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Sims Medieval Hands On

The 21st of February 2011, I got a Hands On experience with Sims Medieval. In this article I will give you my thoughts/opinions on it. I will say that during this Hands On experience I had only 2 hours ish and only played with CAS and the monarch . Before going to the event I had a list of ~22 questions prepared that I wanted to ask and investigate. Because of this I was fortunate that I got some time with Nicola Jenkins and she answered most of the questions, some of the answers are posted at the end, but most are written through out the article, not as Q&A.
I also wrote down a lot of things like all the types of food.

Disclaimer/random
I did not play final version of the game! Remember that while reading this. Also, I’m going to use the word authentic in this article. But I was, obviously, not born in medieval times. So my personal knowledge of that time comes from tv shows (tudors), movies (mist of avalon, a knights tale, first knight), books (R. Garcia y Robertson) and wikipedia.

Also I got the best experience you can have with a game, they put us behind beasts of computers. You know, those computers that us simmers dream of having and dream of how well our Sim games will run on it.

Now to the game!

First impressions.

Pretty
Beautiful
Overwhelming

Second impressions and first line of thoughts.

Impressed.

They took a bit of CAS, a bit of the menu, you obviously got the Sims themselves and there is furniture to interact with. But that is roughly where the similarities between Sims Medieval and Sims 3 stops. The rest is a completely new and a beautiful game. This is what impresses me. With Sims 2 stories, you had a dressed down version of Sims 2 and a bit of a story line. If you could play Sims 2, you could play Sims 2 stories. The 2 hours(ish) we had with Sims Medieval was not enough to even understand where all the buttons are or get properly into the game. This means that you can play a very long time with Sims Medieval.

We at TSR recently had a Medieval theme with medieval related downloads. I’m sorry to say and remember I’m very loyal to TSR it has been my internet-home for the last 8-9 years. But content wise, Sims Medieval beats TSR with a  landslide, hands down, etc.  It is just beautiful.

Starting your medieval Game.

You start the game with choosing a name for your kingdom and then you make a Monarch, every kingdom needs a Monarch. You choose the appearance (clothes, face, hair), you can also choose if he/she is young adult or elder. However the age is in appearance, an elder looking sim will still behave like a regular adult.

Of course if you take into account that in medieval times the harshness of the world and life expecentancy was quite different than it is these days. Elders had to be in fantastic shape as an elder.



The clothes and hair! The CLOTHES and HAIR!!!!  *ahem, cough*yeah I was almost drooling in CAS.  Look at the following screenshots. This is just monarch female, imagine each hero has their own clothes:

Few screenshots of hair/clothes and link to gallery

See the other screenshots here: http://www.thesimsresource.com/staff/sww/galleries/browse

What you will also notice, the faces/fabric look much more detailed and realistic than our cartoony Sims 3.

Traits

With these traits you decide how your sim acts in the game, a friendly sim obviously has different intereactions and options than a vulgar sim.

You pick 2 traits for your sim from the following list:

Whale ate my parents trait?? The info in game says: ‘Carnivourous, Sim-eating whales were a constant threat back in Medieval times. Indeed, legend has it that the ocean was formed from the tears of orphaned children whose parents were devoured by these underwater menaces.’ :D


You also pick one fatal flaw, this is like an addiction. These are your fatal flaw options:

These affect your Sims life in such a way that a licentious sim needs a cuddle/kiss every once in a while or his focus (more on that later) drops. There is a rumour that you can overcome this fatal flaw, probably with a quest? Do not ask me about this, stalk your local EA person, I did not have enough time to explore this. I got the rumour from this page: http://thesimsmedieval.wikia.com/wiki/Fatal_Flaw

So the last thing to do is give your sim a name. There is a random name generator in game and it gives you medieval sounding names! Very useful. I want a name generator in Sims 3, pretty please.

The game itself

Ok made the perfect monarch, time to play the game!

The monarch starts in the castle, there are two types of rooms public and private. Private consists of a bathroom (no toilet for your sim! Chamber pot!), bedroom and a dining room (here you can also cook food and get ale (costs 60§). The public rooms has the throne, a scribe table a tactical map and more. On this tactical map you can see the different territories and kingdoms neighboring your kingdom and you can perform edicts.

An edict is an announcement of a law, often associated with monarchism. /wikipedia

The chance your edict passes depends on the relationships with people who can vote on it. *double check who these people are*. An edict can increase or decrease the relationship of your kingdom with the surrounding kingdoms. This adds a fun strategic bit, which I personally like. What will happen when the relationship becomes very low??

Needs/focus

The needs are less involved, your Sim only cares if they are hungry or tired. But when they are, they get a negative moodlet. Things like a cheap bed or bland food also gives negative moodlets, of course vice versa is true. Good beds/food/etc give positive moodlets. These in turn lower or raise your focus.

Focus is like ‘mood’ in Sims 3 however, they affect how well your sim does things. Like a low focus decreases the chance you win a sword fight. This is just an example, but imagine focus influences success/failure of the tasks your Sim does. We have a new learning curve, to find all the positive moodlets.

Quests and daily life (responsiblities).

It has been wildly advertised that your Sims can do quests, but what are they? They are in my opinion like a set of tasks your sim has to do from talking to sims, to spitting in a well. Imagine the adventures from World Adventures, but much more… well… detailed. There are also parts in the quest where your sim can choose not to do something. For example, my sim was told by her evil cousin to spit in someones face. I said that my Sim does not want to do this. This does not mean your quest stops, you move onto the next part, but the story is ‘you are too nice to spit in somones face’. World Adventures did not give options like that.

Next to the quest, your sim has two daily responsibilities, like writing a law or hunting a bear (yes you can hunt! Its like rabbit hole, Sim disappears for a short amount of time). You get a day to do these responsibilities, if you do not do them, your focus drops a lot.

So a quick summery of quests vs respnsibilities, both are tasks but quests you can take your time with and responsibilites have to be done in a short(ish) time frame.

This is how far I got with playing the monarch sim, I think I could have played this game for days if I was given the opportunity.

Kingdom mode

Kingdom mode is a like world view of your kingdom, you can see the different areas and buildings quite fast. In this mode you can also place buildings (note: NOT build, will come to that later). You have to spend resource points when you want to build like a hero building, your sim earns them by doing quests. Here is a list of all the areas I saw in the game:

In kingdom mode you can also furnish your castle, furnish mode is similar to Sims 3 except different and more medieval icons (duh). You have the regular ‘category’ option to look for objects, however and this got me excited...

There was a collection option too! You could pick like noble themed objects and nature themed. Hopefully this is means the much hoped for collections will come to Sims 3 too. (please)
I wish I had more time to explore kingdom mode, but alas.

Angela and AnoeskaB got the chance to play a bit with the spy and they told me there are funny interactions like pickpocketing.

Questions/random things

My first question to Nicola Jenkins was this:

What makes this game interesting for fans of the regular Sims Franchise?
There is a lot in this Sims Medieval game we already love, but a lot of additional gameplay and its challenging to create and control Sims in medieval times.

My personal view, this is not a Sims game in such a way that we know. You do not go to work every day, build up your career, build up your charisma skill. There are no tasks like that. This is what makes it interesting, it is completely new.

Stories
The game is like one big story and you lead where it goes. Cannot wait to discuss with everyone in the community where their personal actions/choices got them where in the game!

The usual screenshot/video tools are there too btw :).

Religion
I know medieval times had a lot of conflicts with religion (english church/catholic/etc). But I was worried about religion in game, my sims are mine – I do not want the game to give them morals  that at every step they do, something will smite them *extreme example* ;)

This is not the case, religion I would say is there as something that can be used while sims interact and may cause some dislike between sims. (I cannot confirm this, did not play with religion) There are two religions Jacoban and Preteran, and  you can choose to play with them or not. You have to place the buildings in the game to get the religion.

Transportation
This question has been asked many times ‘are there horses, are there horses’ well NO there are no horses. Your sim walks everywhere, but your kingdom is not that large.
However, there is a ship that actually sails away!

Food
My monarch cooked her own food on a cauldron in her dining room, you get the ingredients for the food by collecting or hunting! For example, you see a shrub somewhere, you click on it and ‘discover’ and it turns out to be wildflowers, which you can then collect. Or you go hunt for boar and come back with 3 steaks of boar.

I found the amount of foods fascinating so I wrote it all down:

Next to food I also found ales! Cant have medieval times without ale, as you probably cannot drink the water. Drinking Ale does give you a hangover!

Aging
There is pregnancy in game, but there is no aging. A child stays a child, does not become an adult. Shame, that does feel a bit like we are going back to Sims 1.

Money
A sim makes money by doing their profession, a physician makes money when he/she heals other sims for example.

Magic
The wizard adds funny looking magic, but I didn’t have much chance to explore this myself L
I did hear he meditates instead of sleeping, here is a screenshot:

Cheats
Yes there are cheats. Angela told me.
No, I have no clue which ones. I didn’t check myself.

Customizable vs authenticity.

As said before there is no build mode, there are also no patterns in create a sim and no custom content. So you may think ‘no way I am buying that game’, but take a few more min to think about it.

EA wanted to give us a medieval game, how would it stay authentic if we could do the same customizable capabilities as in Sims 3? For example I know maybe 3-5 house creators who are talented and patient enough to build a castle in the proper style, I am not one of them – it would just be a square building if I was given a build mode and it would be the same for most players.

So instead they took away that option and gave us a beautiful looking castle.

No custom clothes – have you looked at the screenshots, they clothes they supplied are GORGEOUS! So if you want to complain about no custom clothes, be my guest – I disagree and am happy with the clothes.

I think this game is great for players, especially those who do not like the need system in Sims 3, it’s a lot less in Sims Medieval. It also is great for story, screenshot and video people. But I can imagine for object/clothes and house builders that they will like it less.

For me however (a player) it is great and I want it now… sigh, 28 more days.

Thanks

Thanks goes to Angela and Anita for the invite to the Hands On event. The screens were taken at The Sims Medieval EU Community Day event (Hever Castle).

Blackgarden was a great help with writing this and last but not least Shouren from EA UK for checking some facts :)

Jensen Ackles

Since I´ve done with Jared I started Jensen =)

Thanks guys for all your support!

Anna Living Room - in work

Know I make new set "Anna Living Room". I give you one pic of object from this set.

I presnet you pouf!!

Wallpapers, Terrain Paints and Floors for the Sims 2!

I have spent the last hour creating some terrain paints, wallpapers and floors for the Sims 2, so I'm hoping that you will all be able to download them very soon ^^ I never realised how time consuming it can be! :o)

I hope to upload some more things very soon for you all to download. Thank you for the amount of support so far ^_^

My Community Lots

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So far my community lots in Dundalk, Ireland are

-Barry Pender Motors(A Car Dealership)

-The Cat's Claw Nightclub(A Nightclub)

-Good Shepherd Catholic Church(A Church)*

-Palmer's Pool And Park(A Combination Of A Pool And Park)

-Clybaun Beauty Salon(A Beauty Salon)

-Glasnevin Cemetery(A Graveyard)

-Holy Cross Catholic Church(A Church)

-Pope Pius X High School(A School)

-Dundalk City Art Gallery(An Art Museum)

*Good Shepherd Catholic Church was actually going to be a Mormon church but “The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints” is too long of a name to give a community lot and “Mormon” is just too informal.

Chronicles are back!

Some of you have already noticed - I'm back with my Chronicles series :) There was a lot going on in my life and even if I played sometimes, I had no time or wasn't in the mood to write... That's why you get two parts at once and will get another one soon, probably this week. It is nice to see that people still read the series and enjoy it, so I officially state that... the chronicles will continue! Strangetown's 15th part will be the last for now. I only have a few more families left to write about and I think I'll let you know what's Arielle's secret, if you haven't figured out yet. I will end the story for now because I've reached the 50 sim-days (50 years in the game meaning) in each household, like I did in Pleasantview before, and I will move on to start a story about another neighborhood. I'm not abandoning Strangetown forever, I will come back to both Pleasantview and Strangetown eventually, but there are 4 more cities with other families that have stories to tell. One of them also came with the base game. You guessed right - Veronaville. I see no reason in breaking the sequence, so my next work will focuse on Romeo and Juliette. I can't promise when will the first part come out since I want to do some custom content downloading, deleting, organizing... But I am in the mood of writing and creating. As long as it lasts - you will hear from me once in a while :) Thank you all for your interest, patience and continued support.

Building In The Sims 2

So, since I can never come up with any good ideas of my own, I've decided that all of the buildings in my neighborhood will be based(loosely) off of houses built by others simmers. I've been on youtube looking at tutorials of how to build houses. I've gotten some ideas about how to build community lots including a night club that looks like a cat and of course this park/pool which I am working on building now.

It looks so cool. Of course mine will be a modified version since I don't have all of the expansion packs, but still, all in all, things are going quite well. I'm currently looking for items to use to build a pub and a stadium.

smile

hello to all have a great weekend

Sims 2 Submitting Problem

Okay, so, I submitted 2 Sims for the Sims 2 a week ago, and they haven't been approved yet. How come it's taking so long? :(

Visit My Blog!

Visit my blog

Creating a Banner

So, I finally got enough Kudos to buy a banner for my page!  After buying it, though, I thought that TSR would give us a variety to choose from and customize...you know, like point and click web design.  Nothin' doin' - you're on your own with this one.  But what a great opportunity to learn how to really use one's photo editor!  I think mine came out pretty well, given that it's a first attempt for me.  I've titled my little site "Adventures in Simming", taken after my favorite '80s movie, "Adventures in Babysitting".  This whole thing is truly and adventure for me, because whether I'm in game or learning how to mesh (still working on that one) and create new things, it's all an exciting adventure!

Alien -WIP

Hiya guys, come an' see my newest Sim WIP

Yep-yep, he's an alien inspired in Cameron's navi, and some kind of faeries. He don't have any name nor hystory yet but he'll we when I update him. I'm triying to keep him off of CC even If I usually use lots and lots of it and I think I will succes.

So, I am definefely going to submit here this sim but until then... what do you think 'bout him?

Moving

Hey all! I thought I should stop by and let you know that if you think I've been kind of scarce, I have. I got a new apartment and I'm starting to move stuff. It might take awhile since I work full time and I'm still trying to arrange some time off to hasten my efforts, and I still have all that crap to do at home like laundry and dishes and so forth. It's a drag but it will be so great once I'm settled in at my new place. I'm still taking small breaks to squeeze in some fun time so I don't go completely crazy, but not enough to really sit down and build or get serious about anything.

Just thought I'd give you all the heads up on what's keeping me away. Hopefully it will be over sooner than later.

Dundalk, Ireland

So now, I've created a new Irish neighborhood called Dundalk, Ireland. I'm taking things a lot slower this time. I'm installing custom content little by little and I'm building all of the community lots myself(based on tutorials found on youtube. lol) instead of downloading them. So far I've built a school, an art gallery, a beauty salon, a church and a graveyard. I've also built some homes. I'm pleased with it at this point.

Evil Nanny:L

Oh my gawd!:S Okaaay... So i was playing sims 2 and My family wich i had a baby and my simself! I went to work and because I had no one to look after my baby (Violet) I had to hire her a nanny so I did and then i was ready to leave .. as I left the nanny picked up my baby and took care of it! and then in real life i thought ill wait til i come back from work and ill just quickly run to the toilet for 1 min, And as a come back the nanny is juggling violet! Violet's Needs were low, she was hungry, sleepy, dirty, and was bored.. :L As i came back from work i dismised nanny and when nanny left she took my BABY with her! she actually stole my baby!:'(

My Game is really glitchy.. :l it glitches everytime! and then my game starts to crash! But anyway i miss my baby viliot:(

Violet - Toodler (My baby)

Simslef - Adult (Suzie)

Tombs

A few of you may be wondering about my prolonged dusky spell. Not to worry. I got bit by the tomb spider and since the first of the year I've thrown all my energy into learning and producing them. I will have some tangeable results by the time our next theme hits the streets in April.

In a sub catagory of lot downloads lies a catagory called tombs, it's been there since around September last and there are 9 submissions in it. After almost three months of working with them I can now understand completely why that is. I wish though that more people would find that extra bit of tenacity to stick with it because there are SO many new possibilities and realms now for the builder to explore than one could ever imagine. This first project of mine, for instance, has found me totally caught up not just in constructing the tomb but building a plausible story line and plot around it. There are other spin off bunny trails too like story telling, machima and sim characters that can all tie into any given tomb project . You can even try a collaberative effort as I'm doing with Fredbrenny, one of our premier story writers.

Whether traditional or digital, how many strategy type games are out there? It's really too difficult to number, isn't it. Well that's the blue ocean that I'm seeing here. The exciting challange in it for me is how to translate some of those concepts into a sim tomb. In this first project I've attempted to put a working sudoku puzzle in the tomb for your sim to work out, just make sure they bring a pencil and grid paper in with them.

If you are a builder, do consider it. The learning curb can be arduous particularly if you are right brain challanged like me, but at the same time I've never felt like I've been in the flow more than ever recently.

If you like to stratagise, seek out a good builder and hook up with them. You will both have a blast I'm telling you!

If you are a simmer who also likes strategy games, well....do stay tuned because all this effort is for you!!

New Poll - Pancake Day

Alrighty then..I've popped a new poll onto my minisite page..got bored looking at the last one..the results of 'Which is your favourite Expansion Pack?' are:-

World Adventures : 45.83%

Ambitions: 25%

Late Night: 54.17%

Base Game Simmers: 16.67%

So I guess most people are happy with Late Night. Is it the vampires? Or perhaps the clubbing to all hours of the morning? :-D

The new poll is about Pancake Day, or whatever it might be called in your part of the world, I know there are plenty of variations out there. It's going to be 8th March this year!!! What!! Why so late?!! I can't wait that long to eat pancakes!!(Although as my boyfriend keeps telling me, I can eat them whenever I like)(That is NOT the point!!) Anyway, can't wait..they are going to be covered in sugar, lemon juice and golden syrup...utterly dripping and oozing..Oh my, I'm salivating! Hang on while I just wipe the drool off my chin...

I've also uploaded another lot which will be out tomorrow and I've uploaded a new set of paintings which hopefully will be approved..

A set from Bridgeport. I'm hoping to get back into the swing of making them, and will make a set from each of the EA worlds. Hopefully they will be better than my previous efforts since the water graphics are better since Late Night and you can get some pretty good colours and effects.

Hope you like them.

Have a great week to come :-)

Waters Add On

Added a bed, some bigger lamps and ceiling lighting and stuff 

Pattern-pattern

yay!! now i can make pattern!!!! and i will provide you with my pattern collection~ 

there's something i want to confess.. 

my up coming pattern name Motion wood, the file are not in the right place, ex: my motion wood 1 is place at motion wood 3 submission and etc. 

so.. i hope you'll not confuse when you download that :D

Mid February 2011 Update

Find myself with three projects on the go. A house for a request on the forums http://forums.thesimsresource.com/showthread.php?t=388796 ; a police station that is being based on Old Scotland Yard; and a lot for the February Valentines contest. The last one has me stumped more than the other two... hmmm, maybe not being in some sort of relationship is causing a artists block. No romance, no inspirations..... hmmm.

Jared Padalecki

Jared is the next guys, our beloved Sam Winchester from supernatural

GTA 4 Created Characters and Lots

THE GTA IV SIMS 3 PROJECT

Version 1.0.1035

As from the 15th March 2011, my account will be filled with Sims and Lots and Sets to do with this set.

Characters currently being created:

Niko Bellic

Roman Bellic

Mallorie

Elizabeta

Vlad

Dmitri Rascalov

Mikhail Faustin

Niko Bellic (C) 2008 Rockstar Games

Sorry I have been ill

Hi all,

I would just like to say thank you to the members who have left comments over the last few weeks that I have not replied to because I was in hospital.

I have been quite poorly and had to have an emergency operation for a dental abscess that swelled up under my jaw and across my throat threating to cut off my breathing, but I am home again now and hope to get back to creating things real soon.

 Take Care Lorraine xx

My first creation upload

So i finaly made my first upload here in TSR. 

It is summer dress

.

A REALLY new direction....

No, I am not dead.  :)

Real life has been requiring a lot of my attention lately, but things are now settling down and I'll be building some great new lots soon.

The new year brought with it a new address, and I had forgot that designing a real place takes much, MUCH more time and energy than building one for a Sim.

So, for those who are interested, here's a 'behind-the-scene' look at the REAL home of QubeDesign....

Full tour: http://gallery.me.com/bigmusclepaul#100278

The Andretti Legacy

I want to apologize...I have been trying and trying and trying to submit The Andretti Legacy Chapter 112 for a month, if not more, now. Something is wrong with my 'submission' area and I've been waiting on this issue to be fixed. I am so so sorry, but I am continuing to write them...and I have about 5 or 6 chapters just sitting on my computer waiting. Bear with me...I'm sorry!

New Dress

I have a new dress I made from hand and I am happy with it.. I just hope others like it. I know my outfits arent anything amazing, but I am still learning.

Summer Brick Jelly

Summer  


Brick House

Jelly

Sunset Bay Bungalows

A new set of homes I'm working on,along with the two comunity lots that will go with them. They are kind of retro,and look very cute all together. They look as if they have been in town for a few decades :) I hope you like them. 

New Banner

Thought it was about time i changed my profile banner.  i've had the same one for ages!  I'm quite pleased with it to say i'm no whizz at photo editing programs!

Have a fabulous week everyone!

:D

Ts Duck or Chicken on Table

TS Building



Garden Hose


Adironqacker

The Martinez Legacy

The Martinez Story is now going to begin a Legacy. It will start with Austin Martinez and Annette. You will be see where they have settled and much more in the first installment.

Hope you will enjoy when it comes out. The lastest Chapter of The Martinez Story should be out soon. I submited it now I am waiting for it to approved.

Victorian Style part II

Here is a preview of the second set. Some nice roof ridges to build a victorian look. Even when you lower the roof the ridges goes down too!!!   And offcourse much more to build....

Tomb in the making!

I don't often post things here do I... Oh, well just wanted to mention that I'm currently working on a tomb :D

I have just discovered the buydebug-cheat (yea,yea, I'm a bit after ;P ) and I'm having so much fun testing all the different items and tomb-effects :D So TS3 is currently messing up my schoolwork even more then usual, and since I wanna be really really thorough with this I'm afraid It's gonna keep messing with my homeworks and tests for quite some time ...

So... that's it^^ I'm so thrilled about this that I just had to tell someone xD (that is if anyone cares to read this...)

So... bye now xP hope u are all feeling great and thank u so so much for downloading and commenting my lots :D any comment from u really brights up my day :)

Wave Knot Tables

Wave


One of my top 5 favorite lamps   


Metal Tables

A good week!

Wow Ok, I just checked the downloads on Amelia's Castle and I'm really happy with it! I got side tracked and busy with a few other projects so haven't had a chance to upload anything else yet... Here's what I've been working on!

I've posted the story on The Simmers Scociety here

http://www.simmerssociety.net/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=12&id=106136&Itemid=56

I'm hoping to post the sims and eventually Clara's Art Deco home here!

help

can anyone please tell me where i can find a side braid for free please please please

Deleted All Custom Content

So yesterday I deleted all of my custom content. So now I'm starting all over with my sims. I deleted all of my neighborhoods and I'm beginning completely anew.

Robert Pattinson

As Robert started his career as a model I think it´s a good idea to make my version of his sim! ;)

Soon soon

Happy Valentines Day !