Adoorable!

Oh, ho-ho-HO - the titles get even better in the lame-stakes! Today I'm going to grace you with beautiful doors...

You see: I thought I'd capture the essence of a pretty countryside scene for a change, with wild English rose gardens, babbling brooks and little thatched cottages for my next series of build items...


HA!


Come on! Did you REALLY think I'd start getting all pretty?! No way! Far too many nice lots being uploaded of late and so I'm going to encourage an end to this farcical situation with some PROPER build items!



There are five meshes in the set (plain door, a fire escape, two windowed doors and a double door) and they all share a single set of six beautifully delicate textures as shown above. Soft rust, mellow corrosion, that sort of thing... See? I know what you REALLY like!

You want to make unreasonable demands?!

Now that the signs set is out but you think there is a sign you would like that wasn't included in the set, then let me know. If I receive enough requests that will amount to another set (I'm thinking 4-6 as a minimum), I'll make them.

And any joker who thinks they're hilarious by asking for a nice Welsh town name sign along the lines of LLANFAIRPWLLGWYNGYLLGOGERYCHWYRNDROBWLLLLANTYSILIOGOGOGOCH (yes, really - look it up if you don't believe me) will find that THEIR sign will say something infinitely more rude than anything I can write here and I won't be held accountable for it!

A sign of the times...

 
Now released!

About time we had another corny title, but at least this time it goes a small way to describing my next set!

I was looking at an old photograph of a derelict street where once-majestic buildings were boarded up, plaster falling away (usual sort of pretty building I like to make) but what perhaps stood out most is that the once brightly painted signs had corroded too. Badly.

I figured therefore that fellow urbanites might like some corroded signs too, so I've made a set comprising both rooftop and wall-mounted signs that not only come in corroded and rusted colours, but there are a few more cheerful paint colours too. I've made the following for this set:

BAR
BOWLING
DINER
GARAGE
GYM
HOTEL

By the way, that awesome crumbling plasterwork wallpaper in the top picture is by our very own MsBarrows and is an essential ingredient to any down-town building kit! It looks fabulous in the game and I'm hooked on it!

Being much shorter words, the BAR and GYM wall-mounted signs come in a small as well as regular size. The regular size of these smaller words looked a tad peculiar unless used on a higher floor, so I made a smaller size so you can choose which fits best. And I've actually made a collection for them too (I know that makes a change, but you might be glad to know I'm making collection files for older sets too - thanks to Jenova who prompted me into action).

These signs are scheduled for release on Friday 15 August. And do not assume you will impress me by pointing out any spelling mistakes in them!!!

EDIT: two new BROKEN signs added for GARAGE and HOTEL!

5 Million!!!!!

Who would have thought it?!

Well, nobody actually, least of all me! Compared to a lot of artists, it's not a colossal number, but it is huge to me and it's you I thank for continuing to download from me despite my lack of taste and style.

Even if you DO only download out of sympathy!

Thank you everyone! And I hope you enjoy my latest pretty set of rowhouse doors and windows to mark the occasion!

Swing fixed - and free for a month

Due to a problem with with a file on one of the TSR servers, some people were downloading a corrupted version of this swing which was crashing their games. This has been found and fixed, and if you were one of the unlucky ones, then you will be able to download the fixed version. The set is completely free from tomorrow (23rd July) so you won't lose out if your subscription has expired.

Download from here: Weighing Hoist Swing






How do I know if the swing is causing my crashes?
The crash occurs only when you select the game catalog's Miscellaneous/Children section (in the same place that the Maxis swing is located). If you try to select anything in this part of the catalog, the game crashes to desktop if the file you were unlucky enough to be served with the corrupted file. If you experience this crash, you need to redownload the swing.

I'm getting this crash - how can I find the swing in my Downloads folder?
The file is named 'cyclonesue_swing_weighingHoist_MESH.package'. Replace with an up-to-date version from the link above, or simply delete the swing from your Downloads folder.

Do I have to redownload the recolours too?
No, though it won't do any harm if you do by mistake. Only the mesh file was at fault.

I have always been able to use the swing - do I have to redownload?
No, if you can click on the swing in the catalog, then your version is fine. Nothing has changed with the file. I have simply reuploaded the same file to force the TSR servers to replace the corrupted version on one of our servers.

So, who sorted out your mess THIS time?!
Oh, so many to credit! Sceeters02, Figaro_black, MsBarrows, TabbyLou, swmeek, deagh - and lots of other people who willingly tested and reported a yay or nay on whether the swing caused a crash. A particularly special mention goes to MsBarrows who found the cause though. She noticed that the corrupt version was a larger file size and the internal coding was all gibberish. So if you happen to feel at all grateful for this piece of tat I made, DO please thank her for saving the day!

Why has the name changed - is this a different swing?!
No, I just got it all wrong as usual. The filename hasn't changed, so redownloading will overwrite the corrupted version properly, but I've changed its name on the screen.

Why?
Because it's not a weighing hoist. It's a crane.

So why did you call it a Weighing Hoist?
I DON'T KNOW!!!!!! Probably just to make you ask questions!

I want to rank you as the worst-ever Sims creator. How do I go about that?
Go away.

My apologies to all who love pointless tat

Yes, I'm sorry. The pointless-tat-machine (that's me, by the way) has not been outputting the usual quantity of late. Other than some not-me-at-all pretty lots, I've been unable to produce that much due to real-life time-hogs (like work - booooo, hiss).

I have some lovely slum windows that I'm dying to submit, but that set is not quite finished yet. I will do as soon as I have more time. Of course, if there is anyone out there who can pay me stupidly huge amounts of money for sitting on my posterior all day instead of joining in the grind and toil of work, please do reply! You have NO idea how much I'm longing to hear from you!!!

Arches now published

Yep, I finally got off my butt and uploaded the set!

And sure, I'll see about uploading the pictured house too for those who'd like it. I'm glad that it IS a house this time - I'm rather good at building front walls and that's it when it comes to taking screenshots for meshes!

Thanks again for your comments - hope you enjoy the arches! :-D

Arches - usual apologies and stuff...

The arches are very nearly ready at last! As usual, my previous blog entry is the cyclonesue-classic example of over-promising and under-delivering. Anyway, just the narrowest 1-tile arch to sort out (it's a tad too wide for the tile still), and then I'm ready to upload! Anyway, I'm very sorry about the delay and a huge thank-you for the fabulous comments you've left!
More testing! Unfortunately, I wasted a couple of extra weeks remaking the meshes from scratch when I realised I was going to have a wall-alignment problem (I want the arches to fit into flat walls seamlessly too). But all my remakes proved unnecessary (and wrong too!) - but had I kept a backup of the old?! Oh no, of COURSE not...
Use alone, or seamless join with neighbouring walls Anyway, I've found a good way of making the arches suitable for both stand-alone and blending into a wall, so all is well once again. An upload will follow as soon as I finish the screenshots!

Some decorative arches for posh buildings!

I've made some arches [insert-bored-applause-here] that actually aren't arches. Well, they ARE, but just decorative objects (not doorways). Because they're decorative, they can be lined up with or without building walls, and can be used to make tunnels and walkways, and Sims can still walk beneath them... I send huge thanks to AnoeskaB who rescued these arches (and me) from my Recycle Bin. I had spent a couple of weeks trying to find out how to prevent the arches being plunged in dark shadow when a floor tile was placed above them. Naturally, I did not solve this at all, but Anoeska did - and I'm very, very grateful indeed!

Your lots no longer locked if you use my tat!

One change I was admittedly totally negative about at TSR was the fact that builders who used FA creations in their submitted lots were suddenly having their lots locked as subscriber-only. That sucked; as one of the founders of TSRAA, the whole point was that lot builders could use TSRAA-marked work without worry or concern, without having to worry about giving credit and all that tosh...

Well, a huge, huge thanks to TSR who've given this a rethink and will no longer be locking your lots if you should ever use TSRAA items made by FAs.

And ALL my stuff is TSRAA - even if I've forgotten to mark it as TSRAA. Use it freely in your lots - no need to ask first. Recolour my rubbishy meshes too, again, no need to ask. Please do as you like.

That means you have NO excuse now not to use my reinforced steel girders and my dirty toilets sets! There'll be none of this pitiful "Oh Sue, you know I WOULD, but my lot would be subscriber-only..." nonsense any longer! Ha! You're cornered now, and I will be watching!

You have been warned!