Alternate reality neighborhood

[windy_moon]

You'd think with all the reading I've done, I'd have picked up the answer to this question, but I'm 'fraid not.

I'd get a kick out of playing an alternate reality neighborhood.  Currently, I only play Pleasantview.  I put in a lot of CAS families and characters to start, playing the Maxis Sims as an afterthought to what I had in mind. Found I really like the Maxis Sims.

So, I'd like to start Pleasantview over, but as an additional neighborhood, not a replacement. (I love my oriiginal hood.)  I don't want to clone the Sims, I want to start the gameplay the way Maxis had set up and create an alternate reality for the Maxis Sims.

I could just set up another user on Windows XP, but I'd prefer not.  Is there a way to just copy the neighborhood file from the Sims disk and change the number?  OR, could I go into my husband's user profile on XP and steal Pleasantview from him and rename under my files as a fourth neighborhood?

You'd think I'd know the answer to this question.  I'm afraid of trying without asking because I do not want to hose my game.  I'm too attached.

Thanks!

[Kukes]

I copied Pleasantview - same reason, alternate reality. I copied the neighbourhood file and changed the numbers - but you also have to change all the numbers in the character files, the lot files (e.g. N001_User0000.package to N[number]) - basically check every file in the folder. It took me a while but I got into a rhythm after a bit. It was worth it - I resurrected all the dead spouses, and it's been a very different experience from the first time (when I was so incompetent Dina had aspiration failure every day, too many babies, and Mortimer died really early on... leaving Alexander with some harsh teenage years).

[lechapeau]

We've done some renaming of the files for duplicates, and you do have to go through all the folders.
It took around ten to fifteen minutes the slow way.
Explanantion:

http://forums.thesimsresource.com/showthread.php?t=283730

Also Zythe put this way of renaming it up on our Maple Valley thread. I tried it the other day for my daughters versions and it was really simple.
I copied this link from PlaidSquirrel's post in the Simpotence thread, with their directions to the post as well, mainly because it goes to the page and also saved me trawling through our thread!
Post #1304  It is 4 or 5 down:

http://forums.thesimsresource.com/showthread.php?p=3060820&highlight=command+prompt#post3060820

It says you don't have to rename the Storytelling folder...You don't *have* to, most photos show up fine.
Some are named as snapshot_00000001_then the mixed numbers/letters to the particular photo, there are then the thumbnails and also a web entry file. If you replace the 1 with whatever your new neighborhood number is then the Neighborhood Story shows up as well, if it's important to you.

[windy_moon]

Awesome, thanks guys!

I know what I'm doing this weekend.   (It was either this or laundry.  )

[Motoki]

The laundry is what you do when you're waiting for the game to load. 

[yetyak]

Having the computer in the laundry room helps there...Yes, I am strange.

[Dark Trepie]

I've considered doing an alternate reality Pleasentview myself, but I was planning on it being a bit more "alternate".  Like what if Mortimer was abducted by aliens instead of Bella.  What it Skip or Darleen didn't die.  What if the Brokes were rich and the Goths were poor.  And etc.  Of course, doing it this way would mean that I would have to extract every sim from Pleasentview with SimPE's sim surgury and rebuild Pleasentview from the ground up.

I also thought a gender swapped version of Pleasentview would be interesting.  How does Morticia Goth or Donna Lothario sound...?   

[windy_moon]

The laundry is what you do when you're waiting for the game to load. 

Yeah, um, theoretically...but I get absurdly focused when I'm Simming.  I actually stare at the screen and wait for the boxes to start flashing.  (Send help.)

Okay, the instructions worked beautifully, and the neighborhood Pleasantview Redux is up and running.  My first stop was the Brokes, since I had ignorantly "broken" that family up the first time around. (I killed Brandi off, gasp, only playable Sim I ever did that to and have felt horribly guilty ever since.)

Now, everybody is in Platnimum, Beau knows how to walk, talk and pee in a pot, Beau will be turning into a child shortly...and Brandi is near birthing.  Oh, and Dustin had his first kiss.

Sold the stupid pinball machine, curtains and painting so they have some cash.

Atoning for my mistakes......time to go to bed and rest up for a heavy day of  laundry Simming. 

[Scotty]

I have a duplicate Pleasantview, and I used a mass renaming program to do it. I think this one will rename all the files at once: http://www.freedownloadscenter.com/Utilities/File_Maintenance_and_Repair_Utilities/Mass_Renamer.html

It sure beats renaming everything one at a time.

[Scotty]

Here, this may be a better one: http://www.123renamer.com/download.htm

[Zeljka]

I started to rename a Neighbourhood manually and just couldn't do it. I found Oscar's File renamer at http://www.mediachance.com/free/renamer.htm,
I liked it because it's easy -set up like Windows Explorer. (ctrl-H, to find and replace, then Apply Changes and you're done) 

I tried Strangetown but Nervous Subject was just too creepy and that house boggled my mind, so I deleted all 3. All the talk lately almost makes me regret not giving the others a try, (meh, the shakespeare one really doesn't interest me)

[windy_moon]

Here, this may be a better one: http://www.123renamer.com/download.htm

Wow, that could be so handy or dangerous.  Dangerous because I've always been obsessed with alternate reality or parallel dimension plot lines in books and films. (Saw some cheesy sci fi movie with that kind of plot when I was a little kid in the 60's, and I was hooked.)  Make it too easy for me, and I fear there might be no end to the Pleasantview versions I'd create. 

Meanwhile, I have a work project I think that utility (or one of the other links) could help me with.  Hmmmm. Thanks!!

Zeljka wrote:

I tried Strangetown but Nervous Subject was just too creepy and that house boggled my mind, so I deleted all 3. All the talk lately almost makes me regret not giving the others a try, (meh, the shakespeare one really doesn't interest me)

Yeah, it's other people here who have expanded my thinking about the Maxis Sims.  I was narrowly focused, when starting the game, on replicating my own Sims 1 characters in CAS and I only gave a handful of the Maxis characters a real shot in life. 

I've considered playing Strangetown, but alien story lines don't have a ton of appeal for me. (To play, I enjoy reading about other people's Strangetowns.)  Haven't run across many people who have gotten into Veronaville. 

'course, I'm probably going to be busy enough running 20 different Pleasantviews and doing laundry.

[lindaetterlee]

'course, I'm probably going to be busy enough running 20 different Pleasantviews and doing laundry.

lol I feel the same way.

[eaglezero]

Thanks everyone for explaining how to do all of this. My Pleasantview, Mark Two is up and running, which is exciting. Dirk Dreamer won't be killed by an evil stepmother, Cassandra won't marry the philandering Don, Daniel and Mary-Sue won't stay together, and Angela and Lilith won't become best friends. It's all terribly exciting.

I've considered playing Strangetown, but alien story lines don't have a ton of appeal for me. (To play, I enjoy reading about other people's Strangetowns.)  Haven't run across many people who have gotten into Veronaville. 

Veronaville is one of my main 'hoods. It was the first one I played, because I looked at it and was like, "Eh? Shakespeare?" Bianca Monty was the first Sim I played. She died really quickly, because the length of time it takes to starve to death has been reduced from the original Sims (Did anyone else notice this? It used to take about three days, now it takes less than one!). I was really startled that the Grim Reaper came in and watched TV for a really long time.

When Uni came out, I had one of the other Montys resurrect Bianca, so she could marry Kent Capp and he could stop living with Regan and Cornwall. Now, Bianca + Kent and Regan + Cornwall are some of my favorite sims. It's too bad that they're nearing the end of their simmish lives. But it's alright, as they all have children to carry on the line, or whatever.

[baratron]

I tried Strangetown but Nervous Subject was just too creepy and that house boggled my mind, so I deleted all 3. All the talk lately almost makes me regret not giving the others a try, (meh, the shakespeare one really doesn't interest me)

Waah! I adore Nervous! The poor thing has been horribly maltreated by the evil Beakers!

It's true that I have a soft spot for Nervous, because he & Pascal Curious became the first autonomously gay couple in my game. Quite a few people have found this, it's as if the game is set up for it to happen. Basically, because of his extreme personality (including Active 10) when he is a visitor on a lot, he'll stick around for about 21 hours before getting tired and going home. He's a Family sim, and is drawn to babies. And Pascal is kinda shy and needs a partner anyway.

I played Olive Specter's house a lot and boosted their friendship to the point where he could move in with her. Then I used the Encouragifactor to get his personality points back. Once he had a "reasonable" personality (with a bit more Neat and Nice), he proposed to Pascal. And now Pascal, Nervous, two alien kids, Olive & Olive's husband (an ex-handyman) all live together in my reorganised Specter household. Their new house has three floors, which with six playable sims plus visitors and ghosts is a wee bit laggy on my system. But hey .

[Zeljka]

hmm, well it was the first home I tried in the game (the basement room really screwed me up) and he is pretty gruesome looking...
I did later use that neighbourhood to test some things, I played the Curious home for a while but there didn't see any special chemistry between any of them and Nervous (heh heh, yes, he did seem to spend a day or two there) In mine, he's seeing a Singles girl, the Romance one because I don't want either of them to breed.

[BeckerCheez]

I sort of have an alternate reality Curious household.  I packaged the house and moved them into my custom neighborhood.  At this point the brothers were not getting wants for abduction or weren't getting abducted anymore.  They had two alien babies cooking in the proverbial oven at this point.   

Needless to say, Pascal and his son Starboy, the Alien Biker Criminal Mastermind, moved out and lived in their own little house.  Vidcund was single until he became attracted to his brother's wife's sister, Aerith, and had a son with her.  So he has an alien son, Boba Fett the Space Pirate Criminal Mastermind, and Enoch, the Artist.  Lazlo married a family Sim and had two sons with her:  Pepé the lazy cop who married a Romance Sim with a really long last name, and Beel, who's in college.  Now all Curious brothers are dead from old age, Pascal and Vidcund having platnum stones since they achieved permaplat.  Vidcund's wife Aerith is also dead, and Lazlo's wife Yuna is currently recovering from Aspiration Meltdown by dating a gardner.   

[ari_]

I love Nervous as well.

Sadly, by the time I noticed that Nervous was interested in Pascal, Pascal had paired off with someone else's alien girl that the brothers had raised (thank you, teenwoohoo). So Pascal rejected Nervous, very gently. But Nervous still went nuts, and set fire to his home while Circe and Loki were in it. Then Tank Grunt took him in, and they fell in love. They adopted a girl, and I've been slowly giving him Nice points whenever he does something nice to Tank or the girl.

The other 2 Curious brothers had 3 alien kids (Laszlo has twins), and are living with the Singles girls, all of them in custom Jouralist, Photography and Alien Conspiracy careers, except Chloe, who's a fetish model. Since they, along with all other Maxis characters that I play, "moved" (ie, were re-created) to my Custom Neighborhood, everyone of my CAS sims thinks that they're two brothers who're married to two sisters. However, their bedrooms tell a different story...

[birene]

Hey, that's funny, I just put some fresh Maxis Neighborhoods in my game, to see if things would develop differently this time around. I kept the "old" versions too, by renaming them like suggested here. Of course, I had to read about the renaming programms here only after I had already manually renamed 500-1000 files. 

Also, Pascal&Nervus are meant 2be4Eva!11!! This time Pascal got an alien baby boy, while he had gotten a little girl in the first version of Strange Town. I called him Surprise. 

[skandelouslala]

Nervous creeps me out.  He is just plain unsuitable for breeding normally lol
I got Circe out of the Beaker household.  Vicund and her used to have a lil something something back in the day so I figured I'd hook them back up.

I never really got the whole Beaker household anyways.  Maxis set up the other Strangetown households decently and the Beaker household is just meh.

I decided i would make them my household of incredibly strange experiments.  Oh yeah..and Nervous and Loki got joined hehhehe

I created them this house on a "mountain" and created two terrible looking sim/monster/really bad genetic things to carry out my experiments. There's some clones..some children of the grim reaper...and other random things going on up there.

The two "things" are zombies now..and Loki wants to be a zombie so he'll probably get his wish.  I have no idea what to do with the house of freaks now lol

[baratron]

Nervous creeps me out.  He is just plain unsuitable for breeding normally lol

Well, that's obviously why he's meant to be with Pascal & the alien spawn . That way, he can be a parent without passing on any of his genetics.

You see! There WAS a plan!

[yetyak]

I made a female sim for Nervous, that had his features done opposite.  She had big jaw and eyes slanted the other way.  I wanted to see what the kids looked like.  Test and Trial are aliens, not too cute.  Different and Master are quite homely.  Loyal looks normal so far, but she is only a teen.  Taboo is just a baby, so hard to tell there. 

[VJay]

Believe me or not, but I got the cutest grand children from Nervous. He married Erin Singles and it's true their son was ugly, he looked like his father so I called him Nervous J. lol. Then Nervous J. got married to a not so good looking NPC, I think it was one of the exterminatorsl and they had the cutest twins ever. I really didn't expect cute kids to be born from ugly parents. lol Anyway, Strangetown is THE ONLY neighbourhood I enjoy playing. In my current Pleasantview, Angela, Lilith, Don, Nina, Dina etc they're all dead of old age and it's their children that are having children now. I'm really bored there. I had fun only with Don and the 3rd Broke son that is really cute. 

[Zeljka]

I know it's dreadfully shallow, but I just don't enjoy playing unattractive Sims. (if I want ugly, I can leave my home or turn on the tv)

I don't mind the odd freakishly homely Sim, it adds character, but Challenges requiring continuous introduction of Maxis characters (Npc's, townies) always end up boring me because they all start to look the same. The squinty Pao-mellon eyes, the big ape mouth and awful jawline... I just can't bear to continue breeding them, and a home without breeding is dull indeed. Maybe it's the fact they also bring those horrendous clothes with them.

I didn't mind a few of the homes in Strangetown, Circe and Loki were ok, the Curious brothers were alright -I liked Lazlo (and Vidcund because of his rushing in to poke everyone) Smiths (blech) Singles (ho hum) I made the mistake of pairing Ajay up with another finance sim and almost died of boredom.

I only recently discovered the Grunts and really liked them. I actually thought they were townies - heh heh.
I don't think I'll ever pair up the dad, but the teens are great and the kid... uh, he seems torn between pleasing the tough guys and his love for cooking and cleaning. He's either trying to tell me something, or my hood is glitched because he's spinning wants for paintings and flowers.