Attention All Simmers!
Who: All of you. Players. Writers. Photographers. Designers. Stylists. Creators. Builders. Everyone from Sims 1 to Sims 4, My Sims to Sims Medieval, and everything in between.
What: I’m thinking of starting a community-collective literary journal of sorts for simmers, by simmers. As such, the focus would be on writing (short fiction, humor, tutorials, creative non-fiction), which I know you’re all great at, but in-pictures are more than welcome as well.
This will be a heavy undertaking for just one person, so if you’re interested in helping with more than just submissions, feel free to offer yourself as sacrifice. Of course, this all depends on the amount of feedback and submissions I receive. It could be amazing and last forever, or it could fizzle out in a shorter time span than it took to make this cover. Who knows?
Why: Because simmers are awesome and a medium that gets their creative work the attention it deserves seems like an amazing idea. (And I’m not doing anything with my writing degree so it gives that, and me, a sense of purpose.)
When: Distribution of the issues will all depend on the amount of submissions we (currently we = me) get. Hopefully in the future a schedule can be created.
How: Issues will be distributed on Amazon as free digital e-books. Let me know of any other distribution means you’d like to see.
Where: Any questions, concerns, inquiries, volunteers, or any such thing can be posted here or private messaged to me. For submissions, see
this post on my Simblr.
I have a lot of faith in this becoming something beautiful and I really hope you all envision the same.
Submission GuidelinesWritten Work
Your submission must be related to ‘The Sims’ in some way. This is a publication about Sims by simmers for simmers, after all. As ‘The Sims’ is simply a game about people living their lives, it’s easy to justify almost any type of narrative as being “Sims related.”
Any and all genres are welcome. Here are some examples I’ve come up with. Feel free to borrow, steal, be inspired by any of them for your own submissions.
First-person comedy of someone who’s been locked in a tower. A twist ending reveals the narrator was only trapped by a plate in front of the door.
Creative non-fiction piece about your discovery of ‘The Sims’ and how it ruined your life became such a big part of your life.
Poetry about your undying love for ‘The Sims’ or that super cute, buff, Adonis-like sim you sculpted with your bare hands.
An epic quest to discover who is running the simulation of our own lives.
As you can see, there’s tons of ways you can spin it for your own writing. It doesn’t have to be anything super obviously Sims either. Just people living, really. People will understand.
Other miscellaneous requirements and guidelines:
While there isn’t a page limit, don’t go crazy and send in a sixty page short story. At that point you could essentially publish your own short story e-book. It would be best to keep it around 10 pages or less, but it’s not a hard ruling.
Any series must be sent with all parts finished. No one likes to invest themselves in a story that ends up unfinished. Each consecutive issue will contain a part of the series. Each part must be able to stand on its own, however, so it needs its own beginning, middle, and end, climax and resolution, etc. apart from the series as a whole.
Submissions can be based on any Sim game. It could be from the main series ‘The Sims 1-4,’ ‘Sims Castaway Stories,’ ‘Sims Medieval,’ or any of the others not mentioned.
Images
Related to ‘The Sims,” of course. These can be in-game pictures or your own artwork made in programs like Photoshop or a real-life painting.
If it’s an in-game screenshot it needs to be of a higher level quality. So don’t submit something anyone could hop in game and take the same screenshot of without any difficulties. You can even submit multiple pictures that tell a story. Just let me know so I keep them together in the publication. Feel free to name your pictures, caption them, include a written story, etc.
Keep in mind this isn’t a magazine. There are already community driven magazines for ‘The Sims.’ This is a literary journal that’s more focused on writing. I don’t just want pictures of outfits you like or a cute room design shot. The images included in the publication will need to have a spark that ignites something in the reader. It needs to make them think or feel something.
Deadline
The initial deadline for submissions will be
June 30.
Comments
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
I'll need any type of editable document as they'll need to be readjusted as it's being pieced together with other submissions. So pdf's won't work. The actual formatting of the piece won't matter as it'll be changed as needed, but if something has special requirements for creative purposes I'll keep them as is for the final product.
As of now the most help I'll need is getting the word out. None of this is possible without plenty of submissions. After that I'll need a group that helps sift through the submissions and pick which ones should be included in the first issue. I'll also need plenty of copy editors/proofreaders.
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
Origin ID: SummerFalls
House: Ravenclaw/Wampus - Wand: Alder wood with Unicorn hair core 10 ¾" and Slightly Springy flexibility - Patronus: Neblung Cat
| Simblr | Youtube | I love creating sims! |
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
Nope it's two words, Simmer Review. Thanks for asking though!
I can invest myself in this, but only if there are enough submissions and this really becomes a thing.
♦ My Tumblr ♦ My Twitter ♦
Thank you for the offer, but it's actually not like a magazine, so there isn't a layout to be done. It's more book-ish than anything, so the minor formatting it will require is aleady done.
What do you mean by magazine-themed story?
♦ My Tumblr ♦ My Twitter ♦
Discord: #5153
Written Work
Your submission must be related to ‘The Sims’ in some way. This is a publication about Sims by simmers for simmers, after all. As ‘The Sims’ is simply a game about people living their lives, it’s easy to justify almost any type of narrative as being “Sims related.”
Any and all genres are welcome. Here are some examples I’ve come up with. Feel free to borrow, steal, be inspired by any of them for your own submissions.
As you can see, there’s tons of ways you can spin it for your own writing. It doesn’t have to be anything super obviously Sims either. Just people living, really. People will understand.
Other miscellaneous requirements and guidelines:
While there isn’t a page limit, don’t go crazy and send in a sixty page short story. At that point you could essentially publish your own short story e-book. It would be best to keep it around 10 pages or less, but it’s not a hard ruling.
Any series must be sent with all parts finished. No one likes to invest themselves in a story that ends up unfinished. Each consecutive issue will contain a part of the series. Each part must be able to stand on its own, however, so it needs its own beginning, middle, and end, climax and resolution, etc. apart from the series as a whole.
Submissions can be based on any Sim game. It could be from the main series ‘The Sims 1-4,’ ‘Sims Castaway Stories,’ ‘Sims Medieval,’ or any of the others not mentioned.
Images
Related to ‘The Sims,” of course. These can be in-game pictures or your own artwork made in programs like Photoshop or a real-life painting.
If it’s an in-game screenshot it needs to be of a higher level quality. So don’t submit something anyone could hop in game and take the same screenshot of without any difficulties. You can even submit multiple pictures that tell a story. Just let me know so I keep them together in the publication. Feel free to name your pictures, caption them, include a written story, etc.
Keep in mind this isn’t a magazine. There are already community driven magazines for ‘The Sims.’ This is a literary journal that’s more focused on writing. I don’t just want pictures of outfits you like or a cute room design shot. The images included in the publication will need to have a spark that ignites something in the reader. It needs to make them think or feel something.
Deadline
The initial deadline for submissions will be June 30.
But yay!
Discord: #5153
Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
I've had plans to have themed issues, so I'll definitely keep that one in mind!
@Wilderwolf sorry to bring up my thread and not put up a link! Here it is:
forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/818903/may-issue-out-simsacious-magazine-my-sims-backstories-and-interview/p1
Take a look at some of the stories I have there and you'll see what I mean.
As far as I can see I'm just going to need help with the editing process once all the submissions are selected.