I finally realize there's an offswitch to Neighborhood Stories. The news article I came across did not speak of this, I only saw that neighborhood sims could now die. Kudos to me for not checking the patch notes, lol. But I think EA has more than redeemed themselves for initially refusing an offswitch. Now we can all customize stories for specific houses! We can have it off for some, only some options on for others, I'm happy with it now. I don't have to stress over checking every household in my world making sure they're all still alive.
