What the Christmas Faery Brought

Date Posted: 26th Dec 2008 at 1:56 AM

More games of course, and with them came dark portents of the dread SecureRom. Nevertheless, after backing up my Sims 2 directory I stormed ahead installing Open For Business, Freetime and the infamous Mansion & Garden Stuff. The only glitch was many CC items disappeared, but all was well again after reinstalling CEP. (This is on a Windows Vista machine btw.) So glad the SecureRom beasty didn't bite. Now to building my first OFB business- The Rat & Raven.
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Mulling Things Over

Date Posted: 16th Dec 2008 at 6:54 AM

Back to residential designs having temporarily run out of ideas for the Urban Series. Been thinking of making a bowling alley reminiscent of one I remember from the suburb of my youth. It was like many other places- big, long, gawdy architectural obscenity with plenty of lanes, racks of beat up bowling balls, a cheesy pro shop thing with shirts and really sexy bowling paraphernalia, and finally a dark little bar annex where the dads went to get away from everybody, including themselves. And so on.

The residential work has been fun, a nice break from the concerns of community lot design. Houses are easier because they don't make as many demands as community lots. Two houses currently in the works, one loosely based on an actual floor plan and the other on My Old Kentuicky Home

More soon.
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Sim Ergonomics: Form And Function

Date Posted: 10th Dec 2008 at 5:35 PM

Floating around in the back of my mind is how sim ergonomics applies to sim architecture. When I started designing buildings the space they contained tended to be larger than necessary for their function. I soon learned that the best way to insure a space works is to use its contents as a template. In other words furnish your room first and then build walls around the furniture. This is an easy way to insure the functionality of a space.

But function alone is not enough because the sweetest part of design is form. Whether you're designing a grand entrance with a spiral stair or placing a fireplace in a pleasing location, form and function will eventually lock horns. You will discover that half the art in architecture lies in making graceful compromises that bring it all together.

You can figure this stuff out for yourself or you can look for inspiration in other designers solutions. A couple of links:
More in time.
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Beginning

Date Posted: 7th Dec 2008 at 10:11 PM

So my girlfriend and I had both been laid up with medical probs for a time when she got the idea to buy us a new amusement- The Sims 2. We played the original game ages ago and both went mad making stuff for it, but this time we've gone madder still. Revisiting clothing creation, sim making and house building was like old home week, but with a bunch of interesting new twists.

For me, this time around has been mostly about architecture. It's been wonderful to express many of the inspirations found from years of living in San Francisco. So far most of the stuff in my Urban Series has been loosely based on many SF locales. In the process I have enjoyed remembering how much I love all these places. New additions to the series are ever in the mill. More in time. -Clem
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