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history online since 18 april 2002

The Sims history
in a chronological sequence
start at the bottom of the first page please
& the experience of Ra
note please this is not an objective,
but Ra's subjective view of the incidents
you'll find DLs here in their chronological appearance on SimOnes/simchaotics
marked with a
DL
with
PIC are marked files, which are no more available for DL for you
you can just see, what one can make for this game
with a lot of blood, sweat & tears
if not otherwise stated are all files made by Ra

past <<< presence >>> future


Date incidents
june 2005 holy new world order!
so the brave PayPal decided, that
Tainted Love ist a crude porn site, which offers abusive stuff & makes that way a mount of money & so doesn't deserve to be supported by the moral watchman of the worldwide money flow - what a joy to be reminded which is a monopoly's might
june 2005 what's the difference between a game, which offers to the player the possibility to implement own made stuff & sims, especially sims2?
* sims/sims2 is supporting the world of consumerism & a possibility to some/few to produce creative
* the game, which i would like is supporting a world of creativity for players, which get the needed simple tools into their hands to produce by themselves in an easy way own stuff - there is of course enough space too for extraordinary quality stuff, made by real geniuses, but in the main the game is made for nobodies, which are happy to manage how to slash a color near another one & call that product 'a gown'
if i think about the difficulty to handle a 3D prog, is a game in 3D not the real medium to get folks to be creative besides maybe of pure decoration & arrangement after the DL of stuff produced by the geniuses
* btw. sims/sims2 is supporting also a world of stardom, which i deeply despise
june 2005 i stumbled recently about a new problem of Sims2
the PACKAGES files
i suppose that the overall problem is known to at least several files creators, but i suppose also, that it is not really gotten in it's entire potentiality
so i try to explain ...

in SimsO(riginal) the most complex files are the family & the house files, it's not different to Sims2
the difference lies in the by Maxis programmed files management
in SimsO(riginal) those files do contain a sort of a TAG mentioning the basic file from which the actual file (object eg.) was 'cloned' & if i PACK a house or family file there, the game does not include in the concrete the actual file at all, just the TAG mentioning that actual file & so, if i didn't download that actual used file before i put the new downloaded family/house file into my game & before i play that new family/house file, in the result the game REPLACES the actual used file by the creator of that family/house file through (mostly) a Maxis created one or (here & there :oP) any other 'matching' (along some sort of screwed & not clearly defined routine) file, which i have in my folder
means in the effect for the creator of family/house files, that he needs to accomplish it with an additional, deliberately offered DL of the actual used files in order to offer to the downloader the actual created family or house in all its ment complexity
otherwise, the downloader will get a family or house with a 'poorly' decorated house or a 'poorly' designed sim
OR!!! the game will crash
& i suppose that potential of crashing was the basic argument for Maxis to change that program in Sims2
now the family/house files (& also a singular sim file) includes everytime i pack it to a PACKAGE all the by me used 'under-files' (genetics, clothing, hair, objects, terrain design 'colors' etc.)
means, that in order to not to violate the creator's rights of the actually used files i have to have a virgin pure downloads free game
do you think i exaggerate? no, it is not enough not to use the with a star marked files within my creation of a sim/family/house:
1. since there are eg. Maxis created objects, which are 'allowed' to be included but are the same marked by a star & there are of course my own creations, which are also marked by the same star
2. added the fact, that the space for an info, which can be add to a file to mark it as 'forbidden' is very scarce
3. additional the half senseless automatic file naming by the game, so i cannot track the origin of a file really
4. the meantime even worse way of the game as in SimsO to throw all the by me produced files into some folders (i lost meatime the track how many 'there' are & where they are too, since there are several places, which the game is using)
5. originally by Maxis meant, i cannot edit the once created Sim, if i remove a by a design of a Sim used file, the game replaces it somehow by some other matching file, same as it is in SimO, but different as in SimsO, now i do NOT have ANY direct access to the files, they are all PACKAGED, no bitmap files, no meshes files lying somewhere extern around
in order to replace deliberately a file included in a package i have to hack in
without i cannot even edit my own created packaged files, especially not the Sims themselves
6. & the top is that the PACKAGES do gather also files, which are not really needed - do you think i am joking? no, a simple house without even an ExPack installed, without furniture, without painting of the terrain, without any other added file than the strictly just the by a star UNmarked Maxis windows, doors, one floor & one wall contains some weird files
is that a BUG? looks like
& it remembers myself indeed of virusses or spam at least, since the packed file is actually bigger than it had to be!
given that, the policy rules stated by the creators eg. on their websites runs against the practice of that game
just a creator, who does NOT download any singular file from none site at all can be really sure, that he's not using a forbidden file
any other, even the most cautious creator, who'll offer own files, but has also files downloaded from other sites is in permanent danger to pack a file, which is 'forbidden'
all in all, this is not really a base which allows a frictionless & enjoyable creating of files for that game
the solution would be, same as it was before, that Maxis/EA had really to care for the Sims community & not just how to popularize stronger their game also 'dearly welcomed' on the back of the fans for that game

btw.
i am designing my game once again further after a creative pause
a fresh look at my game & at Sims2 is everytime really enlightning which has to be programed in & which should not

november 2004 i bought & installed TS2 in october
played for 2 weeks maybe & tested the possibilities, changes & borders
the result is, i not even start the game since the last 2 weeks anymore
i made few files for TS2, some houses, families with & without gen mods, some new head meshes with the Body Shop, very few skins for make up, clothing, gen skins
i DLed also some files from thesims2.com & looked, what's to get on fan sites

resume:

* Maxis made the Sims animations astonishing well & in a great mass
* the building section is improved a lot, but there is a too big mass of bugs, glitches & borders still
* the buying arrangement is So La La, some improvents, many new confusions & still the preprogrammed chaos, which will unavoidable appear already after the first 20 new user made objects are in
* the new navigation & arrangement in the neighborhoods is ok
* the Body Shop is at least a middle big catastrophe / some points about / too dark light, bordered view of the meshes, frustrating difference between the possibilities to modify the meshes within the game (family creation) & Body Shop, confusing & fussily navigation, the purest chaos of files appearing already after my first 50 files, i do not find anything really anymore !!! & i cannot recognize anymore which file is made by me & which is DLed (well, stupid me, i had to be overcontrolling !!!)

before the release of the game, i have feared that it would be a big problem to create files because of the 3D meshes - how many people can manage a 3D prog? & how many will learn it indeed? -
but it came differently
Maxis didn't offer any tool to allow to implement own objects at all
& that Body Shop for skins & head meshes is, plain said, a bad joke
body meshes? walls & floors? roofs? carpets?

so, Maxis/EA have decided where they are pointing to & this is more than ever not where i will go
& i am not that dumb, to repeat all the health draining craziness for Maxis/EA as a free creator, since their policy of constant neglect of creative fans is striking

outlook:

i am working now again on my game
it won't be at first 3D, & if it will ever reach the status of 3D depends rather on the easy handling of a 3D prog, which is not in sight for the next years, so the game will be plain 2D
i concentrate at first on the easy possibility to add player created content into the game, anything else, eg, the interactivity of the game's creatures stands aside & will be added first after the interface between game & player is working excellent

the beginning, including an overall shape is done now
maybe i'll post here a screenshot in the next time

august 2004 i added a pure DL site, so from now on, no need to pick the files out of the chronological text
may 2004 about the relation between pay sites, free sites & donations sites

there are of course still alot of totally or mainly free sites, means, which are providing their work to the folks for free & dealing somehow with the possibly costs of the DL traffic (graphics+zips)
mostly are those sites small, new & unknown & as long their work is updated seldom, scars & of a bad up to average quality will the site stay free for a long time, but
if the creators are productive & eager to improve the own abilities, if they update often with an increasing quality of the files, then the traffic breakdown is near

in such a situation is to offer donation files a sort of solution to cover the costs at least for a while
& i suppose it will work mainly for those creators, who point to remain still on a level of amateurs & if they cover their daily living costs from a usual job eg. & if they value a little acknowledgement for their work high - that sort of pay out is probably usual for older creating members

but if a creator is young, a design student maybe, with some future goals, where time & work is a high valued good, so after the first euphoria is the usual acknowledgment in the sims web by far not enough
& that sort of a combination* will end for a site soon in closing, moving as designer to another site, which will have then the traffic probs or ending in a pay site after a probably transition period of donation files

since 2001, the first year in which pay sites started to appear & the donation files started to be normality has the sims web changed its face
in the first year people have experimented more, searching for a sims web direction, up to the release of Hot Date (base game + the first & second expack) Maxis/EA experimented same & was undecided & cautious in changes to the game's engine - HD brought a sharp change in EA's policies to the game & to the sims web, the game started to be used to recruit new fans mainly, serving the changing fashions in & outside the sims web more than the game's consistency (sex, relations, buying, outgoing, amusement, pets, gardening, magic boom, superstar boom),
in the sims web was the main change, EA's relief of web sites to earn "some" money to "cover the costs"

the result of the second within the web was then, that unexperienced & naive creators had to deal with the traffic & lack of acknowledgment, while pay sites gathered becasue of their omnipresence & force to manage a big amount of files & smooth working service the main acknowlegement - sims surfers are still claiming a service, & do not realise that a private fan site is not a money making company, that to work for free out of fun to create is not to compare with a creative paid work of employers

the result of the first, the changes done withing the game engine, is nearly not realised by noone, after some confusement, the most fans were confident with the decreased account of bugs & crashes within the game & the remaining adapted their creations to the stronger & closer drawed borders of that new game engine
the main changes were done withing the sims meshes, bordering them to the FIT-FAT-SKN types, that might be a "small" change, but far in the consequences to the way of sims creation - less experiments, more normality & the exploding concentration on female haircut fashions & clothing
the high increased interaction of sims with each other & especially with the objects, the widening the possibilities of the game far beyond the dwelling borders (downtown, vacation ressort, old town, magic town, glamour town) have brought more confusion for creators than an explosion of creativity
the main new user created files offered in the sims web are since years tons of room sets, with static functionality (one can see often sims sitting around & reading) made mainly for the usual dwelling, so made for the first 2 ex packs
HD - on much fewer sites, there are also some shop & restaurant arrangements, which are mostly cloned & recolored & not changed in shape
UL - for the gardening & pets there are just singular sites, offering really inventive & unusual files
files for vacation resorts are seen nearly not at all
few files here & there for SS
magic city files are also available very seldom & mostly cloned/recolored





* increasing quality, increasing traffic costs, increasing work & time spent with creation & site management, decreasing acknowledgment - the fan fun turning to strenous work


05 may 2004 Simply Sims moved from sims to second life

well, let's say, i'm some lost between all the possibilities, which are none
what i find regarding that simulation stuff is not what i like to have
all is too aggressive, too commercial, too much about popularity
all that i can have in my normal human life, if i will, so why the shitty same in a simulated world too?
where is just the first sims innocence gone?

03 may 2004 Sim Skins
so SimSkins is now a pay site too - well - was predictable as there is no escape from the dilemma of popularity, good quality & no support from the official side (EA)

Unlaced Sims
Frilly Sims & Pickle Sims try another way - they invented a common pay site with some objects sets & meshes/skins
i am very doubtful about the success of that solution

it is indeed still hurtful to see fans creating at first for fun just to be slammed by their own creativity, productivity, talent & striving for quality

& EA is chaffing their hands about so many cheap workers ...
02 may 2004 looks like many sims creatives escape the meantime chronic traffic costs (usually known as "bandwidth") of an own website opening eg. a yahoo group
there are meantime over 1000 such groups offering any sort of sims files
28 april 2004 few days ago i started after months of disinterest The Sims, which are still in my HDs, probably out of pure laziness to remove all the thousands of files, however - i was bored to death - for the first time i realised not mainly the tiredness to deal with all the borders, bugs & balks but the tiredness of the gameplay itself, which turned to boredom - i have meantime so far all expacks, but although i installed MM short after i bought it, so the SS is still untouched & i start to doubt, that i will ever install it at all

in the last months i tried "BeBop", a pixel version of Sims for PDAs & i played very little "Singles", a german mix of Sims & Big Brother - both games are lacking unfortunately, what made me stay in touch with that sort of games - the possibility to implement my own creations into the game
Dejobaan Bebop   Singles: Flirt Up Your Life
BeBop REVIEW    

so why not back to Sims?
i surfed the last 3 days through the Sims web again, & i met as ever a flood of feminine way to decorate the simulation of a shallow consumption reality, there are of course still some unusual sites with some experiments to widen those borders, but how can it be possible to implement real experiments into a predetermined cycle of nothing than a human, white, christian & western normality - there is no escape & no space for something realy new - the Sims space will be ever bordered to this normality - all, to what i would like to widen this game is not possible - result: boredom

Sims 2 - i do not expect any radical change in the course of to be bored - to make that game more diversified & more complex & more like the above described reality is not making it more interesting, but speeding up the appearance of boredom - well, i will buy it, i will test it

what's with my own game?
the main cause, why the tryouts haven't crossed the beginning is mainly my lack of decision to make it at all - nevertheless, i haven't quit the idea, so maybe one day i'll come up with that game, currently nothing new about to say

well - there is a new version of the Tmog 2.0 - a Beta version - ok, Don Hopkins' tinkering further with Sims - probably we will see that tool implemented one day into the game officially - maybe i'll test that Beta, maybe before i deinstall Sims for good

presently Sims are for me more interesting as the websites appearance than the game itself & somehow i think the most of the creating fans, especially the experienced one feel like that too, sounds schizophrenic - because of that only remaining interest, i'm updating once again a little the Links section, very tiring, as ever ...


past <<< presence >>> future




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