More Awesome Than You!

Ok, let's try; I suck at decoration, feel free to point and laugh.

Lot: 3x2
Price: § 77,606
Bedrooms: 3 (double)
Bathrooms: 4
Garage: 1
Swimming Pool: yes
Basement: yes
Playtested: yes (a copy), with 4 adults + 1 child + 1 toddler + 1 baby

EPs: University, Nightlife, Open for Business, Pets.

No custom content included. I was not sure about the official awesomeness of Inge's stuff, so I didn't include in the package. If you have
her wallpaperable walls for stairs (http://simlogical.com/dinnerbell/index.php?topic=69.0) you'll have the stair wall open towards the kitchen, if you don't you'll have a normal wall.
Best effect is with open underneath stairs (http://www.modthesims2.com/creator/showthread.php?t=233769) by Crocobaura, not included.

Additional note: Basic furniture only provided.

Focus: general playability, expandability, no trees/columns/crap blocking view, can see where the sims are and what they're doing with the minimal camera movement possible (yes, I'm lazy).

(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/aerialview.jpg)

Features:

• Front fence only,
• Basement garage
• Enough space (I hope) on the front lawn for Seasons' stuff, pets accessories, or other crap
• Front deck with enough space for visitor greetings and the usual following dirty jokes/RPS/kickybag galore without blocking other sims' walk
• Mailbox relocated for better spotting of walkbys
• A lot of corners to locate decorative items to enhance environment score without clogging the rooms or influence whine&stomp behaviors

(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/frontview.jpg)

Another ugly suggestive front view, showing the spatious balcony above the garage, with easel, telescope and a dartboard.

(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/rearview.jpg)

Rear view.
Barbecue and a spacious deck+stairs for no whine&stomp during walk. The door leads to the kitchen.
Notice the trashcan relocated and hidden behind the shrubs: near the kitchen but away from kickers (you may spot them more easily while they travel throug the garden)

Floor plans

Basement
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/basement.jpg)

Spacious stairs, room for coffins, career awards, crafting stations, or other stuff. Separate bunker-room with lockable door. Both garage and room have windows (light will enter, once in game).
A lot of space under the decks for lot debugger, macrotastic, other stuff to keep hidden.

First Floor
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/firstfloor.jpg)

One Desk near both main entrance and garage stairs, with a tile free on its side for the adult/teen who teach to study. Computer on a different, separated, desk.
Lockable kitchen. Indoor dinner table is nearer than outdoor, and accomodates up to 8 dishes: therefore, the sims will always serve food indoor, and only in rare cases will go also outdoor. The same, reversed, happens if the sims grill outside. If you substitute the table outside with a (at least) 3 tiles one, you'll have no travel indoor when barbecue.

Note: you may also separate a corner of the One Desk room with a wall (the corner with the computer desk), thus providing an additional terlet on the first floor, for visitors.

Second Floor
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/secondfloor.jpg)

Three bedrooms big enough for double beds. In this case they're furnished as 1 double, 1 twin and 1 nursery.
The spacious deck can locate an additional crib without clogging the walk space, keeping everybody separated.

Bathrooms are minimal on purpouse; they have exactly the needed space to have people shooed without problems (e.g. toilets always far from the door).
No sinks (the only sink is in the kitchen), to minimize the visitors traveling to wash hands.


Details

Rear
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/trashcan.jpg)
Relocated trashcan area. You may see the basement windows and the kitchen through the window.

Stairs
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/stairs.jpg)
Notice in this picture the opening toward kitchen.

Kitchen
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/kitchen.jpg)
How the kitchen looks with Inge's wallpaperable stair walls: they are - as a matter of fact - windows.

Dining room
(http://www.fantasiadomain.com/sims2/MATYBuildingContest/diningroom.jpg)
Dining area is kept divided by carpet separator: this works like a wall for acustic propagation. Result is no more "dance together" offerings to people in this area, stucking between seats unlucky sims who want to eat, clean up or go to bathroom.
No cheering at the piano, too: eat and shut up.

Bribe
Huh... this is the hardest part, I don't have special skills to offer, and I'm not sure I may be funny enough to insult or mock, so... I may offer to customize skintone selectors or other similar hacks, ready-to-go with the judge's personal choices.

Whoa...I had no idea you could do that with a driveway.  Considering that my main neighborhood has little flat land, I would love to know how it was done.  Do simcars actually drive down it or do they jump/teleport/slide down on their rear bumper?

Nice work, though.  It looks very appropriately residential and roomy without becoming a hummer-house.  I would make a few cosmetic changes, especially to the roof, but don't take that as an insult.  I don't typically download lots at all, since building is one of my favorite parts of the game, but I might just take this one.  Well done.

Cute!  I'll enjoy this, thanks.   :)   The nice thing about downloading houses from this challenge is the lack of tweaking I need to do -- it's great seeing so many houses designed for gameplay.

They sort of teleport into the garage, looks a bit funny but works well if you are a little tight on space. Someone at MTS2 has lots that come with just the basement garage so that you can build your own house over it. I like being kind of 'cheaty' that way. Call me lazy. :P ;D

Thanks :) No insult, don't worry, I know I suck, expecially on roofs lol; just figure I've made a special effort just on this occasion, forcing me to paint walls with some variety ;).

I remember of a tutorial for that kind of garage, but I can find it no more. Anyway it's quite easy: you place the driveway as usual, then activate the cheat constrainfloorelevation false in the cheat box, then dig the slope under the driveway (providing the last row of tiles is 12 clicks deep).
When you're done, here's the amazing trick: grab the driveway and delete it, then immediately undo the action: the driveway will return in place, but perfectly sloped this time.
Turn constrainfloorelevation true, place the driveway extension, then false again and repeat, etc.

I went on a tutorial search after seeing this house, and found this http://www.reflexsimsforum.com/showthread.php?t=963 (http://www.reflexsimsforum.com/showthread.php?t=963) on how to do sloped driveways. With pics and all! :)

That is great.  I presume one could do a similar procedure to make the drive go up to a house on a hill as well.  I will have to do some experiments with this now.

There's a tutorial over at MTS2 about uphill garages; do a search for "sloped driveway" and you'll find it. That was where I ended up when searching for the underground garage.

1.1 for aesthetics. The exterior is much nicer than the interior.

! THIS LOT HAS NON-LEVEL EDGES !
Placement of this lot in your neighborhood will permanently damage the neighborhood terrain! Do not use this lot!

Bribe: 0.0 (is this supposed to be useful?)
Functionality: 0.6
Scenarios: 0.6
Cost Effectiveness: 0.9
Expand 0.7
Physics: 0.01
Aesthetics: 1.1

Technical: 0.629
Total: 0.377

Correct Behaviors
Anti-Wolf Fencing
Kitchen Firebreak & Visitor Raid Defense Good
Easily Accessible One Desk

Correctable Issues
DO NOT MOVE MAILBOX!
Strange Window-Things Embedded In Random Walls
No Food Near Nursery

Fundamental Flaws
EDGES NOT LEVEL - Lot useless and cannot be placed anywhere other than original neighborhood's spot without damaging terrain!
Warped Driveway Produces Visible Car Clipping Artifacts
Visitors Not Confined To Viewing Deck
Nursery Small, Not On Viewing Deck