ACR and other things

No, I don't have the game installed yet. In fact, I'm feeling like crap and I did say don't expect anything for a while, right? But I've been looking at my downloads and mods and stuff anyhow, trying to figure out what I want to keep, and ACR is on the "only maybe" list.

Decisions, decisions

Okay, well, after thinking about it some more, since I'm still feeling iffy about the old projects, I think maybe I'd be better off just making a fresh start.

So, as soon as my back pain allows, I guess I'll go ahead and look for the disks and install. See if I can get FT working without hitches, or deal with the hitches, see if I can get that bodyshop compression workaround doing some good (and do some updates on my CC), do testing in the default neighborhoods, etc. I'm not planning on rushing; among other things I'd just as soon wait to start publishing until I at least get a little further into sorting out my health woes or, y'know, acquire a painkiller that works reliably. But when I get around to setting up custom 'hoods, it'll be for new projects.

Today's dilemma

Or, more like, "last few months' dilemma".

I've been pondering reinstalling the Sims. Again. Still. Whichever.

Unfortunately, I'm still having health issues. Yes, I'm trying to do something about them, but being that I'm using the local po' folks' insurance, time between appointments gets long... not to mention that the last appointment I had I missed because, heh, I was sick. And then my doctor left the practice. Yes, really. She's moving out of state. I did make it to what one of my friends calls "the annual titsmash" (no problems, btw, yay) but haven't tried to get on a new doctor's list yet, because I hate starting over with a new doctor. I know, I know. I'm going to call soon, really.

Well, huh...

...seems like Pescado is still a genius, because if I'm reading this description of his mod correctly, he actually figured out a way to address the number one biggest problem I'd have with the game:

1. TS2-Style Aging [Optional - Default: Disabled]
Allows you to have sims age TS2-style, with only the active household.
Not enabled by default.

Which still isn't 100% ideal, but I'd far rather have that then the default way. (Ideal would be household-by-household option.) And considering he went from "Modding will be a pain" to "Oh, here, have a mod that, among other things, fixes some of the bugs in the game and addresses the biggest annoyances people have turned up" in, um, a week, I wouldn't be surprised if he figures out how to handle that at some point anyhow. And on top of that, the mod allows you to turn most of the options on/off (hopefully all of them at some point).

So, I may end up picking up the game at some point after all. You know... after I someday get another doctor appointment or two and reinstall Sims 2 and start making progress there again and all that...

I'm cooking da ribs in da oven

Which isn't the point of the post, but since I don't want to nap while the oven is on, I thought I'd take a bit of time to give my impressions of other people's reports of the Sims 3. I actually already posted some of this in a comment to an LJ post but I've since read and seen more and figured I'd do a bit more complete post with like, categories and more words. A lot more words.

To be clear, yes, this is based entirely on other people's reports and screens, but that's what word of mouth is, and so far, word of mouth isn't making me any more likely to go out and get the game anytime soon.

Cleanly pulling Sims from photos

I remembered recently that right before I started my extended Sims break I said I was going to explain how I pulled Sims or objects from a scene to do effects to them as I do now with Twilight Dreams; the first few times I did it by hand and it's reallllly slow that way. This way is rather easier, and leaves very little to clean up by hand.

This is pretty long, but I promise it's actually very easy, and once you do it a couple times you won't even have to think about it. Oh, and, warning: these are humongous pictures in their full sizes. I have a widescreen monitor and you're getting what I usually see.

Pixel Play posts

I realized I never posted pointers on this blog, so: my non-Sims gaming blog does have posts in it. 4 from early January, 3 from today. Click the link on the side.

Top 6 Reasons I'm Not Getting Sims 3 Anytime Soon

I guess everyone knows I'm not getting the Sims 3, at least not anytime soon, but with its immiment(ish) release, I wanted to go over why... it's a big list, probably bore you to tears, but hey, I like blogging about things.

No more non-Sims stuff here...

I've made a new blog for my non-Simming gaming blather, if anyone's interested. Incidentally, both this and the new blog now have links on the bottom if you want to use an RSS reader to keep up with them, though I'll continue to post links from my LJ as well (and occasionally posts will be made just there as usual).

browsers, lack of simming, blather

So, okay. I got sick of sites telling me how horrible I was for not upgrading to IE7, and tired of Windows Update trying to suggest it, so I did.

Boy, was that a mistake. I now understand why so many people dislike IE these days. IE6 was fine. IE7 is a piece of crap.

Microsoft has Star Trek syndrome. For those of you who aren't geeks, Star Trek Syndrome is this thing where the Star Trek movies tend to alternate between good and bad releases. (You might find some argument about which is which, mind.) Microsoft has apparently developed the same problem. For instance: XP? Fine. Vista? Piece of crap. IE6? Pretty good. IE7? Piece of crap. Luckily that means chances are whatever's after Vista and IE8 will both be fine.

Anyhow, I am now using Firefox. Reluctantly, but I am.

You might wonder, why am I reluctant? Because I am sick of people telling me how fab00 and absolutely better than anything Firefox is. Because it's not magic. It still has CSS display issues (every browser does). It doesn't magically protect you from spyware and malware, despite what people claim. (Ask my sweetie.) It's not that I think it's a bad piece of software; there's definitely good points about it, and there are ways in which it is stronger than IE... but it's not magictabulous. (I've been infected by Miranda, I think.) And I'm sick of people who think that it's okay to code for one browser and not care about others. (That applies to people who do it for IE, too, yes.) And I'm sick of Microsoft bashing. They're not perfect, no, but they're astoundingly better than they used to be, and I think that some people refuse to even consider that. Their problem, I guess.

Anyhow. I'm keeping IE7 installed and using it for sites where I have multiple logins as my alternate (Neopets is the main one for that), but I'm setting Firefox to be my default for now.

I haven't even tried reinstalling Sims yet. I wanted a break. Part of the problem is if the reinstall doesn't fix my problems I'm still not sure what I want to do. The issue doesn't make the game unplayable. It just makes it laggy in certain circumstances. So, um. Yeah. That and I don't feel like digging out and reinstalling all 9000 discs. Next week, I think.