Gameplay: How do YOU keep track of sim lifes?

[blackcat]

After seeing people mentioning here and there different note keeping styles, starting from simple scrapes of paper, upto creating a whole database from scratch, I though that this deserves a thread of it's own. So here you go. Tell us how do YOU keep track of those little sim lifes.

I personally have a simple excel sheet, where I count rotation days, additional taxes and ages.
Though right now I'm looking for a good genealogy program like this one maybe: http://www.legacyfamilytree.com/ for a fresh start neighborhood.

[nekonoai]

try family echo. and if you search here, you can see how Notovny used it. I've been thinking of implementing it for keeping track of the clowncars.

[Zazazu]

This is one thing I'm incredibly lazy and uncaring about. In townie-aging hoods, I did keep a spreadsheet of townies, their ages, and what round they were last aged in (since they had two rounds as adults). For my playables, I'll note when sims come back from college in the family information, as well as what house they are in rotation. Once I get more than 5 houses rotating, I usually mark my 'hood map with the numbers. This 'hood, it'll be on a spreadsheet since the map is at such a small scale.

I also note their life path that I roll for at teen transition, in the sim's personal notes (under characteristics) in-game. Notes are typically "Knowledge-no 2nd, Junior dropout, No LTW, Military-Recruit", etc, for aspiration, college, LTW fulfillment, and ordained career.

[Tsarina]

I don't keep much track of them. I usually play one season per house, sometimes less, depends on the 'hood. I just find that the season-rotation works best for me.

[maxon]

You keep a simple spreadsheet: I keep one of arcane complexity.  I think last time I looked it had 30-odd pages.  I have to sneak the file into work to print it seeing as I am too mean (and too broke) to print it out at home.  I also have little plans for various sims noted down on sheets but I am leaning more strongly all the time towards chance and, at least for now, I roll dice for the non-story-important sims.  I do spread things like skins and eyes about (geneticised) because I like to see the genetics work themselves out and the spreadsheet helps with that.  See, I knew those D&D dice were worth keeping.

PS for family trees I have used GenoPro.  I'm actually generally not too keen on this idea (I can keep family trees in my head) but GenoPro has the advantage of being free off the Interwebs.  I used to like that programme called ... what was it now ...  Sims2 Database?  Yeah, that was handy.  But it seems to have disappeared now.

[purplebunny]

I have notebooks (way, way too many notebooks) for tracking individual branches of the family tree, as well as determining who is in each college 'class'. I also use my notebook to keep track of plot ideas and to write out scene-by-scene breakdowns of shots I need to get for my various plots.

I've started using index cards to track stats for individual sims. I track:
Name/Gender
Personality/Horoscope/1^o Aspiration/2^o Aspiration
Lifetime Want (and subsequent, if the first is fulfilled)
Parents
Spouse(or partner--not all of my sims get married)/Gender preference
Children (with a note whether they were adopted or if the father is other than their spouse/partner)
Skintone DNA
Eye DNA
Hair DNA

Any other pertinent notes go on the back of the card, and they're filed alphabetically by generation.

[Kyna]

I'm still limping along with Sims2DB (which is still available at MTS2, although it hasn't been updated for 2 years).  I print out a "household plans" report for each household and then keep them in rotation order, with notes scribbled all over them to remind me what I'm planning for the sims in each household.

I have been considering the index card method over recent months.

There is a current thread by Rufio about the program he has developed, including discussion with Inge about importing data from SimPE.  When the SimPE-import function is added to his program, I'll probably switch to it.  Given that SimPE's coders are going to be very busy over the next couple of weeks updating SimPE for AL, I expect it'll be a while.

[ingeli]

I made the Windlebridge site for my documentation - its built on a sharepoint server list, with additional lists for houses, hoods, and other little things to keep tracks of . With 1000 sims its necessary to keep some track of things. I also use GenoPro for the genealoy - but I have also tried several other genealogical programs. The good thing is that the Gedcom file format can be transferred to try out different programs before you decide.
The advantage I see with GenoPro is the options for saving pictures both for individuals and for events (weddings ect) and places (houses). And that its super easy to generate all the htmlpages to keep local on your comp or publish to a webpage of your choice. Some of the genealogical programs I tried were very pretty but you could only publish to THEIR website.. and I for some reason didnt want to have my fictional families on a serious genealogical big site, that didnt feel right.
Link to Windlebridge main genealogical page: http://portal.charlamov.com/windlebridge/FamilyTreePages/windle/default.htm
I only register the breeding sims in the GenoPro database.

[rufio]

I assume my program in Peasantry was part of the inspiration for this thread (and it's already been mentioned), so I won't go into it again.  I actually used to keep track of genetics too, though, but without SimPE working for me it gets to be a bit of a guessing game.

[Sagana]

I don't keep track either. I use the lot sync timer to make sure I play the houses the same amount (sometimes a few days a round, sometimes more - just depends) and the 3 sims any playable knows best get aged up with them when they age up and killed off as elders when the elders die. I find it frustrating that the BV sims don't make the list so any BV (or NPC clerks) my townies are best friends with get teleported in and aged when they do as well. If my sims and I don't know them, I don't care if they stay young too long. I do hate seeing the same names too often so I seldom miss too many townies.

[rohina]

I use a really hip, cool, new system called "remembering".

[Grugly]

 I don't like that one. Every new release it gets buggier and buggier, the search option is borked, the creator doesn't support it and it's increasingly incompatible with new hardware. Half the time the data gets corrupted and I swear it's always overwriting my old data without asking.

[blackcat]

Hm, I also went looking for personal wiki, as lefty suggested in "how do you play" thread, and this is what I found:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_wiki
Should be more useful then genealogy for somebody who just likes to take a lot of notes, as opposed to organizing family trees.

ingeli: I'm really impressed by Windlebridge site. That's a lot of work put into documenting.  And all of your sims have such individuality, all mine CAS turn out to be look alikes 

[HeyYeah]

I also use the remembering system. My hood isn't that big and I have no pressing need to write down every detail of a sim's life. I do take a snapshot when a sim ages up, so when I look at a newly aged up toddler and go, "Damn. That kid has some serious FCS," I can look at the toddler pics of its parents or older siblings and see if the poor thing will grow into its face or not.

[lowbart]

What's FCS?

On topic: I don't really keep track of my sims on paper. The ones that need to be sorta synchronized, I just try to remember.

[Zazazu]

Fugly Child Syndrome. My sims are more prone to Fugly Toddler Syndrome, but I do have a couple whose genes didn't mix well for their girl children. The boy is okay.

[lefty]

I'll sorta cross post from the other thread:

I have a program that acts like a wiki that I edit, with a page for every playable (and any townies that donate their genetic material but aren't moved in) detailing things about that sim. I have seperate pages with the pictures I took with captions for myself as I get down to generation 5 and say "hey, doesn't this sim act a lot like that one sim way back when? Let me check..." and a detailed family tree made in photoshop, along with lots of misc info on my sims. I dare say I almost have as much fun working on the "database" as playing! I get a little OCD with it I think.

 To give you an idea here are some screenshots of how I have mine set up for my current hood, though I'm constantly revamping it as I play since the hood is so young:







When I first started doing this with an old hood it was because I had tried remembering, but as the hood branched out I found I couldn't remember all these sims and stuff, even though I had tons of snapshots.

I also tried an arr'd version of family tree maker, and that was ok, but I find that every genealogy program I try always tends to have some features that annoy me, or not all the features I like, so I haven't really been able to decide on one.

[Gelina]

I keep track of my sims in an Access database with about 7 tables in it and various forms/reports.  I'm constantly tweaking it depending on my current style of play (I have built in rules that run based on certain fields for the family/sim/neighborhood).

I play in Windowed mode so I have the database and Sims up at the same time and record pertinent things as I play.

[pixiejuice]

On paper - my chart is one page, all 84 playable sims listed from oldest to youngest, and my ages are modified so that one day = one year in a normal lifespan.  I'm very picky about this, so that if a couple has a child when they're 20, they'll be 40 when the child is 20, or whatever.  If they get out of sync for whatever reason, I'll cheat them back to their proper place.  I play 2-sim-days for each household in the round.  It goes kind of slow, but I have fun with it. 

[Roux]

1. Sync timer for rotations. Then I use the neighborhood family description to keep track of the current day and upcoming events for each family, so I can quickly see where I need to play without loading a family. I think I saw someone here suggest it a long time ago. The neighborhood family description typically looks like this:

Code:

D59 18:00
Event D60: Morgan ages to teen
Event D61: (Ursula ages to toddler) Thomasina gives birth 13:00

2. Simple text file to log events, sorted by day. Also to record random thoughts I get for future reference or storytelling purposes (e.g., that sim kid should be popularity because she keeps being brought home from school by other kids).
3. Sort & rename pictures every so often so I know when and where they happened.
4. Family trees recorded in Family Echo (thanks to notovny for providing that link some time ago).

It may look like a lot, but it's actually very time-effective. I've tried various genealogy programs, but never cottoned on to them, and I don't like the way it looks in a spreadsheet. Reminds me too much of work, I suppose. 

[Grugly]

I keep track of my sims in an Access database with about 7 tables in it and various forms/reports.  I'm constantly tweaking it depending on my current style of play (I have built in rules that run based on certain fields for the family/sim/neighborhood).

I play in Windowed mode so I have the database and Sims up at the same time and record pertinent things as I play.

Access?

MICROSOFT Access?

You must be a masochist.

[Lorelei]

I don't.

When my game was working properly, I would just choose a family that hadn't been played in a while, mouse over each one's head to make sure i remembered their named properly, and let them do their things. Sometimes I'd just take over each family member consecutively to let them have a chance to be micromanaged.

Then again, I'm not long-term-goal-oriented with my style of play. I've had one death, one vamp, one plantsim, and three births (two alien). I'm more into decorating and building and making Sim likenesses of real folks, and being OCD about organizing my CC.

[Assmitten]

Yeah, I'm pretty much on the "fuck it" school of thought. "Who are these people? Why are they so ugly? I made them? BLURGH." Now they're a houseful of beloved romance sims that I have played for weeks, tomorrow they will be all smited to death as visitors on someone else's lot. So yeah, no long term goals. Just kind of banging them together like Barbies until a head pops off. "Oops."

[Faizah]

I pretty much just play, I've hardly ever done anything that needed records. Lately, I've been planning things a little more, like, "Boronia will have endless pregnancies." or "Potato-face Brae will spawn with Count Pointy-nose once he graduates college." Even then, I'll only 'keep track' as long as it interests me. I made no note of potato-face Brae's 'plan', and was lucky to remember it when he finally graduated.

Although, I suppose I am keeping track of the generations. I started with a single CAS Sim, Aden Elin. Between him and his wife, they had Baras, Brae and Boronia. Baras had Corona and Chrysopoeia, Brae had Cabbage and Another-C-Name, and I don't have Boronia's list handy, but they all also started with C. (And, by the 10th name -- 14th if you count Baras' and Brae's kids -- I was running low. The final pair got Cadman and Caldwell.)

Boronia's lot did get photos taken, for each birth and age transition, as well as a text file indicating birth order, with names and genders of her children. And that's about the extent of it. I'll probably only play them through uni, ship them off to the holding pen another lot when they graduate, to be friend and romance fodder for future playables. I haven't even decided yet whether to keep up with the spawn photos now that the spawners are elders. I may well continue, if for no other reason than completeness.

Boronia is an elder with 12 kids from 8 pregnancies, potato-face Brae has a pointy-nosed little girl whose name I forget, missions accomplished. Moving on.

[Nepheris]

I have a list of familynames and put a tick beside them for every week I've played them, to keep em on the same timeline. That's pretty much it :p