Playtesting + preparing for my (first ever) hybrid gameplay series.
FIELD NOTES is where I share my latest experiences, observations, and discoveries from playing The Sims 4.
Hi, my loves!
Is it just me, or have the last couple of weeks flown by? I've picked up painting again 🎨 and am happy to announce that I've (finally) started a regular writing practice. Between that, my day job, and spending time with my family in this beautiful spring weather we're having, I've been busy-busy setting things up in my game for some new content I've got planned!
Here's what I got up to in game this past week👇
Preparing for my first gameplay series.
Have you ever seen HBO's Girls? Sex and the City? I'm planning a Let's Play series that will have similar vibes: two girls in their mid-twenties are "finally getting their shit together" after pooling their bartending money and moving to the city.
This series marks the start of my new world and I'm excited to see how these founder stories unfold! 🥳 As of right now, the girls are set up in their apartment (a run-down little corner apartment above the Spice Market in San Myshuno), their jobs are set, bank accounts have been created, and now I'm working on reno'ing a couple of lots for episode one: a grocery store, a corporate office building, and a nightclub. Eventually, I'll build proper lots and this will become my Forever Save, but for now we're going with quick over quality so I can get started sooner rather than later (you know what they say: start before you're ready!)
💭 This is my first time doing a Let's Play series–any tips? Requests? Thoughts? Let me know in the comments!
My first time attending Sunday Sessions–and you'll never guess who showed up.
The other day I jumped into early gameplay to test out a few mods for this LP (we'll take a closer look in my upcoming Mod Labs) and since both girls are into music, dancing, and partying, I sent them to one of the game's Sunday Sessions. We got there and the place was already drawing a crowd–I was cackling watching them run in perfect unison to the stage from their spawn point 😂 It was so unserious.
If you've never been, the Sunday Sessions stage is a small festival where I'd imagine local music artists put on a show that quickly becomes background noise because everyone is preoccupied getting drunk on juice, but to everyone's surprise–especially mine–Bebe Rexha showed up and started playing on the stage's piano.
I didn't even know I had her in my game..??
Anyway, everyone started raving 💃🕺 But for me, seeing her up there on that sad little wooden stage in Willow Creek of all places made me realize that my save file is going to need a proper music festival venue 😂 I'm going to use this mod and see if I can't build a fun outdoor spot that's got a little more going on for the girls to get into in some of the early episodes of this series!
Play-testing Riverrun and preparing for release.
I've had a few people ask me if I plan to share Riverrun–the short answer is: yes!
But, to make sharing clean and easy, I'll be sharing a "lite" version that doesn't include any unnecessary clutter. All of the essentials needed for the build's integrity will be there, but you'll need to fill the rooms with some furnishings and personal touches.
With that in mind, I've been play-testing the lot to make sure it works well and have made a few eye-twitching discoveries:
🤦♀️ Sims are witless beings who love to run through the river to get anywhere. My solution is to try out an invisible fence that will hopefully force them to go around it.
🤦♀️ If you have ANY planters on the lot: every. single. one. of your neighbors will compulsively plant seeds in them even if they have virtually no gardening experience (and equally no reason to have seeds in their inventory). This means you've got sims trying to plant avocados where avocados can't germinate–and the game notifies you about this every few minutes as if it's a local emergency.
🤦♀️ You have to manually add fish to bodies of water for them to be fishable. The catch? (🥁) You have to go fishing in order to manually add fish to said bodies of water. 😂 So far we have...bettas. Yum? 😬
Coming Up Next:
Celebrating 11k members – keep an eye out for an upcoming poll 🗳️
Mod Labs – banking, wifi, and debit cards in The Sims 4?? 💳
Riverrun gameplay – the village is coming to life and I want to share the story with you! 🫶
New Let's Play intro followed by the pilot episode – it's happening!! 🎉
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