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kamra1961's avatar
7 years ago

Starting Sims 3 fresh

I have been back in Sims 2 for 2 or 3 years and just restarted my Sims 3 Fresh. Have forgot how to play but main thing I need help with right off is a list of the must have mods, hacks, and programs. Please help me get started again.

4 Replies

  • Nraas errortrap,overwatch, any nraas mods are helpful but those two help keep the game clean ...otherwise it gets really dirty and could corrupt
  • I'd start with NRAAS and add Error Trap and Overwatch. Then gradually add more NRAAS mods such as Debug Enabler (it gives you access to commands made by EA but we were not given access to in the game) and Master Controller and whichever of it's add ons that you'd like to try. This gives you new commands and settings for your game.

    Then depending on how you like to play gradually become familiar with other NRAAS mods until you have a game that is fun for you.

    Other mods I particularly enjoy are:

    The Gardener hiring mod by douglasveiga from Mod the Sims. Because I love gardening in the game (not in real life) and this mod released my sims from the need to spend their whole lives tending their gardens.

    Various other gardening related mods that give extra harvestables and recipes. These mods are by people such as douglasveiga, Cinderellimouse, icemunmun and others.

    icarus_allsorts has some nice mods to add extra animations to the way sims eat and chat.

    MrHawk and others have unlocked a hundreds of stencils that EA didn't unlock for us when releasing store content. The stencils are already in your game, you just can't see them unless you get some of these stencil fix mods.

    simslogical has a excellent tools to help you manage your mods.

    crinrict has a very useful blog with all sorts of info in it to help you trouble shoot your games.

    I've been making videos over the past year or so and they demonstrate various aspects of game play. Generally in a modded game.

    Video Series 1. The Isla Paradiso Bunch

    My first video began as a game to get a badge - have your sims make 300 elixirs. I tried it a few times but never managed to get it. Not trying any more but it's turned into a fun game.

    Originally I had a pair of sims, Dianna and Meryl, who I made to test some Custom Content I was putting into my game. That content was made by luna.

    I added Dianna and Meryl to a house in Isla Paradiso. Then I added Judy, a witch I like to play and has been used a lot lately. She's the one who was really going to make the elixirs. Dianna is a magician and Meryl is evil and mean spirited and wants to see the ghost of her wealthy spouse. Then I thought I ought to add a male sim to balance out this all female family and I added Craig. Then decided to add Sam too just to even things out a bit more. Sam joined the lifeguard career and Craig went out looking for seashells. Suddenly Craig uncovered two hidden islands at the exact same time. All I can imagine happened was he picked up a special message in a bottle (they turn up as seashells when using the collection helper) and the bottle was on a beach close to a hidden island that you only need to go near to reveal it. The special message in a bottle also reveals a hidden island when you find it.

    I got excited with that happening and had been thinking of making videos for YouTube for a while and decided to give it a go.

    Before starting to record the videos I wanted to add a genie to the mix and searched through my extensive sim library. I finally narrowed it down to three. Couldn't decide which one I preferred and added all three. That gave me a total of 8 sims in the household that I originally was going to have restricted to about 4. Then I made myself a sort of simself and added her too. Now I have 9 sims and added a stray dog and cat as well just to make it interesting. (You need a combination of a few NRAAS mods to remove the 8 sim restriction to a household.)

    I put my first video up on YouTube on Jan 1st, 2017. I was using all free software that I had to learn to use and was shouting into the microphone built into the screen of my laptop. I also had bronchitis. But the video was watched by a heap of people and I got lots of wonderful comments and encouragement to continue. So I did and that story is now up to Episode 59 which I posted a few days ago. Since the beginning there have been many events and adventures. There are several toddlers in the household including genie twins who's father is a mermaid, a pair of plant sim boys and a clone of another mermaid. University Life Expansion Pack is needed for the cloning.

    In the first few episodes they were doing things around Isla Paradiso and they uncovered all of the hidden islands. Then I started sending them to World Adventure Worlds and they are still there doing the tombs. So if you're i nterested in tomb walk throughs then you will find them in this series of videos.

    Series 2. Caroline and Friends
    This started in December 2017. I now have a new computer, headset and paid software to edit my videos. Things are looking up.

    It is up to Episode 7 whick I posted a few days ago.

    Currently Caroline lives alone. She's working getting me badges. There are a few Island Paradise badges that don't trigger if you have more than one sim in a household. When she gets those badges i'll be adding friends for her.

    The purpose of doing the badges is to find new ways of playing the game. Caroline and her friends will be demonstrating this process. Currently Caroline is in the lifeguard career and also looking for hidden islands. She'll soon be running a resort as well. Then she does the resort thing again. By that time all of the single sim household badges will have been achieved and Wilma moves in and they move to a party houseboat and get the badge for throwing parties on a houseboat. Then we move on to University Life badges and I built them a bowling alley in Isla Paradiso. That's as far as I've recorded so far and posted videos only up to her being almost through the lifeguard career and making progress on the hidden islands.

    Series 3. The McFluff story - I posted Episode 1 of this in December 2017.


    This is total fantasy. I have a witch living in hidden springs. She's doing things with a digger at the moment. She wants to make a Sim Bot and has to find stuff and deliver it to the science lab.

    She's got some talented and experienced sculptors living with her at the moment as I want her to have a history of sculpting in her home and these sculptors can make anything in ice and their ice doesn't melt.

    There are also 15 cats in the household. Gertie loves her cats. She needs to befriend 15 cats to achieve her lifetime wish. She begins a quest to find a potion to turn the cats into humans. Don't know why she'd want to do that - I want to do that because I found some awesome skins that make human sims look like cats. I want an excuse to use them.

    When the sculptors move out, the Iris Green will move in. Iris becomes Gertie's best friend. Iris gets a husband and they have a family and continue living at Gertie's place. They have grandchildren, great grand children, great great grand chldren and so on and they all continue living at Gertie's place until they all eventually die of old age. There will continue to be 15 cats. Eventually, by Generation 5 of the Green family, Gertie dies of old age too. She leaves everything to another young Gertie, Gertie Green. Young Gertie has to become a witch so she can eventually turn the cats human. She does eventually succeed.

    in the meantime they've moved around different worlds (NRAAS Traveller mod) and finally end up at Cake Island. Now my version of Cake Island (by Rflong7 and on the Exchange) is unpopulated. I'm populating it will interesting Sims. I have a family of fawns living there already. Now I'm making a mermaid household to move to Cake Island too.

    I have put some videos of my mermaids up on YouTube recently. This is all in preparation for the McFluff Story to gradually unfold. Currently old Gertie still lives in Hidden Springs with her cats the the sculptors. The sculptors will end up on Cake Island too - by way of travel using old Gertie's time machine she's just made. That video hasn't been done yet.

    Series 4. Oscar and Louise - this was begun in December 2017 too.

    This is an interesting story. I made some base game sims when I started installing my Sims 3 game onto my new computer. I decided to play with two of them. They were happy together. Both are hopeless romantics and flirty. This leads to some very funny interactions.

    Another badge I did finally manage to get a while back is to have a sim have 15 children. This usually means one sim has a series of partners to have children with. I decided, since I can have as many sims as my computer can cope with in my game, I'd get this pair to have 15 babies. I made up a bit of a back story to explain why they'd do that and started having babies. Then the babies started aging up and I decided turn it into a video. So I started again. I still have the original game and will be trying to stick closely to it and will be transferring babies into the new game being made for the video as they are born. I think they'll probably end up with more than 15 though. I just want to see the genetics and how the babies age up and what the grandchildren look like.

    Series 5 - the mermaids. I just started this one. It isn't really a story - I just like playing with mermaids and seeing them swim around under water. I'm trying to give them colourful tails.

    In the video they are in Isla Paradiso. I've since moved them to Cake Island where I'm building the 'ultimate mermaid home'. There aren't any dive lots in Cake Island and I might need to add a few before Gertie's crew move there. I want the mermaids, sculptors and fawn as the townies for when the Green's move there with the cats and start turning cats into humans.

    I also do the occasional tutorial video to show how I fix some issues in my game.

    This is the link to my channel if you'd like to take a look.

    https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuW44b3uCMtCSaq4gwC8EZg

    Whatever you decide to do, have fun and Happy Simming
  • memori-thank you
    Karritz-very helpful and thank you for all the recommendations. I had the gardener one and many of the NRaas, but forgot. You all jug my memory and help me get back up and running.
  • I would've kept my TS3 folder saved on external hard drives and 7zipped on my computer so I could just reuse my old folder even if I was starting new saves in it.

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