The Grouch's Trash Pile [Baldur's Gate 3]

One of the things I really love about Finland is that they haven't paved over every inch of forest in the cities, so while I live a ten minute walk away from a mall that also hosts the library, a health center, a bus terminal, and a metro stop, ten minutes in a different direction gets me to the start of a walk down to and along the coastline that looks like this:

Spoiler

It was quite a long walk... there's a bit where the path leads up to a main road that we can follow and loop around to the main road that leads straight to the mall and close to home, or take a different direction through one of the rich people neighborhoods that takes us to next stretch of walking path along the shore and is a mile longer overall. J and I did that tonight and my feet and legs are protesting a bit! 4 miles is about the edge of my limits right now.

 

I arrquired the new Sims 4 expansion and it was even more boring than I thought it might be. The Social Bunny app is annoying and doesn't make much sense -- sims keep sending messages to themselves, or if they send a message to someone autonomously there's no way of telling who they sent it to. The school is far too big for how few students show up (even with a mod to make more sims appear on community lots), the classes are just sims sitting there and taking notes -- the bulk of the school time is spent either before class or during the 3-hour lunch, where they can still barely get things done because it takes so long to walk to other rooms. Prom was even more of a snore than it was in real life. The thrift store is cute but very basic, and the carnival pier is rabbithole rides. The world is even more of a setpiece than usual with very few lots.

I kinda had fun, but I still feel ripped off and I didn't even pay for it! For an expansion, there's almost nothing innovative or interesting. Maybe modders can do something with it but if they don't, I'll rip the cosmetic items I like from it and toss the rest into the bin.

 

I haven't been keeping up with Sims news because I have only room in my little brain for one life-consuming game rn, but it sounds like they've increasing just gone for the lowest effort options with regard to game packs. :/

(also would you be interested in the latest limited edition Squashies? they're Minion-branded, unfortunately, but if that's not a deal breaker and you'd like to try the banana-blueberry flavour I'll order some to put aside.)

 

Funny enough, Werewolves -- which is 'only' a game pack, as opposed to a full-fledged expansion like the High School one is supposed to be -- has WAY more to it. I haven't played it myself yet, but from what I've seen people say, there's an entire involved system with moon phases and werewolf specific traits and behaviors. The werewolves themselves are cartoony if you go for the default look, but their coats can be painted like pets can be; one fan has uploaded a bunch of werewolves with very realistically painted coats, and they look rad as hell.

As for the candy, I'm a little wary of banana flavoring even with candy that has done perfectly with the other flavors. *thinks* If you vouch for them I wouldn't mind a package, though!

 

Maybe the high school expansion is for those people who want more chores for their sims for more 'realistic' gameplay because apparently they don't have enough chores to do in real life (I grumble to myself as I prepare to haul out the vacuum cleaner).

 

Oh my. EA finally went "Ok, you abused our lenient policy and now you can't paywall any mods at all, ever" for Sims 4, and the people who have decided to make a career of it are throwing an absolute fit.

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Some modders make a very comfortable monthly salary off of their Patreons and never release their work for free -- and in some cases rarely release anything at all and string supporters along -- which looked like a "fuck around and find out" in progress to me. Piggybacking your income off of someone else's IP in an unofficial capacity is such a stupid thing to do, and I'm certain some of these modders do it not because it started as a hobby, but because they found out a lot of Sims players don't play anything else and think it's normal to charge $$$ for fan creations.

If these modders want to sell virtual items for real money, Second Life is right there -- although they'd actually have to make some effort to break in, and wouldn't be able to charge money for modifying in-game assets. :P

 

Also in Sims drama, I'm feeling very lol over one popular naughty mod maker saying he's removing teens from being affected because the new expansion recontextualizes them as being pre-pubescent, bc:

1. That's not what that word means, dude. Child-age sims are pre-pubesecent; teenaged sims are pubescent. As in going through puberty. ...Puberty no longer looks like a real word.
2. They were always high schoolers??? You could add acne and scruffy facial hair to them since the Parenthood pack??? They have always popped from children to models that look like slimmer adults with smaller busts??????
3. Teens have a 'mess around' option that allows them to do implied sexy things in all the same locations as YA+ can do 'woohoo' at... including in the shower. This is by default.

Either this guy is unusually oblivious, or this is a CYA move. (Let's be real, it's a CYA move.) I wonder if he got a sternly worded letter from EA or something.

 

I resent that I had to sign up for LinkedIn as per employment agency requirements that I do job searching activities each month, and I resent it even more now that LinkedIn pesters me all the time to use their app. No! I'm on my desktop all the time, I don't need your fucking app!

 

It's fair to be wary of banana flavours, most of them are horrendous (still lamenting the demise of banana Toffos which were objectively the best banana toffees ever, this is not up for debate).

The blueberry-banana squashies are ... not offensive? Not as good as the rhubarb or original flavours. The first one was like OMG BANANA but tbf I hadn't eaten much that day when I tried one so likely anything was going to smack me in the face with Flavour™. Anyway I ate a whole packet -- not in one sitting -- and would not be averse to them if the opportunity arose, although I wouldn't hunt them down bloodhound-style like I would for the rhubarb ones. I guess that's an endorsement, of sorts?

 

Well, I'm willing to try them, at least XD I'm sure you'd be able to tell if they had that weird bitter aftertaste that a lot of banana flavored things have (Panda banana fudge chocolate, I am still so disappointed in you).

 

Be proud of me, as I saw a post giving Homestuck classpects to the FFXIV scions that was absolutely 100% wrong, and only bitched about it to friends instead of reblogging it with a Nerd Rant or even vagueposting about it on my tumblr. (It was bad, though. Extremely poor reading comprehension bad.)

 

The one that makes the Warrior of Light the Heir of Light because they both have "of Light" in the name and ignores that Homestuck classpects mean something very different by it?

 

The very same!

 

I reblogged it solely because the thought of Estinien in the Prince getup made me laugh immoderately :3

 

Tsk! Tsk, I say!!!

 

Yes yes, I am a reprehensible human, be glad I didn't tag you like my inner devil told me to XD

 

ಠ_ಠ

 

It JUST hit me that the whole "thinking you're trans is a social contagion" thing isn't even remotely new, because a (very former) friend pulled that SAME SHIT on a friend who came out in 2005. Former friend insisted Friend was only doing it because of peer pressure and wanting to be like a newer friend, and it very much had the whiff of "poor, misguided girl who doesn't know any better :(" about it.

I mean I know intellectually the social contagion thing wrt trans people been around for a long time, but it only now just hit me I actually encountered it in the wild almost 20 years ago. Heh. I wonder what that former friend would think about me having come out as trans... I got on his case pretty hard and asked him if he'd treat me the same way if I should happen to decide to transition. Even though I was still ten years away from being able to admit it enough to go through with it, it was always pretty close to the surface, despite everything.

 

A couple of days ago I tried once again to have fun with the high school pack, going so far as to make my own school and make a group home for deliquent kids for the Drama, and it was insufferably boring. The gameplay doesn't add shit for someone not already obsessed with high school.

I'm uninstalling it, the new traits and aspirations are a big nothing. Someone already ripped the CAS items so I don't have to do it myself, at least.

 

Okay, well, I AM extracting a bunch of the objects. Can never have too much clutter. Might go through and do the same for a few of the other packs, like Dream Home Decorator -- fun idea but super buggy, and the furniture is largely snore-worthy contemporary 'design' -- but the storage bin clutter is great.

It's a shame, the game's object design is great but a lot of the new gameplay is just *wet fart noises*.