood that might be OK for you, I don't remember it very well but it was a creepy sort of place and that might fit the mood.
For ours it was annoying when they were 'still' mourning someone who according to a storyline died ages ago, but they are mere sims and you'll be able to play them past that part and can give them something else to think about if you try hard enough!
In a shared hood you'd want to play things out as little as possible and do as much as possible with SimPE and hacks and boolprop to limit the need for play and give others the chance to make their own stories there.
Personally I'd rather have had deaths with a storyline connected with them and not 'just for the sake of it' but yes, going with other opinions gives you a different scenario.
I still like that, my fun came from playing a hood I was part of and knowing some of the people who had contributed that I felt that connection with and why so and so was doing/feeling such and such, which I couldn't do or didn't like doing with any of the Maxis hoods.

I didn't start out with a storyline, it grew from the type of things people were sending me and it's not a strict storyline either to give room for change. All I wanted at the time was a replacement for my lost Maple Valley and a few people had said privately they wanted to get involved if I did decide to do another. The thread grew into something I had never imagined and became very rewarding, I saw it all from a completely different perspective to my previous involvement in Maple Valley and enjoyed it a lot...
I can totally see why you'd want to keep the project to yourself though, your idea is already there, it doesn't really need other input. For the storyline you've chosen there still might be big interest in others downloading it because that show had a definate following if you're really setting up the story, but that's all up to you.
And sharing CC was out with us organizing it on TSR even if we'd wanted to, but we didn't. It still would have made our filesize too big and does have drawbacks, or did, before Pets took all of the meshes along in the packages as well!

I think there is a call of sorts for this type of thing. People ask when I'm doing another over there now and then and they like the idea, as you did, of playing a ready made hood that's different from the Maxis ones but that they don't have to build from scratch themselves.
People start threads inviting others to join in on a project, and as said the thing usually holding them back over there is expansion pack incompatability or a limit in knowledge of how to actually complete it.
Someone at TSR just made another one themselves and that's quite cute, small and easy to get into. They asked me to look at it, but they were disappointed in other people not obviously showing an interest.
That's where the community taking part in the making of ours has helped and also with Morewood, but you make it, tell people it's out there and they'll take a look if they want to and that's all anyone can expect really.
From there it'll either take off or it won't.
  

[mildlydisguised]

Thanks Rohina, I'll go check those out 

Had no problem installing Beacon Falls and I'm very impressed with the starting points of the families I've played so far.  I've been checking memories as I've gone along and everything seems to fit with the stories in the family info.  I made sure I read the Beacon Falls discussion thread as I wanted to try and understand the process a bit more.  It has made me feel more involved (without obviously being involved) than I do playing the Maxis hoods.

I think creating the ghost of Laura Palmer just before packaging the hood would definitely help the doom and gloom of a Twin Peak neighbourhood.  I wasn't going to attempt a straight rip off version but I have to admit I am now quite tempted to do just that! I might just create a new account and make it without any custom content just in case anyone does show any interest.  I always feel a bit of a leech as I don't create or share anything, I just greedily grab whatever is on offer    Maybe it is time to offer something back, providing of course I make it to the end of the project!

[lechapeau]

Ah well, if you made it through the discussion topic you can make it to the finish of the neighborhood!
That's something I often wondered, why somone who wasn't initially involved would want to bother with playing it. Having got this new one recently I had a want to carry on with it past the 'just looking' stages though so it does work if you like any of the sims in there.
And good if the threads made you feel like that...
It gets really interesting the further you get in, well it did for me, I found myself contacting a few of the people and saying "I've found out how to do this, would you like so and so to happen..." and getting a few of the stories bulked out a little more. And you know your goal so you can judge by that how well you're doing as you go along. The new account is useful mainly because it loads really quickly, make regular back ups after each major stage just in case.
I wish you luck with it!

[Madame Mim]

I can see that working together makes for something much more rounder and fleshed out. I can also see the problem you mentioned with 'why would people who don't know the story play?' I'm going to give it a go for sheer interests sake (or maybe professional curiosity is a better word). With mine I rely on the theme getting people interested - just as the Twin Peaks one should interest people who watched the series (thanks for the Wiki link mildlydisguised) - people who watched Star Trek or always wanted People Cats in their game or people who miss the Sims 1 Characters and (or course) the remake of Pleasant Village.

Rohina - can I please have a link to this Simania so that I can see their Neighbourhood too? I googled but couldn't find them.

[cwykes]

Have you seen Sedona in Peasantry? - it's a business sub-hood which you could install alongside Bluewater as a default until Pets broke the mechanism.  With Pets you have to replace Bluewater.  The Sedona link is in my siggy and the Sedona thread links back to the "how to do it" thread.

Why not start with a default subhood? - a uni or a downtown or another business hood?   If you restrict CC in the sub-hood to things that work with that EP, more people can download and use it than if you really let yourself go.  And they can choose where they put it and re-use it in more than one hood.  AND there is NO renumbering required with a default subhood.

If you think of your complete hood project as 4 smaller projects, base hood, uni, downtown and shopping that fit together, you're allowing people to pick and mix according to what EPs they have or what they like the look of.  It also keeps the download file sizes more reasonable.   File size is a big issue - that was the problem Simmiecal hit in spades with Matyville - it was a huge download.  Sedona is already a 20 MB RAR.  Keeping the hood and sub-hoods separate just seems to me a really good idea.

CC really adds to the size of the hood and the problems 1. not everyone wants it CC in their game, 2.  it's painful identifying duplicates for people who already have a massive downloads folder and 3. you need to give credit.  Anyway, I stick to no CC uploads pretty closely.

If you've made families with stories, you want those to be included, but the storytelling folder can get pretty big.  I've used the Exchange for my back stories (free and no culling of stories yet) - the families who went into Matyville have a long backstory.

I'm working on a second business hood, but it's getting too big and I still have an important family and a lot of businesses to make.  Anyway I'm going to finish it off and then decide what to do.  It will use base game and OFB content only like Sedona. 
If you want to play with the hood I'm working on PM me and I'll work out how to get it to you.  It has 105 sims, 40 or so houses and a handful of small community lots - no businesses yet!  It includes a lot of elders by the way - there's a reason for that apart from the fact that I like them.   You need base+OFB and if there are problems taking it into a game with other EPs, I'd rather know now!  It's already a 45MB RAR!  My website allowance is 50.

[mildlydisguised]

Thanks lechapeau 

Cwykes, I haven't checked out Sedona yet probably because I tend to use a Uni as my only subhood.  I am intrigued though and will definitely check it out before I start work on anything of my own.

It is probably a good idea to start small with a subhood rather than a whole neighbourhood.  I don't want to bite off more than I can chew!

I love to have a play with the hood that you are working on, I am currently runing all EPs on my main account but I also intend to set up a separate XP account with all EPs but not PETZ111.  I could give it a try on both for you. 

[cwykes]

Thanks!  I can send it to you by e-mail - it'll fit in 5 mails.  If you like it, why not make me a custom Uni or Downtown to go with it?  I can do or help with the SimPE bits even if it won't work in my game.  I'd vote for Downtown as there are 3 Maxis Uni's and I know Motoki would like an alternative Downtown.  You have to make the uni/downtown as a main hood.  If you make it as a sub-hood, we can't turn it into a default.