Updates and Other Such Creatures

[orikes]

WARNING: Sim Stuff Ahead

As always, I'd been hoping to get an update out by now, but failed. Day Three of the BC is probably about two-thirds written. I've only got one scene I don't know what to do with this time, so I'm debating whether or not it gets cut. I'm getting very tired of writing conversations that are just people getting to know one another. So while the group dinner is a nice scene visually, I'm not sure I can come up with anything decent to actually say for the pictures.

Either way, Day Three should be up soon. Once it's up, I'm going to play through to the end of the BC and then figure out the plotty scenes I want to fill in. I'm thinking of doing Day Four similar to how I've done them so far, but throw in more plotty, then combine Days Five and Six into one.

I really really really can't wait until the BC is over. I'm so anxious to get back to the main storyline. It's been three months since I've played the main neighborhood, but the next Pseudo update will be mostly plot so I still can't play. I'd really like to get to Gen Six before the two year anniversary, but I'm not sure I'm going to pull that off.

I keep going back and forth on whether the BC was a mistake or not. I just write too slow to be able to throw something like this in the midst of my regular storyline. At this point, Gen Five should be teenagers and getting ready to head to college. Instead, they're all still babies or unborn and I'm slogging through the BC. I know I'll be (mostly) happy with it when it's done, but getting there has been painful.

Day Three would have been done this weekend, but I've got 'stuff' going on. Tonight is gaming and since it's in the 80's, I'm going over early to go swimming. Yay swimming! Tomorrow is my friends' daughter's third birthday party which I am not allowed to miss. Not that I would since Adelaide is my buddy. I should be able to squeeze in the rest of the writing soon, and then it'll be easy to throw it up there.

On another note, I tried out Kiki's Phasmatic skins, but ended up taking them out. On some of my sims, they looked absolutely lovely and I wish I could have kept them, but on sims that don't have perfect features, they did very weird highlighting things. The toddlers I looked at had weird facial planes on their cheeks. Ophelia had some weird highlights around her nose, and Stacielee's eyes looked like they were sitting on a shelf behind her cheeks. Oh well. Maybe I'll give Lyran's skins a try and see how they look. I liked that Kiki had default replacements for the supernatural races to go along with the regular skins.

Anyway, I'm off to swimming and D&D. :)

Comments

[smjoshsims.livejournal.com]

Ophelia also looks weird with my Skins- I think it's because her nose doesn't "fit" on her face, so on some skins she looks weird.

[docnerd.livejournal.com]

Kiki's skin overrode the custom skin that SimStacie has? I thought default replacements would only work on Sims with, you know, default skins. Although now I'm shuddering to think of how SimNerd's chin looked with those skins, if Stacielee looked weird.

It is pretty simple to combine Days 5 and 6, especially if you're not spending time with the ousted contestants (which is harder to do when they're locked up!). And, hey, Day 3 is halfway there, and it takes hardly any time to play through three days, even when you're stopping and taking pictures every two seconds.

[profbutters.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm glad you're doing the BC. It's a lot of fun and I think everyone is enjoying reading it. I hope it (will have) been worth it to you, but it's worth it to me, and that's aside from the fact that your version of Cecil is really entertaining me quite a lot.

I'm wondering now if Heneage would look better in regular Maxis skins--he looks a little "broken" too--but mostly Lyran skins seem to make pretty Sims look prettier and questionable Sims look better--mostly. The blushy effect can take a little time getting used to on males, but I was able to forgo guyliner and indeed a lot of makeup. I like not having to put eyeliner on my children just so they can have defined eyes.

I hear you on the"slow progress" thing, though. I have two more to go, but the last generation took a whole year!

PB

[orikes13.livejournal.com]

No one has custom skins in my neighborhood. I'm sort of funny about that, so all the custom skins that came with legacy sims or simselves got dropped in favor of standard Maxis skins. That's why Staci was showing up with the Phasmaxian skintone.

SimNerd didn't look too bad. The problem with Kiki's Phasmaxian skintones seems to be more in the cheeks and the eyes.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm glad that you did the BC. If I had known that you had planned to do it, but didn't end up writing it for Miranda, I would've been a bit bummed. And it definitely adds a lot of humor. I can understand what you mean about wanting to rush through the BC and get it over with though.

I tried PhasiMaxian tones, and I wasn't too impressed, it gave a bit of a painted look on my toddlers. I'm considering switching to Lyran's, I took a look, and I like the way they appear on my sims, particularly because they are a bit Maxis Matchy, but not too shiny, just with a nice little glow.

[honorkid54.livejournal.com]

Woops. Forgot to log in :D

[smoothiesims.livejournal.com]

Same here. Custom skins bug the heck out of me (same with eyes) so I usually just switch the Sim to the closest Maxis tone. Or whatever my defaults happen to be.

Ori, Lyran's tones are pretty good if you don't mind the light blush. They're pretty nice if you want the same effect as the Maxis tones. The only reason I don't use them is I don't like the 4 much...it's kind of orange-looking, to me. But they are really nice.

[orikes13.livejournal.com]

I'm okay with custom eyes, within reason. I think most of the simselves that came with custom eyes (like Ben and Renee and Pen) kept theirs, but I removed all custom skintones.

I've debated about the Lyran ones. I don't play with a censor blur, so I worry a little bit about the painted on nipples and feeling like a perv considering how often my sims have 'Nakey Time'.

[dgjamie.livejournal.com]

I read this post of yours just before bed and then proceeded to have a whacked out dream about awesomesauce bachelorette and doctor who. It was too weird to get into but I'm pretty sure Dean won ;)

Looking forward to day 3. Last time I couldn't find a caption for a picture I just used docNerd's trick of putting the italics boxes in and no actual words, you can always let the pictures speak for themselves if you really are reluctant do cut them in spite of the fact that you don't want to write dialogue for them.

[chickensensei.livejournal.com]

Didn't see this until just now ... but better late than never, right?

Kiki's skins certainly have their ups and downs. I like the noses, but I wish she had just left the eyelids the same, cause if your sim doesn't have "normal" eyes, then they go all zonky. I put Lyran's eyelids on my sims to remedy this, they work pretty well but look a little odd on the darker skin. I just really like Kiki's noses and can't be bothered to apply the layered effects on every one of my sims. I also don't like the difference between Maxis skin one and Kiki's skin one.

I like Lyran's too, and would probably use them if it weren't for the odd eyelashes on men. It makes them look a little too feminine for my tastes.