Okay, so this is going to sound very idiotic..

[cyzeller]

I have been a Sims 2 fanatic for a long time, but recently bought a new computer that could run Sims 3, so I was like, "what the heck, I'll start playing this instead." I bought all the expansions, and have all of the patches downloaded. It's been a week, and I'm kind of losing my mind. There's more I dislike about it than like, and I'm kind of confused at the moment. I had a few questions that, if answered, I'm hoping will make me like the game a lot better. And I really want to.

First off, if story progression is off, but aging on, will my inactive sims just get old and die?

Secondly, i have story progression off, and I am able to visit inactive sims, but I never see any of them walking around town. Is that why?

These are the main problems I have, aside from finding families I had intended on playing disappear because they "moved out", basically meaning they disappeared without a trace, leaving all their stuff in the house and being wiped from the memory of any friends they had. I wouldn't mind leaving the story progression and everything on if it meant that I didn't have to worry about families vanishing.

And on a side note, I looked around, but couldn't really find much. Does anyone know if they are planning on bringing back the ability to really build a community lot like a restaurant, or bowling alley? I was a big builder, and being able to only build things like a laundromat and library was kind of a slap in the face.

I apologize if this makes me seem like I'm doing nothing but complaining, but I have always loved these games, and this one so far has been hitting rather off mark from what I was expecting.

[carlydunham]

you can b uild any building you want yuou have to edit it and set it as whatever building you want

[cyzeller]

Well I understand that. But there are only set things you can make. I mean, how many art galleries does one town need? That's the other thing I had a question on. I created my own salon and consignment store, but there's never anyone there to work!

[severedsolo]

Did you put a consignment register in the store? Also did you set the lot type to consignment/salon?

IIRC, its actually Story Progression that decides who works in which store, so that might be why Sim's aren't being assigned to them assuming you have done it right.

To answer your other question: Aging and Story Progression are unrelated, so yes your Sim's will just grow old and die.

[sandymdh]

I always make my own rabbitholes. Just make them and download a set of rabbithole mats. If you can't find them with Google try 'My Sims 3 Blog'. There are 3 different sets that I know of which modders have made just for this reason. Place say a 'school mat' in a school you have made and the sims walk right up to the mat and disappear to go to school. You can't get them to actually use the building as a school but it's the next best thing.

[cyzeller]

Okay, well, these things fix most of my problems. Is there a mod that anyone knows of to keep my inactive families from moving out unexpectedly? Or popping out kids when they aren't married/in a relationship?

[acid_fairy]

If you get Twallan's Story Progression mod, you can change the neighbourhood to age like it did in TS2. http://ts3.tscexchange.com/index.php?topic=4500.0

[cyzeller]

Thanks Acid. I'm reading through it, I guess I'm just not as computer literate as I thought.

[Mellowyellow09]

Cyzeller, if I remember correctly the inactive moving situation can be solved by playing all of the families you want to stay in the neighborhood. Make each family active, then play them for a short time.

[cyzeller]

Thanks Mellow. I'm glad to hear that. And if anyone could tell me real quick, what folder do I put the StoryProgression mod into? Just the mod folder? It's so wildly different for me, where everything goes.

[J. M. Pescado]

First off, if story progression is off, but aging on, will my inactive sims just get old and die?Yes.

Secondly, i have story progression off, and I am able to visit inactive sims, but I never see any of them walking around town. Is that why?No, EA story progression is completely unrelated to any form of visible activity, and can easily blatantly contradict anything you might have physically observed or deduced through observational evidence. Your inability to see anyone walking around town is due to a combination of graphical caching, draw distance, a bunch of other factors which may either make it so they're there, but you can't see them because it takes too long to render and you move on before it finishes, or simply because various other factors are keeping them from being there at all.

But basically, without AwesomeMod, the game is horribly broken.

[WoohooAndTheCity]

But basically, without AwesomeMod, the game is horribly broken.

Would you be interested in creating the Sims 4 for us before EA releases it in 3-4 years?

[kittenette069]

I have been a Sims 2 fanatic for a long time, but recently bought a new computer that could run Sims 3, so I was like, "what the heck, I'll start playing this instead." I bought all the expansions, and have all of the patches downloaded. It's been a week, and I'm kind of losing my mind.

I'm surprised you lasted a whole week. I literally played like 5 minutes, cut it off and went searching for mods.

And if anyone could tell me real quick, what folder do I put the StoryProgression mod into? Just the mod folder? It's so wildly different for me, where everything goes.

No, don't do that. Do this first:

1)Make sure you are putting your mods folder in the correct section. The mods folder will be in the Documents/EA/Sims 3, and not in the program files.
2) Inside your mod folder, create another folder and name it Packages. You'll put Story Progression and any other CC you get inside this folder.
3) Create another folder, label it DCCache. don't put anything in this folder, just leave it be.
4)Make sure you have the updated Resource config file, cause the old one doesn't work anymore.

Hope this helps.