http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/ Fri, 03 Sep 2010 02:46:40 +0000 MyBB http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1738 Thu, 02 Sep 2010 18:38:59 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1738
Has anyone else received shipment confirmation for Fast Lane and did it say Fast Lane on it?

]]>
Has anyone else received shipment confirmation for Fast Lane and did it say Fast Lane on it?

]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1737 Thu, 02 Sep 2010 17:30:34 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1737 Dog does the merengue


http://comedy.video.yahoo.com/?l=4418225&v=8171221]]> Dog does the merengue


http://comedy.video.yahoo.com/?l=4418225&v=8171221]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1736 Thu, 02 Sep 2010 03:33:48 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1736 Exotic world version 2

After playing game this week, I've decided to remove version one of exotic world, I was disappointed with the dark lighting while playing the game.

Old



New



The entire concept was to make a large playable world, during the early stages of this world I reduced the number of textures and reduce some of the quality of the world in favor of being able to play the world, to much eye candy is bad for the speed of the game.
I was a little disappointed with the end result, let down by me changing the lighting files very late in the world development. With this new version I've done my best to correct them errors and taken on-board suggestions made by fellow simmers to improve and tweak the world.

So for anybody reading this for the first time I will do a full showcase of the world and include the new picture that show off the world:-

The biggest improvement in the new version is the lighting, you can see in the top left how clear the Sims are in the new version, the second pic top right you can see the heat glow on the taxi, this is a new additions to the files, I increased the bloom effects on a hot day, to give the world that extra cool touch. In the bottom left you can see I still make days murky, but like the close up pic in the bottom right shows you it makes little difference to the sim details.

The only time during me testing the files I did see some darkness that produced poor lighting was during a sunrise on overcast day, with no lighting from the street lamps and it being a bad day, to reduce this I've increased the bloom on them days, it still not 100% perfect, but it very much playable and a lot better than it was.



The first pic shows the new sunset, I wanted to keep this in this version, it makes a dramatic ending to the days.
The other things tweaked in this version are some of the lots made more user friendly



Version one would be great version to play if your a Goth, version 2, you will be more at home if you like lots of colors, the top right pic show you the new background terrain I made, notice how the background terrain now, is reflecting the heat from being a sunny day. During overcast day the background looks dull.
The bottom left pic shows a overcast day, notice how the mountains fades away behind the castle. Bottom right shows you the emerging train.



The top two lots show you the level detail used on the lots and with the new lighting in full force you can see more clear on how things look, notice the smoke coming out of the chimney on snowwhites cottage on the right pic, you probable missed this in version 1, due to it being so dark. Do not think I've forgotten about indoor lighting this also got a little tweak, it will be great place show off any new lots you build with the tweaked indoor lighting.



The Story

Hope Island is a picturesque development on the northern end of the Gold Coast.
In 2012 hope Island broke away from the gold coast, and became to the locals the Exotic world.

Current Year 2020


The Coast area

Here summers are warm, or even hot, with a three-month period when rain rarely falls. When it does rain in this season it is heavy and often associated with thunder. Sunshine is abundant, as much as eleven to twelve hours a day in summer and five in midwinter.
Winters are generally mild and sunny but this pleasant weather is often interrupted by very changeable cold and blustery weather brought by a northerly wind called the mistral. This blows with particular strength in the Exotic valley and around the coast area.

The Mountainous Regions

These areas are the wettest and coldest regions of Exotic World and much of the winter precipitation is snow. Winter sports are best developed in this area and Pyrenees but can be pursued for a shorter period in the other mountain regions. The weather and climate of the is very similar to that found in the Swiss Alps. Plans for a special Xmas Exotic world are already in the planning stages of the local Sims.

Central Eastern Island

Summers also tend to be a little warmer. Rainfall is generally low and tends to fall in summer when it is often associated with thunderstorms.
Winters become colder towards the east and they are not any warmer farther south. In winter occasional very cold spells can occur. There is a definite increase in summer warmth in the south and an increase in sunshine from an average of seven to nine hours a day. This is also home of the main city area for exotic island, most people come here for jobs.
On the north end of the island, a oriental housing zone was established, this was attempt by the city council to introduce a higher cultural level to the island.

Western Island

This is mainly a lowland region, winters are generally mild and cold spells do not last for long.
The summers are significantly warmer and sunnier than in eastern Island. They can be rather wet, particularly towards the border, but the rain tends to be heavy and of short duration. Summers have more sunshine and longer spells of settled weather than farther north.
This area also contains a small french rural area and a medieval castle. Also home for the main science and industry area and boast some great nighttime shopping area's

North Island

Low-lying and rather flat area, there are some high mountain regions around the small island. Since 2015, the military have used this area, still some people live in this area and rumors that several archeologist have set up camp to explore some new ruins bring this place some interest.

KEY FEATURES

* Edit INI files
* All Rabbit holes
* Animated Train
* 122 Lots
* Compressed to reduce loading times.
* DX5 Textures used
* Vista used on the lots
* Texture sounds used
* Street names
* Lighting used on roads
* Emitters used inside lot, will only activate after one save, you will hear a bang the second time you load in the world, to tell you the emitters are working correctly
* Hiking area's used
* The Tricksters Dungeon, 5 levels of death and chaos
* Effects used on world map
* Spawners used in a balanced way
* Working Rainbow
* Edited Moon
* Edited Rabbit Holes
* Edited Posters inside the theater
* Working Ambitions lots with a new fire station

Download Link

http://gb.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html?assetId=3034982


LOTS USED

Hillside Wedding Chapel
By rinirae
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2522944#

Briarwood Farm
byEuphorialQueen
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2281364#

Lone Artist Loft by EQ $39,475
by EuphorialQueen
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2267998

Greenwood Waterfall
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2459379#

Romantic Oasis
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2661731#


Treehouse Camp
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2459382

Weeb's Cottage
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2732076

21st Century Central Park
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=762706#

Doo P's 5 Towers Centre
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=960906#

The Villa Dubai
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=1171544#

Starter Cottage under 16K
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=1490301#

Ocean's 11
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=1783522#

Mystical Lodge
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2182096#

Pinehearst Science Lab
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2378690#

Archeologist Camp Site
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2403382#

White Wash Delight
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2569777#

Irish Rose Cottage
by cerridyn
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2584779#

Many of the other lots in the world are made by me or I used edited EA lots.
The number of lots in the world might get reduced prior to release so this list might change.

All the designers of the world have been given credit inside the game for the lots they designed in form a plaque that your sim can read and it will state the designer of the lot.

Tutorials

I got sick of making guides in the end, but here is full list of all the guides and CAW stuff I used while building this world:

I started a building a world guide, it's split into 12 parts, the guide will cover all the trick I used to build this world.

1-6 http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1007.htm

7-10 http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1013.htm

11-12 http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1187.htm

Large Address Aware

http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...-t1040.htm

Spillway Ambitions missing object from CAW

http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...-t1193.htm

Replacement Dungeons
Pack contain a replacement exotic world dungeon

http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...-t1207.htm

World Specific Params files

http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-libra...g-t934.htm

How to re-upload worlds to the exchange

http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-libra...-t1159.htm

Exotic World Household Sims

This pack contains 44 sim households to used with exotic world, all the Sims are based around lifetime wants

http://builders.forumotion.net/show-your...-t1205.htm


CUSTOM GRAPHICS

The world contains a large number of custom graphics, all the change are limited to this world only, you will not be able distribute the graphic changes inside any lots you design in this world. The world is mod free and nothing will be installed other than the world file.

]]> Exotic world version 2

After playing game this week, I've decided to remove version one of exotic world, I was disappointed with the dark lighting while playing the game.

Old



New



The entire concept was to make a large playable world, during the early stages of this world I reduced the number of textures and reduce some of the quality of the world in favor of being able to play the world, to much eye candy is bad for the speed of the game.
I was a little disappointed with the end result, let down by me changing the lighting files very late in the world development. With this new version I've done my best to correct them errors and taken on-board suggestions made by fellow simmers to improve and tweak the world.

So for anybody reading this for the first time I will do a full showcase of the world and include the new picture that show off the world:-

The biggest improvement in the new version is the lighting, you can see in the top left how clear the Sims are in the new version, the second pic top right you can see the heat glow on the taxi, this is a new additions to the files, I increased the bloom effects on a hot day, to give the world that extra cool touch. In the bottom left you can see I still make days murky, but like the close up pic in the bottom right shows you it makes little difference to the sim details.

The only time during me testing the files I did see some darkness that produced poor lighting was during a sunrise on overcast day, with no lighting from the street lamps and it being a bad day, to reduce this I've increased the bloom on them days, it still not 100% perfect, but it very much playable and a lot better than it was.



The first pic shows the new sunset, I wanted to keep this in this version, it makes a dramatic ending to the days.
The other things tweaked in this version are some of the lots made more user friendly



Version one would be great version to play if your a Goth, version 2, you will be more at home if you like lots of colors, the top right pic show you the new background terrain I made, notice how the background terrain now, is reflecting the heat from being a sunny day. During overcast day the background looks dull.
The bottom left pic shows a overcast day, notice how the mountains fades away behind the castle. Bottom right shows you the emerging train.



The top two lots show you the level detail used on the lots and with the new lighting in full force you can see more clear on how things look, notice the smoke coming out of the chimney on snowwhites cottage on the right pic, you probable missed this in version 1, due to it being so dark. Do not think I've forgotten about indoor lighting this also got a little tweak, it will be great place show off any new lots you build with the tweaked indoor lighting.



The Story

Hope Island is a picturesque development on the northern end of the Gold Coast.
In 2012 hope Island broke away from the gold coast, and became to the locals the Exotic world.

Current Year 2020


The Coast area

Here summers are warm, or even hot, with a three-month period when rain rarely falls. When it does rain in this season it is heavy and often associated with thunder. Sunshine is abundant, as much as eleven to twelve hours a day in summer and five in midwinter.
Winters are generally mild and sunny but this pleasant weather is often interrupted by very changeable cold and blustery weather brought by a northerly wind called the mistral. This blows with particular strength in the Exotic valley and around the coast area.

The Mountainous Regions

These areas are the wettest and coldest regions of Exotic World and much of the winter precipitation is snow. Winter sports are best developed in this area and Pyrenees but can be pursued for a shorter period in the other mountain regions. The weather and climate of the is very similar to that found in the Swiss Alps. Plans for a special Xmas Exotic world are already in the planning stages of the local Sims.

Central Eastern Island

Summers also tend to be a little warmer. Rainfall is generally low and tends to fall in summer when it is often associated with thunderstorms.
Winters become colder towards the east and they are not any warmer farther south. In winter occasional very cold spells can occur. There is a definite increase in summer warmth in the south and an increase in sunshine from an average of seven to nine hours a day. This is also home of the main city area for exotic island, most people come here for jobs.
On the north end of the island, a oriental housing zone was established, this was attempt by the city council to introduce a higher cultural level to the island.

Western Island

This is mainly a lowland region, winters are generally mild and cold spells do not last for long.
The summers are significantly warmer and sunnier than in eastern Island. They can be rather wet, particularly towards the border, but the rain tends to be heavy and of short duration. Summers have more sunshine and longer spells of settled weather than farther north.
This area also contains a small french rural area and a medieval castle. Also home for the main science and industry area and boast some great nighttime shopping area's

North Island

Low-lying and rather flat area, there are some high mountain regions around the small island. Since 2015, the military have used this area, still some people live in this area and rumors that several archeologist have set up camp to explore some new ruins bring this place some interest.

KEY FEATURES

* Edit INI files
* All Rabbit holes
* Animated Train
* 122 Lots
* Compressed to reduce loading times.
* DX5 Textures used
* Vista used on the lots
* Texture sounds used
* Street names
* Lighting used on roads
* Emitters used inside lot, will only activate after one save, you will hear a bang the second time you load in the world, to tell you the emitters are working correctly
* Hiking area's used
* The Tricksters Dungeon, 5 levels of death and chaos
* Effects used on world map
* Spawners used in a balanced way
* Working Rainbow
* Edited Moon
* Edited Rabbit Holes
* Edited Posters inside the theater
* Working Ambitions lots with a new fire station

Download Link

http://gb.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html?assetId=3034982


LOTS USED

Hillside Wedding Chapel
By rinirae
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2522944#

Briarwood Farm
byEuphorialQueen
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2281364#

Lone Artist Loft by EQ $39,475
by EuphorialQueen
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2267998

Greenwood Waterfall
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2459379#

Romantic Oasis
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2661731#


Treehouse Camp
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2459382

Weeb's Cottage
by glitzyangel
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2732076

21st Century Central Park
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=762706#

Doo P's 5 Towers Centre
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=960906#

The Villa Dubai
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=1171544#

Starter Cottage under 16K
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=1490301#

Ocean's 11
by magician1
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=1783522#

Mystical Lodge
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2182096#

Pinehearst Science Lab
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2378690#

Archeologist Camp Site
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2403382#

White Wash Delight
by Euka
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2569777#

Irish Rose Cottage
by cerridyn
http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...d=2584779#

Many of the other lots in the world are made by me or I used edited EA lots.
The number of lots in the world might get reduced prior to release so this list might change.

All the designers of the world have been given credit inside the game for the lots they designed in form a plaque that your sim can read and it will state the designer of the lot.

Tutorials

I got sick of making guides in the end, but here is full list of all the guides and CAW stuff I used while building this world:

I started a building a world guide, it's split into 12 parts, the guide will cover all the trick I used to build this world.

1-6 http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1007.htm

7-10 http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1013.htm

11-12 http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1187.htm

Large Address Aware

http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...-t1040.htm

Spillway Ambitions missing object from CAW

http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...-t1193.htm

Replacement Dungeons
Pack contain a replacement exotic world dungeon

http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...-t1207.htm

World Specific Params files

http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-libra...g-t934.htm

How to re-upload worlds to the exchange

http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-libra...-t1159.htm

Exotic World Household Sims

This pack contains 44 sim households to used with exotic world, all the Sims are based around lifetime wants

http://builders.forumotion.net/show-your...-t1205.htm


CUSTOM GRAPHICS

The world contains a large number of custom graphics, all the change are limited to this world only, you will not be able distribute the graphic changes inside any lots you design in this world. The world is mod free and nothing will be installed other than the world file.

]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1733 Wed, 01 Sep 2010 11:12:32 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1733 I went out and and bought a jar of nutella to see what it was and this is what it's became. Discovered by David! Tested by PKS

5 Marshmellows=80 Calories
Thinly spread a light coat on the top of the Marshmellow's...Yummy!

]]> I went out and and bought a jar of nutella to see what it was and this is what it's became. Discovered by David! Tested by PKS

5 Marshmellows=80 Calories
Thinly spread a light coat on the top of the Marshmellow's...Yummy!

]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1731 Wed, 01 Sep 2010 05:32:02 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1731 Check it out Really!

http://simmerssociety.net/index.php?opti...5420#35420]]> Check it out Really!

http://simmerssociety.net/index.php?opti...5420#35420]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1730 Wed, 01 Sep 2010 01:49:40 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1730
If you use any custom content (anything that did not come with the game disks) please just say so in your thread. Some of our members do not use cc.

The link to the official thread is below, where you will find pictures and the download.

http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySim...6#pid29456

Thanks]]>
If you use any custom content (anything that did not come with the game disks) please just say so in your thread. Some of our members do not use cc.

The link to the official thread is below, where you will find pictures and the download.

http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySim...6#pid29456

Thanks]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1728 Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:37:04 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1728 new world to play in a few months. Looks awesome to me.]]> new world to play in a few months. Looks awesome to me.]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1727 Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:09:31 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1727 Thanks in advance, Patty

UPDATE: Nevermind....it crashed, I lost everything I had done & now am in the process of re-doing it....*sigh* I'm saving frequently now, though. Reminds me of the Sims 2 days & the Pets expansion. My computer did NOT like Pets worth anything....it was always crashing! LOL!!]]> Thanks in advance, Patty

UPDATE: Nevermind....it crashed, I lost everything I had done & now am in the process of re-doing it....*sigh* I'm saving frequently now, though. Reminds me of the Sims 2 days & the Pets expansion. My computer did NOT like Pets worth anything....it was always crashing! LOL!!]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1726 Tue, 31 Aug 2010 07:40:41 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1726 Well I know that it is not time to install that one yet!

Help!

I don't just Drop my Folder back in do I ???

Frustrated!

OK I am going Back in and unistalling again I must of missed something...it says WA is installed...and I think Linda said I would need to install in order...so...see you all soon I hope]]> Well I know that it is not time to install that one yet!

Help!

I don't just Drop my Folder back in do I ???

Frustrated!

OK I am going Back in and unistalling again I must of missed something...it says WA is installed...and I think Linda said I would need to install in order...so...see you all soon I hope]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1725 Mon, 30 Aug 2010 19:50:24 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1725
i am posting these 2 request in 1 simple post rather than starting a new thread since this request is a 2 in 1 i would like to know if it would be posible to make for me these characters as sims and this house for these sims.

thank you very much
Sims





House:






http://www.architecturaldesigns.com/flor...2040aa.asp]]>
i am posting these 2 request in 1 simple post rather than starting a new thread since this request is a 2 in 1 i would like to know if it would be posible to make for me these characters as sims and this house for these sims.

thank you very much
Sims





House:






http://www.architecturaldesigns.com/flor...2040aa.asp]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1717 Sun, 29 Aug 2010 15:14:26 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1717 It requires WA and Ambitions.







]]> It requires WA and Ambitions.







]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1716 Sun, 29 Aug 2010 14:05:37 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1716

For those who don't know me - I'm WebbyMom, and I've been playing Sims since Sims 2 came out. Before that, I was a Sims snob - "Why the HECK would people think that game would be FUN?" was the thought going through my head every time I passed a Sims 1 game in a store. Seriously, at one point, I think I actually rolled my eyes as I walked past.

So I've been playing and creating and telling stories since a long time ago. Most of my story series don't get finished... my bad. LOL But I just love telling my sims' lives the way I see it as they play out. ;)

Glad to be here again, I'll surf around and see what's up - however, I'm sort of posting and running as I'm gone for the next week at a family camp we attend with my side of the family yearly (or whenever we make it!). So I'll be back around next weekend, I'd expect! :D]]>

For those who don't know me - I'm WebbyMom, and I've been playing Sims since Sims 2 came out. Before that, I was a Sims snob - "Why the HECK would people think that game would be FUN?" was the thought going through my head every time I passed a Sims 1 game in a store. Seriously, at one point, I think I actually rolled my eyes as I walked past.

So I've been playing and creating and telling stories since a long time ago. Most of my story series don't get finished... my bad. LOL But I just love telling my sims' lives the way I see it as they play out. ;)

Glad to be here again, I'll surf around and see what's up - however, I'm sort of posting and running as I'm gone for the next week at a family camp we attend with my side of the family yearly (or whenever we make it!). So I'll be back around next weekend, I'd expect! :D]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1715 Sun, 29 Aug 2010 12:32:30 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1715
Melissa Traverse is a lot like her mother and has unfortunately picked up some of her worst traits. She also is a neurotic loner. She did at least inherit one good trait - she is brave. They both will need to be in this next stage of their lives. Especially if these two want to enjoy kicking back with their favorite food and music while sporting lovely clothes in their favorite colors. Melissa loves those cookies her mother used to bake while listening to her favorite kids tunes. Melissa loves the color red.

Won't you help these two find shelter until they can get their lives back together again?

Cindy and Melissa are packaged together in a zip file where you will find the Sims3 Package file for both from CAS, as well as together from the Library. ]]>
Melissa Traverse is a lot like her mother and has unfortunately picked up some of her worst traits. She also is a neurotic loner. She did at least inherit one good trait - she is brave. They both will need to be in this next stage of their lives. Especially if these two want to enjoy kicking back with their favorite food and music while sporting lovely clothes in their favorite colors. Melissa loves those cookies her mother used to bake while listening to her favorite kids tunes. Melissa loves the color red.

Won't you help these two find shelter until they can get their lives back together again?

Cindy and Melissa are packaged together in a zip file where you will find the Sims3 Package file for both from CAS, as well as together from the Library. ]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1714 Sun, 29 Aug 2010 10:48:20 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1714 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1713 Sun, 29 Aug 2010 07:03:55 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1713 I could barely see out of my old ones.
When I went to the eye doctor I had to have two of the male types pick out my glasses...Really I can't see. Do you know how hard it is to trust a Male Adult & a Male Teen with choosing what you see everyday in a mirrow
They did not do real bad...They chose Tommy Bahama glasses thinking it would make me feel more stylish.
The glasses have lovely rinestones and I noticed in the mirrow a design on the ear pieces...
Yep they say Tommy Bahama.
I'm not sure if I feel stylish or more like a walking Billboad.
I did bring it to their attention that I would need a new wardrobe to go with the fancy glasses. ]]> I could barely see out of my old ones.
When I went to the eye doctor I had to have two of the male types pick out my glasses...Really I can't see. Do you know how hard it is to trust a Male Adult & a Male Teen with choosing what you see everyday in a mirrow
They did not do real bad...They chose Tommy Bahama glasses thinking it would make me feel more stylish.
The glasses have lovely rinestones and I noticed in the mirrow a design on the ear pieces...
Yep they say Tommy Bahama.
I'm not sure if I feel stylish or more like a walking Billboad.
I did bring it to their attention that I would need a new wardrobe to go with the fancy glasses. ]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1712 Sun, 29 Aug 2010 06:55:46 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1712 Junes Uploads

Okie's Simself by Okie



CLICK HERE FOR DOWNLOAD AND DETAILS

White Willow by GldKelly

[img width=600 height=448]http://i395.photobucket.com/albums/pp36/gldkelly/A%20S3%20Builds/Screenshot-4-7-2.jpg[/img]

CLICK HERE FOR DOWNLOAD AND DETAILS

Mickey Mouse Dress for Kids by Pierre(*file will be reuploaded soon)



CLICK HERE FOR DOWNLOAD AND DETAILS


[center][size=12pt]The Month of July Uploads[/size]

The Pattersons By Pierre





Click Here For Download and Details


KeyLimePie By Gldkelly


[center]


[b]Click Here For Download and Details


Blue Plaid By Joset

[img width=800 height=415]http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb293/joset715/Decorated%20images/BluePlaid.jpg[/img]

Click Here For Download And Details


True Teak By Nancy01905




Click Here For Download and Details

Funky And Artsy By Tia




Click Here For Download And Details


**All of these Uploads Have been Cleaned With Delphy's Sims Cleaner**

[/center]]]> Junes Uploads

Okie's Simself by Okie



CLICK HERE FOR DOWNLOAD AND DETAILS

White Willow by GldKelly

[img width=600 height=448]http://i395.photobucket.com/albums/pp36/gldkelly/A%20S3%20Builds/Screenshot-4-7-2.jpg[/img]

CLICK HERE FOR DOWNLOAD AND DETAILS

Mickey Mouse Dress for Kids by Pierre(*file will be reuploaded soon)



CLICK HERE FOR DOWNLOAD AND DETAILS


[center][size=12pt]The Month of July Uploads[/size]

The Pattersons By Pierre





Click Here For Download and Details


KeyLimePie By Gldkelly


[center]


[b]Click Here For Download and Details


Blue Plaid By Joset

[img width=800 height=415]http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb293/joset715/Decorated%20images/BluePlaid.jpg[/img]

Click Here For Download And Details


True Teak By Nancy01905




Click Here For Download and Details

Funky And Artsy By Tia




Click Here For Download And Details


**All of these Uploads Have been Cleaned With Delphy's Sims Cleaner**

[/center]]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1711 Sat, 28 Aug 2010 07:51:50 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1711
This must be a first I'm showing off a lot in the CAW section, before you move this thread, this is the spillway from Ambitions, used in a 10 by 10 lot, you can download and add this to your world, you can move and edit the lot in caw.





This is also a test upload, should you think this is a good idea and wish to see more of the missing CAW objects in this format, please say so.

I'm just trying to see if it's worth doing any more, many thanks.


Download link

http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2978701]]>
This must be a first I'm showing off a lot in the CAW section, before you move this thread, this is the spillway from Ambitions, used in a 10 by 10 lot, you can download and add this to your world, you can move and edit the lot in caw.





This is also a test upload, should you think this is a good idea and wish to see more of the missing CAW objects in this format, please say so.

I'm just trying to see if it's worth doing any more, many thanks.


Download link

http://www.thesims3.com/assetDetail.html...Id=2978701]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1710 Sat, 28 Aug 2010 07:51:17 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1710
You should only need this program while building a large world, it can speed up scrolling about the world, and loading the game, read the instruction prior to using, it does work, I've been using the program for the last 2 weeks with no problems. You will not get a massive speed increase, but in the later stages of building a world, this can help avoid crashes while the game try to access more RAM than you have.

The file you will need to edit is in main program file inside your CAW folder, anyway here is the link:-

http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=112556]]>
You should only need this program while building a large world, it can speed up scrolling about the world, and loading the game, read the instruction prior to using, it does work, I've been using the program for the last 2 weeks with no problems. You will not get a massive speed increase, but in the later stages of building a world, this can help avoid crashes while the game try to access more RAM than you have.

The file you will need to edit is in main program file inside your CAW folder, anyway here is the link:-

http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=112556]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1709 Sat, 28 Aug 2010 07:46:16 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1709 PART 1

Over the next few weeks I will be starting a building guide, each part will give you some helpful hints, links and tutorials on how do some of them sneaky little tricks inside CAW.

By the end of this guide, you should be able to follow each part and you will have a completed world by the end of part 12, yes this guide will be 12 parts long. It will cover many different aspects of building a world, from you humble start, up to the point of no return and you upload your world.

So lets start at the start:-

The problem with CAW and learning to build, is you have a mass of information and also everybody builds worlds differently. The method I will be using is the method I use, now I'm not saying this is the best method, but it will be used for this guide.

Start

Before you even load in CAW, you should do a little research, this can be done by viewing the exchange forum
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/forums/show/401.page
&
viewing this forum.

What you are looking for is completed worlds and worlds in progress, make a mental note of the worlds you like, look at the different styles and designs. I'm not saying you should copy a world, but if you like some design, perhaps you can use something similar yourself.

The next part would be to work out the order you do things in making a world, planing a world is very good idea, this is simple plan I've made for my world:-

You will notice that I've planed out 12 parts, 1 for each part of this guide.

1 Story-time Write a story about the world
Name the world
Building List
Number of residential list
Building the world

2 Edit INI files

3 Make new textures
Terrain paint time
check ponds and large rivers are textured
Clean up texture time
Try to reduce size
delete world cache

4 Tweak roads
Tweak bridges
Setup train

5 Add side walks
start a Preview

6 Routing, Routing, Routing
Camera Non-Routable paint

7 Custom rabbit holes Graphics
Lots of Lots
Set community Status
Texture sounds
Tweak INI files again
Give each lot a cool street names and realistic addresses
Assigning Addresses to Lots
game Objects

8 Time for Trees

9 Sims & CAW (in testing)
Effective Effects

10 Spawning Time
Try to reduce size
delete world cache

11 Rebuild the routing data for your world
Come up with a memorable names and description for your world
Take screen shots that shows off your world
Save your world!
test world play
Try to reduce size again
Make Sim pack
Installing INI & ADS files
Uploading your world to The Sims™ 3 Exchange

12 Odd and sods
Merging neighborhoods (In testing)


So lets go back to the start:-

Story-time Write a story about the world

With this, it's a very good idea to have basic story of your world from the very start. No you don't after do a 10000 word essay, just a few lines about the world, from this you should have a idea of what the world you are going to build. If you don't wish to use a theme then go for a generic world, anything works in this type of world. You can then mix a few different style together. Pleasant view and sunset valley are good examples of generic worlds.

Name the world

Names and even the story is open to change, you might come up with a new name for your world while building. But the name for a world is something you should at least consider at this point.

Building List

I do this in the planning stages, mainly because I've yet to build the world and while I'm building the world I will be thinking to myself this will be a good spot for the town and I will leave that area pretty much level to help me build the town. This example is a building list from my recent world I'm building, you can always make your own list in notepad:-

You might notice that some of the buildings have sizes next to them, at the time of doing this list I used the sizes of the lots, that I was going to use that are in my library, thou everything is still currently open to change

Rabbit Holes
Community School – 64x64
(Supermarket ( all 3 on one lot)
Budget Books
Theater)
City Hall – 34X64
Police Department – 36X44
Hospital – 44x44
Stadium – 48x64
Science facility – 60X60
Warehouse Corp. – 55x40
Military Base – 64x64
Fried Diner – 20x25
Corporate Towers – 40X40
Spa
Bistro

Community Lots
Pool –
Library –
Hangout –
Beach –
Art Gallery –
Gym –
The Consignment Shop -
nectar -
Chinese garden -
Laundromat -
Salon -
Fire Station-
Junkyard-
Tomb-
Large Park X2
Small Park X2
CemeteryX1
Fishing Spots X4
Closed Lots that can't be edited X4 (more about this in part 4)

Residential list

My current world is split into 3 islands, so therefore I split up the numbers of house's I will use in each section, like everything so far this is still open to change.

Large Island
40 Residential lots
Med Island
20 Residential lots
Small Island
10 Residential lots

Building the world

This will be first time you actual get to load in CAW and this will be a good time to read the manual:-

http://www.thesims3.com/content/en_US/pr...l/help.pdf

Another good source for info is this thread

http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/152074.page

I will consider at this point you have basic knowledge if not more on how to use CAW.

I will not say that much about world building stage other than, a little tip, when you have the basic layout of your world, enter edit in game, and fast forward the clock until sunset and sunrise, look at where the sun comes up. This is important for lighting, so it will be good Idea to have the sunrise behind a mountain.

What I would also do during this stage, is place any distant terrains you wish to use, it's better to place them now than later, less objects to worry about, why you try to move them about. Distant terrains can be awkward to place , if your not happy with it's location select the world object and the select move world object around. When they are placed you can edit the terrain so it covers the edges of the distant terrains.

The next part is optional, but I highly recommend you do this now, goto C:\Users\yourname\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3

Open the file called options in notepad scroll down until you see terrainquality , set the total to 3, you should leave the option on 3 from now until you complete your world. This option will also effect the main game and give you much better textures, if slower machines have any problems while playing the game, switch the option back down to 1 or 2, but 3 should be fine for CAW.

UPDATES

From time to time I will be updating parts of the guide, should new info become available, if you have already read this guide, you will usual find any new info at the bottom of the relevant part.

Useful Tutorials

Height Map Tutorials, Tips & Tricks

http://builders.forumotion.net/tutorials...-t1088.htm

How to create a world using Real-World Height data

http://builders.forumotion.net/tutorials...-t1151.htm

Beginners Caw Tutorials

http://builders.forumotion.net/tutorials...-t1026.htm

PART 2

Lets start part 2 with another little tweak to the option menu , this time change the texturequality , set the total to 3, like at the end of part 1 .

INI FILES

Before you read any more I strongly recommend that you read this first:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

Now that you understand what they where trying to do over at mod the Sims, I started to investigate on how to edit Sea colors inside CAW, I failed in this, not sure why, I think the game overrides' the files. But it was not a complete loss, I did get something working that was rather novel.

To do this you need a basic understanding s3pe find this here:-

http://forums.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=362412

To do this the easy way you can download the 6 files I've already completed for you, you can find them here:-

http://www.4shared.com/file/_uBBeFeS/china.html

So what are the files?
The files are for testing certain setup for Caw neighborhoods, I will give you what I think the files do, but remember this is only for testing and use this only on a backup.
If you use the files I've sent you, you will change the Initiate files to that of china

1 Change the LotRenderSettings and changes LotLODHeightThresh
2 Lighting, this is little more interesting it deals with SunlightScale, I think thats something to with the sunlight beams, I might be wrong
3 Tunable Parameters Related to Sky, you can change sunrise times, sun and moon radius
4 Misc Params with this file you can change cloud layers, star intensity, fog distance, I think fog distance is a mist that you can surround your neighborhood with.
5 Fly though proof of concept, even if you don't use any of the above, this file might be worth getting, this allows a Fly though when you fist play the neighborhood for the first time, the current file is set for china, good luck on getting the setting right for your own world

So how do you add them into my CAW worlds, that parts is very easy, use s3pe and just, open your World from you Caw folder and then click resource and import and import each file into the game remember backup and save first.

If you need to delete them just open your world in s3pe and delete the INI files, your world will not currently have any INI until you export the game.

Can I edit them files, like change the sunrise times?
Feel free to test this, I've not fully tested what you can and can't do with them files.

When will I see some changes?
Some changes do not happen until you load in the game, but say you wanted to make a vampire town, always dark, try changing the sunrise times and you will see the changes in caw.

This photo was taken 2pm game time


A alien sunset


Now I'm starting to get inpressed, will this damage my game?
All the changes should be for the current neighborhood, but I said and will repeat this again this is still being tested, I did notice that I changed the top colors of my walls, this seems to be global, if you use that file I've uploaded the top of all your walls while building will turn brown, instead of bright white, this is much better for you builders, who like things to blend in better.

Where did you get the INI files?
You can take INI files from completed worlds, so lets say you wanted the Egypt files, with that bright sun, hot glow, just extract the INI files from Egypt world file found in your programs/sim 3/ world adventures folder, using s3pe and then import the files into your CAW world. On a side note for players of the game who wish to see longer days, you can edit the Egypt, world adventure file, for personal use.

That about all I can say about this, I'm sure the people who use this, in neighborhood designs, will increase downloads and the look and design of your worlds.





There is little point in repeating the mod the Sims tutorial, I could not say it any better, what most people found was that it was hard to get the custom sea's to work in CAW. So I recommend you follow that tutorial:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

The only thing you need to do different than this tutorial, is that you need to export the Custom Sea files into a completed world and then extract the same files out of a completed world. I understand this sounds odd, but when you extract them out again, it sets up the file names that you need for it to work in caw. The last stage is then using s3pe again export the files to your world.

You now have custom sea's in CAW, but when you exit CAW, after a save, it will delete the INI files, it will not save them inside caw. All is not lost, when you export your world, the INI files go with the world and then work correctly with the exported world.
So the truth is that you use CAW only to test the sea's and it should be the last thing you place in your world prior to exporting the world, just remember if you save you loss the INI and you will need to replace them again, so make sure you have backup of the files you will be using.


In conclusion much of part 2 is a repeat of what I've already said in other threads, but this guide is trying to collect all the information on one massive 12 part guide. Many players will not feel the need to edit the INI file, should you fall into this bracket just skip this section and move onto part 3.

TERRAIN MAKING

With thanks to auntielynds, for this info

Make Your Own Textures

Instructions for installing your new textures:

When you download click on save and then download them where you can find them.
Okay now you have your files downloaded I will walk you through putting them into your game. I'll write this for beginers like I was just a few months ago.

Find your files and then open up Windows Explorer.
On the lefthand side under Folders, go down to Documents,
then to Electronic Arts,
then to The Sims 3 Create A World,
then to UserToolData.
then click on SourceTextures.
Now just drag and drop the new .dds files into the SourceTextures file.

Making your own textures link
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/152801.page

Obtaining DDS Plug-ins and installation
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/196896.page

A very important thing to remember when adding new textures to the game, make sure they are DDS format and not PNG, a number of texture designers use png format texture. But DDS surprisingly really renders a lot faster than many other formats.


Texture Pack



This is 4 textures placed together to make a large picture



This pack was actual released back in December, I've not added anything new, but I wanted to post a link to anybody who missed this pack first time around. Many of the textures are replacement EA textures, compressed with DX5 format. Some of the textures you will need a little work from yourself to make the best from them.


The pack contains over 130 textures

To use them make a folder called "source textureX" and place that folder here:-
C:\Users\yourname\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 Create A World Tool\UserToolData\SourceTextures


The download link:-

http://www.mediafire.com/?dzomghjtczo


Part 3

Terrain paint time

auntielynds As already posted a link to get new textures to help you use in CAW, you can find this link here:-
http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...s-t522.htm

The Easy Way to Create Terrain Textures
A link to this can be found here:-

http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/152801.page

DSS plugins can be found here
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/196896.page

CAW does come with some nice textures, so even if you have no desire to make any or download any, it should not make your world any less pretty. Using Terrain inside CAW is a little like using Terrain inside the game, just on a bigger scale.

What I will show you in this part is how to make some simple grass by blending a few colors together, you can use this method to just about to make anything, from mountains to other effects around your world:-

If you wish to follow this yourself, use a test world.

First place a base color, I did this by right clicking on the texture on the editing tool and changed my default grass to a much darker grass:-



You do not need to change the base color if you so wish, just go over the area with a dark green grass

Next I would use a lighter green grass, so you need to add a Terrain inside CAW, so click add layer and add a lighter green grass, then turn the opacity down to 48 and highlight the area like so:-



Next we will use the base dark green color again this time set the opacity down to 25 and the Falloff down to 0 and then go over the image like so.


You can see that the grass blends into the light green, now this method of blending color can be used for any texture in the game, I could if I wished add another color into the mix, say I wanted the grass to be swampy I could add a brown color with a Opacity of 12 and 0 fallout, it would add another dimension to terrain painting, but for this example I will stick with two.

So lets have a look on what we could do with this inside a world, you could click on the sculpt button and make a few small hills, perhaps I wanted to place a little sand around the outside, this of course could be more grass or a river, but for this example I will use sand and I will place a few trees.



When you think about this, I only used the sand to divide the color from the background this entire look was only made with 2 texture blended together.

PART 4

Roads
The best method for building roads can be found on this tutorial, I can not add anything to this tutorial and this method is the method I try to use:-
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/144681.page

Special thanks to Sim_Outlaw for this tutorial.

Prior to using roads in your world, if this is your first world, then I recommend that you practice using the above method, inside a test world, understanding how roads work is one of the most important things for any world.

Bridge Building and Roads

To place a bridge in the game you can follow this tutorial:-

http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/145413.page

The only downside to this, is that the tutorial cuts a little short on placing roads, so we will have a little look at roads and bridges in more detail.

So first build a bridge, should be easy if you read that great tutorial,, we should open up CAW and place down a bridge and sculpt the terrain like this picture.



I've not made this very easy for you, but in a real world that your building you might get far worse problem than this, if your a first time world builder you will need to flatten the land below the bridge using the sculpt button, then use the steep valley sculpt tool under the bridge to build the water and last select the object and use the raise object to move the bridge above sea level.

The next step will be to switch the grid lines on, this will make placement of roads a little easier(TOP TIP- Grid line on will also help with lot placement) Build a road either side of the bridge like so:-



You can see by the picture we need to raise the terrain for now just level out the terrain to about the same height as the bridge like so:-



Yeah, it's starting to look a little messy, but don't worry about this, all you need to do is connect the roads up to the bridge, like you would to a intersection.(see Sim_Outlaw Road building tutorial for more info on this).
Scroll closer to the bridge and you will see the bridge connections points are not that good:-



The best way to fix this, is go back into the sculpt menu, raise the terrain using the gentle hill and few clicks should increase the height of the road, then flatten the terrain around the bridge, including the other road on the other side of the bridge, your road should look better, if not repeat until you get the correct height.



The last step is that we need to smooth out the road, I find the best results can be done with sculpt terrain tool and then use smooth road, then use the road grading tool menu and smooth road. Do not forget to replace the river under the bridge with the sculp tool. Here is the end result:-



This bridge might look better than before, you still must check the road for bumps and fine tune the terrain.

SETUP THE TRAIN

You can ignore this part, if your world will not contain the train, If your going to use a train in your world, it would be a good time to place this object early in the world development, the reason for this, the size of the train tracks, it will get more and more tricky to use correctly the more you build and sculpt your world.
I use the emitters to place the train, the emitters are placed inside a lot, that will activate the train, alternatively you can just place the train from inside a tunnel, then the train will sometimes animate, I'm not 100% sure how this works, so I will just show you the method that I use.

To use the train by using the emitter you first need to research this tutorial:-
http://builders.forumotion.net/useful-tu...0-t696.htm

This is more a knowledge update, should you set up a lot in create a world that contains emitters, when that world is first installed, some of the emitters temporary reset to fog emitters. This is a minor setback, all you need to do to get the emitters to work as normal, is save your world, exit to the main menu and reload the save and the emitters will turn back to normal, all test I've done confirm this.

The reason this happen, CAW only contains Fog emitters, so when the world is installed you only get fog, until of course you save the game, then the game will recognize your emitter codes, this currently effects all lots installed by CAW.
The animated train




The train was made using a simple emitter placed inside a lot, of course I also needed to make the train track, that is a simple texture.

You can see the emitter in the center of the lot built over the train tracks, if you have read part 3 of the guide you will understand how to change the emitter code:-
the code for the animated train is:-
ep1train



The downside, of the train, it does not stay in the world forever, I needed to place 4 emitters in 4 different lots, so when one emitter runs out, hopefully inside a tunnel another emitter kicks in, to give the illusion that train is going from when one end of my world to another.

Making Ponds & Rivers

I wont say to much about this, just try and design ponds and river with some common sense, you will need them for fish.

Ponds and Textures

Here is a photo of 4 different ponds:-
pond 1= Deep pond no textures
Pond 2= Deep pond with textures
Pond 3= Shallow pond no textures
Pond 4= Shallow pond with textures



Now lets have a little look at them ponds in the game=



Not much change really, but that is my point, it's more or less a waste of time, energy and use of KB size to your world to terrain paint a pond, river, sea. Your just best editing around the outside of the pond, everything you do to a world will increase loading times and upload time, so keep your world fine tuned.

Clean up texture time

While we are looking at textures, it will be a good time to go over your world and check for any abnormalities in your terrain painting, look for area's that might need blending since you placed your roads and around your bridge area

Try to reduce size

I'm not going to say to much about this, I will go into this in much more detail in part 11, where we try to reduce the upload size of your world. We will get ready for this now, here a few things to watch for, testing texture paints inside your main world is a bad idea the game will keep a copy of the texture even if you delete the texture. A copy of the textures is saved inside your world file, so only test textures on test worlds thou in part 11, I will go into more detail on how to remove unwanted textures.

I highly recommend anybody who is building a world bigger than a small island to download The Compressorizer Redux! this works with CAW worlds unfinished or finished world, you can find this program here:-
http://forum.jfade.com/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=473

When you have download this program, feel free to test this now on your world file, on a side note this program works on:
* .package
* .dbc
* .sim
* .sims3
* .world
* .sims3pac

If you have never used this program, this program can also reduce lot/sim upload & download times to the exchange.

Delete World Caches

From time to time, while building your world it will be a good idea to Delete World Caches, this is more for your benefit, it should stop the world loading all the extra stuff that's not needed.
To do this, just delete the entire contents of this folder, found here:-

C:\Users\YOUR NAME\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 Create A World Tool\WorldbuilderCache

The game will just spawn a new cache next time you load CAW

PART 5

SIDEWALKS

Part 5 is a small section about side walks you can add to the game, they can add a extra dimension to building any world, at the very least you should consider using them to break the terrain up, give that extra dimension so to speak.
By reading the manual, you should already have a good idea on how to place sidewalks so I will just show you how I used them in the two worlds I'm building:-






If your following this guide you will not have placed trees yet, so at this stage the sidewalk just break the terrain up, but later you can place trees and other objects for sims to view while using the sidewalks

START A PREVIEW

If you have not done so already it will be a good time to start preview for your world, gather some feedback.
You can do this on this forum or the exchange forum, or any other places CAW builders gather.

If you have got this far into world building, you have done well.

PART 6

The half way point and the last part on this thread, 7-12 will be on a another thread

Routing
Much of this guide is about the order I build worlds in, I've tried to collect information that will help you build a world, I understand some of the info might be of no use. Some of the info is more common sense, but it's very easy to forget something, that is why this section is rather small of information, the Routing section, much of the ways to set Routing is already discussed in the manual.
So part 6 is more hands on, so it's time to complete your Routing, you really don't want your sims running over your lovely crafted mountains.

Camera Non-Routable

This is similar to the above, I can't really add anything that is not already in the manual, some points thou:-
Allow the player some flexibility to move the camera out into the sea and always block Distant Terrains, they look terrible close up.


Here ends part 6]]> PART 1

Over the next few weeks I will be starting a building guide, each part will give you some helpful hints, links and tutorials on how do some of them sneaky little tricks inside CAW.

By the end of this guide, you should be able to follow each part and you will have a completed world by the end of part 12, yes this guide will be 12 parts long. It will cover many different aspects of building a world, from you humble start, up to the point of no return and you upload your world.

So lets start at the start:-

The problem with CAW and learning to build, is you have a mass of information and also everybody builds worlds differently. The method I will be using is the method I use, now I'm not saying this is the best method, but it will be used for this guide.

Start

Before you even load in CAW, you should do a little research, this can be done by viewing the exchange forum
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/forums/show/401.page
&
viewing this forum.

What you are looking for is completed worlds and worlds in progress, make a mental note of the worlds you like, look at the different styles and designs. I'm not saying you should copy a world, but if you like some design, perhaps you can use something similar yourself.

The next part would be to work out the order you do things in making a world, planing a world is very good idea, this is simple plan I've made for my world:-

You will notice that I've planed out 12 parts, 1 for each part of this guide.

1 Story-time Write a story about the world
Name the world
Building List
Number of residential list
Building the world

2 Edit INI files

3 Make new textures
Terrain paint time
check ponds and large rivers are textured
Clean up texture time
Try to reduce size
delete world cache

4 Tweak roads
Tweak bridges
Setup train

5 Add side walks
start a Preview

6 Routing, Routing, Routing
Camera Non-Routable paint

7 Custom rabbit holes Graphics
Lots of Lots
Set community Status
Texture sounds
Tweak INI files again
Give each lot a cool street names and realistic addresses
Assigning Addresses to Lots
game Objects

8 Time for Trees

9 Sims & CAW (in testing)
Effective Effects

10 Spawning Time
Try to reduce size
delete world cache

11 Rebuild the routing data for your world
Come up with a memorable names and description for your world
Take screen shots that shows off your world
Save your world!
test world play
Try to reduce size again
Make Sim pack
Installing INI & ADS files
Uploading your world to The Sims™ 3 Exchange

12 Odd and sods
Merging neighborhoods (In testing)


So lets go back to the start:-

Story-time Write a story about the world

With this, it's a very good idea to have basic story of your world from the very start. No you don't after do a 10000 word essay, just a few lines about the world, from this you should have a idea of what the world you are going to build. If you don't wish to use a theme then go for a generic world, anything works in this type of world. You can then mix a few different style together. Pleasant view and sunset valley are good examples of generic worlds.

Name the world

Names and even the story is open to change, you might come up with a new name for your world while building. But the name for a world is something you should at least consider at this point.

Building List

I do this in the planning stages, mainly because I've yet to build the world and while I'm building the world I will be thinking to myself this will be a good spot for the town and I will leave that area pretty much level to help me build the town. This example is a building list from my recent world I'm building, you can always make your own list in notepad:-

You might notice that some of the buildings have sizes next to them, at the time of doing this list I used the sizes of the lots, that I was going to use that are in my library, thou everything is still currently open to change

Rabbit Holes
Community School – 64x64
(Supermarket ( all 3 on one lot)
Budget Books
Theater)
City Hall – 34X64
Police Department – 36X44
Hospital – 44x44
Stadium – 48x64
Science facility – 60X60
Warehouse Corp. – 55x40
Military Base – 64x64
Fried Diner – 20x25
Corporate Towers – 40X40
Spa
Bistro

Community Lots
Pool –
Library –
Hangout –
Beach –
Art Gallery –
Gym –
The Consignment Shop -
nectar -
Chinese garden -
Laundromat -
Salon -
Fire Station-
Junkyard-
Tomb-
Large Park X2
Small Park X2
CemeteryX1
Fishing Spots X4
Closed Lots that can't be edited X4 (more about this in part 4)

Residential list

My current world is split into 3 islands, so therefore I split up the numbers of house's I will use in each section, like everything so far this is still open to change.

Large Island
40 Residential lots
Med Island
20 Residential lots
Small Island
10 Residential lots

Building the world

This will be first time you actual get to load in CAW and this will be a good time to read the manual:-

http://www.thesims3.com/content/en_US/pr...l/help.pdf

Another good source for info is this thread

http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/152074.page

I will consider at this point you have basic knowledge if not more on how to use CAW.

I will not say that much about world building stage other than, a little tip, when you have the basic layout of your world, enter edit in game, and fast forward the clock until sunset and sunrise, look at where the sun comes up. This is important for lighting, so it will be good Idea to have the sunrise behind a mountain.

What I would also do during this stage, is place any distant terrains you wish to use, it's better to place them now than later, less objects to worry about, why you try to move them about. Distant terrains can be awkward to place , if your not happy with it's location select the world object and the select move world object around. When they are placed you can edit the terrain so it covers the edges of the distant terrains.

The next part is optional, but I highly recommend you do this now, goto C:\Users\yourname\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3

Open the file called options in notepad scroll down until you see terrainquality , set the total to 3, you should leave the option on 3 from now until you complete your world. This option will also effect the main game and give you much better textures, if slower machines have any problems while playing the game, switch the option back down to 1 or 2, but 3 should be fine for CAW.

UPDATES

From time to time I will be updating parts of the guide, should new info become available, if you have already read this guide, you will usual find any new info at the bottom of the relevant part.

Useful Tutorials

Height Map Tutorials, Tips & Tricks

http://builders.forumotion.net/tutorials...-t1088.htm

How to create a world using Real-World Height data

http://builders.forumotion.net/tutorials...-t1151.htm

Beginners Caw Tutorials

http://builders.forumotion.net/tutorials...-t1026.htm

PART 2

Lets start part 2 with another little tweak to the option menu , this time change the texturequality , set the total to 3, like at the end of part 1 .

INI FILES

Before you read any more I strongly recommend that you read this first:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

Now that you understand what they where trying to do over at mod the Sims, I started to investigate on how to edit Sea colors inside CAW, I failed in this, not sure why, I think the game overrides' the files. But it was not a complete loss, I did get something working that was rather novel.

To do this you need a basic understanding s3pe find this here:-

http://forums.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=362412

To do this the easy way you can download the 6 files I've already completed for you, you can find them here:-

http://www.4shared.com/file/_uBBeFeS/china.html

So what are the files?
The files are for testing certain setup for Caw neighborhoods, I will give you what I think the files do, but remember this is only for testing and use this only on a backup.
If you use the files I've sent you, you will change the Initiate files to that of china

1 Change the LotRenderSettings and changes LotLODHeightThresh
2 Lighting, this is little more interesting it deals with SunlightScale, I think thats something to with the sunlight beams, I might be wrong
3 Tunable Parameters Related to Sky, you can change sunrise times, sun and moon radius
4 Misc Params with this file you can change cloud layers, star intensity, fog distance, I think fog distance is a mist that you can surround your neighborhood with.
5 Fly though proof of concept, even if you don't use any of the above, this file might be worth getting, this allows a Fly though when you fist play the neighborhood for the first time, the current file is set for china, good luck on getting the setting right for your own world

So how do you add them into my CAW worlds, that parts is very easy, use s3pe and just, open your World from you Caw folder and then click resource and import and import each file into the game remember backup and save first.

If you need to delete them just open your world in s3pe and delete the INI files, your world will not currently have any INI until you export the game.

Can I edit them files, like change the sunrise times?
Feel free to test this, I've not fully tested what you can and can't do with them files.

When will I see some changes?
Some changes do not happen until you load in the game, but say you wanted to make a vampire town, always dark, try changing the sunrise times and you will see the changes in caw.

This photo was taken 2pm game time


A alien sunset


Now I'm starting to get inpressed, will this damage my game?
All the changes should be for the current neighborhood, but I said and will repeat this again this is still being tested, I did notice that I changed the top colors of my walls, this seems to be global, if you use that file I've uploaded the top of all your walls while building will turn brown, instead of bright white, this is much better for you builders, who like things to blend in better.

Where did you get the INI files?
You can take INI files from completed worlds, so lets say you wanted the Egypt files, with that bright sun, hot glow, just extract the INI files from Egypt world file found in your programs/sim 3/ world adventures folder, using s3pe and then import the files into your CAW world. On a side note for players of the game who wish to see longer days, you can edit the Egypt, world adventure file, for personal use.

That about all I can say about this, I'm sure the people who use this, in neighborhood designs, will increase downloads and the look and design of your worlds.





There is little point in repeating the mod the Sims tutorial, I could not say it any better, what most people found was that it was hard to get the custom sea's to work in CAW. So I recommend you follow that tutorial:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

The only thing you need to do different than this tutorial, is that you need to export the Custom Sea files into a completed world and then extract the same files out of a completed world. I understand this sounds odd, but when you extract them out again, it sets up the file names that you need for it to work in caw. The last stage is then using s3pe again export the files to your world.

You now have custom sea's in CAW, but when you exit CAW, after a save, it will delete the INI files, it will not save them inside caw. All is not lost, when you export your world, the INI files go with the world and then work correctly with the exported world.
So the truth is that you use CAW only to test the sea's and it should be the last thing you place in your world prior to exporting the world, just remember if you save you loss the INI and you will need to replace them again, so make sure you have backup of the files you will be using.


In conclusion much of part 2 is a repeat of what I've already said in other threads, but this guide is trying to collect all the information on one massive 12 part guide. Many players will not feel the need to edit the INI file, should you fall into this bracket just skip this section and move onto part 3.

TERRAIN MAKING

With thanks to auntielynds, for this info

Make Your Own Textures

Instructions for installing your new textures:

When you download click on save and then download them where you can find them.
Okay now you have your files downloaded I will walk you through putting them into your game. I'll write this for beginers like I was just a few months ago.

Find your files and then open up Windows Explorer.
On the lefthand side under Folders, go down to Documents,
then to Electronic Arts,
then to The Sims 3 Create A World,
then to UserToolData.
then click on SourceTextures.
Now just drag and drop the new .dds files into the SourceTextures file.

Making your own textures link
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/152801.page

Obtaining DDS Plug-ins and installation
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/196896.page

A very important thing to remember when adding new textures to the game, make sure they are DDS format and not PNG, a number of texture designers use png format texture. But DDS surprisingly really renders a lot faster than many other formats.


Texture Pack



This is 4 textures placed together to make a large picture



This pack was actual released back in December, I've not added anything new, but I wanted to post a link to anybody who missed this pack first time around. Many of the textures are replacement EA textures, compressed with DX5 format. Some of the textures you will need a little work from yourself to make the best from them.


The pack contains over 130 textures

To use them make a folder called "source textureX" and place that folder here:-
C:\Users\yourname\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 Create A World Tool\UserToolData\SourceTextures


The download link:-

http://www.mediafire.com/?dzomghjtczo


Part 3

Terrain paint time

auntielynds As already posted a link to get new textures to help you use in CAW, you can find this link here:-
http://builders.forumotion.net/resource-...s-t522.htm

The Easy Way to Create Terrain Textures
A link to this can be found here:-

http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/152801.page

DSS plugins can be found here
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/196896.page

CAW does come with some nice textures, so even if you have no desire to make any or download any, it should not make your world any less pretty. Using Terrain inside CAW is a little like using Terrain inside the game, just on a bigger scale.

What I will show you in this part is how to make some simple grass by blending a few colors together, you can use this method to just about to make anything, from mountains to other effects around your world:-

If you wish to follow this yourself, use a test world.

First place a base color, I did this by right clicking on the texture on the editing tool and changed my default grass to a much darker grass:-



You do not need to change the base color if you so wish, just go over the area with a dark green grass

Next I would use a lighter green grass, so you need to add a Terrain inside CAW, so click add layer and add a lighter green grass, then turn the opacity down to 48 and highlight the area like so:-



Next we will use the base dark green color again this time set the opacity down to 25 and the Falloff down to 0 and then go over the image like so.


You can see that the grass blends into the light green, now this method of blending color can be used for any texture in the game, I could if I wished add another color into the mix, say I wanted the grass to be swampy I could add a brown color with a Opacity of 12 and 0 fallout, it would add another dimension to terrain painting, but for this example I will stick with two.

So lets have a look on what we could do with this inside a world, you could click on the sculpt button and make a few small hills, perhaps I wanted to place a little sand around the outside, this of course could be more grass or a river, but for this example I will use sand and I will place a few trees.



When you think about this, I only used the sand to divide the color from the background this entire look was only made with 2 texture blended together.

PART 4

Roads
The best method for building roads can be found on this tutorial, I can not add anything to this tutorial and this method is the method I try to use:-
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/144681.page

Special thanks to Sim_Outlaw for this tutorial.

Prior to using roads in your world, if this is your first world, then I recommend that you practice using the above method, inside a test world, understanding how roads work is one of the most important things for any world.

Bridge Building and Roads

To place a bridge in the game you can follow this tutorial:-

http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/145413.page

The only downside to this, is that the tutorial cuts a little short on placing roads, so we will have a little look at roads and bridges in more detail.

So first build a bridge, should be easy if you read that great tutorial,, we should open up CAW and place down a bridge and sculpt the terrain like this picture.



I've not made this very easy for you, but in a real world that your building you might get far worse problem than this, if your a first time world builder you will need to flatten the land below the bridge using the sculpt button, then use the steep valley sculpt tool under the bridge to build the water and last select the object and use the raise object to move the bridge above sea level.

The next step will be to switch the grid lines on, this will make placement of roads a little easier(TOP TIP- Grid line on will also help with lot placement) Build a road either side of the bridge like so:-



You can see by the picture we need to raise the terrain for now just level out the terrain to about the same height as the bridge like so:-



Yeah, it's starting to look a little messy, but don't worry about this, all you need to do is connect the roads up to the bridge, like you would to a intersection.(see Sim_Outlaw Road building tutorial for more info on this).
Scroll closer to the bridge and you will see the bridge connections points are not that good:-



The best way to fix this, is go back into the sculpt menu, raise the terrain using the gentle hill and few clicks should increase the height of the road, then flatten the terrain around the bridge, including the other road on the other side of the bridge, your road should look better, if not repeat until you get the correct height.



The last step is that we need to smooth out the road, I find the best results can be done with sculpt terrain tool and then use smooth road, then use the road grading tool menu and smooth road. Do not forget to replace the river under the bridge with the sculp tool. Here is the end result:-



This bridge might look better than before, you still must check the road for bumps and fine tune the terrain.

SETUP THE TRAIN

You can ignore this part, if your world will not contain the train, If your going to use a train in your world, it would be a good time to place this object early in the world development, the reason for this, the size of the train tracks, it will get more and more tricky to use correctly the more you build and sculpt your world.
I use the emitters to place the train, the emitters are placed inside a lot, that will activate the train, alternatively you can just place the train from inside a tunnel, then the train will sometimes animate, I'm not 100% sure how this works, so I will just show you the method that I use.

To use the train by using the emitter you first need to research this tutorial:-
http://builders.forumotion.net/useful-tu...0-t696.htm

This is more a knowledge update, should you set up a lot in create a world that contains emitters, when that world is first installed, some of the emitters temporary reset to fog emitters. This is a minor setback, all you need to do to get the emitters to work as normal, is save your world, exit to the main menu and reload the save and the emitters will turn back to normal, all test I've done confirm this.

The reason this happen, CAW only contains Fog emitters, so when the world is installed you only get fog, until of course you save the game, then the game will recognize your emitter codes, this currently effects all lots installed by CAW.
The animated train




The train was made using a simple emitter placed inside a lot, of course I also needed to make the train track, that is a simple texture.

You can see the emitter in the center of the lot built over the train tracks, if you have read part 3 of the guide you will understand how to change the emitter code:-
the code for the animated train is:-
ep1train



The downside, of the train, it does not stay in the world forever, I needed to place 4 emitters in 4 different lots, so when one emitter runs out, hopefully inside a tunnel another emitter kicks in, to give the illusion that train is going from when one end of my world to another.

Making Ponds & Rivers

I wont say to much about this, just try and design ponds and river with some common sense, you will need them for fish.

Ponds and Textures

Here is a photo of 4 different ponds:-
pond 1= Deep pond no textures
Pond 2= Deep pond with textures
Pond 3= Shallow pond no textures
Pond 4= Shallow pond with textures



Now lets have a little look at them ponds in the game=



Not much change really, but that is my point, it's more or less a waste of time, energy and use of KB size to your world to terrain paint a pond, river, sea. Your just best editing around the outside of the pond, everything you do to a world will increase loading times and upload time, so keep your world fine tuned.

Clean up texture time

While we are looking at textures, it will be a good time to go over your world and check for any abnormalities in your terrain painting, look for area's that might need blending since you placed your roads and around your bridge area

Try to reduce size

I'm not going to say to much about this, I will go into this in much more detail in part 11, where we try to reduce the upload size of your world. We will get ready for this now, here a few things to watch for, testing texture paints inside your main world is a bad idea the game will keep a copy of the texture even if you delete the texture. A copy of the textures is saved inside your world file, so only test textures on test worlds thou in part 11, I will go into more detail on how to remove unwanted textures.

I highly recommend anybody who is building a world bigger than a small island to download The Compressorizer Redux! this works with CAW worlds unfinished or finished world, you can find this program here:-
http://forum.jfade.com/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=473

When you have download this program, feel free to test this now on your world file, on a side note this program works on:
* .package
* .dbc
* .sim
* .sims3
* .world
* .sims3pac

If you have never used this program, this program can also reduce lot/sim upload & download times to the exchange.

Delete World Caches

From time to time, while building your world it will be a good idea to Delete World Caches, this is more for your benefit, it should stop the world loading all the extra stuff that's not needed.
To do this, just delete the entire contents of this folder, found here:-

C:\Users\YOUR NAME\Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3 Create A World Tool\WorldbuilderCache

The game will just spawn a new cache next time you load CAW

PART 5

SIDEWALKS

Part 5 is a small section about side walks you can add to the game, they can add a extra dimension to building any world, at the very least you should consider using them to break the terrain up, give that extra dimension so to speak.
By reading the manual, you should already have a good idea on how to place sidewalks so I will just show you how I used them in the two worlds I'm building:-






If your following this guide you will not have placed trees yet, so at this stage the sidewalk just break the terrain up, but later you can place trees and other objects for sims to view while using the sidewalks

START A PREVIEW

If you have not done so already it will be a good time to start preview for your world, gather some feedback.
You can do this on this forum or the exchange forum, or any other places CAW builders gather.

If you have got this far into world building, you have done well.

PART 6

The half way point and the last part on this thread, 7-12 will be on a another thread

Routing
Much of this guide is about the order I build worlds in, I've tried to collect information that will help you build a world, I understand some of the info might be of no use. Some of the info is more common sense, but it's very easy to forget something, that is why this section is rather small of information, the Routing section, much of the ways to set Routing is already discussed in the manual.
So part 6 is more hands on, so it's time to complete your Routing, you really don't want your sims running over your lovely crafted mountains.

Camera Non-Routable

This is similar to the above, I can't really add anything that is not already in the manual, some points thou:-
Allow the player some flexibility to move the camera out into the sea and always block Distant Terrains, they look terrible close up.


Here ends part 6]]> http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1708 Sat, 28 Aug 2010 07:44:44 -0700 http://www.flyingacres.com/NeighborlySims3/showthread.php?tid=1708
Advanced tutorial "Tweaking your worlds, custom sea/sky/rabbit holes/emitters"

The following information is for reference, I wanted to pass some of my findings over to the community, it might help you think about designing even more unique worlds.


PART 1
Before you read any more I strongly recommend that you read this first:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

Now that you understand what they where trying to do over at mod the Sims, I started to investigate on how to edit Sea colors inside CAW, I failed in this, not sure why, I think the game overrides' the files. But it was not a complete loss, I did get something working that was rather novel.

To do this you need a basic understanding s3pe find this here:-

http://forums.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=362412

To do this the easy way you can download the 6 files I've already completed for you, you can find them here:-

http://www.4shared.com/file/_uBBeFeS/china.html

So what are the files?
The files are for testing certain setup for Caw neighborhoods, I will give you what I think the files do, but remember this is only for testing and use this only on a backup.
If you use the files I've sent you, you will change the Initiate files to that of china

1 Change the LotRenderSettings and changes LotLODHeightThresh
2 Lighting, this is little more interesting it deals with SunlightScale, I think thats something to with the sunlight beams, I might be wrong
3 Tunable Parameters Related to Sky, you can change sunrise times, sun and moon radius
4 Misc Params with this file you can change cloud layers, star intensity, fog distance, I think fog distance is a mist that you can surround your neighborhood with.
5 Fly though proof of concept, even if you don't use any of the above, this file might be worth getting, this allows a Fly though when you fist play the neighborhood for the first time, the current file is set for china, good luck on getting the setting right for your own world

So how do you add them into my CAW worlds, that parts is very easy, use s3pe and just, open your World from you Caw folder and then click resource and import and import each file into the game remember backup and save first.

If you need to delete them just open your world in s3pe and delete the INI files, your world will not currently have any INI until you export the game.

Can I edit them files, like change the sunrise times?
Feel free to test this, I've not fully tested what you can and can't do with them files.

When will I see some changes?
Some changes do not happen until you load in the game, but say you wanted to make a vampire town, always dark, try changing the sunrise times and you will see the changes in caw.

This photo was taken 2pm game time


A alien sunset


Now I'm starting to get inpressed, will this damage my game?
All the changes should be for the current neighborhood, but I said and will repeat this again this is still being tested, I did notice that I changed the top colors of my walls, this seems to be global, if you use that file I've uploaded the top of all your walls while building will turn brown, instead of bright white, this is much better for you builders, who like things to blend in better.

Where did you get the INI files?
You can take INI files from completed worlds, so lets say you wanted the Egypt files, with that bright sun, hot glow, just extract the INI files from Egypt world file found in your programs/sim 3/ world adventures folder, using s3pe and then import the files into your CAW world. On a side note for players of the game who wish to see longer days, you can edit the Egypt, world adventure file, for personal use.

That about all I can say about this, I'm sure the people who use this, in neighborhood designs, will increase downloads and the look and design of your worlds.

Feel free to update this with you own findings should you explore this in more detail.


PART 2 Custom Sea's/ponds




There is little point in repeating the mod the Sims tutorial, I could not say it any better, what most people found was that it was hard to get the custom sea's to work in CAW. So I recommend you follow that tutorial:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

The only thing you need to do different than this tutorial, is that you need to export the Custom Sea files into a completed world and then extract the same files out of a completed world. I understand this sounds odd, but when you extract them out again, it sets up the file names that you need for it to work in caw. The last stage is then using s3pe again export the files to your world.

You now have custom sea's in CAW, but when you exit CAW, after a save, it will delete the INI files, it will not save them inside caw. All is not lost, when you export your world, the INI files go with the world and then work correctly with the exported world.
So the truth is that you use CAW only to test the sea's and it should be the last thing you place in your world prior to exporting the world, just remember if you save you loss the INI and you will need to replace them again, so make sure you have backup of the files you will be using.

PART 3

Extra objects and Animation, the builders dream


Strictly speaking this guide is aimed at lot builders more than neighborhood designer, but you can get some very useful stuff to help you design your world, I wanted to include this guide, due to part 4 deals with the animated train

The tutorial guide on how to include extra objects and animation in your lots, if your interested in this keep reading.

I think back in the days of the sims 2, it was frillen who unlocked the 229 ingame Maxis objects in
collection files you can all about this on the following link:-

http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=131127

To builders back in the days of the sims 2, them extra objects added a new dimension to building, it was one area I was starting to miss in the sims 3, something builders can have, that gives them a step up, above more casual player.

With the sims 3 to get access to them objects we use a very simple cheat, on a very basic level this is no more difficult than using the money cheat, so what I was going to do was try and show you, more on how to use the objects in the cheat at 3 different levels, Basic, advanced and jedi levels.

WARNING you will need ambitions installed for this to work and use only a test lot while playing about with this tutorial.

BASIC LEVEL


Ok this is the easy part, the cheat is very easy to use:-

1 Load up a test sim family and open the cheat menu ctrl+shift C and type the
following code testingCheatsenabled true.

2 Next type buydebug on and enter the debug objects, this is the ? in the object list for anybody who
as never used this cheat before.

3 Goto misc.objects and look for the fog emitter



drag and drop this object onto the game and start playing, many players will be already aware that after about 5 seconds of playing the area around the test object will fill up with mist.

4 Ok lets try something new, lets make some weather, snow would be a good start, lets drop another fog emitter onto a test lot, then hold down ctrl+shift and left click on the emitter, you should see
a new menu:-



click on set visual effects you will see ep2spiritfog, change this to snowfallingheavyday, without any spaces, now test, you should see something like this:-

.

5 Thats really about all you need to understand, the rest of this tutorial will be about my findings, so
lets finish the Basic level by using the cloning, if you where going to design a winter wonderland
you will probable need about 10+ fog emitters, so lets clone the fog emitter that we used for the
snow, crtl+shift on the emitter and click clone, yes nothing seems to happen, but you do have the
object in your hand, you just can't see the clone, try dropping the snow emitter down and test in
game. the next time you enter build mode you will see the clone will appear so you move it around if your unhappy with the placement.

6 A great tip, when your building it's best to build with a active sim in the lot, so you can test the emitters, if your building for a long time, don't forget you have testingcheatenabled on, so you can click on the energy bars if your sim starts to die. If you wont to have a little play about at this point here are few more emitter codes to try

alarmclockcheapfx
bubbles
bubblessuds
fire
fireworksa
timemachinelights
tombstonefog
train
waterbuoy
windmill


ADVANCED

When I say advanced the objects need a little(I really mean a little) work from the builder, many of the
objects that are needed to be used in water need to be placed prior to building your pool or pond, so if you want to use water jets in your lot you need to place them prior to building the
pool, for example:-



I placed all the waterjets prior to building the pool. Another example



I placed the water rapids prior to building the water, for the best results your best dropping the area that you wish to place the rapids/waterjets a few clicks, so when you make the pool/pond it does not look like the rapids are 5cm off the floor. Ok lets build a simple waterfall, build yourself a nice raised square, something like this



next drop a emitter and rename the emitter waterfall_1_short and drop the emitter at the back of the hill and start playing,



you can see this did not work very well, I wonted the water at the front of the hill, to do this just enter build mode and turn the waterfall around, it should look like this.



that looks better, the next step for me would be to clone a few more emitters, add some rocks, boolprop the hill and you should then end up with something like this:-



still not that great to look at but you must remember while building you will adding trees and other intresting objects, I found also adding rapids to the base of the waterfall looks pretty cool, to do this type rapidsnorock and place the emitter at the base of the waterfall and then I used rapidsrock emitter and placed that at the base of the pond. Then perhaps this would be a good time to place the pond in, don't worry the emitters do not move when you boolprop, but should if you change your mind, you will not be able to replace the emitter in the same location, it will always drop to the lowest point, so thats why you need to place them first. Just to be aware only a few emitters work under water, seaweed for example, rapids need to be placed on top of water.



Top tip, when building rivers or using sea waves, test how far the water animation will go. you don't wont that wave moving into the house that you just spent 3 days building.

Here is a list of things you might wish to try and play about with:-

poolbubbles
pooldrownbubbles
poolsimsteam
seaweed
rapidsnorock
rapidsrock
rapidswaternarrow
rapidswaterwide
waterfall_1_short
waterfall_1_shortsplash
waterspout
oceansurf
oceansurfreduced
fountainscience (the water jets I used in the pool lot)


JEDI

This part more information than anything else, and a few idea's, I was not the first person to work any
of this out, that honor should goto, Goggalor over on the more awesome than you web page, well at
least I think he is the first, you can download a complete list of extracted codes from the following

page:-
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/in...664.0.html


So what next, well I found a number of the objects in the list can be used with triggers, a example,
you wanted to make a haunted house, you can use a trigger for a rat to run accross the floor. So many
of the objects can be used with the World adventure dungeon triggers. You could make a scientist sim
flick a switch to make it snow, with of course the correct trigger in place. You could even build a
an Olympic stadium and when you light the torch, hundreds birds will fly up into the sky. Many of
that goes beyond this tutorial, but it's all possible. So if you want one final play with your new toy, try a few animals from the list Bird, rat and crow, you can watch them fly around your lot, but they will disappear after a short time, so to make the best use of them, use the trigger events.
Many thanks for reading, please report any good findings.

UPDATE 30/06/10

WILL MY GAME SLOW DOWN

Good question, I've done some research into this and this was my conclusion, directly no, but like anything in the game to much of anything then yes it can.

I will give you some example of how this can slow down your game, Your playing in the game with a very large heavy detailed lot that uses loads of animations, the lot on it's own, should not slow the game. But lets say your neighbor contains a large number of electrical animations, you might start to notice a very small slow down, lets say your other neighbor is a big lot, full of animations, this will start to get hard for most PCs' to handle, it's trying to animate from 3 different locations. In testing what I found the game will slow down if you use to many large animated lots in around the same area, my advice is to split up the animated lots around the neighborhood. That should reduce all slowdown, just don't have them all together in the same place.

Some animation are worse than others, for example the waterfalls are very minor, but the large electric discharges are high in power. I'm not saying not use them, just don't use to many in the same location.

I've not done that much research into this, but I think the game loads your active lot and upto 12 lots around your active lot, they will run in the background, so simple maths tells you, to keep any large electrical animated lots, a few streets away from each other and the game will be running like clockwork.


In conclusion, I'm happy to use them, I've noticed no slow down in my main neighborhood, but in extreme testing, with all settings on top, the FPS will drop if you use multiple very high animated lots in the same area. At the end of the day you could also say that if you build a massive world with CAW or use 1000s of custom objects, or even if you have 7 expansions installed.

A little about the test I did, the test was this, I placed my shimmer lot (full of electric energy discharges) around the neighborhood at various points and tested the FPS, more or less they where all about the same, I placed 4 shimmers next to each other and tested, the FPS did drop a little, it was not unplayable, but I could see how the FPS could drop more if shimmer used more animation or was on a bigger lot.

I will update the first page with this info, if anybody wishes to do any more test into this, please print your findings.

UPDATE 19/07/10

CREATE A WORLD & EMITTERS

This is more a knowledge update, should you set up a lot in create a world that contains emitters, when that world is first installed, some of the emitters temporary reset to fog emitters. This is a minor setback, all you need to do to get the emitters to work as normal, is save your world, exit to the main menu and reload the save and the emitters will turn back to normal, all test I've done confirm this.

The reason this happen, CAW only contains Fog emitters, so when the world is installed you only get fog, until of course you save the game, then the game will recognize your emitter codes, this currently effects all lots installed by CAW.

PART 4 The animated train




The train was made using a simple emitter placed inside a lot, of course I also needed to make the train track, that is a simple texture.

You can see the emitter in the center of the lot built over the train tracks, if you have read part 3 of the guide you will understand how to change the emitter code:-
the code for the animated train is:-
ep1train



The downside, of the train, it does not stay in the world forever, I needed to place 4 emitters in 4 different lots, so when one emitter runs out, hopefully inside a tunnel another emitter kicks in, to give the illusion that train is going from when one end of my world to another.

PART 5 custom neighborhood objects, recolors

By the time you get to this part you should be upto speed with using S3pe, and you will need this for the last part of this guide

The more I play about with CAW, the more I see to edit:-



In fact the truth of the matter and all my test confirm this so far, you can edit just about anything in the game and keep your game custom content free. You can use your world to edit the, neighborhood objects




The way you do this is to extract the texture using S3pe, you can find the textures here:-
C:\Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\GameData\Shared\Packages

FullBuild2 file contains most of the building recolors, just extract the file you wish to change and when you have finished the edit, you need to move the file into your CAW world, using S3pe.
The textures work much like INI files, your best editing the texture and check they work ok in backup copy of your world, if everything work, then like the INI files they should be last thing you do prior to exporting your world.

WILL THIS WORK WITH CUSTOM SIM CLOTHES?
Not tested this yet

WILL THIS WORK ON PLAYER MADE CUSTOM CONTENT & STORE OBJECTS?
I did test this on custom made object I downloaded, it did not work, I've not tested on store objects.

Other information:-

Most of the info is still being tested, so you should consider all the guides are open to change, should any problems or any new info comes about.
So you use the info at your own risk, the last thing I want is somebody to damage a world they are building so please make backups and test what you use from this guide.

If you wish to read more info of a more detailed description of how to use some of the guides I've started thread over on TS3 CREATORS CONSORTIUM,over the next few weeks I will update the guide here:-
http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1007.htm
The guides will contain more a step by step on how to do things, so if your a little new to extracting files, using programs to edit your world, this thread will be easier to understand.


If you wish to follow the progress of the exotic world I'm building you can view this thread here:-

http://builders.forumotion.net/wip-f7/ho...0-t941.htm
or
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/232499.page

Many thanks for getting this far, I suppose I want my world I'm building to be about the world not how I turned the sea turquoise, or how I made a green balloon. :lol:

Cya later]]>
Advanced tutorial "Tweaking your worlds, custom sea/sky/rabbit holes/emitters"

The following information is for reference, I wanted to pass some of my findings over to the community, it might help you think about designing even more unique worlds.


PART 1
Before you read any more I strongly recommend that you read this first:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

Now that you understand what they where trying to do over at mod the Sims, I started to investigate on how to edit Sea colors inside CAW, I failed in this, not sure why, I think the game overrides' the files. But it was not a complete loss, I did get something working that was rather novel.

To do this you need a basic understanding s3pe find this here:-

http://forums.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=362412

To do this the easy way you can download the 6 files I've already completed for you, you can find them here:-

http://www.4shared.com/file/_uBBeFeS/china.html

So what are the files?
The files are for testing certain setup for Caw neighborhoods, I will give you what I think the files do, but remember this is only for testing and use this only on a backup.
If you use the files I've sent you, you will change the Initiate files to that of china

1 Change the LotRenderSettings and changes LotLODHeightThresh
2 Lighting, this is little more interesting it deals with SunlightScale, I think thats something to with the sunlight beams, I might be wrong
3 Tunable Parameters Related to Sky, you can change sunrise times, sun and moon radius
4 Misc Params with this file you can change cloud layers, star intensity, fog distance, I think fog distance is a mist that you can surround your neighborhood with.
5 Fly though proof of concept, even if you don't use any of the above, this file might be worth getting, this allows a Fly though when you fist play the neighborhood for the first time, the current file is set for china, good luck on getting the setting right for your own world

So how do you add them into my CAW worlds, that parts is very easy, use s3pe and just, open your World from you Caw folder and then click resource and import and import each file into the game remember backup and save first.

If you need to delete them just open your world in s3pe and delete the INI files, your world will not currently have any INI until you export the game.

Can I edit them files, like change the sunrise times?
Feel free to test this, I've not fully tested what you can and can't do with them files.

When will I see some changes?
Some changes do not happen until you load in the game, but say you wanted to make a vampire town, always dark, try changing the sunrise times and you will see the changes in caw.

This photo was taken 2pm game time


A alien sunset


Now I'm starting to get inpressed, will this damage my game?
All the changes should be for the current neighborhood, but I said and will repeat this again this is still being tested, I did notice that I changed the top colors of my walls, this seems to be global, if you use that file I've uploaded the top of all your walls while building will turn brown, instead of bright white, this is much better for you builders, who like things to blend in better.

Where did you get the INI files?
You can take INI files from completed worlds, so lets say you wanted the Egypt files, with that bright sun, hot glow, just extract the INI files from Egypt world file found in your programs/sim 3/ world adventures folder, using s3pe and then import the files into your CAW world. On a side note for players of the game who wish to see longer days, you can edit the Egypt, world adventure file, for personal use.

That about all I can say about this, I'm sure the people who use this, in neighborhood designs, will increase downloads and the look and design of your worlds.

Feel free to update this with you own findings should you explore this in more detail.


PART 2 Custom Sea's/ponds




There is little point in repeating the mod the Sims tutorial, I could not say it any better, what most people found was that it was hard to get the custom sea's to work in CAW. So I recommend you follow that tutorial:-

http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=388840

The only thing you need to do different than this tutorial, is that you need to export the Custom Sea files into a completed world and then extract the same files out of a completed world. I understand this sounds odd, but when you extract them out again, it sets up the file names that you need for it to work in caw. The last stage is then using s3pe again export the files to your world.

You now have custom sea's in CAW, but when you exit CAW, after a save, it will delete the INI files, it will not save them inside caw. All is not lost, when you export your world, the INI files go with the world and then work correctly with the exported world.
So the truth is that you use CAW only to test the sea's and it should be the last thing you place in your world prior to exporting the world, just remember if you save you loss the INI and you will need to replace them again, so make sure you have backup of the files you will be using.

PART 3

Extra objects and Animation, the builders dream


Strictly speaking this guide is aimed at lot builders more than neighborhood designer, but you can get some very useful stuff to help you design your world, I wanted to include this guide, due to part 4 deals with the animated train

The tutorial guide on how to include extra objects and animation in your lots, if your interested in this keep reading.

I think back in the days of the sims 2, it was frillen who unlocked the 229 ingame Maxis objects in
collection files you can all about this on the following link:-

http://www.modthesims.info/download.php?t=131127

To builders back in the days of the sims 2, them extra objects added a new dimension to building, it was one area I was starting to miss in the sims 3, something builders can have, that gives them a step up, above more casual player.

With the sims 3 to get access to them objects we use a very simple cheat, on a very basic level this is no more difficult than using the money cheat, so what I was going to do was try and show you, more on how to use the objects in the cheat at 3 different levels, Basic, advanced and jedi levels.

WARNING you will need ambitions installed for this to work and use only a test lot while playing about with this tutorial.

BASIC LEVEL


Ok this is the easy part, the cheat is very easy to use:-

1 Load up a test sim family and open the cheat menu ctrl+shift C and type the
following code testingCheatsenabled true.

2 Next type buydebug on and enter the debug objects, this is the ? in the object list for anybody who
as never used this cheat before.

3 Goto misc.objects and look for the fog emitter



drag and drop this object onto the game and start playing, many players will be already aware that after about 5 seconds of playing the area around the test object will fill up with mist.

4 Ok lets try something new, lets make some weather, snow would be a good start, lets drop another fog emitter onto a test lot, then hold down ctrl+shift and left click on the emitter, you should see
a new menu:-



click on set visual effects you will see ep2spiritfog, change this to snowfallingheavyday, without any spaces, now test, you should see something like this:-

.

5 Thats really about all you need to understand, the rest of this tutorial will be about my findings, so
lets finish the Basic level by using the cloning, if you where going to design a winter wonderland
you will probable need about 10+ fog emitters, so lets clone the fog emitter that we used for the
snow, crtl+shift on the emitter and click clone, yes nothing seems to happen, but you do have the
object in your hand, you just can't see the clone, try dropping the snow emitter down and test in
game. the next time you enter build mode you will see the clone will appear so you move it around if your unhappy with the placement.

6 A great tip, when your building it's best to build with a active sim in the lot, so you can test the emitters, if your building for a long time, don't forget you have testingcheatenabled on, so you can click on the energy bars if your sim starts to die. If you wont to have a little play about at this point here are few more emitter codes to try

alarmclockcheapfx
bubbles
bubblessuds
fire
fireworksa
timemachinelights
tombstonefog
train
waterbuoy
windmill


ADVANCED

When I say advanced the objects need a little(I really mean a little) work from the builder, many of the
objects that are needed to be used in water need to be placed prior to building your pool or pond, so if you want to use water jets in your lot you need to place them prior to building the
pool, for example:-



I placed all the waterjets prior to building the pool. Another example



I placed the water rapids prior to building the water, for the best results your best dropping the area that you wish to place the rapids/waterjets a few clicks, so when you make the pool/pond it does not look like the rapids are 5cm off the floor. Ok lets build a simple waterfall, build yourself a nice raised square, something like this



next drop a emitter and rename the emitter waterfall_1_short and drop the emitter at the back of the hill and start playing,



you can see this did not work very well, I wonted the water at the front of the hill, to do this just enter build mode and turn the waterfall around, it should look like this.



that looks better, the next step for me would be to clone a few more emitters, add some rocks, boolprop the hill and you should then end up with something like this:-



still not that great to look at but you must remember while building you will adding trees and other intresting objects, I found also adding rapids to the base of the waterfall looks pretty cool, to do this type rapidsnorock and place the emitter at the base of the waterfall and then I used rapidsrock emitter and placed that at the base of the pond. Then perhaps this would be a good time to place the pond in, don't worry the emitters do not move when you boolprop, but should if you change your mind, you will not be able to replace the emitter in the same location, it will always drop to the lowest point, so thats why you need to place them first. Just to be aware only a few emitters work under water, seaweed for example, rapids need to be placed on top of water.



Top tip, when building rivers or using sea waves, test how far the water animation will go. you don't wont that wave moving into the house that you just spent 3 days building.

Here is a list of things you might wish to try and play about with:-

poolbubbles
pooldrownbubbles
poolsimsteam
seaweed
rapidsnorock
rapidsrock
rapidswaternarrow
rapidswaterwide
waterfall_1_short
waterfall_1_shortsplash
waterspout
oceansurf
oceansurfreduced
fountainscience (the water jets I used in the pool lot)


JEDI

This part more information than anything else, and a few idea's, I was not the first person to work any
of this out, that honor should goto, Goggalor over on the more awesome than you web page, well at
least I think he is the first, you can download a complete list of extracted codes from the following

page:-
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/in...664.0.html


So what next, well I found a number of the objects in the list can be used with triggers, a example,
you wanted to make a haunted house, you can use a trigger for a rat to run accross the floor. So many
of the objects can be used with the World adventure dungeon triggers. You could make a scientist sim
flick a switch to make it snow, with of course the correct trigger in place. You could even build a
an Olympic stadium and when you light the torch, hundreds birds will fly up into the sky. Many of
that goes beyond this tutorial, but it's all possible. So if you want one final play with your new toy, try a few animals from the list Bird, rat and crow, you can watch them fly around your lot, but they will disappear after a short time, so to make the best use of them, use the trigger events.
Many thanks for reading, please report any good findings.

UPDATE 30/06/10

WILL MY GAME SLOW DOWN

Good question, I've done some research into this and this was my conclusion, directly no, but like anything in the game to much of anything then yes it can.

I will give you some example of how this can slow down your game, Your playing in the game with a very large heavy detailed lot that uses loads of animations, the lot on it's own, should not slow the game. But lets say your neighbor contains a large number of electrical animations, you might start to notice a very small slow down, lets say your other neighbor is a big lot, full of animations, this will start to get hard for most PCs' to handle, it's trying to animate from 3 different locations. In testing what I found the game will slow down if you use to many large animated lots in around the same area, my advice is to split up the animated lots around the neighborhood. That should reduce all slowdown, just don't have them all together in the same place.

Some animation are worse than others, for example the waterfalls are very minor, but the large electric discharges are high in power. I'm not saying not use them, just don't use to many in the same location.

I've not done that much research into this, but I think the game loads your active lot and upto 12 lots around your active lot, they will run in the background, so simple maths tells you, to keep any large electrical animated lots, a few streets away from each other and the game will be running like clockwork.


In conclusion, I'm happy to use them, I've noticed no slow down in my main neighborhood, but in extreme testing, with all settings on top, the FPS will drop if you use multiple very high animated lots in the same area. At the end of the day you could also say that if you build a massive world with CAW or use 1000s of custom objects, or even if you have 7 expansions installed.

A little about the test I did, the test was this, I placed my shimmer lot (full of electric energy discharges) around the neighborhood at various points and tested the FPS, more or less they where all about the same, I placed 4 shimmers next to each other and tested, the FPS did drop a little, it was not unplayable, but I could see how the FPS could drop more if shimmer used more animation or was on a bigger lot.

I will update the first page with this info, if anybody wishes to do any more test into this, please print your findings.

UPDATE 19/07/10

CREATE A WORLD & EMITTERS

This is more a knowledge update, should you set up a lot in create a world that contains emitters, when that world is first installed, some of the emitters temporary reset to fog emitters. This is a minor setback, all you need to do to get the emitters to work as normal, is save your world, exit to the main menu and reload the save and the emitters will turn back to normal, all test I've done confirm this.

The reason this happen, CAW only contains Fog emitters, so when the world is installed you only get fog, until of course you save the game, then the game will recognize your emitter codes, this currently effects all lots installed by CAW.

PART 4 The animated train




The train was made using a simple emitter placed inside a lot, of course I also needed to make the train track, that is a simple texture.

You can see the emitter in the center of the lot built over the train tracks, if you have read part 3 of the guide you will understand how to change the emitter code:-
the code for the animated train is:-
ep1train



The downside, of the train, it does not stay in the world forever, I needed to place 4 emitters in 4 different lots, so when one emitter runs out, hopefully inside a tunnel another emitter kicks in, to give the illusion that train is going from when one end of my world to another.

PART 5 custom neighborhood objects, recolors

By the time you get to this part you should be upto speed with using S3pe, and you will need this for the last part of this guide

The more I play about with CAW, the more I see to edit:-



In fact the truth of the matter and all my test confirm this so far, you can edit just about anything in the game and keep your game custom content free. You can use your world to edit the, neighborhood objects




The way you do this is to extract the texture using S3pe, you can find the textures here:-
C:\Program Files (x86)\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\GameData\Shared\Packages

FullBuild2 file contains most of the building recolors, just extract the file you wish to change and when you have finished the edit, you need to move the file into your CAW world, using S3pe.
The textures work much like INI files, your best editing the texture and check they work ok in backup copy of your world, if everything work, then like the INI files they should be last thing you do prior to exporting your world.

WILL THIS WORK WITH CUSTOM SIM CLOTHES?
Not tested this yet

WILL THIS WORK ON PLAYER MADE CUSTOM CONTENT & STORE OBJECTS?
I did test this on custom made object I downloaded, it did not work, I've not tested on store objects.

Other information:-

Most of the info is still being tested, so you should consider all the guides are open to change, should any problems or any new info comes about.
So you use the info at your own risk, the last thing I want is somebody to damage a world they are building so please make backups and test what you use from this guide.

If you wish to read more info of a more detailed description of how to use some of the guides I've started thread over on TS3 CREATORS CONSORTIUM,over the next few weeks I will update the guide here:-
http://builders.forumotion.net/caw-101-f...-t1007.htm
The guides will contain more a step by step on how to do things, so if your a little new to extracting files, using programs to edit your world, this thread will be easier to understand.


If you wish to follow the progress of the exotic world I'm building you can view this thread here:-

http://builders.forumotion.net/wip-f7/ho...0-t941.htm
or
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/posts/list/232499.page

Many thanks for getting this far, I suppose I want my world I'm building to be about the world not how I turned the sea turquoise, or how I made a green balloon. :lol:

Cya later]]>