To keep me on track for a Christmas finish, and because the final four chapters are all going to be quite long (with at least five more extras to come), two more short Taken chapters, AND another extra are now ready! Chapter 66 will be coming very soon, too, as that’s almost good to go.
64. The Story and the Statement
(Dayes and Knights soon-ish but Taken is the priority at the moment because I want to finish it this year!)
I’ve been away the last couple of weekends, hence the slowing down, but I am still aiming to finish this by Christmas. As I’m trying to batch shoot the last few updates, I haven’t got that many characters left to shoot now…
Anyway, short but sweet: 63. Revelation
Mainly because I’m away the next two weekends and want to stay on track for a Christmas finale, here’s another Taken chapter 62. Push the Button.
I’m away the next couple of weekends, so sneaking out Taken chapters whenever I can to keep me on track for a Christmas finale (even if it means… sshh… reusing a few shots to get it done). And here’s another one: 61. Decision
Rejoice! After all the glitching and crashing in the world, I’ve finally managed to play through the stripe generation of the Knights (so much for ultra-speedy) in 4. Knight Lines (don’t do it). As if that wasn’t enough, Taken 60. Almost there is also up. Not only that, but the Dayes are back in Things you do when you’re losing the will. Have at them!
Well, that has been one heck of a start to my year. (I’m an academic, my year starts in September) Working 9-7 almost every day (with no breaks – quick, get the violins out), then into play rehearsals (play was last week; went well), a week in the US at a conference… Simmies, what simmies? Mind you, we’re meant to be working to rule at the moment (not going beyond our contract), which is going to prove one very interesting challenge for me, but might mean I get some free time back.
Nonetheless, the Knights are making slow progress, one crash at a time, whilst the long-awaited Dayes update should be up this weekend, along with chapter 60 of Taken. In the meantime, chapter 59. Address is up for your pleasure. The aim is still to finish it at Christmas, so I’m going to need to average a couple of posts a week, really. Or, knowing me, none for ages, then four at once, like buses.
Still – what I’ve been doing while I’ve not been playing Sims may be of interest to you as I’m starting to sort out the research side of things. I presented a paper at the Internet Research conference in Denver in October. You can read a shortened version of it here (click on the doc icon to read the document) and grab the slides here. Sadly you don’t get the best bit due to SlideShare’s compressions – all the bullet points were shaped like plumbobs in the original!
I’ll be sharing a different side to my research at another conference later this month, and in 2014 when a few other things are out of the way, I’m going to figure out the best formats for writing everything up. Thanks to everyone who’s been helping with it, you’ve all given me some great material to work with!
Oh, and my final Doctor Who 50th celebration banner sees Fitzy Populous as Eleven, Daisy Kyoti as Amy and Karate Daye as Rory. Only a fortnight to go til all the special programmes and geeking out at the convention – very exciting.
I’ve got another new Taken chapter up! 58. Delving Deeper. I had hoped to update the Knights but although they work a bit better than before they still crash to desktop regularly… grrr….
In banner news, Wesley Kyoti and Piranha Daye who were last month’s 9th Doctor and Rose are replaced by Liandra Kyoti as Martha and Treebeard Knight as the 10th Doc. Only one Doc to go!
So, I got a new computer. And it’s way faster and the graphics are better. The final Dayes update from the old computer, Starlight Distress, is up now. And over the weekend, I snuck out a new Taken chapter, 57. University (very topical given the academic year has just restarted). Annoyingly I can’t find the save I need for the next chapter so that will mean some “fun” restaging before I can update. Blech. The best news though is that the new computer has made the Knights work!! Well, they still crash to desktop, but I’m getting an hour or so’s play at a time from them which is the most I’ve managed in months. They’re even part-way through becoming teenagers! So I might be able to update them soon, which makes me very happy (assuming I can retrieve all the screenshots of them as babies/toddlers from my old computer anyway).
Have a slight spoiler as a present!
Things are escalating even further in chapter 56. UNHQ. End game, did anyone say end game? 😉 14 chapters to go…
Expect a Dayes update soon, maybe Sunday.
Yet another new chapter! 55. Thirteen is short but revelatory and comes with two extras: 55A. Serge and 55B. Wellspring and Lightwood
A new chapter: 54. Ceremony AND a new extra: 54A. Ceremonies in Beacon. Don’t get too used to this pace!
Chapter 53: Bunker is up, and I’m setting chapter 54 to auto-publish on Sunday… I like this being ahead of myself thing.
Well, Bathory may have turned her back on me, but I haven’t forgotten her. After my game has started functioning again (ish, the poor Knights), the Dayes are back in Uni Dayes. Did any of them pass any exams?
You might remember that last year I did a big survey of Sims fans. I’m currently writing a couple of articles based on this and I am wanting to do some follow-up research with simmers who use Tumblr or Instagram for simming activities – if that’s you and you would be willing to answer some questions, please can you email me on r.a.deller@shu.ac.uk or post in the comments below?
Please can people spread the word to your simming friends? Thanks
Rad
Well, I’ve had a very lazy week off work because I was supposed to be moving this week and then that didn’t happen. But real life=blah and I posted about all that last time. Anyway, a week of freedom has meant I’ve got to play the Sims. Or sort of play. After a lot of faffing, I thought I’d finally saved the Knights. (Hence a stripy pic with no spoilers of faces) But then their save has gone all frozen again. My game is on a ridiculous go-slow right now. It probably needs a huge overhaul, but I at least want to get Taken out of the way before I delete CC or anything just in case I chuck something I really need.
Get Taken out of the way? Did I just say that? Well, I wrote up to chapter 61 today (chapter 52 is the most recent one that was published) and three extras. Including where you find out about S**** and S**** and the S****** S********. No idea why a lot of my more mysterious elements begin with S, sorry.
Only nine more chapters and maybe six or seven extras to write, folks.
Oh, and then almost twenty chapters and a bunch of extras to stage. That’s going to be the hellish bit. I was costuming certain characters for their final entries today and I have to do that for several more, plus build a few more sets and then stage all of those chapters and extras (fortunately only one scene needs me to source new CC) – even though I’m planning to shoot multiple chapters at once, that may take quite some time – but looks like I’ll make good on my aim of finishing the story in 2013 – and then I can delete a whole bunch of saves and maybe some CC and stuff, which will be good. I’m also going to have a ‘questions’ page on the Taken blog once it ends to tie up any loose ends you think I missed or to answer questions about the characters, the story, how I wrote it or whatever. So get thinking now.
And it’s a bank holiday tomorrow – might be time to go through my links and delete old ones and read up on stories whilst my game lags away beside me as I try to set up some of those chapters for you.
Blech. So I finally get a couple of weeks off work and think I can catch up on Sims a bit. But no, I am having problems with the nerves in my shoulder and hands and although I’m having physio etc it might be some months before I’m not in pain – which means it’s been a good thing I had leave off work as I can’t type/use computers too much right now.
Anyway, Island Paradise install and a bit of a CC clear out has got the Dayes working again so I hope to update them soon, but the Knights seem busted beyond repair so I don’t know what I will do there. I really want to see how the Stripe gen turn out too 😦
Kingsfield is on indefinite hiatus – possibly until Sims 4 at this rate – but Taken has been updated, so that’s
something right? 52. Investigation
Oh and the banner this month is Karis Kyoti as Grace and Dark Knight as a very loose approximation of the Eighth Doctor. If you missed last month’s, here it is again. Fuji Daye as Ace and Jango Lazarus as Seven:
Well, by now I should have more updates. But that would be without taking into account my broken game. I’ve tried about eight times to play the Knights but they just crash. The Dayes are sort of working but glitching like mad and the game isn’t responding very well to me giving them actions. I managed to shoot two Taken chapters and my current banner header (Lab Coat Knight as the Sixth Doctor and Julie Populous as Peri) but the game crashed to desktop with both of those too. It’s been a while since I did a full-on check of CC and mods and I probably need to strip out some CC and check everything is A-OK but seeing as there’s a new EP on the way, there is really no point in doing any of that until it arrives. I hate how time-consuming the game is – like many of you I spend far more time fixing the game (and loading and saving) than playing, which isn’t exactly much fun, especially when my playing time is limited. So I expect to buy the EP late June or so and I have time off early July when I’ll be mostly packing – which may mean I will actually find updating my game somewhat refreshing as a change from that. So don’t expect Dayes or Knights until ll that’s sorted, I’m afraid. I suspect I will have to reduce the household size with the Knights at least as they have a LOT of kids and pets this gen.
In the meantime, there’s a new Taken chapter up: 51. Lockdown and I have shots ready for the following chapter, so I hope that can keep you going for now.
Colour yourselves shocked, but those updates I’ve been sitting on for ages are up. The Dayes hit University in University Speaking, whilst in Taken, events crank up in 50. Uprising.
In the banner this month, we see Pepperoni Daye as the Fifth Doctor, Mr Muscle Daye as Adric, Rae Kyoti as Tegan and Mozzy Daye as Nyssa. That means for the June banner I have to find something approximating THAT COAT. No idea how that will happen.
I see the release of Sims 4 has been met more with indifference than excitement – I feel ya. Sims 3 still feels a lot for most computers to handle, so Sims 4 might just blow them all up (look at all the graphics card blowouts etc people got from TS3 and the tons of mods that have been needed to stop it crashing, limit the FPS, limit the memory blowouts etc – never mind all those we have needed for gameplay!). On the other hand, it might be nice to play something more stripped back after the bloat of CC and EPs that my own game is groaning under the weight of.
Rest assured, Taken and Knights will finish within Sims 3 and the Dayes are committed to still experimenting with all the game has to offer – in all the EPs and SPs (but probably not all the store worlds as really not sure I can be bothered forking out for any more than the ones I already have and never play). Not sure where it leaves Kingsfield although I don’t want to write it off just yet – I may think about restarting it in TS4 and playing that as my main game with a side game of a Dayes offshoot that does everything TS4 has to offer once their TS3 counterparts are exhausted – which probably won’t be until TS5 the rate I’m going and the amount we have left to try. We’ll see how all these things go, I guess. I loved TS1 and 3 but not TS2 so I can see me being an every other game kind of simmer but I will probably get the TS4 base game and give it a shot unless it looks completely broken or requires online play (o hai the latest Sim City which I do not have even though I would have liked to have it if it were an offline game).
Also: I know the links are still out of date. I had an office clear-out / tidy-up the other week, am going to have to do the same at home with moving house coming up, so maybe the bug will spread to the blog…
Boring real-life whining after the cut, should you be interested.
I’ve had the shots for both Dayes and Taken uploaded since the start of this month and am part-way through writing the Dayes entry… but real life, yet again, is getting in the way.
Work is busy – but that’s just normal now – however, the main things are my Creative Writing MA, which has been quite time consuming this semester with a big reading list and an essay deadline in early May, and the fact that I’m in the process of house hunting. I’ve spent several hours every weekend for the past however many weeks looking at houses and that’s the time I’d usually have available to sim. It’s been very tiring and time consuming.
(I also bought a tablet so have got into lots of little games on that – no loading time! Joy! Being able to play a ‘level’ or get through tasks in just a few minutes here and there with no long save times! A revelation!)
Anyway, things are sort of slowly on their way with all my blogs, it just has to be a bit… as and when… and I can’t foresee that changing.
In the meantime, I’ve put a photo of one of the latest Knight kiddies on this entry to whet your appetite (but as they’re only toddlers in game, it’ll be a while yet). By the way – the banner this month is Tizer Knight as Leela and Alfie Win Kyoti as the Fourth Doctor, which reminds me I must get cracking with a May shoot!
Hopefully the first of two short Taken chapters this week, 49. Forgetting and Remembering. Shots are done for Chapter 50 so should be with you soon.
Waiting for mods to get updated so I can install University and 70s/80s/90s and then play Kingsfield / Dayes / Knights. Hooray for Easter coming up soon and a few days off work for bank holidays…
After two years as heir – the longest ever heirship in a legacy that didn’t go on a hiatus?? – Puddle Daye has passed on the baton.
Who to? Well, read the latest Dayes update, Heir We Go Again to find out.
As for my other stories, the Knights have had babies… plenty of babies… I haven’t played much lately, but I recently had a birthday and the latest stuff pack has arrived, with University on its way so I’m very excited about seeing how the uni expansion might work with Kingsfield. And I’ll try and update Taken within the next week or so.
As for the banner this month – Cartland Knight as the Third Doctor and Bebe Populous as Jo Grant, out for a ride in Bessie.
I haven’t managed to play the game much but I have managed to take some shots for a new Taken chapter, so have a read of 48. Eighteen. I hope to update the Dayes within the next week. You have a new heir now, after all…
Oh, and for those wondering about the latest banner… Lestat Daye as the Second Doctor, Scott Populous as Jamie (he was wearing a kilt but it didn’t fit in shot) and Fia Magnus as Victoria. Jon Pertwee (the Third Doctor) is next up month and he’s going to be a challenge… and I’m hoping that by June someone’s made all 11 doctors because what on earth I’ll do for Colin Baker’s coat, I don’t know…
It’s entirely embarrasing how long it’s been, but I updated Kingsfield with a new story post, Quarter-Life Crisis and a new behind the scenes piece, Meet the twenty-somethings. And while I was at it, I uploaded another Taken chapter too: 47. Searching.
Yes, two updates in a few days. Do not grow accustomed to it. (Although do expect Kingsfield this week)
There’s snow business like show business is my favourite post title ever. There’s also an heir poll over at Boolprop, the first in a very, very long time.
There’s a new Dayes update, Seasons in the Sun, which should be the first of two over the next few days as I’ve got loads of shots left and also hope to play a bit. Kingsfield should be updated in the next few days too.
Don’t get used to this…
Rad's Sims Stuff 