gameplay notes on: lot decay, ghosts, and jail

on lot deterioration:

I guess all of these things in my monthly events posts—birthdays, anniversaries, health strikes, and home deterioration—fit a similar theme of aging. Which leads me to a new roll. For not having any ROS in my gameplay (as I so boldly proclaimed), I sure do have a lot of new ROS in my gameplay, lol!


I’m excited about adding the lot damage roll, which will happen every month along with the health strikes. I realized how unrealistic it is that our sims pass down these houses from generation to generation and they never age like the sims do. Also because we just got all of those neat decals with the vampires pack and lot traits and problems with the City Living pack. I want to have more of an excuse to be forced to use them!

In September, Tessa Morton was chosen for the first lot deterioration roll, which was to kill off three of her garden plants. Good thing she has so many!

obituary: Joel Harris

Commemorating the first anniversary of his death. 

Joel Harris: December 14, 2041 to September 19, 2085. He was 43 years old. 

it's your day: Rebecca

September 29, 2086. Aurora Harris is 40, Zach is 9. Meadow Lind is 71, Brady is 72. Happy 3rd birthday, Rebecca Harris.


A year later, Aurora still had nightmares about the explosions. She saw some of them with her own eyes, large enough, close enough, that they looked like big orange stars, wanna-be suns. Pop, they would go, and people would gasp because they knew it had been a ship full of human lives. Almost everyone knew someone up there, a brother, a daughter, a husband. And all they could do was to stand underneath them in terror. Helpless.

There was a choice—try to fight back even though our troops were too weak and too primitive to stand a chance against the alien technology, knowing that we wouldn't win on our own, or else don't fight and let them suffocate the planet. Of course, we fought.

That was how he died.

Aurora didn’t see his exact explosion, probably. The command center was able to pinpoint the last known location of his ship and the moment they lost contact. He was entering the atmosphere somewhere above Mongolia. She couldn’t have possibly seen that from Michigan. The explosion she saw was someone else’s brother or daughter or husband. There were so many.

Most of the bodies could never be recovered. They had splintered into dust. So they sent the families an urn full of moon dust instead, along with their loved one’s personal belongings from base, and a folded flag.

where we left off with the Lind/Harris family

This week, I am revisiting some old old stories (some that are eight years old, OMG!) on Tumblr from the Lind/Harris family, because this family will be featured heavily in the coming chapters. For those who don't frequent Tumblr, I'll just link directly to the relevant updates in case you want to refresh your memory.

I never blogged about these sims while I was playing TS3, so nothing was changed or missed between their TS2 lives and where they will pick up in TS4. It's like they just took a long eight-year nap but only progressed about two years in time, lol! So these posts will be a little refresher for me, for everyone, and a summary for those who may not have read TS2 Lakeside Heights.  

postcards from Copper County

September 2086.


Even though Stephanie has only been on maternity leave for two months, Sharon is itching to get her back to work again. Slow to start, she promised. "Can I just borrow you for a couple of meetings?"

Sharon renovated part of the second floor to make a dedicated meeting room so that she wouldn't need to clutter the dining room with magazines and calendars every time she meets with a new client.

Today, they entertain Adam Thompson from the Great Lakes Historical Preservation Society.

(He's Justin's boss, Stephanie notes—or soon to be ex-boss, as the story goes—and feels a bit awkward about it. They have never met before, but she recognizes his name and title right away. Justin talks about him all the time! She decides not to put him or Justin or Sharon on the spot by making that connection right now. Instead, she just sits there quietly until asked a question about the butternut squash bisque, feeling nervous and weird—about the meeting, not the soup. The bisque is excellent!)

Adam hopes to contract Sharon and her fine kitchen staff to supply food for the gift shop cafe he plans to open in Ironwood Bay. Sharon is excited about the deal. This would be the first time she supplied catering to a retail setting. Adam promised that her business would be well advertised in the store.

five in the bed and the little one said...

September 2086. Stephanie Nova and Justin Kim are 26. Willow is 5, Lily is 4, Benji is six weeks old.

the damage, part 1

September 2086. Stephanie Nova and Justin Kim are 26. Willow is 5, Lily is 4, Benji is six weeks old.


After a few weeks, Justin returned to see his doctor for a checkup. His ribs were healing as expected and the pain had gone away almost completely. The pain in his ribs had gone, at least. On a couple of occasions, however, he'd been hammered with a sudden and excruciating headache, worse than he'd ever experienced before. He was outside in the bright sunshine when it happened and he felt like throwing up and dying all at once.

"It sounds like you've had your first migraine," his doctor said.

the life of Evie

"I loved you," he said. 

"What?"

"Yeah, I did. I didn't know it then, but afterwards, I figured it out. I did love you."

"You don't have to say that," she said.

"Well, I think I was supposed to say it before, so like, backdated, or something."

"A backdated 'I love you?'" She laughed at him. "Well, I can't say I've ever had one of those before."