The Freezer Bunny Club - A Reading Circle

General
1. What were your first impressions on Liz? --- She's so pretty! I love redheads. I populate my Sims world with them. They are only 2% of the real world, and I'm one of the 2% so represent Liz! I also love how "excellent" cooking comes easily to her. What luck!

2. What do you think about the concept of my Legacy Challenge? It's not a normal Legacy Challenge but one related to the MySims Trophies. --- I love it! I think I found my next challenge! :D No... I have too many already that I've got to finish. Wow... how ambitious! I am terrible at moving quickly through challenges so I wish you luck. I like the uniqueness of this challenge and anything that ties the Sims games together makes me happy. I also tend to be bad at collecting in the Sims and almost always end up "cheating" just a little so kudos to you for sticking with it.

3. What do you think about the way I write my chapters? --- love the humor! I sort-of amble through the chapters at a leisurely pace. You write in a way that's easy to read. I can definitely relate to the common Sims "issues" that crop up in Liz's life.

4. My Chapters are classified in Sim days. Do you (dis)like that? --- I think it works well the way it's set up. Bite-sized makes it easy to get through (unlike mine :# )


Chapters - not sure about the numbering of these..

1. :)

2. Which parts in the available chapters did you (dis)like? Why is that? --- I think Liz is bold for asking Brent to divorce Brant so quickly. They're definitely moving at a Sims-trope pace... meet, date, kiss, marry, have baby all in one day. :D I think my favorite part is Brent telling you not to follow him. :D

As I mentioned over on the blog, in the very first TS3 game I ever played, my main character started dating a married man and she didn't even know until his wife showed up in their bedroom late at night to yell at them. *gasp* I didn't even know how to lock a door yet. :# Talk about spicy!

I'm glad Brant found happiness again.

I think someone else mentioned this - Liz's personality. I feel like it would be nice to see a little more of the My Sims influence for this generation (the Chef Gino) in the chapters. I can see a lot of your personality in the chapters, but it would be nice to see a little more of Liz's.

Not sure how I feel about Liz's stinky bathroom wedding. I would've liked to see them have an actual wedding (it would feel more legitimate), and maybe Brent make amends with Brent. Also if they were going to elope, it would've been nice for Liz to at least take a shower and then they could walk somewhere pretty.

What are her traits? I can't remember if you mentioned these or not. Sorry if I'm forgetting. I recall Gloomy, but I'm not sure what else.

I do think parts of Liz shine through pretty well - like when she whimmed for a pool - did she actually go swimming? Or when she drank alcohol and practiced mixology while pregnant. Bad Liz! Lol. She seems to be a hard worker and that helps her get ahead in life. She also seems to know what she wants and she isn't afraid to go after it (even if it's a bit of nudge from the writer).

3. How do you like Ninja and Brent joining the Ridley family? What are your thoughts on these characters? --- love <3 <3 Ninja! He steals the show! Literally every scene he's in makes me go ... aww... It was hilarious that Ninja keeps walking in on them. :D Perhaps they should buy some toys for Ninja to play with to distract him or they should lock the door when they're going to get romantic.

I'm not sure how I feel about Brent. He went on a date with Liz while still married, and then broke up with his husband for her. That's a bit of a bad beginning pattern so I hope he's faithful to her.

5. Does everything in the story make sense for you? -- Yep.

5. Is the story easy to follow? Do you need more information or less? -- I think I've already answered this. I'm enjoying the pace.

6. What are you expecting for next episodes? (they are already played and written but not yet published but I like to see your thoughts about this) -- can't wait to see Alison grow up and their next new addition.

7. Any questions for me? -- you mentioned in one chapter you have detailed notes about the food booth schedules. That's great. I'm religious about taking notes too so I'm curious what you use/do for your notes.

How do you plan your chapters?

What do you plan to do with the spare heirs (like Alison)? Will you include them in the story or will they get side adventures or will you primarily focus only on the heirs?

When do the heirs take over in the next generation? (maybe this was mentioned in the MYSims legacy challenge rules, but I can't remember).

"Duvelina;c-17542030" wrote:
General

4. Does everything in the story make sense for you?
Everything mostly makes sense, but I do have some opinions. I was a little surprised when Liz asked Brent to marry him right after a dinner party but I could get over that. But then they got married in her bathroom (?) even though Liz needed a shower. I'd go all-out and make it a special occasion instead (or I don't know, not stinky in the bathroom? ?).

@Duvelina I felt that way too. At least take a shower first, Liz. :# @Skeilah I hope we get weddings in game in the future. I do love to see how other gamers handle/portray weddings.

"mercuryfoam;c-17542458" wrote:

1. What were your first impressions on Liz?
I think she has a confident personality and is opinionated. She loves animals and is good-natured. She’ll be the friend you want, the kind that stands up for you and tell you the truth instead of what you want to hear.

@mercuryfoam I think this is a great description of Liz! Confident was the word I was looking for when I was trying to describe her in my answers post above.

"ajamkeevin;c-17545507" wrote:

1. What were your first impressions on Liz?
I like Liz! I was happy to read about how you created her randomly, I think one thing I spend TOO much time on with my stories is taking aaaaages to create just one character in CAS.

@ajamkeevin I have this perpetual problem too. In fact, I have a running series on Tumblr - I Spend Way Too Much Time in CAS. :D

"ajamkeevin;c-17545507" wrote:
Side note: I always find it so hilarious that Sims meet, begin dating, get married, and have babies in just a matter of days. Can you imagine if this was the case for people in real life? Haha!

Haha... I made this comment too!

"ajamkeevin;c-17545507" wrote:

About the Brant/Brent thing: I really don't ever take the pre-made Sims' established backstories into account when writing my own story. I can only think of two pre-made Sims that appear in my story (Mitchell Kalani and Bella Goth) and only Bella has 'canon' details, but that's because she's a veeeery minor character with no bearing on the main story. My Mitchell, for example, has nothing in common with the pre-made Mitchell. So, I say, write the characters in any way you want! EA might have created them, but you're fleshing them out and making them your own.

@ajamkeevin I try to incorporate townies as much as possible, particularly in my TS3 stories. I am actually kinda obsessed with interconnecting games and stories.

But I had to comment because you mentioned Bella and Bella has her own canon in my Simworld. You'll see her crop up in a way in KCKLKF. :smiley:

Actually, I do think you have a refreshing approach to characters. I wish I could leave pre-made stories and lore alone. On this note, @Skeilah, I do think you are making the characters your own and I like that!

Chapters

2. I’m personally not a fan of wedding parties but I’m going to take everyones stinky-bathroom wedding comments with me and not do that again :P I’m far ahead with my screenshots as everyone knows, but the next heir actually got a real wedding (spoilerrrrr). I’m so proud of myself for doing that. Non-heirs won’t get an actual wedding (sorry, that’s just too much for me :’)), but I made sure they were not stinky, hungry, had a full bladder or something else.

Another spoiler: in Chapter 1.15 (comes out next Saturday), Brent and Brant will meet each other once again to settle things :)

Liz’s traits are summed up on the side-bar on my blog, but I’ll also mention them here for you:
- Foodie
- Clumsy
- Gloomy

3. I never thought of locking the door :’) Oops. He does have toys from the start. He just never plays with them.

I can tell you, Brent is faithful to Liz :)

7.
I’m curious what you ude/do for your notes
I have a MacBook so I just use the Notes app which is also synchronized with my iPhone. So when I’m playing the game I use my phone to keep notes and when I’m not playing I switch to my MacBook to look at them. It looks like this. I can easily check the ones I finished:

https://www.mupload.nl/img/cqpy4e.01.42.png

How do you plan your chapters?
I don’t plan. Mostly I play 1 or 2 Simdays, just see what the game will give me today, then I close the game and write the unpublished version of the story. When I’m going to publish it, I rewrite it a little bit to make sure it follows the story.

What do you plan to do with the spare heirs (like Alison)? Will you include them in the story or will they get side adventures or will you primarily focus only on the heirs?
I can tell you about that because Alison is already an adult in my game :) As a kid, Alison met someone and that person became her soulmate. I’m doing this with everyone by the way. They became a couple when teenagers and got engaged/married when young adults. From that moment, Alison moved in with her spouse and she’ll have her own life but no worries, she won’t disappear. Just as in real life, siblings will see each other now and then.

When do the heirs take over in the next generation?
The next heir needs to be young adult, because parents can’t live with the next heir when actually taking over.

In my case: the next heir got his actual wedding party (whoopwhoop!), Brent and Liz slept in the Ridley Residence for one day and that’s the end of Generation 1. The next day will be Chapter 2.1 where the next heir will take over and Brent + Liz will take their leave to the Ridley Retirement Home (I love how all these words start with R hahahahah); But okay, that’s still suuuuuper far away!