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Aging for "Active Household only" works not as expected -- an experiment in rotational gameplay
MsPhy
Posts: 5,055 Member
Okay, so I did an experiment with rotational gameplay. First I did a "save as," so I could return to my original family if this did not work.
For auto-aging, the setting was "Active Household Only," and for unplayed Sims it was "off."
I made note at the time I left my original household. It was in-game Saturday at 8:37 p.m. Female sim had 3 days left before aging to adult, and had just become pregnant. I noted the days to age-up for other family members as well.
I went to another house. It was in-game Saturday at 8:37 p.m. when I arrived. Single resident had 9 days left until age-up. I played there until in-game Tuesday at 2:58 a.m., at which point he was 6 days left until age-up, then returned to my original household.
At the original household, it was Tuesday 2:58 a.m., which surprised me because that's not how it worked in Sims 2. Female Sim had given birth (I was warned by others that this would happen). Her days left to age up was now 2, but I guess that's because I left them at 8:37 p.m. on one day and returned at 2:58 a.m. on another day, crossing the midnight line? All other Sims in the household also had their days to age up reduced by 1. If I had returned at at a time before midnight, I wonder if the aging would have been affected. I'll have to go back and try that in the next round.
So: it would appear you CAN engage in rotational play. However, things will not be frozen where you left them. Aging should not be affected, I guess, unless (possibly) you pass the midnight line; more trial needed on this one. Might be good to try to rotate at the same general time each time (like 5 a.m. or 10 p.m.). Also, pregnancies are not suspended. Sim will give birth.
For auto-aging, the setting was "Active Household Only," and for unplayed Sims it was "off."
I made note at the time I left my original household. It was in-game Saturday at 8:37 p.m. Female sim had 3 days left before aging to adult, and had just become pregnant. I noted the days to age-up for other family members as well.
I went to another house. It was in-game Saturday at 8:37 p.m. when I arrived. Single resident had 9 days left until age-up. I played there until in-game Tuesday at 2:58 a.m., at which point he was 6 days left until age-up, then returned to my original household.
At the original household, it was Tuesday 2:58 a.m., which surprised me because that's not how it worked in Sims 2. Female Sim had given birth (I was warned by others that this would happen). Her days left to age up was now 2, but I guess that's because I left them at 8:37 p.m. on one day and returned at 2:58 a.m. on another day, crossing the midnight line? All other Sims in the household also had their days to age up reduced by 1. If I had returned at at a time before midnight, I wonder if the aging would have been affected. I'll have to go back and try that in the next round.
So: it would appear you CAN engage in rotational play. However, things will not be frozen where you left them. Aging should not be affected, I guess, unless (possibly) you pass the midnight line; more trial needed on this one. Might be good to try to rotate at the same general time each time (like 5 a.m. or 10 p.m.). Also, pregnancies are not suspended. Sim will give birth.
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Comments
Have you got the drop down menu after 'Autoage (Played Sims)' to 'Active Households Only'? And then the check box after 'Autoage (Unplayed Sims)' is unchecked? If so, then the game runs as normal but they don't lose days off their age. They still look young and ageless no matter how long you leave them. It's like turning off aging in Sims 3, but for all the story progression. Was their any changes to their relationships or wealth at all?
I play a rotational style game. I currently have twelve households, and I rotate among them. Since I made the mistake of creating some of my sims as adults rather than young adults, I currently have turned aging completely off. I'm going to see if it's possible to manually age my sims when I want.
The only real problem I've found in my gameplay is that sims do give birth before I want them to. I'm hoping maybe there will be a way to "tweak" the length of time a sim remains pregnant. I have an "in-game" calendar that's part of my play style. So, I "pretend" it's January when I'm playing Sim A's household, then when I move to Sim B's household, it's "February"...and so on. Thus, if Sim A gets pregnant in January, I want to go back to that household 9 "months" later when my in-game rotation tells me it's October, and I want her to then have the baby. As it is now, the babies are born way ahead of my game schedule. I just have to live with it for now, but I've asked in the mods forum if there might be a way to adjust this.
Other than that, the rotational style is working well for me. My sims will go out, meet people, and make friends while I'm playing other households, but thank goodness, they don't have career promotions, change jobs, or conceive children on their own.
Good luck with your game play. I hope it works out for you and your sims, too.
Oh also - the date changes but they'll age up later now if not aged up manually, right? turning off aging us basically turning off aging *up*?
Sims won't age if aging is turned completely off. There are options in the game play settings that give us control over that aspect of the game. We can have it completely off, completely on, or on for ONLY our active family. But, aging on/off has no effect on pregnancy.
As far as other changes, no, I haven't seen skill changes...but, to be honest, I haven't really looked closely. I have seen some of my single sims start "lovebird" relationships with other sims. That's the only real change I've noticed though. I can live with that. I'd have a huge problem, though, if they got married, changed jobs, got pregnant, or moved away while I was playing other households.
This was why I couldn't play Sims 3. Even with "story progression off", it was a nightmare. I'd make a sim, put him in a Level 1 job with only a few simoleons, and after playing a few other households, I'd return to find him at the top of his career with hundreds of thousands of simoleons. It was an nightmare for me...enough to make me quit playing.
See above. Autoage was set to Active Households Only.
No. If Autoage is set to Active Households Only, it appears that time does, indeed, pass (the unplayed Sims are not frozen), but they (probably) do not age if you return around the same time of day you left. My Sims aged 1 day, but the played Sim aged 3 days. However, I returned to the house in the wee hours of the morning instead of at night, so I'm thinking that's what caused the one day aging. I need to test this more.
I should note that my Sims were not at home when I returned to them (I left them at home). The adults had gone out to a venue.
Then this means there is some type of story progression in TS4. Because in TS2 Sims would have been home when you went back to their house, though they may have been on community lots when you visited lots as another Sim. They still would be at home when you got there. This is one weird SP imho. It's not TS3 nor TS2 style SP at all.
Sims with the Romantic trait will likely develop romantic connections while you are not playing them. This doesn't seem to interfere with current relationships since there is no jealousy or reputations (yay), so just ignore the person and the relationship will decay and disappear. For sims that I never want to flirt with anyone else, I don't give them that trait. It's easy enough to make sims flirty without them having the trait.
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It never occurred to me that others would take rotational gameplay to mean something slightly different. Personally, I'm glad that my families don't freeze, that's one aspect I hated about TS2. To play with one family in the morning, then switch to another to have it be nighttime, nah, TS4 does it better, imo.
Yeah. I think I can work with it, but I want to make sure I understand exactly how it all works before I really get into it. Keeping a log of my "Save as" games so I can go back if things don't work out at some point. I'm going back so I can be there for the birth of Alice's baby. As long as the family members do not age while I'm gone, I'm okay with them not being frozen in place. I'll just make sure to be there for the babies. I'm still going to go back and test whether returning to my first family at a similar time of day as when I left them makes any difference on the aging, as I was surprised to see that 1-day difference.
However the rest of it seems pretty much like Sims 2 from what I have seen in my game, because besides aging there is minimal progression in any of the households, unless I actively get involved. Other households only get jobs and have families if I jump in and make it so, and it looks like other households only socially interact with each other and other sims if the household I am playing is involved somehow ... so the sims who are in the public spaces or the community lots my household visit have their relationship bars go up with whoever it is they are with. I have moved sims into existing households, even made spouses, left them alone and then later when I have checked on them to see what's happened, they don't even know each other, even when I have edited them to be spouses. I also have the option switched on for other sims to move into empty lots, and have not seen that happen once yet.
There are two aging boxes. I don't have access to the game at present, so no screenshot, but one is for unplayed Sims (townies and households you've never played), which you can toggle on and off.
The other box has a drop-down menu for your played Sims (any household you've played, even for a minute). From the drop-down you can choose no aging, played Sims, or active household only.
Played Sims means that any households you've played, even for a minute, will age right along with the household you're playing.
Active household only means only the household you're playing right now will age. The Sims you are not playing will not freeze in time like in TS2; the days pass for them, and they might not be at home when you go back to them, but they will not have had days subtracted from their lifespan (i.e., they don't age when you're not playing them).
Honestly, I missed the "active household only" the first time I examined the menu, so I wondered later if it came with a patch. It might just have been me not noticing, however. Go into your game an see if you can see what I see.
I've heard tales of romances starting when you're playing another house. I'm just going to ignore them if I don't want to play them. I might even invite that Sim over and be mean ;-)
As for the NPCs, that's why I left aging off for them. You can replace them with Sims from the gallery if you want, or I believe once they all die the game will repopulate.
But what is different is that there is a kind of story progression where sims meet, make friends or romance eachother
http://www.getfreeebooks.com/star-trek-original-series-fan-fiction-trilogy/
Haven't read the whole thread yet, but I found it on the first day. So that option has been there since day one. You might have just missed it.
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They could gain some skills along the way but this depends. Like sometimes, the non-active household comes to my active households and plays video games and I realized that they gain video gaming skills after that.
I wondered why my rich family paid no bills and yet the poor assistant dishwasher I was trying to get to level 2 in her career had to pay a massive bill! LOL! Her rich friends will now purchase a virtual gaming rig for her...
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