Thursday 2 February 2017

Changes for Sullivan

For a while now, I've been a bit bummed about how long it takes me to get through a round. I have a lot of families! If I didn't, I could get through a round a lot faster...but I'm also very attached to most of them.

I can find the time to play but when I have to blog about each family, playing requires a bit more planning and thought. So I've come up with a solution that I hope will work for me. I really want to see my sims progress in their relationships, careers and families and it's not looking incredibly likely for my youngest sims, if I keep going the way I'm going.

This is my plan. Generally, I have two families scheduled per game month. From now on, I will write a full update for one of the families and update on the other in the birthdays updates. Depending on what happens in that family, the birthdays update may be longer or shorter. I will also attempt to make sure the families who aren't getting a full update that round feature in other families' updates, so their own stories can be touched on there too.

My one exception to this new rule of mine will probably be the uni updates. I really love the uni updates and I think so many of my sims really come into their own during that time that I'd miss doing those, if I decided not to.

I was going to just mention this in the next birthdays update but I thought I'd make a dedicated post, just for anyone who is interested in my ramblings on the matter. I'll add a note in birthdays too, just for anyone who normally skips these sorts of posts. :)

15 comments:

  1. It's a good way to make sure you keep all your families and don't get too stressed out by blogging about them. Of course you know you never "HAVE TO" blog about anything :-) Also, updates can be shorter if you do not have much time to write.
    But I know what you mean - it takes me ages to finish a round in my game, even though I try hard to limit the number of households by keeping to my strict baby policy (no babies, unless they are needed for a Sim's LTW, or if Alien abduction happens) and by having Sims move in together when it feels right.

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    1. Well, to continue playing and truly enjoying the game, I do have to blog. :) Blogging has been the missing puzzle piece for me to really get the most out of my game and I wish I'd started a lot sooner. It's just a time thing - writing takes longer than playing, at least for me. So it'll be regular-length updates for one family a month and everyone else condensed into birthdays (which may or may not continue being called birthdays!).

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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  2. It does take a long time to get through a round when you add more households as kids grow up and move out! I think your idea is a good one. Blogging all the families can take a lot of time. Sometimes my updates are just really quick peeks into a family without going into a full on story because I just don't feel like writing a lot or nothing really significant happened during that playtime.

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    1. I am hopeful this will work out for me. I have the next family ready to go and have a rough idea of what I'll show for the next family in birthdays too. I feel like I have a couple of updates in the pipeline, even though I haven't actually got them up on Blogger yet.

      But right, sometimes, nothing happens in a session. I am happy with the idea of not forcing an update out of a fairly uneventful play session.

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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  3. Sounds like a great plan, that will speed things up a bit but still let you have a blog record in general. I agree about uni- it is the time when I really get a sense of who each sim is.

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    1. Uni is the best. :) I see so many people saying it's boring but I've always loved it. I would definitely miss it if I did fewer Uni updates.

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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  4. Sounds like a good idea! I know what you mean about the hood not progressing fast enough. I think that was one of the reasons I got tired of SimsVille an eventually started Linfort. Now I need to make sure the same thing doesn't happen with Linfort.

    I love the new format of your birthday-posts!

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    1. Glad you've been enjoying the birthday posts, Tanja! Keeping the hood progressing is kind of the whole point of the game, as Laura says below, so it's important to me to try to find a way to do that in a more timely fashion. Hopefully this does the trick!

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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  5. Same here. When I'm in rotation mode, rather than super-long story-mode like I'm in right now, I have stopped forcing myself to write elaborate story updates for absolutely every family. I don't really have playables vs. non-playables, but just some families have things going on right now and others don't. And that's okay. Because OMG I actually have over 200 sims now, lol! I couldn't give them all full stories. You've probably seen me post "updates" that are literally like five pictures and two words. But that's fun and effortless for me, and it keeps things moving along in between the longer stories. I like the feeling of their lives having "moments" in between all the more complicated chaos, because there have also been times when I felt that I rushed too fast between points in time.

    But seeing their lives progress is sort of the whole point of simming, so the balance between speed and depth is important. I think your new plan is a good one!

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  6. Also, agreed about spending more time on the uni students. That time of life is just so packed with growth and change, it's definitely rewarding to give them extra attention and focus.

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    1. Exactly! I've been told that I don't play that slowly but I really feel like I am and that's entirely the opposite of what the whole goal of the game is. Seeing the generations progress was the whole focus of the original ad campaign for TS2, the big reason everyone wanted the game. It's the thing I've always enjoyed most too, so I really want to keep it going.

      Yeah, your five pic/two word updates are probably similar to what my birthday updates will be like sometimes. :) Sometimes there'll be more to say and sometimes there'll be very little. I think I've always had more complicated things going on between fairly drama-free happenings but I just want to condense that and make it move along a little faster.

      Love uni! So much. It's probably my favourite expansion, honestly.

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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  7. Sounds like a good plan if it will make things easier and more enjoyable for you. :)

    I struggle to find time too, it's more that I make time to play because I know how long an update might take. I play a family for one sim week because that's about my limit but I'm also always super excited to play the next family too. lol

    You've done an amazing job so far of posting updates of your families. Sometimes I look at your blog archive and I'm in awe! Your updates always have so much going on in each of them but I do love your uni updates too. The teens can be pretty amusing! ;) And I always thought TS2 uni was super fun!

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    1. Fingers crossed! I tend to play my families for as long as I feel like playing them...or as long as I need to play them, if I happen to need pics I haven't got yet. I have aging off, which makes that very simple. I usually don't play longer than a week, though my record (set very recently) was nine days! Time got away from me with that session!

      Thanks for the kind words! I really enjoy doing this but it's just a matter of figuring out a way to keep doing it in a way that is realistic for my life. This might work. :)

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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  8. Looking forward to see this played out! It's been fun discussing schedules, birthdays, and the like on n99 lately. I hope that you are happy with the changes, and the progress your hood will make!

    I'm glad you are keeping UNI. It's one that I'm keeping full updates on as well. I think it's an important time to learn about the sims as YA's and outside of their parents home. Plus all the drama and romance! It's a fun time to play. I agree that uni is fun!

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    1. Ha, you know I always love a good nerdy discussion! It was very helpful to get the perspective of other simmers as well...and in a way, the permission! It was nice to hear other people say "yes, the number of families can get overwhelming when you're writing an update on each of them". I don't know why I thought I was the only one, lol.

      Uni is probably the most fun time for me, though I love the roomie stage too. I love figuring out who the sims are and who they're going to end up with. So you will continue to see plenty of that in Sullivan!

      Thanks for reading and commenting!

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