More Awesome Than You!

I'm a regular user at http://www.gaysimsclub2.net/ and the Admin, Scotty, figured I should share my findings with other Sims 2 Community and not just them.

If you're a member of gaysimsclub2, here's the original thread. http://www.gaysimsclub2.net/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=11&t=2204&st=0


Now here's a re-post of that thread:

Not sure if anyone has done this before, or at all. Or in a different way. Anyway whatever.

Anyway, yes I have managed to connect all three default neighborhoods out of sheer boredom. Families/Households can now travel freely between Pleasantview, Strangetown, and Veronaville.

Special note about the pictures. I dunno why some of the pics shrunk when I uploaded them on photobucket. But I have a bigger 640x480 pics that you can clearly see things. If you want to see them PM me so I can email them or something. Or contact me at wyrmking@aol.com.

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/Neighborhood.png)

As you can see, it still looks like three separate neighborhoods. But don't be fooled. Pleasantview is actually the main neighborhood, while the other two is just associated with it.

Here's sample screenshots:

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/SimStateBright.png)
(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/Sample1.png)
(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/Sample2.png)

I had one of the students in Sim State University, call up a taxi, and the menu pops up to which lot I would go. As you can see there are options to go to not just Pleasantview, Downtown, and Sim State, but also Strangetown and Veronaville. I remind you, PM me so I can show you a bigger version of those pics. I dunno why they shrunk.

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/KentCapp.png)

A picture of Kent Capp, member of the Capp family from Veronaville. I moved him to Strangetown (not by packaging a lot, that would cause him to loose his ties with his family)

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/CappFamilyTree.png)

You see he still has his family connections.

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/FamilyBin.png)

And other families from Veronaville, I have not given them a home yet. But I'm just showing you that they appear in Strangetown's family bin (and they show up in Pleasantview's and Veronaville's).

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/DonErin.png)

Don Lothario calling Erin Singles from Strangetown. When I was experimenting by having Erin go to Pleasantview's community lot, they met. I was gonna invite her over but I forgot that Erin does not have a phone yet in her new house.

Now these are my favorite screenshots. I moved in Bella from Strangetown with Loner (forgot his name). And then I resurrected Bella from Pleasantview by using SimPE. And now they all live together!

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/TwoBella.png)

They look slightly different, not too much. Pleasantview Bella is on the left.

Now, as you all know, Strangetown Bella has no family tree or any connection to anyone from Pleasantview.

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/BellaStrangetown.png)

Now, Pleasantview Bella does.

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/BellaPleasantview.png)

Anyway, I haven't played much with it. So I don't have a lot of screenshots. I'll be taking more soon. I'm still trying to see if there are any bugs or whatever. The Summerdream household did get a little buggy in the beginning, the whole house got flooded with that terrain water. It was weird, but it's all fixed now.

So if anybody wants to know how I did, just say so.

A re-post of the instruction:

How to connect your neighborhoods.

By Laurence aka Wyrm King

This is pretty simple, it might be a little time consuming, depending on the size of your neighborhoods and how many neighborhoods you're going to connect together.

Before we start. BACK UP YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD FOLDER. Just in case.

Note that Pleasantview and Strangetown is not associated with any Downtown or University lots yet. We'll get to that later. Just read on ahead for now.

Also note that I only have University and Nightlife.

1.) Pick which neighborhood will be the primary neighborhood. I suggest you pick the one you play most or the one with the most families you play at. I used Pleasantview is my primary neighborhood. Its neighborhood number is N001.

2.) Now, I'm gonna connect Pleasantview with Strangetown. Take screenshots of the neighborhood view of Strangetown. Make sure you get every angle and every house. You'll need to know where everything is for later. Also get a pen and paper, mark down which vacant lots go where, this is just for authenticity when putting everything together.

3.) Now using either the Tombstone of L and D or the Advanced Teleporter Painting from http://www.simlogical.com/ start putting families together in houses. I suggest the Advanced Teleporter Painting, the people you will summon would be grouped by Households so they're easier to find, but it has to be the advanced version, it has an option to move in people that you've summoned, and it also has the option to clear out the lot of all non-residents. Just put together, in one house, the people you don't want to lose touch with each other.

I don't care much about relationships between friends, because that can be fixed later, but I suggest you group together people that are related through blood or marriage so that their family trees remain intact. So look at various family trees and see whom is related to whom. And group all the families together. Erin Singles is sister to the Beaker Guy, Nervous Subject is adopted by Olive Specter, etc. etc. So group them accordingly. And with the Tombstone of L and D or the Advanced Teleporter they let you add more than eight people per household.

Or, group every family plus their friends together in one house if you absolutely must. Don't forget Strangetown Bella if you want to keep her. If not, you can just resurrect Pleasantview Bella, and replace Strangetown Bella, plus she has the family ties anyway.

4.) Now that everything is grouped. Start putting the houses in the house bin. Occupied, Community, and Unoccupied Lots. But before you do this make sure you have the screenshots and notes about where everything goes when you put everything back in its place. Empty Lots cannot be put in the Housebin, so just take a note on its size, and what type of lot it is and the lot name you gave it. Now once you're done putting every lot in the housebin, exit the game.

5.) Now open up C:\Documents and Settings\HP_Administrator\My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Neighborhoods. CUT and paste Strangetown's folder (N002) from your neighborhood folder, to your desktop for backup. Copy and paste the following files from the N002 folder into Pleasantview's folder (N001) N002_Neighborhood.png, N002_Neighborhood.package, and N002_Neighborhood.reia if you like the moving pictures on the Neighborhood chooser.

Now copy and paste N002's Storyline folder to N001's Storyline folder. Let it overwrite. The pictures and stories will appear in their respective neighborhoods.

6.) Now start your game. Go into Strangetown and put everybody back in their places using the notes and screenshots you've taken to help you out. Then go into any of the lots you've put back. I suggest the one with the biggest grouping first. When you go in, it might take a while to load because the game is recreating the character files and such. Now, you can now move out some people in the households and put back the families into their respective households.

7.) Now that your neighborhood is almost back to normal, try and call up transportation or use an automobile to go to a community lot to make sure that both Pleasantview and Strangetown community lots are available. Now if it works, then it's a success.

8.) Now, if Strangetown happens to be associated with a Downtown or University lot. Just do the same thing for those sub-neighborhoods what you did for Strangetown. Take screenshots and take notes. Group households accordingly, and put them in the House Bin. If your Young Adult is related to anyone in the main Neighborhood or Downtown, then put the Young Adult in that group. Then put every lot in the housebin including communities and empty lots. Exit your game when done. It's probably best that you should do this part in the beginning while you're grouping your main neighborhood.

9.) Now go into Strangetown's N002 folder. And copy and paste N002_University001.package, N002_University001.png, N002_Downtown001.pacakge and N002_Downtown001.png to Pleasantview's N001 folder. Rename these files N001_University001.package, N001_University001.png, N001_Downtown001.pacakge and N001_Downtown001.png. If Pleasantview has those files already then rename the files  N001_University002.package, N001_University002.png, N001_Downtown002.pacakge and N001_Downtown002.png. Or depending on how many university and downtown lots is associated with Pleasantview, then just rename them accordingly.

10.) Now start your game, and using the notes and pictures you've taken. Put everything back in their places. Now test it out if you can access every community lot from Downtown or University.



My neighborhood folder looks like this after I've connected all three neighborhoods, completely associated with Downtown and all three Universities. Yours should look similar.

(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/OneFolder.png)
(http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f359/samplewyrm/FolderContent.png)

I know the instruction is not too well, but I will try to help out as much as I can if you have any questions or if something's not working.

So far the only downside I see is that all the townies seem to be from Pleasantview. I'm not sure of if Strangetown townies get recreated during the process.

I mostly spend my time on MTS2 or gaysimsclub2. You can send me some PM if you have any question.

This is not really a new method, and dragging all the sims together in this manner requires that you basically glob every single sim from a neighborhood into the same family before attempting this move process, or you'll get duplicate "undead files" of everyone they knew.

Are you talking about this one? http://www.lifeofasim.com/how/neighborhood01.php

'Coz mine can travel freely between one neighborhood to another.

The pictures shrunk because they were too big. Photobucket automatically resizes pictures that are bigger than 512KB.

Interesting. So how do you switch between main towns? Are they selectable like normal at the main menu? Or are they all accessable in gmae like the subhoods?


And thinking about it, is there anything specific prevening you from renaming say one of the base towns to a downtown file name and placing it as a subdivision? (probably is, But I am not awesome like fish.

Thanks. Didn't know that. I've never used Photobucket before.


You switch between main towns through the neighborhood chooser. But this time, they're all connected and the characters can go back and forth between neighborhoods.

Or if you're playing a household, and you want to go to a community lot, the neighborhoods and subneighborhoods will be listed together on the menu.

I'm not sure why base towns cannot be downtown sub-neighborhoods. :-\

Sound great, but too confusing for the likes of me...

Is it just me, or does this sound like a BFBVFS waiting to happen? (Unless you delete the memories via SimPE first.)

not something i could be arsed to try quite frankly, even in the name of experimentation, which i'm not normally averse to doing. theres always reinstall when confronted with the tits up scenario

I agree with Lythdan (for once) and I didn't see the step that removed very irksome memories, so have a happy BFBVFS!

It's the putting occupied lots in the lot bin that worries me.  Doesn't that cause duplication of the character files of every sim they know outside their own household?  Even in a freshly installed, unplayed Strangetown there are relationships between the households - so (if I were silly/brave enough to try this) I'd not only have the (real) Johnny Smith in the Smith household, I'd also have a 2nd Johnny Smith character file from Ophelia's relationships, a 3rd Johnny Smith character file from the Grunt boys, etc.  When you consider how many characters are already known to other families in unplayed versions of Strangetown and Veronaville, you're starting to look at a heck of a lot of character files.

I have tried many, many ways to combine the three maxis hood. This one as well.
But it does create quite some broken memories and duplicate characters.
Actually, I haven´t found a way to have all the maxis characters meet each other without
these issues.
If someone did, please tell.

I exported all Maxis sims I wanted with SimSurgery, took notes of the personality/zodiac/family ties/interests/etc. And then I recreated them in CAS, and stitched them back together with SimPE. Did the same to the sims I had currently been playing - the neighborhood was getting unstable, and I just recreated everything before installing NL.

Alternatively, it *should* be possibly to move Maxis sims into one neighborhood if you put *all* sims of that neighborhood on one lot (probably with Inge's Teleport Plus Shrub). By all, I mean all playable characters, and all characters they've ever met/have memories of. That would mean including at least some Townies/NPCs, and adding the resurrected dead. That way, you'd get no duplicate or abandoned memories.

Or, alteralternatively, you could only put the sims you want on a lot together, then go into SimPE and clean out their memories, and then only import the selected sims, but you'd have to be damn careful to make sure you *really* delete all references.


I get wanting to put Maxis sims together - after all, I added the interesting ones to my own custom neighborhood as well. I just don't think it makes sense to link all three neighborhoods in the way described in this thread - if you're gonna combine them, why keep the annoyance of having to switch between neighborhoods? The three different terrains aren't really *that* interesting.

Two questions, Most Awesome One:
1) Did you mean Townies, NPCs, Professors...EVERY sim? or every playable sim?
2) What do you think...is this do-able without having to edit memories? I'm a SimPE virgin, so be gentle. :)

I just had a thought!  What if I appendaged Strangetown externally to Plesantview or Veronaville as a downtown.  It would keep all the sims and I could delete the townies.  There would be no smashing of memories as all the families are still intact in one piece.

I thought that's what this does?

That´s interesting, I ended up with the Sim Surgery Solution as well. I´ve had
them all in one neighborhood since nightlife.
But I just think it´s a real pain to do... there should be something easier. I guess moving them on one lot would help but it turned out thirty or more sims were too much for my computer to deal with.

This method would surely cause BFBVFS bc there would be tons of duplicate character files.  I would rather stick to the LOASmethod and then create custom sub hoods using Veronaville and Strangetown templates.  Strangetown would probably be Downtown and Veronaville would be business district.  In fact since I have done the LOAS method I will do that. I havent added sub hoods yet anyway.


I am going to test this on a second account just to see how bad it can get... ;)

If someone wanted to comine their neighborhoods and retain their family ties, there's really no other way than using this method or lot-binning families.  It'll create a BFBVFS anyway that it's done because of those memories, except for the SimSurgery method which forces you to reconstruct family trees and stuff.

I'm not so sure about "deleting" files to merge neighborhoods either, as far as I know the sim description file is still in the Neighborhood even after you oust the file.

A BFBVFS- but WORTH it

surely we can find a way to do this with minimal damage?

Are the maxis characters so appealing that this is worth it?

Ooooh!  I can just tell that this is one of "those" questions.

I think people either love or hate the Maxis characters.

Thats what I was thinking after I replied earlier.  Surely if one or two characters were that good you could transfer the Sim in question to your chosen neighborhood! :-\

But wouldn't that involve lotbinning them anyway? and that causes problems too!

I like pleasantview and strangetown. I might just delete Veronaville.

Personally I hate the maxis characters.

The first thing I did when I got the game was delete them all, move lal the houses into the lot bin from all 3 hoods and start my own.

This allowed me to have smaller neigboorhoods with distinct stlyes within one big map.

And I, personally, like the maxis characters.  (Well, there's a few I could do without)


Finding a way to merge the hoods like this safely would be awesome.  But until then I think the only truely safe way to do that is to copy them all with sim surgury and slap them all in one hood.  The relations can be fixed with simpe.

I just don't know what to think about Maxian Characters.  They're equivalent to townies in my opinion, however I do have a "few" maxian sims in my custom neighborhood.

I've still got all the neighborhoods around just because I don't feel like deleting them.

I would really enjoy it if the neighbourhoods were still separate and Sims could travel between them at will, but this sounds as if they'll all appear in each other's neighbourhoods at random (i.e., walkbys and so on) which would be no different to moving them into the one neighbourhood in the first place.  When I restarted Pleasantview and ditched Strangetown I put the Beakers into it (minus their family trees to avoid extra character files) because they had great twins (both thoroughly nasty, like their parents) and I wanted to see how they grew-up.  I still have a couple of Strangetown back-ups, so I may eventually put some other characters in, probably the Grunts and the Curious Bros, or maybe just their alien offspring.

I love most of the Maxis Playable Characters from Pleasantview and Strangetown...Personally if your going to lot-bin include every sim that knows each other on one lot...If you dont you get tons of garbage character files...




No they wont unless you stick them on a lot...lot-bin...and then use Inges teleporter bush to make them townies again...


That is why you would need to put all characters on one lot with Inges teleporter bush.  For Strangetown I put everyone on one lot plus Crystal Vu, Meredith the Bartender, and Abjiheet Cho.  Veronaville Characters didnt know any NPC's.  Pleasntview you would have to add Kaylynn Langerak and Gordon King.  I also added the graves to the sims inventories.  I dont know if it matters or not

I think the only safe way you could do this is to package the occupied Lots to files(make a list of all the sims that are actually on the Lot for each occupied Lot), then delete all the characters in strangetown and verona, then install the occupied Lots using clean installer (to remove all the characters that are not actually on the Lot)

Otherwise you will end up with a ton of unlinked character files which is bad...


I'm a little tempted to try this with a couple of new custom hoods that have no character files/sims to worry about, link them up and then create my new sims for each hood.

Not sure if it is worth the trouble/time though...hmmm do the hoods now actually share a University & Downtown? or do they still have to have their own?  If I do this would I be able to send sims from all 3 hoods to the same Uni, where students from all 3 hoods can share a dorm and do stuff together?  now That would be cool and would certainly make it worth doing!!

That would make it worth it



Especially if you lot-bin each family instead of adding them all to one lot...If you put everyone on one lot you dont have unlinked characters...I have had all three neighborhoods combined in one neighborhood since Uni and had no problems infact that neighborhood doesnt have as many characters as the Pleasantview Im playing in now. I have checked with Simpe and dont have any duplicate files and then used Theo's memory enhancement to fix memories and it didnt do anything so Im guessing there was no broken memories.

right, but when you package them, what about all the weird things like "birthevents" that get packaged as well? And if you delete all the extra character files, you also sever the relationships, and any memories...

realized right after I climbed in bed last night that I forgot to add the bit about fixing their memorys.


Ellatrue, thats why you would want to put all related sims on one Lot. I moved about 50 sims (family and friends) on one Lot to a different hood awhile ago, by moving them together they kept their relationships with each other, memory cleanup afterwords was all for townies/sims they didn't take with them.

Of course you could use SimPE to remove all the relationships(and memorys) with other townies/sims that aren't going to be on the Lot before you put the occupied Lot in the Lot Bin (then you wouldn't have to package the Lot to a file) If you don't sever relationships with sims/townies that aren't on the Lot then you will end up with unlinked character files.