More Awesome Than You!

One of my major misgivings with this game, is the speed that the Sims move up the socio-economic ladder once they start advancing in their jobs. I want them to hover around the middle-class level, or at the most, upper middle-class.

Do I need OFB for the harder jobs hack to work? Please tell me that I don't!

Harderjobs isn't in the NL directory, so yes, you will need OFB.

Upgrading to one of the higher EPs (OFB, Seasons, BV) is not a bad idea in any event, since the Nightlife engine is not great to begin with (so I understand).  The higher EPs would upgrade the game engine and make things more stable.

NL engine is horrifically buggy and unstable. Recommend upgrading to it just for the engine boost, the OFBp2 engine is by far the most stable of any expansion combo, even more so than the subsequent expansions, which broke stuff that was fixed in OFBp2, and never refixed it.

The engine in Glamour Life is still the best one, no doubt about it. After that, there's a HUGE regression in the routing code somewhere that affects just about every possible animation/routing conflict.

I have been seriously considering purchasing OFB for the longest time now. Cash flow issues is holding me back, though. In addition, I am wary 'starting over' again. I have tons of hacks and other downloads, and they are all horribly unsorted. I wasn't aware that subfolders within the Downloads folder are workable (I now know that under certain conditions, they are), so it's hundreds and hundreds of rows of content, and removing all of the hacks, and retesting them first, seems like a huge task.

Then again, OFB looks intriguing. It holds the most storytelling and playability value from what I can tell. Seasons also look like fun. I guess I'll make the OFB update soon and painstakingly sort out the hacks and reinstall the updates.

It's ridiculous how much of my time this game consumes!

Generally, as long as your hacks have names (as the Awesome hacks do) instead of incomprehensible numbers, they are not that difficult to sort out and delete.  Problems arise mainly if you miss something.  I would suggest deleting all hacks from the NL game (good idea to remove downloads altogether before installing OFB - save the downloads folder somewhere else while you install) and once OFB is installed, get the appropriate awesome hacks (and anything else you need that's compatible).

In any case, if your downloads folder is so disorganized, you might want to start over anyway.

That's the best excuse you can come up with?

Aye Cap'n, aaarrrrrrr

Hmmm. I wasn't aware there was an awesomeness rating for excuses as to why I haven't updated my game yet.

I'm currently saving up a measly buck here and there for my year-long stay in Taiwan, coming up this February. So any buck counts at this stage. In addition, I'll only be really able to play the OFB expansion pack for roundabout 2 months, before I take off for parts unknown.

The main reason? I'm already so besotted with this game, I'm getting dreams about my Sims. So it's kind of reaching seriously unawesome levels of preoccupation.

Thanks to all of you, though, for helping out. You never know if you stand a greater chance of being mocked for asking for help, or saying thank you for the help offered. Haha.

Aarrr, 'e be a foine pirate, 'e be.

I take it the same goes for the increasedbills hack. Tis a pity, because I crave mods dealing with the finances aspect of the game. I guess the OFB upgrade is becoming more and more imminent.

I believe Witch is hinting broadly at the word "torrent".

Blimey, that was hard work, cheers jolrei!  ::)

In even plainer language: Just fucking steal it already!
Arrr! and Jolly ho! and all that.  Pirate it! Download it! Take it! Claim it as your own!  We won't judge you (or rather, we're judging you right now because you haven't already).  If you feel bad, you can pay for it when cashflow resumes.  And you shouldn't feel bad, because EA are suspicious pieces of shit who treat us all like thieves even when we aren't.

Oh, feeling bad about possibly pirating it? I downloaded the Nightlife expansion pack from my university network, so it's safe to say that I don't harbour any unnecessary feelings of guilt.  :)

The reason I don't have the OFB, is because it is not available on the network in question! So I'll fork out the R175, and feel like a law obeying citizen.

It'll be worth it, methinks. Will be fun renting out apartments and appointing a landlord. The childsupport hack is also pretty (dare I say it?) awesome, even if it is located at modthesims2.com (a site I happen to like quite a bit).

Will you ostracize me based on the above paragraph?  :D

What's to stop you getting it from somewhere else? There are loads of torrent sites out there.

Here, I'll help you out. Toorgle (http://www.toorgle.com) is Google for torrents.

There. No excuse now.

EDIT: Missing L.

(http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/crapola/pancake_bunny.jpg)

Take your pick:
http://thepiratebay.org/tor/3634315/The_Sims_2_Open_For_Business
http://www.torrentspy.com/torrent/1276341/Sims_2_Open_For_Business
http://www.torrentspy.com/torrent/614731/The_Sims_2_Open_for_Business_www_torrents_and_more_to
http://www.mininova.org/tor/240134
http://www.mininova.org/tor/240733

Well guys, I found a solution for my problem. I've managed to talk my parents and my brother into jointly getting me the OFB expansion as a Christmas gift. We're not big on Christmas at all, and only give presents (on most years, anyway), as a family nicety, so no one is expected to blow huge amounts of cash.

So, problem solved! Middle-class Simmies, here I come ...

As an aside, what did you find the most gratifying about OFB? I've heard Pescado refer to 'subhoods'; what would that mean? And is it feasible to run apartments on lots, or is the setup of even this expansion pack still not very conducive to this?

OFB so far sounds like the most interesting EP, followed by Seasons. I'll pick up Seasons some other time. I also like the chemistry mechanism in Nightlife - it makes the hookups and relationships less arbitrary. I care little for the Downtown lot, though. Really, who does? An occasional trip is okay-ish, but other than that, I'm very blase about exiting my Sims' homes. For that very reason, the concept of BV bores me to no end. I heard Pets was on the whole a disappointment, but I might get that one some time, as I've never played with non-Sims in the game, in the original and Sims 2.

Subhoods are additional terrains you can add to your main hood.  Similar to the Downtown that comes with NL, but they act like regular 'hoods' in that they don't add any more townies. So you could spread your sims out, so to speak.

And no, no real way to run apartments yet.  The closest is the hotels in Bon Voyage, but they're limited to vacation sub-hoods, and you can't own them.

Chemistry is added with every EP after Nl (like inventory I think).

For me, the most compelling thing about OfB was setting up a home business. I don't really get the appeal of community lot businesses.

I don't really think it makes much of a difference if you run mostly retail businesses to sell to townies, but home businesses can't be visited by other playable sims.  I like to have crafted goods and produce available to buy conveniently without making every sim get the relevant badges.  Also, with Pescado's evilsimseviltoys my nice sims can buy evil toys!  :D

The other thing is themed venues and restaurants.  It seems more reasonable to have a medieval-themed restaurant, or wild west saloon/brothel off-site.