The Glory of Rome...

...and a few other places too.

I am hard at work redesigning my Roman Challenge with some raiding, trading and conquest in mind. So far I have begun work on the Provincia Romana as my main neighborhood and Terra Celtica; representing, broadly, all Celtic territories the Romans ever "visited". I am planning on adding the eternal city, Roma herself, as my Downtown and I will most likely add both Greece and Egypt as Roman provinces too, and possibly Germania as another Barbarian land.

My point here is that I will be adding self-Sims I collect (and a few Supernatural Sims too) to the various 'hoods, and I was wondering if anyone had a preference as to where they started out their Sim life. Due to the raiding and trading, you may move around a bit as captives or spouses, but cultural origins are your choices.

All that said, I am still hoping to see some more Roman and Celtic stuff pop up for the Sims2. Romans are better off than the Celts, but the stuff is older and all the newer stuff is so much better. The poor Celts have me almost inclined to find a site to download some nude skins and have them be Gaesatae-

Anyone know where you can find a severed head to carry around? I got these miniatures for Christmas too.

In other news, I am thinking of revamping my Ancient Roman UI mod, just a few tweaks, things that kind of bug me during the loading screen now when I see them, and I am planning an ancient Celtic UI mod to switch in for when I play my Celts. Yes, I am that much of a perfectionist that I want everything to set the mood. Celtic names live file may be on the way too, but I may have to play pretty fast and loose with history on that one- there aren't a lot of recorded female names for ancient Gauls or Britons, so I'll probably be forced to substitute in large numbers of early medieval Welsh names.

A few more Gauls...

...and maybe some Britons.

For a guy whose primary neighborhood is Roman, I seem to find myself looking still for more Gallic stuff. I collected a few more pictures from Google to show a little more of what I am looking for, but Gallic stuff is non-existent for the Sims2, as is stuff for the very culturally similar Britons, and the Celts were one of the major groups the Romans interacted with. The Greeks, the Egyptians and various eastern Mediterranean groups and the scary barbarian Germans being the others. There is some Greek stuff out there and some Persian stuff, a bunch of Egyptian stuff, and while I'd have to say the ancient world is a pretty neglected place Sims2-wise, the Celts and Germans come off the worst.

But right now, I am working on the Celts, so here's some more Gallic stuff for inspiration to those who can make Sims2 stuff rather than just NEED Sims2 stuff-

Click on the pictures to embiggen them,  currently I am most interested in the clothes and hair/facial hair, but eventually I'll want some cool shields and weapons and the Carnyx horn and maybe a couple of spirally "tattoo" overlays for them. Incidentally, if anyone can point me towards some pictures of ancient Celtic women on the web, I'd be much obliged. My google-fu has failed me there and I need clothes for the ladies too. Pictures of ancient Celtic warriors are everywhere, ancient Celtic home and village life are tough to find.

Another question, can you just pull the stuff out of other games, like Rome: Total War, for instance and convert them to Sims2 format?

Viking Themed Scrolling Text

I just created a Viking themed UI Text and wanted to share. I have now created probably my last UI Text file, since I have covered everything my family and I are really interested in that hasn't already been covered by someone else. You can find it here.

I know a picture of a Sims2 Viking ship would have been more appropriate, but I didn't have one handy.

Self Sim

I, with the help of my lovely wife Mona, made a self Sim today. In order to make him vaguely realistic, I was forced to use the Bear Body Builder body style. Mona is an artist and did most of the facial detail work, so it came out as close as the Sims2 Bodyshop can build me I think. There's some other custom content in there too, here's the picture of the list from the Clean Installer-

Now here's a few of what he looks like, mostly like me, only younger- less paunchy, no grey.

 

His "I've just been installed into the game" picture.

 Sitting inside the decorative hall I created especially for this photo shoot.

 Looking at some of the stuff on the wall.

 More looking.

 

Laughing.

 Soaking in the private hot spring I gave him.

 Neighbors dropped by.

Hanging out with a bald chick.

He's in my Roman neighborhood, because I've been working on rebuilding it, but I named him "Erc Mac Cai" after another old Screen Name of mine. I figure he'll end up as a Gladiator or some rich Roman's Celtic bodyguard.

You can Download him here. Should you happen to want him to play like he's actually me, make him a Leo, give him a family aspiration with a knowledge secondary aspiration (or vice versa) and make his turn ons Charismatic and Artistic and his turn off Zombies. Seriously, they creep me out.

Gauls

These guys are what I am looking for for my sub-hood. Roman stuff is hard to find, Gaulish stuff is nigh impossible.

I like the helmet and the mustache on this guy.

Since he's naked, his facial hair and his gear are pretty much what I am looking for.

Another bad-ass mustache.

Aside from the fact that Total War series guys all look alike, mustache, shield, javelins and trousers are awesome.

Same here, only add in the sword and helmet.

Vercingetorix must have been made king of all the Gauls because of his epic mustache and mane of hair.

Anyone who can find or be so kind as to make some of these items, would have me greatly indebted to them.

OK, I am go for Romans- Again

I really want to do the adaptation of the MCC to a Roman Class Challenge, where Patricians have to try and maintain their status and wealth and Plebeians have to try and rise up through the ranks and become "New Men" in the Senatorial Class.

I have some ideas for freeing slaves, so there will be a class of freedmen, and another proto-idea for a system of patronage/clientship. So, I guess that, even with all my lost in game work, I can't really see giving up on the project.

Another thing I really want to add is Gladiatorial games, probably once per week, with a real chance of death, but there is a serious lack of anything remotely Gladiatorial out there. Not even decorative items. I was hoping to have a couple of rival Gladiator schools, kind of like on Spartacus.

So I guess I'll have to rely on the mercy of others to create Sims2 Roman specific items, because they are pretty thin on the ground. There's a couple of nice Roman style shields and some swords that can pass for Roman in the Titans set made by Hriveresse over at Plumb Bob Keep, along with a ton of nice Greek stuff that is very useful and some Persian stuff that is of less utility to me.

Anyway, I'll be rebuilding the "Province" neighborhood and it's sub-hoods. I call it Province so it can be representative of anywhere in the empire.

Now, a bunch of pictures to show the kinds of stuff I am looking for either as bodyshop, deco, accessories, or usable items, courtesy of a guy who paints miniatures and some Roman re-enactors from England.

This one is from an actual Roman Mosaic of Gladiators.

These ones all came from one guys blog, fantastic work really.

These are the Gladiator pics from the re-enactors here.

Now I Am Kind of Torn

Since my Sims2 game blew up on me again yesterday and I still really want to do the MCC, do I still want to go all exotic with adapting it to the Roman Empire theme? Particularly considering the lack of Roman stuff I complained about after I started it. Don't get me wrong here, it's a good challenge and I appreciate a good challenge, but it's also a lot of work and I hate making all of these poor sims and watching them poof into non-existence.

The same exact argument can be made, to a slightly lesser extent, for my Japanese neighborhood. Not a great amount of stuff themed particularly to them, although more than the poor Romans, and I get sad watching them disappear; not that this SHOULD be an issue anymore, now that I have sworn off the no-CD hack.

Now, I also get a bit of history oriented ADD from time to time, so I was also thinking of adding a Norse themed neighborhood, just because my daughter Ember has been playing Skyrim again instead of the Sims2 and I got so much cool Viking stuff for her, and I am a big fan of the Vikings.

Or maybe I could do it with medieval Scots? I am Scottish by descent after all- a Highlander actually, only the 3rd generation born in this country (the USA). Now that's what my daughter Ashleigh is doing, but she isn't doing it "right". She has a lot more anachronism and fantasy than I would, plus she's not playing a challenge. I am the only one playing challenges in the house. I guess it's the old wargamer in me.

My wife Mona calls the Sims2 her "virtual dollhouse" and there is some truth to that. She makes pretty lots, peoples them with pretty, well-dressed Sims, and then moves on to another challenge. She rarely plays any of her Sims for very long, but sometimes we can get her to make stuff for us, or at least decorate our houses.

I digress though, I think the MCC would be easiest to play if I did 12-14th century England or France. So much of the medieval content available is best suited to the high middle ages and western Europe. Some of it CAN be adapted to other times and places, and it'll fit in just fine, but a lot of it is just as out of place as the taxi dropping you off at your new house.

Scotland might be easy to do, because it's like England, only poorer and colder with some plaid thrown about for good measure. I worry about the Vikings because really all of their clothing comes down to one mesh, endlessly recolored for the men, and damned little for the ladies. Norse style build sets are pretty much non-existent and there aren't a whole lot of deco items either. Some Skyrim conversion stuff is OK, but mostly it's not really.

Lastly, when it comes to the Scots, would it kill someone who knows how to make meshes to make some realistic Highland menswear instead of the ren-faire stuff that is out there.

Annoyance Strikes Again

I am swearing off the no CD hack, I'll just buy another copy and our computers can trade back and forth. The same thing happened again, necessitating a re-install again. Fortunately, I wasn't terribly far along yet, and now the specter of poor dead Lucius and Gaius' affair with Nubia will be erased. But now I have to reinstall all the CC and start building lots and families again.

It also strikes me that I never mentioned the feudal Japanese UI text file I did, so you can grab it here. I should also probably make this blog a little more feudal Japan friendly looking, without losing too much of the ancient Rome look- I need something that makes it look aesthetically appealing whether I am telling the stories of the trials, tribulations and triumphs of the Romans or the Japanese, that may be a tough call. SimPQR was just too clever a name for a blog about Roman Sims to pass up though, and it was my wife that came up with it.

I considered starting a sister blog just for the Japanese, but this blog has covered all of my Sims2 stuff so far. I need to remember to take more pictures.

I looked at the functional warrior sword and it's terms of use seem pretty liberal, so I am wondering if anyone reading this, if anyone reads this, if we could kind of morph it into a Gladius for Gladiator combats in the Arena and/or a Katana for Samurai duels or executions. I looked at it in SimPE, but I don't understand the program well enough to know whether or not I can just substitute in another model for the sword itself; or if I need some other software to make that remotely possible.

Lastly, I'll be putting up a Viking themed UI Text soon, I am writing it for my daughter's game. But between re-installing M&G today (twice) and looking for hair for the girls, I just haven't gotten around to enough clever stuff to say about the Vikings yet. But soon.

Simming the Past

I am beginning to wonder if maybe I shouldn't have stuck with something a little less exotic for my Sims. The Ancient Mediterranean world is not exactly a custom content rich zone and neither is feudal Japan. Both have some really awesome stuff and some really mediocre stuff. Japan at least has the benefit of having some EA content.

But there is a ton of really excellent medieval European custom content out there, even if you discount the fantasy stuff and narrow your time period focus you can do pretty well. I was doing this with my Wessex neighborhood until it crashed and then the game refused to start up again until I reinstalled M&G. I am told it was the no-CD hack that caused this, but with three out of five computers here running the game and only one CD it seemed like a reasonable choice. Wessex died because I didn't think to back it up before uninstalling and reinstalling M&G, which was too bad because I was started pretty good there.

My Roman "Province" neighborhood is doing OK, but it kind of bums me out to play there. I am not done populating the place yet, and I haven't made any default replacement NPCs, but my upper class families have at least one slave living with them as a room-mate. I did my Patrician family first, and, aside from the slaves (a mother and child), they had a real resemblance to my family- Husband, Wife, two teen-aged daughters and a teen-aged son.

So, whenever I make a new family, I play them for a day or two to start them off right and make sure they've got everything in order. I aged the one daughter up to adult, so she'd be like my oldest daughter. Then tragedy struck as the son, Lucius, went outside to stargaze and was killed by a satellite. On day one. I was busy with the dad, Gaius, trying to find a job when it happened, so I missed the whole thing. I have never seen that animation, and when Gaius got up and ran all the way back there the Grim Reaper was already gone.

Then matters got worse. Gaius started having an affair with the slave woman Nubia, and was promptly discovered by both his wife Marca and his older daughter Gaia. Only young Vibia and Nubia's daughter Secunda were left unaware. So, that household stopped being fun to play. The guy I thought of as myself is a total cad and my son Sim was killed in a freak accident while trying to raise his logic skill, which was my idea.

I have a small Legionary fort there too, and it has eight Legionaries that are designed to fill the role of Monks in the MCC. I am still trying to come up with a female equivalent that is NOT a brothel or a temple of Vesta. I have a couple of "Equestrian" type families, they are taking the place of the Yeomanry of the MCC, although I am still working out how to make them work. I am a little unsure about how to approach the "Peasant/Serf" class from the MCC for an Ancient Rome challenge. Should they just be free men who are poor? Or should they be tenant slaves?

At this point, the moral implications of Sim slavery are probably starting to bother some of you, if anyone is reading this, but I am a history nerd and I aim for as much historical accuracy as a game like the Sims2 can give me. That's why I decided that slaves were in at the get go, a Roman was only truly considered poor if he couldn't afford at least one slave. Now, for most of the servant type NPCs I am going to assume they are slaves- Maids, Gardeners, Butlers, Bartenders, whatever I might be forgetting. The non-servants, like the Police and Firemen are probably going to be Vigiles.

I work slow, and I am new to modding stuff in the Sims2, so I figure it'll be a month before I have this neighborhood really up and running. Japan's Mura neighborhood will take easily that long too unless someone wants to point me to some MCC compatible lots in the feudal Japanese style.

Japan is actually harder because I feel like I have to make all the Townies and Downtownies over so they not only dress in the proper style, but look Asian. Mura currently only has one family in residence, the Samurai in charge of the Village; the Okumas, Hiroki and his younger brother Matsuo. I haven't redone any default replacement NPCs there yet either, but at least they won't be slaves. Just as an aside, someone really needs to make some totally kick-ass Samurai armor, maybe different Japanese armor types or pieces of armor? I looked into making some conversions today and that is way beyond my skill level.

Roman Stuff

I have been using a lot of really cool medieval stuff for my Roman Sims, but I just can't shake the feeling that there was more stuff for Romans in the original Sims. Even all of that stuff would not sate my need for cool Roman stuff at this point though. A lot of the Roman stuff for the Sims2 is older and not, sadly, up to the same level of quality that the medieval stuff I am substituting in is. Furthermore, there is just a general lack of certain historically accurate things, women's hairstyles, clothing for everyone, armor for both legionaries/auxiliaries and gladiators, and weapons again for both.

Then there are the neighbors of the Romans- My Sim Roman Empire is a late Republic period, so there's Gauls and Greeks and Egyptians and Numidians and Germans and a plethora of easterners including the Parthians.

Now, I have never done any real modding for the Sims2, but I am wondering if I can snag some models from other games and convert them to use for the Sims2? I have a pretty good collection of Celtic weapons and shields from Neverwinter Nights, I'd have to check the terms of use from the original modelers, but they were free to use and all, so I am hopeful.

I was also curious as to whether or not I could take items like the dueling swords and change the sword models, if it is possible to do that and if it's OK to do it. I think I'd be happier if they were Gladius's and the animations would still be fine. For that matter they'd be cool as Katanas for my feudal Japan neighborhood too.

This is all conjecture at this point, I don't know HOW to do any of this, so I am more curious as to whether or not it can be done.

Scottish Medieval Names- The Pics

You know how it is, pics or it didn't happen.

I batch created 3 sets of Townies to get 90 of them to choose from, then made my test Sim know everyone. The MacSorleys I made, the rest are random.

I assume A-G is representative enough?

Scottish Themed UI Text

I made a Scottish themed UI Text too, again, not in keeping with the theme of the blog, but it's for my Daughter. Available here.

Rome's enemies...

...and occasional allies.

I am looking for Sim versions of the Celts, or Gauls, maybe Britons- people who look like these guys-

I like the mustaches, plaid pants and their decorative shields; plus the ballsy guys that go into battle naked. Anyone Simming in the ancient world seen their like?