Long as we're doing download sites

[veilchen]

P.S.: I am a she. I am surprised folks keep getting this off or putting s/he in doubt, because my name sounds very girly to me. Jade, first name, Eliott, last name. Hmmmm.....

You're quite welcome, I like your neighborhoods very much. I kind of concluded that you make individual lots too, but then again, I usually shy away from jumping the gun.

Same with gender. I rather just ask, then assign the wrong gender. Although Jade is a predominantly female name in the english speaking world, in different cultures it might be different. Or, you could be a guy named Eliott who likes the Jade gemstone. Or it could be a completely made up usersame, or....

[Emma]

Lets see now, who can I remember off hand?
Reggikko and Emma have marvelous lots on their page at the official board. You can get to them by clicking on the links in their respective signatures. Both offer great starter homes with potential.

Aww shucks-thanks *grins*

You can get great starter houses from Around the Sims 2. They are basic ones from Sims 2 (no expansions) They look pretty good in the neighbourhood too! My girls use them. I just use my own lots-I really love the 2x2 lot size at the moment, and I have made quite a lot of houses (and a cemetary). I just need to get motivated to upload.

[julieb]

Building houses is the fun part for me...I like to use actual houseplans I find online and create my homes that way.  Authentic Historical Designs and eplans.com are two great sites.  I have two homes up for download on my simpage right now (julieanne4678).  They're not starter homes but they are one story and on the smaller side--both are based on plans from Authentic Historical Designs.  The names of the houses are the actual plan names.

When I download houses I usually get them at TSR or the exchange.   

[resmc]

Although I like to build my own houses, make my own sims etc., I still like to download things. However, most of the really nice things I see online require "donations". Although they work hard to make their stuff, I don't feel like coughing up $$$ for just a few objects from a certain site, and don't feel comfortable giving my credit card # (well, my mom's) to random sites. I still periodically check the exchange,but want more variety. Does anyone know of any good, *FREE* (and I mean TOTALLY free, not just some of the items)  sites that are as nice as the PayPal sites? I have searched all over creation, (and continue to do so), and have yet to find a large totally free site with really good quality downloads.

[BlueSoup]

Although I like to build my own houses, make my own sims etc., I still like to download things. However, most of the really nice things I see online require "donations". Although they work hard to make their stuff, I don't feel like coughing up $$$ for just a few objects from a certain site, and don't feel comfortable giving my credit card # (well, my mom's) to random sites. I still periodically check the exchange,but want more variety. Does anyone know of any good, *FREE* (and I mean TOTALLY free, not just some of the items)  sites that are as nice as the PayPal sites? I have searched all over creation, (and continue to do so), and have yet to find a large totally free site with really good quality downloads.

Well, it's a small site, but I really love www.holysimoly.com.  They have pretty much everything for free (except I think maybe 2 or 3 donation items you can definitely live without - IMO I find them to be the worst things on the site).

[resmc]

Great link. I don't think I've seen so many (good) recolours of (good) items! Great layout/format. And it's *free*!
Thanks, Blue!

[BlueSoup]

You're welcome - I'm glad you like it.  If I was to limit myself to only one site of objects, that site would be it.  And all of their stuff looks really good in the game as well. 

[Sagana]

I bookmarked Holy Simoly - great site :) Thanks everyone, I'm really enjoying all the recommendations, even if I didn't say so specifically (cuz I have trouble keeping up). I'm even managing to get things fairly well of the official site (and there are some lovely houses there, thank you all.) I'll happily spend most of the holidays downloading everything - plenty to keep me busy :)

[resmc]

Not only did I bookmark it, i practically downloaded every item/mesh/recolor on the site!
Thanks again, Blue!

[cwykes]

<tiptoeing through tsr>....
PS - Your lots are great looking cwykes. I particularly like the farmer's market. What a cute idea. Unless I'm missing something only one of them is in the free rotation right now (grabbed but I'll keep an eye out and pick-up the others when they turn out so I can see how the river looks in my hood (I really need some like that - to be a "canal" out to the sea.)

Glad you like them, sorry - I put up a couple of 2x2 and a community lot yesterday and thought I saw them on offer (Simpotence resulted in 3 new lots and a 'hood!) If you want to PM me with an e-mail address and a max file size, I'll zip over a lot or two.  They are 600-1200MB each as I remember unzipped. Or a 'hood with 40 lots in an 11MB RAR file (Not all different!).  I'd love a screenshot from NL about how it looks.  Had trouble with the latest lot where I was trying to hide a pool in the river.  The water level doesn't stay right!

At the risk of getting lynched - TSR has a good business model which means it's going to survive.  Profitable is not totally a bad thing, people.  Look at how many sims1 sites have closed down with content lost forever to those of us who didn't get it in time.   I tried to revisit Persimmon Grove the other day - account suspended.  Felt really sad.  TSR is still providing access to a huge amount of Sims1 stuff.   Wouldn't you rather people put their stuff on TSR than just quit?  Paying is your choice - Being a really penny-pinching individual, I've never paid for anything off TSR.   Bunny Waffles is/was another favourite of mine. Never did build the Victorian baths, got all the downloads though.

We had some links to sites with houses on the sims1 board - can't find them though.  Too busy at Holysimoly (Great link thanks)  EDIT - found a thread with links to houseplan sites - people said they used them for ideas
"Here are some more house plan sites:
http://www.globalhouseplans.com/index.htm
http://www.amazingplans.com/
http://www.stockplans.com/
http://www.coolhouseplans.com/
http://theplancollection.com/
http://www.oldhouseweb.com/houseplans/

And a very interesting one:
http://www.castlemagic.com/color.html

And this one has several links to other sites as well:
http://www.houseplanes.com/g-common2.php?ppid=1040&K=house%20plans

SimMasterAnubis (aka KatAnubis) "

[BlueSoup]

I sometimes use house plans to make houses, but I invariably get so frustrated trying to follow along, I end up just using it as a very rough outline.  I am so boring with my houses anyway, it's so pathetic.

I like one-floor living (better for me to keep track of them), so all my houses have only one floor.  I've made multiple story houses, and I always bulldoze them to go back to 1 floor. 

[cwykes]

Sounds familiar! I tend to prefer my sims crammed into a small space where I can see them and 1 level is much easier.  If you only have 1 or 2 sims, you don't lose track of them upstairs, but then you don't need the upstairs!

[resmc]

I like how big houses look, but find little use for 4 floors, and 19 rooms. I tend to lose sims in houses that big. I go to take care of one, and the rest of the family ends up hiding behind a chimney.

The idea to use house plans has inspired me! I have already downloaded several plans, and have
already built a house! This is way too fun.  Thanks for the idea and links,cwykes!

[Marg]

Hi cwykes

    As soon as I read your message about PersimmonGrove I had to go look and see.    The site is still there
Thank Goodness!    I haven't played Sims1 for quite awhile.  But this is one of my favorite places.

Go here
 http://homepage.mac.com/koromo/PersimmonGrove.html

[veilchen]

At the risk of getting lynched - TSR has a good business model which means it's going to survive.  Profitable is not totally a bad thing, people.  Look at how many sims1 sites have closed down with content lost forever to those of us who didn't get it in time.   I tried to revisit Persimmon Grove the other day - account suspended.  Felt really sad.  TSR is still providing access to a huge amount of Sims1 stuff.   Wouldn't you rather people put their stuff on TSR than just quit?  Paying is your choice - Being a really penny-pinching individual, I've never paid for anything off TSR.   Bunny Waffles is/was another favourite of mine. Never did build the Victorian baths, got all the downloads though.

There shall be no lynching, because, well, who's gonna clean up the mess?

I have nothing against enterprise, or earning an honest dollar, but I do strenously object to doing so by trying to pull the wool over unsuspecting or gullible people. But... let's not get into that, it'll only lead to unpleasantness, and will be unproductive.

Truth is, there are many sites out there that offer marvelous items for free. Items that are well done and look great in the game. I am guilty of one thing though; whenever I recommend sites in a predominantly american site, I omit the great sites from around the world. I just assume that americans are not interested in those, and that is very presumptuous of me.

Anyway, here is my making amends. I doublechecked and I'm pretty sure all of them offer english translations. Warning to all though, the english is sometimes neither orthographically nor grammatically correct. So no complaints please. The russian site has the english translations in a bundle right under the russian ones, just look down.

http://www.haksenhausen.de/haeuser.htm

http://sims2ellis.h15.ru/index.html

http://www.einfach-simlisch.de/index1.html

http://www.m-sim-o.com/    (the only german on this site is spoken in the forums, but that's not where the goodies are anyway )

[Sagana]

Oh, thanks for the "world-wide" ones!

A couple of those I've been too, but several I haven't :) Personally, I love "non-US-English" sites (even without translations). I know a few words of German, just enough to get in trouble or work through where something is and find I can even navigate a Japanese site (not a word of Japanese I assure you) if I pay attention to the letterstrings that repeat and/or if there's a pic here and there. It's not too hard to figure out where "download" is :) and I've even registered on some that have free registration in languages I don't speak (long as they don't ask *too* many questions).

They're so much fun to browse as the worldview is different so likely many of the things available for the sims are too and I'm just really big on"multi-cultural" I guess you'd call. I like diversity.

[Motoki]

At the risk of getting lynched - TSR has a good business model which means it's going to survive. 

Yep, they do. Find a community with a lot of non-tech savvy, naieve, gullible, addicted people ready to hand you their money. EA is taking a page from their book and is starting to get in on this business model on a much more regular basis too.

Oh and Veilchen, I must warn everyone that Elis has been known to have some EXTREMELY high polygon objects. I've counted some objects from their site out over 50k.   Download from them with caution and absolutely open those meshes up in SimPE and check the count. If it's anything over 10k faces or vertices then toss it. If it's in the 5k-10k range I personally would toss it too, but if you absolutely must have it (a 5k-10k mesh, not one over 10k ) then use it sparingly.

[veilchen]

Yes, indeed he does, although the site has gotten a little more cautious. The older models however do have a high count (ok, extremely high count ), so download with caution, no matter how tempting.

Thanks for catching that Motoki, I swear I wanted to add that... stupid real life, always interupting my concentration. However, ModernSimsObjects (the last link) have an extremely low polygon count, and their stuff looks great in the game.

Also watch out with EinfachSimlisch, some of their stuff is too high as well. Their polygon count is available for viewing though, just click on the link that says 'download' above the polygon count notification, and open up the notepad that brings up. Too bad really, some of the real nice looking stuff is unfortunately pretty high as well.

[cwykes]

Hi cwykes

    As soon as I read your message about PersimmonGrove I had to go look and see.    The site is still there
Thank Goodness!    I haven't played Sims1 for quite awhile.  But this is one of my favorite places.

Go here
 http://homepage.mac.com/koromo/PersimmonGrove.html

Thank goodness! - I had a link to the old site in my favourites folder.  There's a note says the site moved over the summer. 

At the risk of getting lynched - TSR has a good business model which means it's going to survive.

Yep, they do. Find a community with a lot of non-tech savvy, naieve, gullible, addicted people ready to hand you their money. EA is taking a page from their book and is starting to get in on this business model on a much more regular basis too.

The non-tech savvy ones are safer downloading from TSR off the official site.  TSR don't have lots with families in that create "grey sims" and they do check the lots out for hacks and you don't find pirated content in them.  EA are going to have to take more resposibility for their stuff if they want you to pay for it.  If I were their lawyer I'd be worried about the pirated content they are already hosting....

[Motoki]

they do check the lots out for hacks and you don't find pirated content in them.

They do that now? They didn't used to. At first they said nothing at all about it, then they told all the creators to not upload houses with hacks and custom objects, but it was voluntary as the creators were expected to police themselves. Now I see that have that TSRAA or whatever program because I guess people were bitching about their stuff getting stuffed in houses there. I used to be a good way to get free objects that weren't on free rotation.

Call me cynnical, but if they are checking the lots now, it's probably because they don't want pay stuff in there.  And I am quite sure Steve doesn't check them himself. He probably uses some his unpaid flunk dogs to do it like Evil Kitten and SWWWWWWWWWW or whatever the heck her name is.

EA are going to have to take more resposibility for their stuff if they want you to pay for it.  If I were their lawyer I'd be worried about the pirated content they are already hosting....

Yes, it is rather amusing that they take a no piracy stance and yet host pirated content (from pay sites anyhow) on their site. Apparently they've seen to it that the holiday pack doesn't get sucked up into the abyss that is lot files by installing it all to Program Files instead of downloads.

[JoanE]

http://thesims2.ea.com/mysimpage/uploads.php?user_id=1923809&nstart=1&asset_type=lot

for NL

http://thesims2.ea.com/mysimpage/uploads.php?user_id=146682&nstart=1&asset_type=lot

Base game and Uni.

Thank you for the mention, Veilchen. If you are interested the Invisible house and the Bothy are on the Uni page.

Joan

[veilchen]

http://thesims2.ea.com/mysimpage/uploads.php?user_id=1923809&nstart=1&asset_type=lot

for NL

http://thesims2.ea.com/mysimpage/uploads.php?user_id=146682&nstart=1&asset_type=lot

Base game and Uni.

Thank you for the mention, Veilchen. If you are interested the Invisible house and the Bothy are on the Uni page.

Joan

You're welcome Joan. Anyone with that much imagination deserves mentioning. I enjoyed a lot of laughs and cackles thanks to your creations.

[cwykes]

they do check the lots out for hacks and you don't find pirated content in them.

It says so on the page you have to read before you submit something. They don't catch everything though.  I reported a file with some esf stuff in it and PM'd the creator who didn't realise what had happened.  The fact they can afford do it at all for such a huge amount of stuff is because the site is established and has some money to operate with.

And I am quite sure Steve doesn't check them himself. He probably uses some his unpaid flunk dogs to do it like Evil Kitten and SWWWWWWWWWW or whatever the heck her name is.

I'd rather he spent his time doing some creating anyway.  OK, no comparison, but would you want JM to write hacks or check files?

TSRAA seems like a good idea.  You give people permission to use that item in their lots. BUT how do you find the damn things again later?  They don't have special codes identifying them as far as I can see.

[JenW]

A lot of people either put "TSRAA" in the item description (both on the site and in the file description for Homecrafter stuff), in their profile, or both. Also, there's a list in the building forum stickied that has a list of all the TSRAA members and links to their profiles.

Jen

[Motoki]

they do check the lots out for hacks and you don't find pirated content in them.
It says so on the page you have to read before you submit something. They don't catch everything though.  I reported a file with some esf stuff in it and PM'd the creator who didn't realise what had happened.  The fact they can afford do it at all for such a huge amount of stuff is because the site is established and has some money to operate with.

So it is still more or less voluntary then. LOL they assume people read. I used to work in customer service, trust me, they don't.

And I am quite sure Steve doesn't check them himself. He probably uses some his unpaid flunk dogs to do it like Evil Kitten and SWWWWWWWWWW or whatever the heck her name is.

I'd rather he spent his time doing some creating anyway.  OK, no comparison, but would you want JM to write hacks or check files?
[/quote]

He actually creates? I've never seen much from him, but the odd house or something but I rather think he spends most of his time sipping mai tais on a louge chair in the French Riviera with all the cash he's constantly raking in.