More Awesome Than You!

So on a whim of madness while bored at work, I ordered Celebrations Stuffit off teh interwebz and if the couriers dont fuck up I should recieve it today.
Ive had a quick look round MATY and I can't see any actual reported problems, the most i can gather is that, it does not have its own executable to run and that Joshure and a few others in Retardoland have nothing helpful to report about it :P

So just wondering, does anyone know of any mad issues?  Will my sims heads explode?  Or is this just a stuff pack with no known problems? 

We've encountered issues with changing names and changing the clock format to 24 hour time.

Even though it's just a stuff pack and in the past we've been able to get away with it...  it's absolutely VITAL that you remove your hoods for install.  We got the clock fixed, and sorta fixed the names...  lets just say it was kinda disturbing to have a male sim called Rebecca.

Actually, it does have its own executable, but it's at OFB/GS/FFS level -- it recognizes if you have Pets or Seasons, and tells you to run the latest EP instead.

Other than that, no big issues -- it will overwrite your camera settings, so if you use a camera mod backup the files first.  It'll also set you back to the 'enable CC' dialog, even though you're not running its executable, so as Ness said, back up your hoods first. And it will reset all your lots, so your sims will be standing by the beds/mailbox/etc when you first go in (but the 'after-patch fix' on the macrotastics controller fixes it).

The problem Ness and others reported were mostly caused by installing different English versions than the already installed game (US vs UK) because Australia and some other places got the wrong version.  Only weird glitch I had was about a week after I installed it, the game just forgot it was there, and none of the stuff showed up anymore.  A quick re-install fixed it, and didn't even cause a reset the second time.

Crap i forgot about the name issues.  Im in New Zealand so i bet we got the wrong version as well...
I know theres a thread around here about how to change the registry for that...
What a lot of drama for some damn items i should have just downloaded lol.

Or just ignored it completely like I did.  8)

There should be something in the FAQ about how to change the registry strings for locale.  If it's not, it should be.  :P

Here is the bbs link I put in the other thread. This fix apparently works, but I haven't used it. I figure learning the 24 hour clock will be good for me, and I never remember my CAS sims names anyway, so I have changed their christian names and am living with Maxian surnames  :)

http://bbs.thesims2.ea.com/community/bbs/messages.php?threadID=578728eb397b07957f7f37fe42b34dce&directoryID=169&startRow=76&openItemID=item.169,root.1,item.43,item.61,item.41,item.127,item.23s

Yes the registry change thing worked :)
to be honest i dont know why i even brought it.  Its got fuckall in it.
LEARN FROM MY REPEATED MISTAKES!! ALL OF YOU!!

/me points and laughs. :D

Hahahahahah.  Silly fool.  Just who do you think you're talking to?  Sims 2 crack addled wh0r3z who have to purchase everything Maxis EA under the sun.  Let's face it, the lot of us are Maxis EA's bitches and there's not much we can do about it, except bend over and enjoy it. :P

Incidentally... Celebrations Stuff is on sale at Circuit City for $9.99. (http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/The-Sims-2-Celebration-Stuff-PC/sem/rpsm/oid/176773/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do)  I swear I am not being paid to viral market this crap, but I just figure, if anyone is gonna bother to buy it, for those of you who feel compelled to (or at least too guilty to acquire it :P) you might as well buy it for cheap. ::)

Even the EPs have gone for pretty cheap and I'm pretty sure I waited for Seasons to go for $17.99 or something like that.  I've just learned that it doesn't really pay to be an early adopter, and worst case scenario, I could always install it before actually buying it. :P

Ste

I noticed another weird thing since installing Celebrations -- the cafeteria worker is missing from every dorm I've gone into since installing it. Forcing an error on the stove doesn't summon him/her.  I have to buy a new stove to get the cafeteria worker to show up again.

Don't know if it's a weird hack conflict or what, but it's just a minor annoyance, since I currently don't have many YAs at the moment. 

I installed Celebrations two nights ago.  I played a dorm that night, and I was testing something last night, and my caf worker seemed fine there, at least for that dorm... *shrugs*

I haven't even bothered to check if the Celebrations objects are actually in the Buy Catalog.  Heh, I guess I should go do that.  How silly of me to just assume that, by installing the SP, they should and would continue to be in there. ::)

Ste

It's not that bad of a pack. The objects have more persistent use in comparison to say, Family Fun Stuff, with the surreal fantasy furniture being difficult to implement for prolonged periods in any building. The additional cakes, buffet tables, wedding arch are a nice touch and should keep the game aesthetically pleasing. I'm not sure on available custom content relating to parties, though the Maxis items are well-rounded in variations and don't appear to abstract against any other game content. If you are a completist, you will enjoy it. If you are not, you will not be missing much without this pack. I'd recommend it over FFS or the Happy/Festive Holidays releases. On game problems, nothing out of the ordinary with the Seasons expansion - catalog items work as (probably) intended.

Along with the Glamour Life Stuff; these two packs are the only two stuffit packs I'd consider installing for the long-term.

The CrapPacks are the only legit software I feel perfectly comfortable acquiring. However, I've not seen anything shiny enough in them to justify it, and this CrapPack is the least impressive yet. To me, anyways.

I still think Glamour has been the best one so far.. There are like 37 objects in Celebrations (which really isn't much) and the rest is wallpaper and carpet.  I haven't had a look at the dresses yet but theres only 3 new hairstyles.  I dont even know why EA would even embarrass themselves with that veil, havent they seen Pronupsims?

This is so true... I know its going to be crap.. but i just can't help it  :D

Honestly, I'm not that impressed with Pronupsims. Their hair really isn't that good, and I didn't like the way their veils looked in my game. Some of their clothes are okay and their stuff doesn't SUCK, but I much prefer the veil from Celebration stuff. I thought it looked rather pretty in game.

I agree with Orikes about Pronup Sims. Their stuff doesn't look very good in-game, though I do like their champaign bottles and wedding cakes, and some of their makeup is decent. I'm still not sure if I'll bother with the Celebrations SP. If I can find it at a low enough price, I might consider it, if only for the buffets.

Here's something interesting.

I got Celebrations as a gift this weekend. This was purchased at a California Circuit City, so should be the US version, right?

Well, it installed in English, the clock did not change to the 24hour clock, and the registry is showing US as the location.

So... why are half the townie, NPC, and college dormie names in my game changed to Maxis crap? I thought this was an isolated problem having to do with locale and/or the version released in Australia and/or installing a UK version on top of an otherwise US game.

Sarah, did it maybe screw up the registries of any other games you might have acquired? I had my game go kaplooie (computer crashed hard while I had the game up, and  the game then crashed every time I tried to load it) so instead of just uninstalling Seasons, I uninstalled it, Pets, and Celebrations so that I could install in the seemingly "right" order and patch things correctly. I installed Celebrations first, but even though Pets and Seasons were installed after it, with the correct (US) language set, and the fact that I was allegedly using the exe from Seasons, my clock and names were screwed up.

No, I checked all the locations, and they're all US.

In any case, there weren't that many truly screwed up names, so I fixed everything fairly quickly. And in some cases it didn't really matter. For example, the mailman that one of my sims is having an affair with used to be Alan and became Jack. I don't particularly care what his name is, so I didn't bother changing it back. None of my playable sims were affected, except for some dormies that I had created in YCAS and put into a dorm but never actually played.

I'm actually taking the EAxis textures from celebrations and sticking them on other maxis meshes. Looks way better, IMHO.
(http://sublimesims.net/images/stories/simsandclothing/fullbody_set(skadi)celebdressbasemesh.jpg) (http://sublimesims.net/images/stories/simsandclothing/fullbody(skadi)celebburgremesh.jpg)

-Skadi