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Cyclonesue's Blog
She Who Dares
So, there is someone here who DOES dare to ask, at risk of my venomous wrath and ascerbic words!But it is a good thing that she did, for I was BURSTING to tell you all about that arched walway... (and if I HAD burst, it would have been on nothing short of a full-scale national emergency to deal with the end result)...
Anyways, that arched walkway (as shown in my last rant) is rubbish because:
(a) floor tiles on TOP of it cast it in shadow - just as they do when you place floor tiles on top of columns.
(b) Sims can walk through the struts (ie through the STONE bits) so an emergency dose of Dr Pixel's 'Do Not Enter' cones are a must!
(c) the ends when tied end to end don't quite meet - seems like a millimetre space. Some people are NOT good at detail.
(d) it needs the 'moveobjects' cheat to place in water
(e) the open arches refuse to line up with any windows in a wall immediately behind it
(f) I made it
But, if you're not troubled by shadows or you fancy using it indoors, it looks pretty okay. So, I thought I'd throw it in anyway. Add it to your collections of 'rarely useful but will use if desperate' collection of items.
Gentle Poke
Psst...After reading that last post, you were supposed to ask: "WHY, dear Cyclonesue-of-all-things-amazing, is that arch 'rubbish'?"
So, I'll sit here and wait.
You want the truth?!
Have you seen that new arched walkway I've thrown into my release schedule for March?Well, it's rubbish, but I thought I'd upload it anyway.
And there we all are.
Okay, so WHO wasn't paying attention?!
I've just had a bit of a giggle at my downloads figures on the Never-Ending Privacy Windows set. Yes, my downloads figures, or lack thereof, are quite often worthy of a giggle, but today I'm giggling for different reasons...You see, at least six of you (at last count) have not downloaded ALL FOUR meshes of the privacy window set. That window ain't gonna work if you don't have them all. Of course, it might be that a few have downloaded some bits more than once (said with hope!), but if the windows won't work, check your Downloads folder to make sure you have all four. The files will be named as follows:
cyclonesue_window_privacy_End
cyclonesue_window_privacy_EndDiagonal
cyclonesue_window_privacy_Middle
cyclonesue_window_privacy_MiddleDiagonal
EDIT: hmmm - it seems you're doing the same with the standard never-ending windows too! It won't work, you know! You MUST download all four pieces!
Right: off you go to check it out!
Cyclonesue's Spring Clean
Well, alright - it's not Spring yet - and there's precious little cleaning being done in the Cyclonesue camp either (so another meaningless blog title, therefore).I realised lately that my Downloads folder was full of 'nearly done' creations and my bombsite-style neighbourhoods brimming with 'almost finished' lots (well, 'brimming' meaning about three, actually), and the ONE thing that had stopped me foisting the dastardly things onto hapless downloaders was pure, unadulterated, bone-idleness. Oh and time, with Real Life staring sternly at me each time I insert the Sims CD back into the drive.
Yes, because, in order to share something at this fine site, one has to photograph it, and make pretty pictures, and submit the things, and... (reaches for sedatives).
But have you seen my release calendar? Packed, it is. Packed with all sorts of useless junk that I should have shifted ages ago (and the odd "Never Ending" set here and there). Yes, I MADE myself finish a gazillion items AND submit them.
[ insert round of applause and/or murmurs of appreciation here ]
Oh, alright then!
I guess that arch (see last entry) looks pretty okay when used in a room of evenly distributed lighting - and it looks great outdoors.If I release the arch (IF), you MUST promise me you'll use it in well-lit areas, or darker areas provided the amount of light that shades each piece is about equal. The worst enemy of this expanding arch is the sideways-on window, where the arch piece nearest to the window is the brightest (as in my last entry's piccie). Use lighting or windows opposite the arch though, and all is well.
And it will go nicely with my Never-Ending Privacy Window (below) that I've just queued up for release! Thanks to DavidH, this idea allows you to make your windows as little or as long as you like!
More never-ending windows to come soon!
Of course, there are some that might say my blog is never-ending too - but we won't mention what will become of them.
Nobody told ME!
I spent AGES making a new arch. An expandable arch with end pieces and a top piece so it could be as little as two squares wide, or as wide as the widest lot base! It was a very cool idea from one of our TSR members and I couldn't wait to try...
Don't get excited. It didn't work because the ambient lighting in the game lights each piece differently and so, indoors as in the above piccie, it looks (quite frankly) rubbish! Just about what you'd expect from the Cyclonesue stable of creations really. Therefore, I don't intend to submit it.
But this ISN'T the point of this story. No, I wanted to tell you about how long it took me to make ALL THREE pieces (note the word THREE). You see: there were TWO end pieces: a left and a right piece. Took me ages to make the last one (the right piece) in particular because it would have looked odd it it was not identical to the left. But I did it - with diagonal versions too!
Only, when playing with the arch in the game, I noticed how interesting it was that, when laying a left piece, it rotated on the wall to face either left or right. So did the right hand piece, come to that. They could both be left-facing, or both be right-facing, OR (as intended) one of each. My partner was also curious to know why I'd made TWO end pieces instead of only one which could be placed either end of the arch.
Yes, instead of labouring intensely over the right-hand piece to ensure it matched the left hand piece perfectly, ANYONE here could have told me that there was NO NEED for a right-hand piece at all, because the left-hand piece could be BOTH ends!
You all knew that, didn't you! Oh yes you did, and that's why you're all pointing and laughing!! You've ALL used doors in the game and rotated them to face left or right, so of course you knew.
(Come to think of it, so did I)
Product Recall (!)
Did you download one of these three items before 17 January 2006?
The Art of Misinterpretation
It wasn't Pinecat.That story below - about doorless garage doors. It wasn't Pinecat's idea.
Well, not exactly anyway. You see: Pinecat's idea was not THIS idea. Pinecat meant a see-through door (see-through in that you can see the wall itself through the door, so in theory you could paint your own door designs on wallpaper using Homecrafter). When I reread Pinecat's idea, it was very clear what she meant. Therefore, I can only conclude that my horrible, destructive nature overtook.
She was very nice and polite about me ripping the garage door off completely though.
And now, INVISIBLE items!
Thanks to Pinecat (yes, I must blame anyone but myself, and this time it's dear Pinecat; Pinecat who thought up this idea and who must take the credit for its brilliance), I have now made......[cue drum roll]...An INVISIBLE GARAGE DOOR!
Pinecat must be applauded for her brilliance! Yes, Pinecat is brilliant anyway, but I'm talking about her IDEA being particularly brilliant. If you are an advanced lot builder, you already know this - you won't even have to think about why. For everyone else, including lot builders who haven't yet ventured the integral garage or underneath parking conundrum, a potted explanation...
What if you wanted to build parking underneath your lot (as in my Gunther House apartment block), or an integral, open-fronted car-port without having to use a garage door? Try it. Lay a driveway and extension, then draw the two side walls and the rear wall only, but leave the front open. Now try adding floor tiles on top. It can't be done, can it? Sure, you can trick the game by placing temporary columns in the centre of the garage upon which to add the tiles, but as soon as you remove the underneath columns, the floor tiles on top become unusable - unless you add a front wall to your garage, which means using one of those garage doors.....aargh!
If you're a dab hand with the CFE cheat, you can work around this problem by inserting a hidden in-between floor (that's how I built Gunther House). For this lot, the perceived higher level of the ground floor space looks fine, but it would look more obvious (and odd) in a smaller house. Therefore, if you want integral parking, you'd do better making it into a full garage and (sigh) adding one of those garage doors... Or darn it, just keep the parking separate.
But now you can thank Pinecat who asked if it was possible to have a garage door that had NO door. So, an open-fronted garage at last! It's not possible to have it entirely frameless, so I've bundled in five basic recolours and for all you recolourers out there, it's simple as anything to make more colour options. But I think it looks cool and allows us to make a garage with NO door that we can now build ABOVE.
For those of you already bored silly with my creations, you'll know this isn't my FIRST invisible item. I made an INVISIBLE DRIVEWAY some time back after tiring of the choice of grey concrete or red brick for my medieval cart parking! It means we can use floor tiles or terrain paints (as in my piccie above) to make our own driveway designs. So, with the driveway AND doorless door, I bring you: Cyclonesue's invisible parking solutions!
The Cyclonesue Mandatory Small-print
Of course, you can't expect anything I make to be perfect (there are other Featured Artists here recruited for perfection; I'm just here for entertainment value). And the little imperfection with the doorless garage is that it STILL makes the clanking door sound. I couldn't see how to remove that though. There were no separate audio references from what I could see.
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