*100th Upload and 1st Year Creator Anniversary* Sims Random Aspect Generators

HURRAY!!! (we are celebrating with this post!) Today marks one full year that I have been a creator AND its conveniently my 100th upload.

Today is special to me because I can look back and see how much I've grown as a creator. My very first upload was a Bodyshop Copy and it was the most basic thing I can think of. Since then I have learned how to make textures for clothes that don't suck (believe me, my first attempts at recoloring the af Tracksuit were AWFUL) to my first dabbling with SimPE for my first clothing mod. Next came learning how to make decent looking realistic walls and my first attempts with object meshing. Those were both learned on the spot in MTS2's first creator challenge and I did well enough that I was our first winner as well.

For my next trick I figured out how to make default replacement textures for clothing and ran with that for a while. Next I got myself a copy of SC4 and figured out how to make a neighborhood terrain. That needed houses so I got busy with my Nana Series. Next came another creator challenge and I set myself to the task of learning to make both a hair mesh and a clothes mesh. Then keeping with genetics I tackled a huge eye set. Then Halloween rolled around and I had some fun with that. Then another creator challenge and I tackled creating a custom career.

To further round out my portfolio I through in a CAS Screen and some terrain paint. Then I decided I needed some more houses in my neighborhood and ended up getting Featured for my Katrina Cottages. I was speechless for days about that one. Then winter hits and I churn out another contest entry, this time a custom swing. Swings are the single most complicated thing I've ever run into, I stand in awe still of anyone who understand BHAVs.

Then I took up my Milkshape and started making conversion meshes, I learned quite a few things about the importance of aligning normals to be sure! Next up my OCD compelled me to do something about the disorderly state in which the Buy Mode and Clothing Catalogs were in and those two mods are my most popular downloads to date. Some more contests and miscellaneous mods and suddenly I'm asked to join MTS2 staff. As that had been my dream since the first day I cowered in phear of the mods in #create I said yes as fast as I could. Now slightly more than a month later, I'm celebrating my 100th upload and my 1st year as a Sims 2 Custom Content Creator. How's that for a year?

OK, so all that aside, what goodies did I bring to the party? Well, not to disappoint or anything, but there is nothing in this post that you can use in your game. I (with some help from my dad) have written two programs that will randomly generate sim aspects for you. What's the purpose you ask? Well, during my stint in starting up Medieval Veronaville (nothing much has happened there lately, rl to busy) I've had to create random families. First I had to roll a dice to see how many families I needed to create, then roll again to see how many sims would be in the first family. Then roll once for each sim for their age, gender, aspiration, and zodiac sign. Repeat per sim per family. As you can probably guess without getting out your calculator, that is an AWFUL lot of dice rolling. And don't forget to keep track of all those rolls and what each one was for. Lordy thats a lot! So, why not instead, use this spiffy program I've created that does all that for you in one click with nice easy to understand pictures? YAY! I have two versions of each program available, the official copy that was coded in Visual Basic and is complete with custom icons and an installer (yes, it writes to your reg files, but it also uninstalls completely) or the version that I coded in Javascript that will run in your web browser. To run that just open the .html file with a web brower (IE, Firefox, Safari) This version doesn't work nearly as well as the official version because, quite frankly, I'm not a computer programmer and my dad is!


The second program is for when a teen grows up. In the Legacy challenge you are supposed to roll for their aspiration but I believe you still get to pick their turn ons and turn offs. I've written a program that will random an aspiration, two turn ons and a turn off. In the official VB version the turn ons and turn offs are customizable based on the Expansion Packs you say you have. (Phae isn't that spiffy at Javascript to be able to pull that off, sorry!)


The last goodie I have for you today is a set of icons. What are they useful for? Well if you plan on writing your own sims program and need an icon for it, then its useful. What if you are tired of seeing 3 identical icons for your AnyGames when one is clearly your Medieval hood, one is a testing ground, and the last is Zombie Apocalpyse? Well, right click on their properties and tell it to change the icon. (The zombie turnon icon works quite nicely for the Apocalypse Challenge AnyGame) What if you are just so sims obsessed you'd like to change ALL your desktop icons into sims graphics. Well, thats a bit over the top, but YOU CAN DO IT!

Here's to another great year of creating at MTS2!
Enjoy!
-Phae

P.S. I hope you all now by now that I LOVE READING COMMENTS! Leave a note, (pretend its a birthday party!)

Additional Credits:
HP, Tig, fanseelamb, whiterider, Delphy, plasticbox, Echo, Canoodle, Lethe_s, Numenor, wes_h, Carmee_kitty, wndy_26, Sophie-David, Fresh-Prince, and all the other wonderful creators and friends who've welcomed me here at MTS2 and made this the best year my sims and I have ever had. THANK YOU ALL!!! <3