StrangerVille or Realm of Magic? (No Spoilers Please)
Both StrangerVille and Realm of Magic are my two favorite game packs, but if I had to chose one, I personally like Realm of Magic the best because of the fantasy elements introduced. I like the worlds...
"ChampandGirlie;c-17243980" wrote: I don't have RoM yet and if I get it, I will do so later. I did actually really like StrangerVille and I actually will keep the settings and pre-mades in my game. I'm more of a realism player though so I actually like that I could come up with a mostly realistic explanation of the events and that I could turn the town into a normal part of my rotation after. I can see an interesting dynamic between the various households and any new sims. There's a "culture clash" in the town that I'll get into.
My StrangerVille hero married a military sim who was with her until the end of the mystery. I thought about having them move out but the setting really is great for the military. I have said that I think that military sims may have to do a certain amount of moving around and to the extent possible, military sims will be expected to live in StrangerVille at first depending on how long they are stationed there.
I wish that the town had a few more lots but that sounds like the case for RoM too. I wasn't planning on getting RoM right away and I'll way until any bugs are under control. It's the sort of thing where I might be willing to have one or two spellcasters because I can be open-minded but it isn't really my play-style. If it had a more involved world, that would draw me more. I'll probably get it ... later.
Long answer? It's not unrealistic that a biohazard developed, possibly caused by ancient meteoric activity. The military investigated and tried to develop a weapon technology in collaboration with a scientific lab that backfired. Random military bases exist in a number of economically deprived small towns so that's completely realistic.
A connected family (the Roswells) decided to get wealthier and to drive off most of their neighbors by making deals with the military and scientists about technological experimentation that they didn't understand. When it all went wrong and started poisoning the town, anyone who knew about it, covered it up and the problem got worse.
You had to have top secret access to have any idea of what was going on. Various employees had ever more restricted access so very few scientists actually knew what they were working on. Anyone who did know probably got sick. Very few military personnel probably had any idea beyond following orders.
The military leadership wanted to grow the plant because they thought it would make a great weapon so they collaborated with the scientists but no one could control the experiment and it blew up. They lost total control and the problem kept spreading. By the time that the "hero" arrives in town, most people are sick or fleeing. No one actually fully knows what is going on but the conspiracy theorists are suspicious.
The hippie YAs move to town to get away to a peaceful beautiful setting with a cheap cost of living and lots of ... plants ... but they don't know what they are getting themselves into. Cue the solving of the mystery.
Other than it being a cowplant that you have to fight, it's pretty realistic. Having vaccines that you need to test and that expire is completely realistic. Local politics went wrong.
Make sense? I will say that seeing Ted Roswell licking a plant intensely was downright creepy and watching sims go from being normal to sick creeped me out too. Fun times with the apocalypse. For me, I'm more interested in the town afterward which appears to be unusual.
