SUBJECTS: family, romance, LGBTQ+ themes
updates fridays!
hey guys, and welcome to the velasco legacy where it (finally) lives on the forums!
i'll probably be making nitpicky edits to this post as we go along, but i wanted to quick stop in and get this rolling before i have to get back to work. SO.
this legacy lives on wordpress
over here - and all extra information about scoring, succession law, and various bits and bobs can be found over
here, for the sake of not having this post go on for centuries. but there are a couple of basic things i definitely want to address:
- first, content warnings, which i'll just copy over; this story will occasionally contain sexual themes – though not in any way the sims itself doesn’t. (some saucy looks, the occasional well-placed hand.) i take a “lighthearted but stern” approach to potentially darker storylines, and will treat them with the seriousness they require as (and if) they appear, but i prefer not to linger at the expense of character dignity. anything under the NSFW umbrella will be warned for at the start of the post!
- and second... yes, it does say generation six, and yes, there are only two chapters. i know. what. i realize it's a bit unconventional, but the further i played into generation six (and with a little encouragement from the inimitable @CathyTea ), the more i realized this might be the best way to tell the story. you can see the full family history over on the family tree if you like - but i'm going to do my best to tell the rest of this story in a way that includes the whole family, as they may be down, but they're definitely not out - and their influences are all over the place! it'll be a challenge, but i'm hoping we can see it through to the end!
and with that out of the way... i guess i'll just release this into the wild, huh? here goes nothing:
thanks guys!
Comments
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
thank you so much! and thanks again for all the support, you've been seriously lovely.
haha, yup! feels good to shake it off though. now i've got a silly redhead, instead! he's a lot friendlier than that big plumbob, at least. :P
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
EDIT: I just noticed it's SimCrush Sunday--I think I have a CartoonCrush on that guy!
EDIT2: He's kinda trans... what pronoun does this Sim like to use?
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
oh goodness, thank you! and wow, he'd be totally honored! i actually think i have a picture of him in almost a mirror of the pose in your avatar - it's fate!
also, rey here is actually not trans - he's a cis male, just likes comfortable clothes and keeps his hair long. (so "he/him," to answer your question!) BUT that's definitely a good attitude to have, i'd say, there are a lot of queer sims in this legacy so far, and i can only imagine there will be more. including rey in fact, although if you'd rather wait to learn more about him, i won't say more than that.
*i will say though that i feature him for a reason - he's one of my favorite sims to come out of the whole story, and easily one of my favorite ones i've ever ended up having in my game. i'm hoping he'll get to have a bigger role a little later on.
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
(read the update here!)
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
If you want to get rid of that annoying lot trait floating above heads, go here: http://modthesims.info/d/586006
I like trans stories, too (I'm a bit partial since my story has LGBTQ parts...) It's VERY Interesting that both brother and sister are trans.
thank you so much! and oh my god, THANK YOU for that save with the lot trait thing. that "convival" trait wasn't giving me a break for a second, and they were arguing! i'm so glad there's a fix for that.
and hey, thank you very much re: the LGBT elements in the story! (and i have a feeling this might get mixed up a lot, actually, given how GNC a lot of my sims are so please don't feel bad omg, but) it's actually just harley who's trans! prince isn't - and for clarity's sake, none of her siblings are either. erm. at least not yet. o__o it's been really interesting to me writing an almost entirely sim/game-driven story this way, because all of harley's mannerisms as a toddler and a child (especially how she interacted with her other siblings) really stuck out to me and made me think she could end up being trans. i went for it in CAS when she aged up, and i really think it suits her well! ^^
(fun fact: prince's sexuality was the same way. he had a lot of male friends, and he threw a lot of parties - then he started rolling whims for some of them and... i mean, oh boy. i don't think i've ever had a sim so conflicted over relationships before. i'm probably as worried for the continuing legacy as harley is, at this point!)
(i'll also have to check out your challenge when i get the time, i have a real soft spot for simlit with queer stories and characters! )
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
Oh...I thought he said he was trans in the story. Very interesting! I love gay characters, too. (Or bi...not sure if Prince is conflicted about that? Ha!)
I think you'll really like my story then. Definitely LGBT full on for the first gen and will always have elements in it...
I just started transferring it to a blog, so you may want to bookmark it. The first gen is transferred there: Day & Knight
So glad I found this!
....uh oh, did he? <.<;; that could just be my 4AM lack of editing coming back to bite me. i'll have to go over it with a clear head in the morning. but either way, thank you again! i really appreciate the support. (i was pretty nervous about writing something with so many LGBT characters in it - and i still am, honestly! they're all over the place in the legacy, despite the story so far taking a pretty casual approach to it. it's good to know there's an audience for it, though. ;v; )
and i will definitely bookmark that so i know to come back to it - i swear i started it a few months back when i was lurking around, but i think i lost track of it? all the more reason to reread from the start!
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
On both WP and the forums, people are just more likely to stop reading and not say a word if something about a story bothers them, rather than trying to anonymously attack the author as on certain other websites. You can't please everyone! And you don't have to. I know there are plenty of people who get tired of straight, cis relationships and characters being portrayed as the default as well, so I know there are people who'd love to read your story because of the LGBT aspect.
Wanting to portray more diverse characters while still remaining sensitive toward their differences is actually something I've been concerned about while writing a comedy. I definitely don't want it to feel like any of the jokes come at the expense of anyone's sexuality, too--I debated including certain things in the Unbirthday Party Arc in my story (Bianca's chapter specifically) because of her nonsense, but a bit of that nonsense was drawn from real life inspiration, unfortunately!
aaah thank you, bb! honestly, i think the sims 4 is a really interesting storytelling medium for a lot of reasons, but that's definitely one of them - like i've been a player for a long time, but retooling the gender interface in CAS has led to me not only being able to create characters more accurately than before (see: my avatar - trying to get his hair before they implemented that patch was impossible!), but i've also found myself experimenting a lot more with character designs and queer/GNC characters with the kind of speed and freedom i don't really get from concept drawing or other writing. ^^ as a queer person myself, it's opened a lot of storytelling doors, and is part of what inspired me to finally try this whole legacy business.
there are definitely a lot of non-cis and non-straight characters in the legacy so far (more this generation, even, including some who have surprised me!) - and it's honestly been fun too to. well, "play that straight," if you get my meaning? (no pun intended.) like - of course sims (as anyone else) will have their own personal relationships to their gender and sexuality, but it's also not the first thing you know about many of them. some of them, readers may never pick up on at all. 0: there are definitely more visible ones, too, and i'm excited to tell those stories, but - for example, i never expected to wind up with a transfeminine sim as someone who has effectively become my main narrator for the story right now. it's been really fun to just... let things like that happen! (i also just love harley, and think she's so earnest and cute. ;; ) anyway, without turning this into more of an essay than it already is (i am so wordy i'm SORRY), part of this comes from something i read recently: "queer people are naturally occurring, in any universe with people in it." (it went on to say "in order for us to not exist, we would have had to be actively removed" - although this doesn't inherently apply to the sims, given the nature of it.) but it stuck with me! i am a bit afraid of the inevitable "are there ANY straight/cis people in this story" kinds of questions, but i definitely believe in the diversity of the story already, and i'd like to see it through.
i definitely hear you about writing comedy, though! if it makes you feel any better, i read the arc (what??? okay, i definitely have been binging fangs, i'll go back and leave comments. i swear. ;;<.<) and found the whole misunderstanding very in-character for bianca. i think the mcelroy brothers have it right, though - it's all about making comedy inclusive and fun instead of mean-spirited, and i think as long as you stick to that, you're probably safe. after all, funny stuff happens to queer people all the time - often funny things happen that just don't happen to people who aren't queer, as well - and the best comedy (to my mind anyway) will always play along with that idea, that we're all human and have weird plum happen to us. (errr, unless you're a vampire, i guess. :K )
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
This is so true, I really like that! I've also noticed how different stories show queer characters and relationships in different ways, depending on whether or not those stories hew closer to the Sims world or the "real" world. Some will focus on the very real struggles and biases of the real world, while others prefer a more idealistic, "Wouldn't it be nice if the world were more like the Sims?" approach. I enjoy seeing all the different interpretations.
Ha, this is exactly what I aim for! I make fun of all of my characters for various reasons, but I don't like mean-spirited humor in general. Funny, embarrassing things happen to everyone, human and vampire alike.
And don't worry about wordiness! I can be very, very wordy before I realize it and force myself to take my fingers off the keyboard.
and @LadyLobster, re: telling different stories based on the universe established, all i can say is YES, DEFINITELY. :P yammering about this kind of distinction in queer representation in media may or may not be a big part of my creative & professional pursuits outside of simming, haha. (basically: i think some people can get aggressive about stories that do show that struggle or hardship, and a lot of what i do is trying to say "hey, wait! those stories are important too!" it's a delicate balance but it's one i've actually spent a long time studying! i'm the nerd, it is me.)
that said, i did make a deliberate choice with this legacy to focus on personal and interpersonal relationships regarding identity, not so much on the conflict reflected in our wider world. it's something i may tackle another time, maybe in some other story! but this has been a very relaxing save for me, to say the least, haha. despite all of the legacy point-chasing, anyway.
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
anyway - thanks for being so patient so far, you guys! ^-^ i've been playing through this generation and making notes to keep writing, i'm excited to really get underway with it.
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
i'd like to work illustrations into more of the legacy going forward too - it'll partly depend on how much time i have, but i've sketched out these sims a few times now, and i'd love for illustrations to be a part of the whole presentation. ^^
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
(read the update here!)
sorry for the wait, folks! this chapter is actually much longer than i anticipated, which.. may very well be a consistent thing at this point. sorry, i'm still figuring it out! ^^; hopefully it's worth all the silence! also, i made some number mishaps (already, somehow) but i think i've figured them out by now.
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
thank you, darling! i'm hoping that things will pick up the further i get in, but i couldn't resist spending time with harley's family, haha. (including her beautiful dad.)
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!
and what makes it my favorite...
"...He chose to go out on his own – and nearly broke us in the process."
It's such beautiful visual symbolism!
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
something something about how if harley does keep trying to get along with prince, that could strain her "current" family? but also that it's up to her. the wedding arch she hears about from mia later on being such a focal point, too. none of this was intentional when i took it, but in hindsight i think it's awesome that it's been taken as symbolic!
The Velasco Legacy: Generation Six on wordpress & on the forums!