2.9 Wherein Death Comes Sooner than Expected

Apr8

The Samples, with the new addition, sat down to a family meal, not realizing that this was the last meal they would have together with this roster.

At the ripe old (and undeserving age) of 96 days, it’s time for Jared to go.

And the Grim Reaper’s time to come for his due.

Farewell, Jared. You were an amazing pain in the ass. You couldn’t even pick a helpful time to bite it.

You pretty much deserve whatever the afterlife has to offer you.

Though, for some reason, your family will miss you, especially now that they won’t have to deal with you.

I can totally understand why this would be hard on Connor. Despite Jared’s assholitude to everyone else, he and Connor were always close.

And even Susie. After a while, you even get used to sources of deep irritation.

But didn’t Lance hate this guy?

And Layla, did you even exchange two sentences with him?

Really, though, I’ll probably miss him the most. The random conflict and rudeness made the whole family a whole lot more fun. He leaves a hole that will probably be filled with more saccharine and sweetness.

Or maybe he’ll come back as a ghost.

2.8 Till Death Do We Part

Apr5

There was only one thing on everyone’s mind’s.

Tomorrow was the big day. Lance and Layla tried to calm their jitters with gardening and martial arts books, respectively.

Before going to sleep, Lance achieved his red belt in Sim Fu.

I’m sure that chair is terrified.

The next morning, Susie made breakfast for everyone.

Jared, of all people, desperately wanted to plan this event, so the family let him with some trepidation. (Huh? Jared suddenly has a wish to throw a formal wedding party?)

They piled into the car to head to the church.

Except, well, the father of the groom, who had an attack of brain fart.

Should have seen that coming. I’d way it was old age, but this is a man who was late to his OWN wedding.

The bride couldn’t hold in her enthusiasm.

The guests piled in.

Including a whole bunch of people who weren’t even invited. Some of them the Samples had never seen before. Think you’re going to get a free piece of cake, huh?

And since when does Jared moon over love?

And bringing up the rear is Connor, who finally remembered that something important was going on today.

Of course, the only vehicle left was Lance’s bike. How fast can he pedal? Will he make it?

Just in time. Whew.

With this ring…

I thee wed…

And all my worldly possessions I thee endow.

You may kiss the bride.

By the authority invested in us by the Grim Reaper, till death do us part.

The air is filled with the sobs and sniffles of the guests.

Though some let their minds wander.

And, well, it was a risk to invite Malika, but the offensive stink came from another direction this time.

Fortunately, she really cranked up the BO after all the important stuff was over. But it did lead to a mass exodus after the vows.

Congratulations from the father of the groom.

Lance: Are we good now?

Maybe.

But maybe we should just stay apart.

I present to you, Mr. and Mrs. Lancelot and Layla Sample.

This is cause for celebration! Everyone dance!

Now for the best part.

(I had a dollhouse extravaganza with this. The church and Layla’s wedding gown are downloads from Mod the Sims and The Sims Resource. I’ve always been baffled as to why there’s no church or really any good wedding venue that comes with the game, and the idea of a Grim Reaper church was just awesome. I also got Layla’s veil from The Sims Resource, and it seems to be the only one in existence, which shocks me. Though it was rendered stiffly, and the game couldn’t handle collision detection for it, so I can see how it might be a pain.)

2.7 Career Moves

Apr5

Time and arthritis were starting to give Connor real trouble.

But he couldn’t let that keep him from his life’s passion.

(Some aftermath of installing awesomemod led something in Connor’s data to get screwed up. He walked around for about a day and a half with his arms twisted in an impossible position. I really should have made a video, b/c still shots just don’t give a feel for how weird it was.)

In fact, he pounded the keys so hard that he broke the computer, JUST as he hit enter to send the new manuscript to his publisher. The book was a raging success, so the computer had not died in vain.

Way to lift a finger, Lancelot.

Jared had always slacked off at his job, but after talking with Rachel, something new started burning in his brain. He might not be a real father, but maybe he’d be a top chef.

Layla’s new job wasn’t her best fashion statement

But she was promoted on her first full day.

Meanwhile, Susie had an autograph session at the stadium that was a total bomb. Only two people showed, one of whom was her old friend Aimee, Malika Williams’ mother. And Aimee didn’t even want an autograph. She just wanted to catch up.

Had Susie’s career peaked? She had to admit that the strain of putting on big concerts was less fun than it used to be. Her fanbase was growing older. It was starting to feel like she was just putting in her time.

After a lot of thought, she took the big step.

She called the theater and retired from her band.

And returned to what had made her love performing in the first place.

Make ’em dance, Susie.

2.6 Let’s Try This Again

Apr5

Layla had another night in her new home to think about what she wanted.

Other than Lancelot, that is.

She headed to the french bistro, the swanky restaurant in town, and got a job.

Lancelot had told her a dozen times that she didn’t need to work because he had a trust fund, but she wasn’t ready to let him completely support her. (Or, she had a wish worth a nice stack of happiness points.)

She also spent time working in Connor’s garden, which he didn’t mind a bit.

When she got home from her first day, Lancelot saw the tension gone from her face. She was ready to make this place her home. Maybe she was ready to make this family her family. He jumped at the chance.

He was going for sunset on the cliff at the back of the property, but he didn’t quite make it.

But she didn’t seem to mind the darkness.

Lance, you lady-killer.

2.5 Just a Little Too Late

Apr5

Lancelot and Connor got word that Lance’s best friend from high school, Julian Ursine’s, big sister just got married. That stopped Jared in his tracks.

You see, Claire Ursine, Julian’s mom, had lived next door to them in the old cottage. He and Claire had had an on-and-off, no-strings-attached thing. When he sat down and did the math, it became pretty clear — Julian Ursine’s big sister Rachel was his daughter.

Jared dropped by Claire’s old house after work the next day.

By then, though, he’d already received word that Rachel’s new husband was dead. He’d died on their wedding night. (Dude, seriously? The game killed some guy on his wedding night?)

It might not be great time for Rachel’s father to turn up on her doorstep, but he was already committed.

She greeted him cordially enough.

But it was clear she was having a rough time.

Some old habits just don’t die. He tried to be friendly, but eventually his true colors came through.

It turned out his daughter was just like him.

But that probably meant that shouldn’t be in the same room together. Maybe if they took the time, they could fight it out and find common ground. But it just seemed too late for that.

Jared took a cab home, wondering about could-have-beens.

At home, he danced alone to make the thoughts go away.

But found himself with unexpected company.

He had family here, at least, who had put up with his sorry ass his whole life.

Dance that jitterbug, Jared. Or is it ladybug?

(Man, without completely micromanaging Jared, there’s just no way to keep him from being an asshole.)

Simfail: More Awesome than MATY

Apr4

Or, perhaps, “More Awesome than EA Games.”

OK, so what really happened with Layla turned out to be a bug introduced by the World Adventures expansion. I’d read about it on a couple of Sims modding forums, but I never found anything specifically about it on the official EA site. I thought when I read about it that it might apply to me, but I sort of figured that something that serious would be talked about in some official source, so I kind of assumed that I as a rather naive user wouldn’t be subject to it.

The deal appears to be that EA changed the way some of the relationship information was stored when they released World Adventures, and the data wasn’t ported over quite right. The result was that if you entered into a relationship before upgrading to World Adventures, then broke up AFTER upgrading, some data structures wouldn’t be updated to recognize that he was now single. You’ll be listed as single, but you’ll never get any menu optioned relating to starting a new relationship.

When I upgraded to World Adventures, Lancelot was still with Malika. He broke up with Malika afterward. She was listed as his ex-girlfriend on his relationship menu. She was heartbroken, and he took a nasty hit to his mood for breaking her heart. However, the interactions menu still thought he had a girlfriend, so he wasn’t given the option to ask Layla to be his girlfriend. Sweet Sims who are programmatically restricted from two-timing. (Not cheating, just officially two-timing :).)

So, it looks like EA probably released a bug fix for this shortly after Lance broke up with Malika, but it didn’t retroactively fix characters who were already screwed up. The only way to do THAT was to install the legendary Awesomemod by J. M. Pescado, a.k.a. “More Awesome Than You.” I wasn’t wild about doing that b/c it’s a really extensive, unsupported third-party core game hack. I don’t know what effect it might have on installing future expansion and so forth. Also, MATY is kind of a current-generation l33t haxx0r. He talks big, delights in offering sparse, cryptic documentation, and heckles posters on his own forum.

That said, he really knows his crap, and the kind of bugs reported with his Awesommod are really minor. And he, not EA, actually figured this bug out and offered a fix for Sims that were already bugged. I just had to install his entire suite of configuration hacks in order to get that one thing. The only other thing I was that interested in was that he’d coded better skin tone blending for biracial babies. EA’s genetics model is pretty cool, except that it treats skin like a binary choice: if a lily-white character and a deep black character have babies, their babies are either lily-white or deep black, not the expected mocha. This really bugged me, since I kind of dig interracial relationships and the resulting babies.

At any rate, digging through the forums to figure out how to install this on a Mac was pretty hairy, and I was reluctant to post any questions on MATY’s forums b/c I’d inevitably get flamed into next week. Even better, the instructions I found for installing on a Mac were from before the release of World Adventures, and they didn’t work. The favored failure mode for this thing is crash on bootup, which is the source of just a bit of stress, lemme tellya.

So, without further ado, how DO you install Awesommod on a Mac? Well then.

The big thing you need to now is where the “World Adventures directory” is. Once you’ve installed the expansion, the mod framework and Awesomemod must be installed in the expansion directory rather than the main game directory. This is probably easier to find in Windows. On the Mac it’s this.

– Applications->The Sims(TM) 3->The Sims(TM)3.app
– Right click, select “Show Package Contents”
– Contents->Resources->AddOns->The Sims(TM) World Adventures.app
– Right click, select “Show Package Contents”
– Contents->Resources->transgaming->c_drive->Program Files->Electronic Arts->The Sims 3 World Adventures

The final directory is where you’d put Resources.cfg and the Mods directory. Put the dll file in Game->Bin.

Gee, I wonder why I didn’t figure that out immediately?

2.4 She’s the Girl for Me

Apr4

Lance got on the phone that very afternoon and called Layla long-distance. He persuaded her to come on vacation to the States with the thinly-veiled promise of free crash space.

Come, Layla, see Lancelot’s etchings.

Lance talks up his physical prowess.

Layla agrees that she likes what she sees.

Better get that mother introduction out of the way.

Oooooh. Yowza.

Did I mention that Layla’s also a Great Kisser? Remember the last Great Kisser to befall the Sample family? Oh, yeah, Lancelot is her willing love slave. All the way to the logical conclusion.

Layla doesn’t need much encouragement to stay the night.

Considering how amazing she is in bed, she has a few odd prudish turns. Turns out that her fifth personality trait is Never Nude.

In the morning, Lance makes breakfast. And they make small talk about the grossness of meat.

The thing is, she won’t let him bring up the subject of commitment at all. She dodges the subject almost before he can bring it up. The afternoon is a cat-and-mouse game of not letting him ask her to be his girlfriend. And yet, she eagerly accepts his invitation to stay the night a second time. Lance is the marrying type. He can’t let her leave without some assurance of her affection.

On the third day, he realizes that maybe he’s laying it on just a bit too thick. He stops hovering around Layla so much. She and Connor discover their mutual love of gardening.

So, seeing how well she gets along with both of his parents, why not try moving in on a trial basis, no strings attached? If she doesn’t like life here in the States, she can go back any time, no questions asked. To his surprise, she agrees.

Hey, why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?

Who’s he kidding? This cow is a great investment.

2.3 Time to Face the Music

Apr3

Once Lancelot had a (literal) taste of Layla Lufti, his thoughts cleared up about Malika. It was just going to have to end.

He went to her house this time. Jogging, because that paunch was starting to show again.

She was still living in her parents house.

She met him with unsuspicious joy. Despite the fact that he hadn’t talked to her for about a week, Sim time, her relationship meter was near the top. In her eyes, Lance walked on water.

That made this all the harder.

He tried to soften the blow. Tell her it was him, not her.

But it didn’t go over well at all.

She didn’t want to be friends after he’d betrayed her. Their friendship, which had shown such a high meter a minute ago, dropped through the floor. She kicked him out of the house immediately.

At least he was free now.

2.2 That’s Because the Hot Babes all Went to Egypt

Apr3

Uncle Jared never did get off Lancelot’s ass.

Um, wow, Jared, he can really kick your butt into next week now. Did you notice that?

Lance took his next trip to Egypt and set himself up at the base camp.

He hunted up a bit more treasure.

And found some secret passageways.

And hit on chicks. He met a few completely incompatible ones, including the relics dealer in the bizarre, who just immediately hated everything about him. I have seen Sims take to each other immediately, but never to hate each other immediately.

So he called up an Egyptian chick he was already acquainted with from the hotel he stayed at in France.

She turned out to have recently been dumped.

Was this an opportunity? Was there chemistry? She turned out to be Childlike, like his mom, and they spent a lot of time that evening playing tag. He talked her up until she was his friend, so he could call her later and invite her to visit him in the States.

Then, another alluring woman, this one Chinese, at base camp.

Also single! He stayed up until five in the morning, engrossed in conversation with her, and then slept into the afternoon.

Then, as he was puttering around, trying to do something with the next day before it was totally wasted, he found an Egyptian girl wandering through the camp.

Her name was Layla Lufti. She was a Vegetarian like him. She was also Excitable and Flirty.

Yowza.

2.1 There are no Hot Babes in China

Apr3

Lance was still torn about Malika. The more he got to know her, the less he really knew here. He took her out on a hot date to a French Bistro, and she didn’t even dress up.

They never really got past smalltalk, and yet she seemed to hang on his every word.

(Seriously, I was trying to see if Lance could actually learn any of Malika’s traits. From her behavior, I was pretty sure we she was Bookworm, Absent Minded, and a Slob — two traits I’ve already played and one that wasn’t very appealing. Lancelot is the strong, awkward type; he doesn’t have any Charisma by design. But you’d think even without it, he’d’ve been able to learn something about her by himself. Seems like the Game Powers were trying to tell me that maybe they weren’t meant to be together after all.)

He escaped his confused ambivalence with a trip to China, where he got his white belt in Sim Fu.

And he explored Chinese tombs with secret underwater passageways.

Way to swim in the slimy, scary water, brave Lancelot.

But mostly he hit on chicks. The first four hot Chinese chicks he hit on were all married. Married! Argh.

Then he met this one at the dojo, and she turned out to be single. Woot!

(I think the mirror in this pic is awesome.)

Then she started yelling at him for no reason. Oh, wait, that’s pretty much what Uncle Jared does. He hightailed it out of there.

The book dealer looked a bit more mature, but she was also single.

Except that the hated each other almost on sight. Every attempt at conversation he made annoyed both of them.

Ah, well, the search for love would go on, but at least he had a bunch of cool swag to sell.