Pinstar Legacy

Traits: An In-Depth Look

Cheshire Traits

The Sims 4 takes a combination approach when it comes to fleshing out your individual Sims. It takes (and expands) the aspiration system from the Sims 2 and takes the concept of traits from the Sims 3.

If you haven’t already, check out my video done regarding traits. This was pre-Creators Camp so some of the information is a little guess work, but it is still worthwhile if you want to see a complete list of traits, as well as the animations associated with each of them. (And a bit of Lady Cheshire animated near the end)

But that isn’t anything new, so let me dive in depth a bit deeper and give you a closer look at a few of the traits I had the chance to play with extensively.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Sims 4 Creators Camp: The Emotional Legacy

In my previous two walkthroughs, my focus was on what was going on, but I didn’t really focus on emotions. In this post, I’ll recount the emotional journey that Lady Cheshire had on one evening early in the challenge, back when she was still living on her own, and on the lawn. The purpose is to give you some under-the-hood details about how emotions work and how they interact with moodlets.

How Emotions Work:

The various emotions your sim can fall under.

The various emotions your sim can fall under.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Legacy Challenge Rules Teaser: The Heir Apparent

masquefamily

In the second part of my Legacy Challenge story retelling, I mentioned that the family’s second born, Lady Fara, was best suited to continue the family in its artistically inclined direction, but Lance, the nerdy boyscout, was the first born in the family.

This made me begin to think about the rules surrounding heirs a lot more closely. This is exactly the kind of thing that I would find dynamically interesting. Here you have a house that art and poetry built, designed and furnished by an insane artist (Lady Cheshire, my founder). Her daughter, being a cheerful artistic prodigy, seems perfectly suited to carry the family along the same lines and the house is certainly equipped to help boost Lady Fara’s artistic endeavors, with it having a fully loaded inspiration room already.

But is that a good thing or a bad thing? In past versions of the rules, you were allowed to pick your heir from among all your children to decide who would take over when your main Sim dies. And in that case, I would be picking Lady Fara. But that got me thinking: Maybe being forced to take on Lance as the heir isn’t a bad thing. Sure I *started* out making my house a sanctuary of art and creativity, but being forced out of my comfort zone with a child who looked like he was gearing up to be a science and knowledge Sim. Not to mention, the point structure of the Legacy Challenge encourages a diverse playstyle.

Today’s post is going to be a poll! I want to hear from you, the fans about how you would like me to address this rule in the official Legacy Challenge rules:

[yop_poll id=”2″]

Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Legacy Challenge Rules, Sims 4 News

Sims 4 Creators Camp: Creating a Legacy (Part Two)

Use the bathroom while confident and you'll pee like a champion. Even the animaion is different. This far funnier than Sims 3 "Take Evil Shower" trait modifiers.

Use the bathroom while confident and you’ll pee like a champion. Even the animation is different. This is far funnier than Sims 3 “Take Evil Shower” trait modifiers.

When we last left our intrepid Legacy Family, Lady Cheshire Masque had just found out she was pregnant. But let me back up for a moment. How did she become pregnant?

Well, if you haven’t had the birds and bees talk, you may want to ask a parent. (On a side note, there is a child-to-adult interaction called ‘Ask about WooHoo’)

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Sims 4 Creators Camp: Creating a Legacy

ladycheshireSims 4 Creators camp is a full three day hands-on experience. There were about two dozen of us invited in total, simmers from across the spectrum. Some were machinima makers, some custom content creators, others builders and modders, and still others were Let’s Players and other Youtube figureheads. Everyone was given the same level of access to the game, but everyone approached their time with the game differently. After the break, I detail MY experience with the game from start to finish.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Sims 4 Creators Camp: Writing and Books

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Writing is back and in good form in The Sims 4. There is still a writing skill and one still needs a computer to work on their writing. There are also a number of improvements and additions to the writing system.

When you want to start writing, you go to a computer, same as it has been since the Sims 2. When you are unskilled the only two options are to practice writing or to start a Children’s book. As your Sim grows in writing skill, they begin to unlock new book types. The types I observed were: Children’s, Non-Fiction, Poetry, and Screenplay. My Sim did not get anywhere near to maxing her writing skill so that is NOT a comprehensive list, but that was all I observed in my play time. Different book types take different lengths of time to write. Children’s books and poetry books are fairly quick to write compared to Non-Fiction.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Sims 4 Creator’s Camp – Whims

While at Sims 4 Creator’s Camp, I was able to experiment a bit with the whims of Sims. Below is what I discovered.

Whims are the new wants. Whims are things your Sim wants to do right now. Every Sim can have up to 3 whims at a time. Two of these whims are general whims and will arise from the general situation. They can be generated by situations, traits or one’s career. In fact, mousing over them will tell you exactly what caused them to appear. General whims will stick around until you either fulfill them or cancel them. There is no penalty to canceling them; a new one will take its place pretty quickly.
The third whim is tied directly to the Sim’s current emotion and has been given the nickname a ‘hot whim’. Unlike the two general whims, their hot whim will forcibly change every time a Sim’s dominant emotion changes. Depending on the circumstances, a Sim’s emotion might only last for a few hours. As a result, the aspiration points gained from fulfilling hot whims tend to be higher compared to the effort needed. They can also be chained. If you fulfill a hot whim, it is immediately replaced by another hot whim related to the emotion.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Sims 4 Creator’s Camp – Careers and School

Sims 4 careers

I was one of the lucky few to be invited to The Sims 4 Creator’s Camp at EA headquarters last week. I learned a lot about the game while I was there and thought that I would share some of that with you. To start, I will be discussing careers and school.

This is a rather lengthy article, but I wanted to cover as much as I could on the subject, so please bear with me.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 Creator's Camp, Sims 4 News

Legacy Challenge Family Wealth

Sims 4 House and Bills

Before we get started, please make sure to read the following from Graham Nardone:

“The consequences of not paying your bills is more severe now. Let your bills go without paying them? First your power gets shut off. Next your water gets shut off. It’s a fun scenario to put your Sims in on occasion (they recognize it and get some unique socials about it). The bill upkeep on more expensive homes is harsher than it’s been in the past as well, so you truly better be earning enough to support living in one. I hope both those things contribute to greater challenges when you put your Sims in those situations.” (to see the whole conversation, go here)

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 News

E3: Discussing the next generation of the Legacy Challenge

Sims 4

Let me share with you some thoughts that are bouncing around in my mind in regards to how the Legacy Challenge might take shape after watching the new E3 Sims 4 Gameplay Trailer.

Personality Traits: While there are fewer per sim, they seem to have a much more powerful effect on said Sim and how they interact with the world. This bodes VERY well for the Legacy Challenge. I *hope* they have a randomize button in the game as I intend to carry on the tradition of ‘customize the founder, random for everyone else’.

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Posted by Pinstar Legacy in Sims 4 News