OldSunset August 2022

This month brought big changes! Our ambitions took us so far that in the month of July it was necessary to release a test version to ensure that there would be no performance issues if we opted for this path. But… Unfortunately we had problems.

The idea was to completely fill the map with these grasses. The irony is that the performance issue we had was not in the map but in the lots! Since Create a World merges each sample keeping them as a single one within each quadrant, the same unfortunately does not happen within the game. When filling lots with several 3D grass samples, eventually well over 200, the game interpreted each sample as a unique object, sometimes taking an average of 14 seconds for the buy/build mode to fully load, whether on a high-end PC. or on simpler cpus. The best decision, therefore, to maintain aesthetic and visual coherence, was to keep the grass out. Using it only as an additive to the scenario rather than the full plan.

With that I focused on improving the look of the map in other ways. It is important to remember that throughout the process, several batches underwent adaptation. Whether getting new gardens or changes in color and objects in your interior. The initial idea of the August update was to promote a nightlife style for your Sims and with that it was necessary to add new lots related to Late Night and Showtime. With this, we added for the first time Bella's nightclub with an exclusive environment for relaxed and fun meetings.

In addition to other exclusive lots for bands and the presence of high society that you will love to know. That said, I made a personal commitment to redesign the exterior look of one of the buildings in Falling Night that are not available in the debug mode catalog. It was an extremely bright building with messy night-light visual effects to say the least. Not anymore.

With new buildings it was difficult to keep the city center consistent with the tone I imagined. There are still a lot of plants around it, and this is a part I'm not ready to go back yet, so I had to make some adjustments to the region to reflect the urban feel I was looking for. The result pleased me! We have an incredible silhouette when seen from afar and a stunning look when seen up close, which is even capable of recalling old SimCity 3000 covers, for example. That's what I call nostalgia!

There are two new residential buildings that have not yet received any changes internally. The lots were recently added to complement the look, but still need a lot of work internally to provide amazing environments you'll want to live in! From these changes I began to feel that the dog park no longer fit in that region. His look was a bit grotesque and needed tweaking. I shared the whole process in a live with the channel guys. The city is still deciding on the color of the tiles for the new bathroom. So don't be surprised if there's nothing inside it.

With that in mind, I made the decision to create OldSunset's first Pet Shop! And it is located next to the city hall. It has several accessories and objects for Pets. And it had its look inspired by the concept art of the exclusive version of The Sims 3 Pets. I went a little further in order to make it even more memorable!

But that is not all. With design change decisions, I completely removed the town square. And with that we had a problem and a benefit at hand. The problem: Without a square it would be impossible to receive friends from other games to perform with The Sims 3 Showtime. To solve this problem, I created a new venue for shows ahead, but I categorized it as a square so that this visit would be allowed.

Now for the two biggest benefits of removing the plaza: One less lot to carry in this region and my favorite: Sims will finally be able to swim in the lake! Yes you read very well! Not to mention that the look was much more natural and less grotesque. Check out the before and after:

I took the time and redesigned the interior of the house next. The furniture was already pre-arranged on the lot, but had not yet been finished with a color finish and organization. Now the house is finally ready. And the painted fireplace.

The writer's home (next door) seemed too lonely. Some people complained about the lack of double beds or cribs, and this was because I was still unfamiliar with the hyper-population growth OldSunset could enjoy. So I made some changes and added a crib so that both a single parent and single parent could welcome their child during the week. In fact, I added a trampoline for family fun too! Click here if you want to see something cute and what inspired me to make this decision.

This was an above average month! With the launch of the site, in addition to creating recommended custom content lists for The Sims 2, The Sims 3 and The Sims 4, with over 700 links in total, I also translated 19 mods myself. And parallel to that I started a challenge with gameplay rules for The Sims 2. In order to build a neighborhood. Don't go thinking that the news is over, because there is still more to come.

I'm building in live, Quedas Verdes, a neighborhood designed and focused to play with the Gameplay Rules I shared IN THIS post. To recycle my own work and save time, I'm recreating batches of OldSunset on this map.

The best news comes now! I've partnered with a talented Brazilian artist called Pixelated-Sim and we're going to convert and recolor several doors, windows and fences from The Sims 3 to The Sims 2 with the OldSunset color palette!

All of this will be available for free soon! I have to assume that seeing OldSunset pushing the boundaries and becoming something much bigger than just a world is exactly what I always envisioned for this project. I had the chance to meet many talented artists in the process and learn a lot from them. I am infinitely grateful. I bet that within the next few years both The Sims 2 and The Sims 3 will remain as fresh and modern as they should be!

To make this ideal possible, I sent him several Starter Kits like this one so he could collect color and texture references to bring them to life in The Sims 2!

I hope I have been able to provide you, who support or not my work, with the best content possible within the possibilities that are within my reach. And of course, I hope to be able to exceed your expectations more and more.

I would especially like to thank all the people on the channel, today more than 5600 subscribers who follow, encourage and inspire ideas for all these projects monthly. You are amazing! And to the 46 people who sponsor my work, whether through Members Club or Patreon, you have no idea how important and essential this is. Even those who donate 1 or 2 reais during our live lives, every penny counts and makes a difference.

You have allowed me to create, expand and transcend ideas that without this support would probably be much more difficult and less likely to happen, since my mind could not stay focused on it for so long. Thank you from the heart! May September come and with it we will be able to go even further, all together!

If you liked everything you saw and would like to have access to the latest version of OldSunset, please consider supporting our work through Youtube Members Club or here on Patreon. By the end of today, the download of the August 2022 version of OldSunset will be available.

If for any reason you are unable or interested in supporting my work, we have a free version of OldSunset available for download in the description of this live. It's worth remembering that this is the February 2022 version, a lot has been added, modified and improved since then.

Thanks again to everyone who participated directly or indirectly in the development of this project, their opinions, suggestions and criticisms are always heard. Have a wonderful weekend!