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The Art of Sims Storytelling

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  • VIRTUALEEVIRTUALEE Posts: 2,507 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »
    @VIRTUALEE Are you talking about removing plumbobs from screenshots? Here's a trick I use in TS4: if you have multiple Sims in a household, just select a different Sim who's not in the screenshot. Plus with the tab camera mode, it's easy to zoom in so that the plumbob doesn't show.

    So simple and brilliant! Thanks a bunch @ CathyTea!!
  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member

    Though in retrospect, after seeing all the other SimLit out there, now I look back at my own stories and can only see myself as "doing them wrong." My word counts are very low compared to everyone else. I tend to screencap and then write around what happens rather than the other way around, composing and then going into game to get the imagery, which seems to be the standard, so now I've become really critical of myself when I hadn't been before. When I started, I didn't really think of there being any "right or wrong" way of doing things, but now I feel like my eyes have been opened and I'm "doing things all wrong," heh.

    I, too, felt like I was doing something wrong after reading others' stories. I felt like my stories were too long and no one would read them. But shortening my chapters meant cheapening my story, in my opinion. I also decided to cut back on my footnotes because Sims game players should know most of the things I was talking about anyway. You live and learn.

    I don't think there's a right or wrong way to write SimLit. That's why this is called creative expression. Everyone has their own style, voice, and way of creating characters, plot, etc. It's ultimately about what you enjoy writing, and then others who have similar interests will enjoy it too and will see the your passion, dedication, and joy through your writing.
    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

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  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    What kind of relationship (or whatever you want to call it) is there between the text and pictures in your Sims stories? And yes, you can answer this even if there is no text or no pics in your story as well. That's a relationship too.

    To answer your question @RipuAncestor ...
    When I first started out, I just took screenshots and then wrote whatever worked and fit after the gameplay element. Now, I have an idea in mind when I go into my game. Sometimes I have to stage things - place certain characters together in a room or situation, dress them a certain way, modify the appearance of a building/room, use certain poses. Typically, I then press play after I've gotten all those things set up and let things happen as they will. This adds a randomness to my story. Then I typically pick my first photo and start writing the story. Sometimes the other screenshots assist in the writing, giving me cues as to things to include in the text, and other times, I just write and fill in the screenshots as needed. I generally have a loose outline when I go into my games, but I love just letting the game tell the story and figuring out how to include that in my idea.

    @CitizenErased14 I like how you use wordless chapters to provide detail for flashback and back stories. This is a neat concept. I haven't been brave enough to try it yet in my story.


    To everyone: Out of curiosity, do you use a lot of mods, poses, and/or cc in your stories (i.e. a combination, only 1, or none)? How do they affect your stories and your gameplay? Is it important to your storytelling, or could you tell your stories without them? Why do you use it?
    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

    Find me elsewhere:
    My EA App ID: livinasimminlife
    Livin' A Simmin' Life Stories
    My Worldbuilding Blog
    Simblr
    My Sims Pinterest
  • Nory_05Nory_05 Posts: 355 Member
    I know I've just been replying all over the place with this thread, I guess with my headaches lately I've had trouble trying to stay cohesive and on track, so bear with. I'm just going to jump into two topics that I think were brought up earlier, and if they weren't... then I'm an idi*t. It's the headache meds talking. -_-;;


    And Tumblr... I'll probably get kicked out of the thread for saying it, but I have never been a fan of it. I am old (I'm going to go out on a limb here and say I bet I'm older than the majority of most of the folks that are in this community/hang out on these boards) and I've just never felt comfortable with it. It is such a chore for me to navigate. I loathe the constant popups in my face to subscribe to this or that when I don't even have a frickin' account and am just trying to read a story. And the way the durn page keeps shifting over to the side on me as I'm trying to read a story! ARGH! That drives me bonkers! I have Daily Chronic Headache, I like my websites to just STAY STILL! Not to mention often I find posts aren't dated (sometimes they are, sometimes they aren't, sometimes they just say "such and such hours ago") which make anything posted on Tumblr an absolute chore for me to try to archive the updates for on the Stories and Legacies Index. I'm not going to say if a story is posted on it that I won't read it, but I definitely will say that probably would push the title a bit lower on my ever-growing reading list.

    @mastressalita i don't get twitter! For me it just looks difficult to use and not very userfriendly. I used to love blogger, had my personal blog there, but when i decided to write a sim story, i found that wordpress is better. I could very simply follow other blogs.

    For me it's also very important how my story looks. On Wordpress i found some really simple, basic themes, and it was easy to set it up in a way that is like turning a pages in a book.

    ra3rei wrote: »

    And lastly to return my my defense of the cheap and mindless. Mindless and fluffy isn't the same as badly written or bad world creation. You can write a completely believable fun lighthearted stories with my little ponies and it not be trite or cheap . When the author doesn't care about the characters or bother to create the world around them that makes sense, then it's bad writing - or writing just to get paid. But most authors I've met or have read their 'on writing' books aren't like that. Even those that toss out multiple books a year with similar plots. They enjoy what they're doing. And as a reader - if I liked the world or the plot - I'd keep reading. I've read enough of "The Cat Who..." mysteries to prove that.

    Then again, I tend not to read or watch "real" world stories. What folks consider "modern literature" or movies and TV shows listed as "dramas" - I avoid. Not because I don't think they're good. But I live in that world so I tend to choose to spend my free time in other worlds. To me, simlit is like another world so even when it "realistic" - I still enjoy it. If it's got vampires, demons, mages, aliens, or sims, I'm going to be there.

    /novel

    @re3rei I agree! I don't mind reading lighthearted, funny, easy to read stories. What i don't like is when a story has no plot, is badly written, has flat, two dimensional characters. Like, for example if every sentence is in a different tense. That would just give me a headache and i wouldn't want to put up with it. Or when I don't know who the main character is, because the POV changes after every two sentences (I've actually seen this happen, not in sim story, but online published story). When nothing actually happens in the story, except the author lists the daily activity in the most boring manner, that's just not something I'd like to read.

    It's just my personal preference though. :)
    My sim stories:
    Regrets (Finished)
    Abbie's Diary (Finished)
    Mistakes

  • CitizenErased14CitizenErased14 Posts: 12,187 Member
    I totally recommend trying wordless chapters sometime, @AdamsEve1231 ! It's much more work than a normal chapter, but the end result is something really special and unique, I think :)

    And now for your question
    To everyone: Out of curiosity, do you use a lot of mods, poses, and/or cc in your stories (i.e. a combination, only 1, or none)? How do they affect your stories and your gameplay? Is it important to your storytelling, or could you tell your stories without them? Why do you use it?

    I don't think either of my SimLit stories would exist without mods and poses! Especially Dust to Dust. The biggest thing I use the mods for are cheating my sims' needs to be full and changing their emotions. This ensures that they won't move away from a screenshot to eat or sleep or go to the bathroom, and the changing emotions guarantees certain facial expressions when I need them :)

    As for poses, I've only used a handful of custom poses in my story. However, I've made use of the TS4 poseplayer (using just the normal animations from the game) and it's been a total lifesaver! Instead of waiting around for the right thing to happen or trying out a bunch of different interactions, I can get the exact pose I need when I need it. And the sims do the pose on an infinite loop so if you don't get the right pose the first time around, you have plenty of opportunities!

    And actually, if anyone is curious about using mods and poses for screenshots in TS4, I actually made a (really awful) tutorial video that can be found here :)
    snvAF3B.png
  • InfraGreenInfraGreen Posts: 6,693 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »
    Re. Elder Sims--one of my favorites is Exra D'amore in Seraphaeli's "What are you even doing?"

    Also, of course I love Bill Racket in @InfraGreen 's Eight Cicadas.

    Both Bill and Exra seem to grow increasingly romantic--and Bill matures in a way that allows him to be a true partner--as they grow older.

    @CathyTea: Aww yeah, a new story to read. :-D

    Bill is a satisfying character to write, especially because the way he is right now (as of Chapters 37-38 or so) was the result of me needing to develop him. And him needing to develop for his own sake. He can talk about the wonders of being apathetic all he wants, but he has a lot of love for a few people close to him. Quite a leap from him getting bored with his wife the moment a baby came into the picture.

    It's something to contrast with Harwood, who was one of the rare elderly characters who starts out that way. But he doesn't have much time alive in the story, and stays more-or-less the same. His eventual end is only jarring to anyone who didn't pick up on him seeming rather uneasy from his introduction. Instead, I find him interesting because of the person he might have been in the past.

    ---

    To everyone: Out of curiosity, do you use a lot of mods, poses, and/or cc in your stories (i.e. a combination, only 1, or none)? How do they affect your stories and your gameplay? Is it important to your storytelling, or could you tell your stories without them? Why do you use it?

    @AdamsEve1231: Lots of all of that. ;)

    So, I'm a relative newbie to Pose Player, as I started using it only last year. But the possibilities for what I could show in images opened up big-time. For the story that's the misshapen ancestor to my current one, introducing Pose Player meant that I could try and take my story into darker territory. Showing characters getting arrested and interrogated, showing fist fights, etc. Adding Custom Content broadened the sort of things I could portray even further. From blood splatter on the floors, to having more clothing so everyone could have a wide, rotating wardrobe (lest they be filthy animals who wear the same outfit every day).

    And since we were talking about elders, I feel a lot more free writing them as more major characters, after finding custom clothing for them! They can look as stylish as their younger co-stars! I will say, TS4 greatly improved that aspect on its own, since clothing isn't limited by age by default.

    Mods help in giving me more god-like control over the game. Not much more to say.

    If I was to try and write Eight Cicadas without any modifications, the story would largely be text-based because there's a lot that the game doesn't have the capability to portray on its own. And boy do I like writing with visuals.
    A thousand bared teeth, a thousand bowed heads

    outrun / blog / tunglr
  • Nory_05Nory_05 Posts: 355 Member


    To everyone: Out of curiosity, do you use a lot of mods, poses, and/or cc in your stories (i.e. a combination, only 1, or none)? How do they affect your stories and your gameplay? Is it important to your storytelling, or could you tell your stories without them? Why do you use it?

    @AdamsEve In my current story i use a lot of poses. There are hardly any pictures without some pose involved. But it's just the nature of the story. It's a bit darker in atmosphere, and the sims never do anything like that by default. Not much crying or violent facial expressions are avialable in game.

    My first story was more a funny one. In that one i didn't use many poses, almost none, except for the wedding shots, and some group shots.

    I can't seem to live without mods though. I'm still not playing too much with TS4 because there's no mod that would slow the time down the way the relativity mod did in TS3.
    My sim stories:
    Regrets (Finished)
    Abbie's Diary (Finished)
    Mistakes

  • ra3reira3rei Posts: 2,418 Member
    @Nory_05 There's a reason I didn't finish reading Queen Victoria's diary. You'd think as a QUEEN, it would be interesting. Nope. Basically as you said "the author lists the daily activity in the most boring manner".

    @VIRTUALEE They've also recently fixed the "headlineeffects on/off" to acutally remove the green plumbob. If they're talking to someone the light grey bob is still there though so @CathyTea's method is more surefire, but I spend half my game now with the headline effects off.

    @mastressalita I find most of the writers around here are in the 25-35 range...perhaps that's just my own bias though. There's plenty of the 20-25 range of course, but there's a lot more over 35 than I normally see. I think it's awesome. But then I always get along with people older than me more

    Also re:Elders. Half the problem is that EA has done a terrible job making Elders real people! They are so limited in what they can do. My folks are 60+ now and they are nothing like the elders in sims. Even my 96 year old grandmother is better off than many of the elders. They're like cookie-cutter folks each sim ages in the exact same way. I have minor hopes (and expect them to be dashed) that THIS time EA will do something cooler with elders.

    @AdamsEve1231 & @everybody
    "To everyone: Out of curiosity, do you use a lot of mods, poses, and/or cc in your stories (i.e. a combination, only 1, or none)? How do they affect your stories and your gameplay? Is it important to your storytelling, or could you tell your stories without them? Why do you use it?"

    I have recently been seduced by the cc dark side. Basically I got tired of there being no decent curtains, only a handful of rugs and a limited number of pictures available in TS4 (HA! I just noticed a mis-typing of TS4 is TS$ <---so true!). Anyway that seduced me into CC. But I try to be sane about it. I also ADORED the autumn mod someone made for TS4 and used it in one of my stories where I wanted to show time passing. So that was important for the story (although I'm not sure anyone noticed). Most of my CC is just background flavor though. Modwise, most of them are to help the game run smoother and not erase all my ghosts. Poses...I installed them and was planning to use them in my short story this month. But every shot I used was a regular shot. I'll try again, but there's something unnatural about them. You have to get the shot just right to have it not look funny. Some folks (cough @InfraGreen cough) are great at utilizing poses. Me, I still need practice. Instead I end up using photoshop....And for my short stories photoshop was absolutely required to get the screenshots I felt I needed.

    But as I've said before. My short stories are the only writing I do where I write first and screenshot second. So I don't really have the sims living their lives normally. It also helps me stay within that 12 screenshot goal...and I kind of cheated on that this month by photoshopping pictures together. I've yet to shoot all the shots I imaged when I wrote the story, but it's always worked out in the end. We'll see what happens moving forward though. I'm getting ambitious. I'll be interested to see/hear if it pays off.
    Check out Raerei's Fortress for Builds, Short Stories, and maybe some longer stuff.
  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member

    It's not the story. It's the changes in the community. There's just not that many people interested in Sims stories anymore.

    Also I cannot update as quickly as I could back in those days, and that's part of it. Along with not having the time or the energy to read and comment on other people's stuff as much as I should if I really want readers. A lot of getting readers is building relationships and investing in other people and their work, and I don't have the capital to invest that I used to...

    Also all the places where I used to advertise are dead, the majority of the people who read it have moved on and left the community, and everyone who is left has moved to Tumblr and YouTube, so unless it moves or it's just pictures they're not interested anymore.

    To end this post on a less bitter note though - this is the one place I've found in the community where people do still care about stories. I am trying to invest here.

    I caught onto the Sims 3 games late. Sims 4 was already in production and was released less than 8 months after I started playing. I really hope the SimLit community isn't dead I do use Tumblr, but I'm not a YouTube-er. I'm glad there's a group like this out there that promotes and supports one another on more than just a cursory level.

    I can totally relate to not being able to update quickly. Between my non-fiction writing and my other fiction writing, starting grad school, and being married, I just don't have as much time as I'd like to devote to Sims, but I'm trying. And you're right about the investing in others and reading other people's work thing. I find this across all my writing platforms regardless of what I'm doing. It takes time, effort, and energy that I don't always have, but would love to have.

    I'm hoping that even if only a few people read then it's worth it. Plus I'm enjoying the story telling process via the Sims for myself. It's a good stretch for my writing brain.

    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

    Find me elsewhere:
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  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »

    My favorite story to write is the one that hardly anyone reads or even knows about! I feel like I can just express whatever I want with that, without even thinking about how readers will respond! There's something so liberating about just writing for writing, not for readers.

    I feel like I'm just getting started. I'm trying to build my readership, and honestly, I'd like readers. But I think you're absolutely right about it being liberating to write just for me and no one else. It does help me stress a whole lot less when I go into my writing/gameplay with this mindset. I just wish I was more brave to let go and keep writing whatever I want without worrying about reader response or the length of my prose.

    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

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  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »

    My favorite story to write is the one that hardly anyone reads or even knows about! I feel like I can just express whatever I want with that, without even thinking about how readers will respond! There's something so liberating about just writing for writing, not for readers.

    I feel like I'm just getting started. I'm trying to build my readership, and honestly, I'd like readers. But I think you're absolutely right about it being liberating to write just for me and no one else. It does help me stress a whole lot less when I go into my writing/gameplay with this mindset. I just wish I was more brave to let go and keep writing whatever I want without worrying about reader response or the length of my prose.

    Oh, I hope you get brave enough to do that, too, because then, I bet what you create will be amazing!

    Maybe you could write it and then surprise us! "Look what I did when I forgot about you!" LOL!
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »

    What if you skip anything that's not "the good stuff?" (This is actually not a goofy idea, but a serious one.) A lot of my favorite stories--those that really grab me as a reader, including work by several writers who contribute to this thread ( @CitizenErased14 , @InfraGreen , @MedleyMisty , @ra3rei ), leave out large chunks in their story. Sometimes, this is filled in later through flashback, sometimes, not--and what happens for the reader is that we're able to really engage to figure out what we need to know to fill in the gaps. As a reader, I love the gaps almost as much as I do the story itself! :)

    I totally have done this before. I did this between the ending of Part 1 and Part 2 of my story - The Krazy Crazy Life of Kassiopeia Fullbright. I filled in some of the gaps in my Prologue (2.0 Resolutions) bringing any new readers up to speed, but leaving out some details that I may or may not fill in later. I like making my reader guess and keeping them wondering.

    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

    Find me elsewhere:
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  • MedleyMistyMedleyMisty Posts: 1,188 Member
    edited November 2015
    @mastressalita I have a Tumblr, and I really like the community there. I've been there three years and there's never been any drama or hate or bullying and I've made a lot of good friends. It does have its faults as a storytelling format though, which is why I felt the need to branch out and find a place like this.

    It also has a lot to do with the form that Surreal Darkness took at first. Like the first chapter is so episodic and is just little vignettes because I started writing it on Tumblr.

    Also I will be...*gulp*...35 on December 17th. Shh, don't tell anyone! *she says, as she posts it in public*

    I will say that I now know why the U.S. Constitution doesn't allow you to run for president until you're 35, though.

    Gosh, you guys were so busy while I was at work! I will have a lot to say after I feed the cats!

    Also I googled stuff like "what makes a book trashy" at work today and I have Links and Thoughts to share!
    Sometimes the darkness and I tell stories.
  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    @VIRTUALEE Welcome. I think it's so cool that you record stories and that you created a story for your mom when she was in the hospital. That's such a sweet idea. I've never made a video and I'm not really comfortable with making one anyway. Give me a writing platform any day. I must confess I don't really watch videos, but I'm going to check yours out.

    Don't really worry about embarrassing yourself. The Sims community in my experience is all about creative license and freedom to do whatever you like and what you're comfortable with. If someone doesn't like it or can't give constructive criticism, they aren't worth your time.

    About copywriting, I echo @InfraGreen and @CitizenErased14 (ah!! scary thought about someone copying my stuff. I hope no one would be so cruel and lowdown.)
    Mightydan wrote: »

    I don't consider myself a writer at all, so I don't feel I could give any useful writing tips. The only advice I have is to be true to yourself. Freeing your mind from any preconceptions of what Simlit should be will help you develop your own writing style. I think it's better to figure out what works for you on your own rather than trying to box yourself into only doing what's considered as being 'the right way'.

    Love this advice! This is so true. What works for some may not work for others. I think it's important to figure out your own unique writing style and be able to take constructive criticism.

    That's what I love about the Sims. There's no right or wrong way. Honestly, I'm learning as I go so I change and adapt my story and my writing style as I go. I learn what others like and support what others write and appreciate that there are so many different styles and ideas out there. Some I just don't like reading and that's okay. I know my writing style won't be for everyone either. The point is do what you love and do best.

    @stalesfo I can't seem to do a legacy challenge successfully either. I like the concept of actually completing one but I get so caught up in making one Sim's story entertaining and deep and I end up never moving on. I keep telling myself I should just do one for fun or create my own for fun (but it's a little overdone so it's hard to find fresh ideas), but then I can't seem to get them going.

    To the community: Have there been certain types of legacy challenges that turned out well for you and/or you're still using them? What does and doesn't work for you?

    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

    Find me elsewhere:
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    My Worldbuilding Blog
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  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    @InfraGreen I use Twitter for my nonfiction writing mostly as a promotional option and to connect with other readers. I use Tumblr strictly for The Sims and to post updates, shorts, etc. I am guilty of doing the "Few pictures, short text blurbs" option on Tumblr. But I much prefer the longer blog posts (even if they take me longer to read and catch up on a story) and the forums (because it feels more personal and more of a commitment).

    I'd say to everyone, even if the community is dwindling, keep up the good work. What you write does matter.

    @ra3rei Don't feel bad. I felt like I was behind when I started. It's hard to keep up because everyone writes such great comments and discussion points and I want to respond to them all. I decided to try and read through everyone's comments and make one long post of my own instead of doing everything separately, but I'm still having to do a combination of both. To the community: do you prefer individualized responses on here or long posts like I'm doing now? I just want to make sure I'm not irritating someone by writing a long post to multiple people.

    I like the way you said "Try a bit of everything and see what sticks." I agree - the first few years (or in my case months since I haven't hit the one year mark yet) is trial and error. I'm still learning and excited to learn and try new things.

    ra3rei wrote: »
    And lastly to return my my defense of the cheap and mindless. Mindless and fluffy isn't the same as badly written or bad world creation. You can write a completely believable fun lighthearted stories with my little ponies and it not be trite or cheap . When the author doesn't care about the characters or bother to create the world around them that makes sense, then it's bad writing - or writing just to get paid.

    Some of the first few stories I read in the Sims fell into the fluffy department and I loved them. They were fun to read and they weren't badly written. The "authors" cared about their characters and you could tell they had fun with them. I personally like to write and most enjoy reading the in-depth stories with dark, mysterious, or real-world elements, but when I need a break from that, I enjoy taking a break to enjoy the fluff. I can say that I don't like mindless entertainment - entertainment just for the sake of entertaining a.k.a. drawing attention to oneself or stupid humor at the expense of someone else. I'd prefer stories with a little bit of depth and ones that actually make me care about the character (like I want to know what will happen next).
    @mastressalita I like what you said about not re-writing old chapters. It's true -- it think it's good for readers to see the author's growth as a writer!
    Every time I consider rewriting, I think about this very truth. I just hope that my readers will sift through the sludge, stay with me in the mundane down-time, and get to the good stuff.

    About elderly characters: I added two to my story about Kass, her grandparents. I kinda based them off my own grandparents with some major changes. However, I really enjoyed writing them. I want to do more with them later, but then I off and sent them to Moonlight Falls and my main character is in Bay City a.k.a. Legacy Island III. Maybe I'll do a Skype chat or something??? (I also had Davis' grandmother, Granny Jade, but then she didn't make an appearance save once... so maybe I'll need to add her back in).
    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

    Find me elsewhere:
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  • MedleyMistyMedleyMisty Posts: 1,188 Member
    @AdamsEve1231 Out of curiosity, do you use a lot of mods, poses, and/or cc in your stories (i.e. a combination, only 1, or none)? How do they affect your stories and your gameplay? Is it important to your storytelling, or could you tell your stories without them? Why do you use it?

    I have one mod in my Sims 4 game - one I was directed to here to solve the problem of the game generating the same basic family over and over.

    In Sims 3 I used the chaos mod to start fires, because Valley needed a couple of big fires. I also very very very occasionally used cheats to get poses that were already in the game when I needed them. I also had a couple of hacks to speed up getting aspiration points because I needed some of the rewards for the story. That was it though. And there is only one piece of CC in Valley - the nightgown that Lilith wears at the Goth house.

    Sims 2 was pretty much the same - I had that Batman box or whatever to get in-game animations on demand. I had more custom content for Sims 2 though. Which made it interesting when some of it somehow disappeared or got deleted or something and a pink fairy character later showed up bald and without her makeup and wings. I wrote her appearance change into the story. I said she had become a carrot addict, IIRC - my Sims 2 legacy was totally just for the lulz.

    So basically I only use mods if I have to, on the rare occasion that I do poses it's just in-game animations when I want them instead of waiting for them to happen, and these days I don't use custom content at all. I'm full vanilla.

    It's important because for me the main attraction of the Sims game as a storytelling tool is its limitations. It's like gutter guards on my imagination, right? No matter how I throw the ball, it's gonna make it down to the pins.

    The entire plot of the first couple generations of the aforementioned Sims 2 legacy came from a screenshot of the founder talking on the phone with the globe speech bubble over her head and a Social Bunny visible behind her.

    I just...gosh. I LOVE the game so much as a storytelling tool. I love coming up with explanations for everything that happens and developing characters based on their traits and using the game's environment to create so many stories, from wildly ridiculous stories about social bunnies taking over the world to finding a personal philosophy of existence in the Sunset Valley waterfall. I can do anything with this game, and I take pride in doing it vanilla.
    Sometimes the darkness and I tell stories.
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    en I can't seem to get them going.

    To the community: Have there been certain types of legacy challenges that turned out well for you and/or you're still using them? What does and doesn't work for you?

    Oooh! I love this question since I just finished my first legacy at 12:23 a.m. Nov. 28! LOL!

    The Pinstar legacy was awesome to play--and I loved telling a story through it. What I love about the game play is that it forces one to play through all sorts of events--no exiting without saving and traits and aspirations are rolled.

    I also love that with a legacy it's basically telling the same story over, and over, and over again... It's much like a fugue.

    This really stretched me as a writer: "Ok. Aspen is going to meet a guy and fall in love. How do we tell this story this time? Ok, Grim is coming for the 29th visit--how do I make this one different?"

    And I just loved how certain themes rolled through the entire legacy.

    This story is entirely game-play driven--and Sim driven, as my Sims all practice self-determination. And so it's different from anything else I've written. I really enjoyed trying to make something that I didn't control (at all) seem interesting, cohesive, and meaningful. I thought it would be a light, funny, humorous story--and it turned out carrying me through the themes of love, mortality, transcendence and freedom.

    I'm also pretty sure it's the last legacy I'll ever play--first and last! One of my Sims really insisted on her freedom to choose aspects of her own life, so she's pretty well convinced me not to subject Sims to challenges that require me to determine how they live.
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • angelbearangelbear Posts: 151 Member
    I like using their wishes along with a general theme but not outright control what they do. You get some interesting story lines and my sims always make me laugh
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    @AdamsEve1231 Also, for this question: To the community: do you prefer individualized responses on here or long posts like I'm doing now? I just want to make sure I'm not irritating someone by writing a long post to multiple people.

    I prefer individualized responses, but I'm also ok with the long ones. I usually don't do the long ones due to attention span! LOL! I see a question and I just answer it, then I see... "Oh! There's more!" **too late! already posted**

    I like spam, too, as long as it's veggie spam! :smiley:

    I also like one-idea-per-post, simply for ease of answering and quoting.

    At the same time, though, I'm flexible and adaptable, so if you prefer the long posts, those definitely work for me, too. And if it's the consensus that the long posts are best, I can modify my own responses to use those.
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    edited November 2015
    Nory_05 wrote: »

    I can't seem to live without mods though.

    Ditto.
    ra3rei wrote: »

    @mastressalita I find most of the writers around here are in the 25-35 range...perhaps that's just my own bias though. There's plenty of the 20-25 range of course, but there's a lot more over 35 than I normally see. I think it's awesome. But then I always get along with people older than me more

    I am in my late twenties. Part of me is glad that I didn't discover The Sims 3 until after college. A lot of wasted time when I should've been studying would've happened. I'm a little concerned about this exact issue happening when I start grad school in January. However, part of me feels like I'm behind.

    I am with you @ra3rei and I've always gotten along with those older than me too. Some of it is how I was raised, I think, and the other part is being married young and growing up a lot in my first two years of marriage. The other thing is I find a lot of people my age (and younger) aren't all that mature and deep. I personally would take deeper more meaningful relationships over casual any day. [And this comment is meant with no disrespect to those younger than me and it certainly doesn't apply to everyone. I have friends younger than me (and my own siblings) that have a good mature head on their shoulders.] I don't think age matters. Integrity and treating people with decency and kindness matters.

    @CathyTea thank you for your sweet comments.

    Okay, I seriously need to get off the forums and actually go do some Simming... and/or writing of my own. LOL. This is such a great forum.
    With these forums closing down, stay connected.

    Find me elsewhere:
    My EA App ID: livinasimminlife
    Livin' A Simmin' Life Stories
    My Worldbuilding Blog
    Simblr
    My Sims Pinterest
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member

    I just...gosh. I LOVE the game so much as a storytelling tool. I love coming up with explanations for everything that happens and developing characters based on their traits and using the game's environment to create so many stories, from wildly ridiculous stories about social bunnies taking over the world to finding a personal philosophy of existence in the Sunset Valley waterfall. I can do anything with this game, and I take pride in doing it vanilla.

    This is me, too. I love vanilla. And as a writer, I love game-driven stories so much! I always figure that I've got my regular writing for when I want to write things I'm more in control of, and for SimLit, I love to let my the Sims and the game set the direction.

    As a reader, I adore story-driven SimLit and poses and CC! As well as game-driven SimLit. I love it all as a reader! :)
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • CitizenErased14CitizenErased14 Posts: 12,187 Member
    I love this thread :) I just had to say that :lol:
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  • MedleyMistyMedleyMisty Posts: 1,188 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »

    My favorite story to write is the one that hardly anyone reads or even knows about! I feel like I can just express whatever I want with that, without even thinking about how readers will respond! There's something so liberating about just writing for writing, not for readers.

    I feel like I'm just getting started. I'm trying to build my readership, and honestly, I'd like readers. But I think you're absolutely right about it being liberating to write just for me and no one else. It does help me stress a whole lot less when I go into my writing/gameplay with this mindset. I just wish I was more brave to let go and keep writing whatever I want without worrying about reader response or the length of my prose.

    I write completely and entirely what I want to write. It's just that once I'm done, I want to share it and have other people like it. I get confused when that doesn't happen and I get all insecure and I wonder if my writing isn't any good or if it's that I'm a bad person, and that's why people don't want the gift that I worked on so hard for them.
    Sometimes the darkness and I tell stories.
  • CitizenErased14CitizenErased14 Posts: 12,187 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »

    My favorite story to write is the one that hardly anyone reads or even knows about! I feel like I can just express whatever I want with that, without even thinking about how readers will respond! There's something so liberating about just writing for writing, not for readers.

    I feel like I'm just getting started. I'm trying to build my readership, and honestly, I'd like readers. But I think you're absolutely right about it being liberating to write just for me and no one else. It does help me stress a whole lot less when I go into my writing/gameplay with this mindset. I just wish I was more brave to let go and keep writing whatever I want without worrying about reader response or the length of my prose.

    I write completely and entirely what I want to write. It's just that once I'm done, I want to share it and have other people like it. I get confused when that doesn't happen and I get all insecure and I wonder if my writing isn't any good or if it's that I'm a bad person, and that's why people don't want the gift that I worked on so hard for them.

    I totally understand your feelings @MedleyMisty !

    I always write for myself, but I LOVE having readers, and I feel those same insecurities when people don't read my story (or start and then stop and are never seen again :lol:). And then I would always feel selfish or greedy for wanting MORE readers because I know my story was decently popular, but there were days when it felt like so many other stories were more popular than mine, and I'd wonder what I was doing wrong!

    But then I would think about how amazing my readers were to me and how thoughtful and lovely they all were, and I really tried to focus on reader QUALITY, not QUANTITY :)

    Part of why I think I'm so bummed about D2D being over is the fact that my readers will slowly dwindle. I've been fortunate to have a few people still reading this past week after my story ended, but I know it won't last! :(

    What's funny though is that, as a reader, I actually prefer finished stories! I get nervous starting new stories because either I fear the story will be abandoned and never completed, or I feel "pressure" about having to keep up with the author's updates and not missing chapters. (By the way, I read several in-progress stories, so don't fear that I won't read yours because I said that! It's just a general preference of mine! :) ) that's why I'm glad CathyTea started the "It's Done!" Thread, which is a listing of completed SimLit stories. I can't wait to read them!

    I feel like I got way off topic with that response :lol: Sorry :tongue:
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  • MedleyMistyMedleyMisty Posts: 1,188 Member
    edited December 2015
    @CitizenErased14 Oh, I could tell you stories if you need help valuing quality of readers over quantity. Believe me, I learned that the hard way.

    At the worst of it I hid the blog for three days, and it felt really nice to see a blank stats page. Because by that point I felt like every view was someone looking for something to put on Simsecret, looking for something to point out as wrong and horrible. Every view felt like an invasion.

    I unhid it and finished the story though. That was very near the end.

    And yeah, the numbers will go down, but I feel kind of happy when I see people reading Valley all these years later. Sometimes they'll comment, and that's always fun. :) You get to laugh at how innocent they are. *rubs hands together and cackles*

    If it helps any, I update Surreal Darkness quite slowly. After two years, it has a grand total of 10 chapters. And all but the first one are just nine pics long.

    Sometimes the darkness and I tell stories.

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