All Gamestar Sims 2 CDs For Download!

How To Dreamwidth: A Primer

the more friends ask me about dreamwidth, the more i realize i know a lot about this site that isn’t super obvious at first glance. so here is a primer for those of you thinking about making a dreamwidth account. this post ranges from your really basic starter tips to the completely esoteric things that come from using it for a decade.

2023 note: This post was written in 2018. While most of this post is still true, various features may have been changed or updated in the years since.

a what now? dreamwho?

Dreamwidth is a code fork of LiveJournal. A code fork means that they took LJ’s code (which used to be open source) and went their own direction with it. They still use the basic ideas behind LJ’s codebase, but have changed and improved upon it in various ways.

The core difference between DW and other websites is privacy isn’t an afterthought, but the central feature. You can lock posts, filter them to a select group, or make them visible to only you. I recommend reading through this section of DW’s FAQ for more on this.

When you make an account, you can subscribe (ie follow) and grant access to other users. Both of these are one-way – if A subscribes to B, that doesn’t automatically grant B access to all of A’s locked posts. Here’s more on this.

DW in general can be kind of confusing for people who have only used tumblr, but their FAQs are pretty good on the whole, and they’re searchable. If a website feature is confusing, start there.

okay, i have a journal. now what?

Customize it! DW doesn’t have all the latest and greatest features, but you can still make it your own. Here are some useful tips.

You can change your layout from Organize > Select Style. Mobile support is hit or miss, unfortunately, but there are some nice default layouts that work with it. You can also use this style for Practicality which makes DW fully mobile-friendly. If you’d rather design it yourself, Tabula Rasa is completely stripped down.

You can get premade DW layouts at the dreamwidthlayouts community. If you have trouble with your code, ask over at style_system.

Edit your profile! This is where you put your usernames for other social media sites, tell people a bit about yourself, and mention your interests. Your interests will be part of the interest search; it’s one way to find people.

Upload icons! Free accounts get 15 icons; paid accounts get 100 icons, premium accounts get 250 icons. You can use one icon in each entry and commment you make. It’s good form to put the maker of the icon in the comment section if you didn’t make it. If you got it from someone on tumblr, you can even link their blog using the code <user name=username site=tumblr>. (This works all across DW!)

While you can’t make pages, you can set a post to stick at the top of your journal, much like Twitter’s pinned tweets. Here’s how to do it.

You can also change how Dreamwidth itself looks, if you don’t like the red. Go to Account Settings > Display. Most other site display preferences are on that page.

While you’re here, look through the Account Settings > Privacy page. By default, your public entries will be included in site searches. You can turn it off at the bottom of the page if you want. You can also set it so your entries are automatically access-locked or private as well.

This got very long so the rest is behind the cut. (Now you really know I’m legit.)

Keep reading

I've put together some of my favourite shiny TXMT settings - these are for TS2 CC creators /anyone editing recolors in SimPe.

I've included two custom envcubes.

Also recommended: my Shine Removal Kit.

Shine TXMT Settings

Download: SFS | BOX

These settings should be added to TXMT with 'merge' button /not 'import'/. Instructions are included.

As is the case with StandardMaterial, envcube reflections get much stronger outdoors. This pack includes various TXMT settings for opaque object recolors, to simulate materials such as glass, porcelain, gold, polished metal, stainless metal, cars and other glossy outdoor objects.

Shine settings can be merged with all kinds of settings (tinted, transparent, with textures, or textureless).

stdMatEmissiveCoef and stdMatDiffCoef brightness might affect the intensity of reflections

Please note my shine settings can also be used for SimStandardMaterial stuff BUT results will be a little different /CAS accessories using that shader look the same indoors and outdoors/.

One of the setting files features my custom greylivingroom-envcube, it's based on TS2 gothlivingroom_01-envcube, which I very often use for glazed pottery or glass bottles -BUT it doesn't have any brassy tones, unlike original.

And there's also pfmall-envcube which I created for cars displayed indoors, but it's not exactly how I imagined it - I haven't found much use for it so far. Both custom envcubes are tiny, 64x64 px DXT5.

A Bit Of Gloss: porcelain / glass kind of shine, good for small objects, I often use it for bottles

A Bit Of Neutral Gloss: same as above, but no warm hues

Cool Sparkles: highly polished surface effect, good for small and larger objects

Shiny Gold & Stainless Steel Shine: what it says on the tin

Subtle Shine Blueish: barely visible indoors, this one is good for outdoor metals

Car Varnish Glossy Outdoor: reflection with green grass, trees and sky

Glossy glowing: for lit panels and such

Wayback Machine is a GREAT tool. It just has a few issues. The number one issue is that it isn't great at crawling. Normal HTML sites are no problem but more complex sites like forums and especially blogs are hard for it to navigate. It tends to get only very small pieces of LiveJournal for example. The entire official Sims 3 forum from 2009-2017(?) is just gone because Wayback wasn't able to access it.

As I've talked about over the past few years, I'm trying to archive a lot of CC with Archive.org. This works well for most older sites but not so well with newer ones. Plus, I'm focusing on custom content more than webpages and stories.

Stories, that people put hours and hours into, legacies, forum posts, pictures, blog posts, all things that are just TOO numerous for me to even make a dent in on my own.

Buuuut, if I could get a bunch of simmers who were actively viewing blogs and downloading content and reading forum posts to archive every post they viewed that could do something!

Wayback Machine Auto-Archiver is a bot that archives all PUBLIC webpages that you visit to the wayback machine. Think of it as a bot that follows you around taking a shot of every blog you visit. Obviously, this isn't just for Sims content but it would certainly help the community who may go looking for the content that you archived after it's LONG gone from the internet.

The auto-archiver is a simple extension. If you're running Chrome or Edge you simply install it like any other extension and then you surf the web like always.

The more simmers who use it, the more content gets archived. Also, it's entirely anonymous. If you're a lurker and you've never made or posted anyway, think of this as a way to give back!

Download it here and please reblog!

(I will be reblogging this post several times)

Super Duper Hug FAQ

Hi everyone. 

I’ve read the last days about the notites from a few Simmers, who has get the Super Duber Hug Bug from downloading lots from other Simblrs like @simper-fi​, @keoni-chan​ and @deedee-sims​. (Where, however, still unclear is whether they really have the bug.) I’ve the Super Duper Hug Bug, too. And I know some lots from me are “infected”.  And I’m really really sorry that I doesn’t inform you, but I through that was not are problem because it doesn’t destroy the game or something.

I thought to overview I make a small FAQ 

What is the Super Duper Hug Bug?

“The Debug Super Duper Hug is a special autonomous testing interaction that allows any sim to hug any other sim without the fear of being rejected. This hug is very effective and make sims into friends very fast. Some people [modders] use it as a template for creating new interactions, where the original is kept on as a fallback. When such a mod is later removed, the Super Duper Hug is then introduced by the game to compensate for the missing interaction. My No Sim Loaded mod protects against this annoying phenomenon.” -  BoilingOil

Can it break my game?

As far as is known, no. But some Simmer doesn’t like the bug, because it annoys them.

How can I fix it?

It gives two fixes who only suppresses the bug, when you get it already.

Boiling Oil’s No Sim Loaded and dolphin26’s Control This Sim.

Can I fix it at all? 

No - “Dolphin’s hack doesn’t fix the Hug – it just suppresses the problem. You still have it in your game and can infect other games. There is no cure for the Hug, but there is a vaccine: if you install No Sim Loaded before you do anything that might cause the Hug, then you will never get it. If you’re already infected, No Sim Loaded just suppresses the Hug as well.

If you’ll forgive the metaphor, the Super Duper Hug is like herpes – if you take appropriate precautions before you woohoo, you won’t get herpes. If you don’t take appropriate precautions and you end up with herpes, you will have it for the rest of your life. You can take medication to suppress it so that you don’t have an outbreak or any symptoms, but you will never be truly cured, and you might pass it along to someone else.” - @esmeiolanthe

Can I still upload my Lots if I have the bug? And I may even still download Lots of others?

In my own opinion, you can do what you want. The Super Duper Hug should forbid you nothing or you take the fun of playing Sims. It would just be helpful to others, when you write to that you have the SDHB in your game so that they can know and decide for yourself. Many also have no problems with the bug. 

I find the opinion of  @dramallamadingdang​  also justifiable:

“[…] BUT! I don’t think this should discourage anyone from downloading or sharing lots. Simply get BoilingOil’s mod and all is well. You never have to worry about the issue again. It’s a mod that everyone ought to have, really. Same as the anti-corruption ones, if you’re a person who plays neighborhoods long-term.…That said, anyone who knows for certain that they have the Super Hug and who shares lots ought to let people know about this. In fact, probably everyone who shares lots, period, should let others know about this, since lot sharing is how the bug propagates between users. So, consider this MY notice, as a person who shares lots. :)”

Important to know is, when you have the SDHB in your game not all of your Lots are infected! So some of my Lots have it, like the Pleasant House Makeover or the Storm Dorm, but some of my houses hasn’t it… And I don’t know why..  May be someone of you has an answer. :)

I hope I have answered the main questions. Most of the information I have from the Replies of @simper-fi’s and @deedee-sims Simblr.  

Please like comment and improvements attach! ?

A normal wedding in Pleasantview...

I thought so too but then remmembered it was actualy ATS, around the sims, I was thinking about. Its ts1 section is still up by the way.

Petition: Dedicated TS1 download section on MTS.

With the release of the Legacy collection, the original The Sims game has seen a resurgence in its modding scene. While much of the modding community is currently located in places like Tumblr or specialized sites such as Simblr.cc, most sites don't have the sort of infrastructure, history, or community that MTS does. 

While other sites such as TSR had a section for The Sims, they've recently locked them and prohibited new submissions. Additionally, TSR has a history of being driven primarily by profit while MTS is almost entirely driven my fans. It seems wrong that one of the oldest, and most established, Custom Content aggregate sites doesn't have it's own dedicated section for The Sims as so much of the games' original custom content from the 2000s disappears. 

MTS having its own section would make it one of the only custom content aggregate sites to have a functioning download section for the original game.

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Fully Functional TS1 Section on MTS

For those who’ve been concerned about losing quality with smaller texture sizes, I thought this might be worth showing. This is a texture I made just for this purpose in 2048x2048 and then resized it. All textures were built with DXT3 format and file sizes are the compressed ones. In my opinion 1024x1024 looks the best in-game. 512x512 is what Maxis originally used for this sofa and it would be a better option performance-wise, though.

These pictures were taken with a full HD display, meaning that it can show resolutions up to 1920x1080 (but not anything beyond that) and with a game that’s set up to use that resolution too. Please keep in mind that the lower your game’s resolution is, the less likely you would notice a drastic difference between 512x512 and 1024x1024 textures in-game.

This Blender manual has a good demonstration of projections & their effect on textures, here are a couple:

Understanding UV Mapping - How Map Projections Work.

Back to Geography with this one; I've seen in some places people say they don't like/understand UV Mapping or unwrapping. Well, I love mapping and had this video saved, It's short and light and explains very clearly how projections work. It helped me catch up on the issue. Unwrapping from what I understand, is basically the first part in the video where the guy is fighting the globe.

BOOST

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