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How many Sim projects/stories/families do you maintain or creating?
TOLKIEN
Posts: 1,594 Member
I've literally a notepad of ideas and stories for the Sims 4 I’m working on.
Currently, my count is around 10 unique story lines that (somewhat) interconnect, with unique sims for each.
Some are short like one high school story involving two groups fighting for school control and settling their differences in a bowling tournament (hey I have to use what I have) but goes way beyond that night as boyfriends are stolen and outside interests become involved.
Other stories have long tentacles, for example before the above story takes place another high school story builds the foundation for all other stories that follow at that school. It involves a group of 7 friends who start a school club, which has far-reaching implications years after this group graduates.
Others are pretty basic like a couple that moves to Strangerville (see my thread elsewhere about this lol), to an actress who makes it big but leads a double life via her twin science loving sister. Things get complicated when a soulmate is met, but when one sister is pretending to be the other.
Another story I have planned around a female doctor who delivering babies who share the same father and the drama of her investigation after being visited by men in black (think camping trips gone wild. Oh and UFOs) complicates her own future.
Yet another storyline involves a priest from that above storyline punishing what he deems the wicked and a voodoo witch trying to prevent the mystery deaths around town via jungle poison.
Then there is the story of a husband trying to resurrect the love of his life, but the fabled book of life written by a vampire is his only choice. A vampire who realizes they were once lovers in another life and wants him back.
Finally, my OTHER OTHER project involves replacing all sims from the game and lots, using a combination of seasons to form my medieval world.
This is a massive project involving humans, elves, demons and orcs. Oh and angels. I can’t even list the amount of stories I have planned for this world.
So how about you, do you have a list of things you want to try/stories to tell for the Sims 4? Or do you just focus on one story, one save?
One family at a time?
Currently, my count is around 10 unique story lines that (somewhat) interconnect, with unique sims for each.
Some are short like one high school story involving two groups fighting for school control and settling their differences in a bowling tournament (hey I have to use what I have) but goes way beyond that night as boyfriends are stolen and outside interests become involved.
Other stories have long tentacles, for example before the above story takes place another high school story builds the foundation for all other stories that follow at that school. It involves a group of 7 friends who start a school club, which has far-reaching implications years after this group graduates.
Others are pretty basic like a couple that moves to Strangerville (see my thread elsewhere about this lol), to an actress who makes it big but leads a double life via her twin science loving sister. Things get complicated when a soulmate is met, but when one sister is pretending to be the other.
Another story I have planned around a female doctor who delivering babies who share the same father and the drama of her investigation after being visited by men in black (think camping trips gone wild. Oh and UFOs) complicates her own future.
Yet another storyline involves a priest from that above storyline punishing what he deems the wicked and a voodoo witch trying to prevent the mystery deaths around town via jungle poison.
Then there is the story of a husband trying to resurrect the love of his life, but the fabled book of life written by a vampire is his only choice. A vampire who realizes they were once lovers in another life and wants him back.
Finally, my OTHER OTHER project involves replacing all sims from the game and lots, using a combination of seasons to form my medieval world.
This is a massive project involving humans, elves, demons and orcs. Oh and angels. I can’t even list the amount of stories I have planned for this world.
So how about you, do you have a list of things you want to try/stories to tell for the Sims 4? Or do you just focus on one story, one save?
One family at a time?
How many Sim projects/stories/families do you maintain or creating? 129 votes
Just the one story, one family, one save game.
16%
21 votes
2 or 3.
22%
29 votes
4 or more.
22%
29 votes
I've lost count...
38%
50 votes
4
Comments
I'm currently setting up a save that'll integrate the sims from three different stories I want to play and write. They're about different age groups so these stories can easily co-exist in the same save. They're kind of interconnected too, but in a sense that a main character from one story can be a side character in another. I've also added sims from my previous stories to this save (I should say will add, I'm still preparing things).
I can start playing once I've put all the sims in the world and set up their relationships and clubs. But the goal is to eventually also replace all lots and release it as a save for others to use. But, knowing me, that'll probably never happen, or like a month before they announce or release sims 5 or something.
Current one has four households/families.
Emmanuel S is an athlete, musician, cowboy and free-spirit kind of type.
Robbie H is a widower with two young children (Kristie started as a toddler and Jayden is nearly a teen. His sister, Vivian, lives with them to help out. Jayden writes professionally. Vivian is a freelancer (programmer).
Nathaniel D is a single, young, African doctor.
Bonnie S is a tomboy, unflirty gardener and eventually-to-be scientist. Breana is her total opposite. She’s a Afro-wearing, self-confident, style influencer. These ladies live together right now.
{Breanna recently gave birth.}
Nathaniel can’t seem to settle down, or he has yet to find the right lady.
I’ve just had Bonnie, hesitantly, flirting with Vivian
Emmanuel and Breana had semi-regularly slept together (risky) woo hoo and now they have a son; Jerry.
I do a simple rotational play of 7 households, a different world and a different storyline for each:
1) Strangerville scientist guy and military gal trying to solve the mystery of the town
2) Willow Creek Couple who live with the gal's mum and dad while they get on their feet - she's trying to become a doctor, him an archaeologist
3) Oasis Springs couple who want a huge family! Dad's a chef, mum's a freelance writer.
4) Windenburg couple who own a vet clinic. They have a dog and a tomboy daughter.
5) Brindleton Bay couple who live in a shack on the beach and have twin toddlers. Mum's in the police and dad is an athlete.
6) City orphanage in San Myshuno. Horrid orphanage keeper who hates kids and makes them do everything for her.
7) Del Sol Valley actor who has got a divorce behind him and two sons by two different women. He has just proposed to his ex-wife lol. And he's finally getting more famous and loving the attention of the paparazzi.
I was getting close to the 200 sim limit, so I recently did a lot of "re-structuring" of my Played and Unplayed families. I'm now keeping only 36 families in active rotation, although those might change with each round because of evolving story lines. Yesterday, for example, I moved an older, empty-nest couple to Unplayed status, and moved a new family to that rotation spot because of one young woman's pregnancy. She's having a relationship with one of my regularly played sims, and I hope they'll decide to marry. So, I currently have 36 active families and another 18 families who are marked Unplayed -- but who are peripheral characters in storylines that are building.
My plan is to never have more than 36 families in my rotation. That will mean making a lot of tough decisions at times, but I think it will work better for me to move out single elders as their spouses died off, or older couples whose children are now starting their own families. I'm essentially a "fall in love, get married, raise a family" type of player. I love seeing how different parents raise their children.
(On that note, I have to say that I love the "Parenthood" pack. It is perfect for a player like me.)
We'll see what happens though after I'm finished with 100BC. I plan to house all the children when they move out as YAs in that save and I might want to play with a few of them. I have an idea that could involve all of them in relation to one particular offspring, so I very well could be playing that save's households in rotation for the first time ever. Maybe... lol *shrugs*
But I get it, I have stories lined up in a notebook as well and I have played many of them already. I made a starter family (old story from TS3 I used to play and never came far), they are now on the 4th generation and in the meantime I created another family of a sister and brother where I wanted to brother to mingle with one of the siblings from my main household at some point. I never intented to play with my second family, but I got hooked on their story, taste, house interior and everything! I decided to play with them once with aging off, but I end up loving it and wanted to include it in my general rotational play. So, now that the brother got married with one of my main sims, his sister is one of my fav characters to play as she lives in Del Sol Valley on her road to be a famous actress. I play now 5 rotational households and one of them is the actress. She now has a relationship with her director and i truly like him. I came across a house for him and then it got me: I want to play him too! The house is perfect and i placed him in there, but didn't play with him yet. Im not sure yet. I will first finish my rotation round and then decide if I want to add him into my general rotational play. Then it will become 3 different families and 6 households
I now stream the Sims 4 on Twitch!
My Discord Server - A place to discuss my challenges, or the Sims in general
I've been really, really wanting to do something with dungeons and dragons, but I don't know how I'd do it because I don't really use cc, and I don't use pose mods.
Year Long Community Challenge
1. My main rotational save that is mostly in San Myshuno, featuring the sim in my pfp and most of the sims I tend to post here, including my StrangerVille hero and my band that I won't stop talking about. I have tons of things going in this one and I'm nearing the 150 sim limit, send help.
2. My other rotational save that is mostly in Newcrest (it was my first rotational save ever!)
3. A save I come back to every now and then when my others feel slow that has 5 YA ladies living in San Myshuno
4. My premades save
5. A StrangerVille save with Liberty Lee and Erwin Pries
6. Another StrangerVille save with Jess Sigworth and her daughters solving the mystery after Dylan died trying to solve it
The first save I listed has the most going on in it. I have a Google Doc for it that is about 30 pages and there are tons of different storylines happening at once. It's my favorite right now.
In one save I have “real life” families, because my daughter wanted her Sim self in the game, so I made my Sim self too. Many side stories as well, because I have 3 grown sons with their own complicated lives
In my current favorite save I have my favorite couple, Ian and Lawrence - which deals with mental health a lot, and a relationship in which there is a age gap. It also has Ian’s daughter’s story in it, while she recovers from her parent’s divorce, grows from 14 to 18 years old, and her extremely unconventional love life
In my 4th save I had Penny Pizzazz acquire the Player trait, and in the process create a hopeless love triangle between herself and her soulmate (who happens to be an alien) and the one boyfriend who just couldn’t let her go while she was getting, and after she got, the Player trait. He followed her all over, every world, every date she went on, always crying or yelling or both. She ended up living with both of them, because neither wants to lose her, lol
In my 5th save I am finally playing the premade families. I’ve never done that before, but being here on this forum made me see how many people do play and love them. I just had these couples “try for baby” last night (I’ll find out later how many worked) the Pancakes, the Jangs, the Fengs, Raj Rasoya w a townie, the Landgraabs, Johnny Zest with Zoe Patel, Mitchell Kalani with Dina Caliente, Gavin Richards with Nina Caliente, Katarina Lynx with Salim Banali, Gunther Munch with Diego Lobo, and Don Lothorio took no less than 6 interactions from meeting Summer Holiday to “try for baby” with her 😂 The Heckings had a baby girl, Brooke, a few days ago.
All 5 saves have my “conventional” favorite couple in them, the man, Jasper, went through and became a master painter, and is now MVP of the team, and his girlfriend, Laney, is a highest level photographer, and in a couple saves she is a highest level scientist. They are in all the saves so they can take pictures and paint portraits of everyone in town.
I play with aging off in every save.
Gallery ID is ARIANNANEAL
Like the OP I have bigger versions and smaller versions of challenges or stories. I play rotational and when I feel really inspired while playing an household I tend to make a challenge for them that suits them and the overall story or theme. Then I write it down in the household-description so that I can continue working toward that goal. Keeping several parallel challenges at a good level isn’t easy, had one rotational save that tanked because I just tried to do to much with each and every household to keep all challenges going. It became a “job” instead of a fun tool. Endless checklists and no play. Now I have a few themes and then several bite size challenges that can be done in a few rotations.
Themes, big overall ideas that cannot be done in one challenge. For example that I should remember that all occult sims are privileged in this save and regular sims are second class. That is to big to fix in one go but I try to make fun challenges that makes that obvious in the world. “Make 3 fun alien celebrities and make them 4-stars or 5-stars”. “Look through the vampires and make one two high ranked politicians”.
This is how I currently play. One main sim who lives in the world and that I follow closely for 2-3 days. She has big challenges. Then follows 2-3 days of rotational play and smaller challenges in the rest of the save. Making my own world building and story progression.
I wish I could have a notepad with info but I misused it earlier so now I keep everything in the game in order to be able to put it down. The notepad was great, so useful for ideas and inspiration. Then I had a severe burnout at work, whee. I found myself repeating earlier bad behavior that got me sick before, thinking about my projects nonstop, not being able to put it away. Was so stubborn that I started to feel sick again before I put the notebook away, I just liked it so much. Still fun to hear about other people’s elaborate plans for their saves but household descriptions is all the info I get to save now.
I also have an Addams Family save I created after purchasing Vampires and Parenthood at around the same time. Morticia raised 5 children (the original 2, Pubert from the movies, and 2 that were born in game) and has maxed Parenthood skill. The children grew up and most have married out, but I keep giving Gomez and Morticia potions of youth so they never die. I need to get back to that one because Gomez raising bees is something I think should happen.
My older save was something kind of like a Legacy. I made it to 8 generations. I'm kind of bored with it but I wouldn't say I'll never go back.