The Return of MR. MONSTER

Updates!

• 2024-08-17:
  (1) MR. MONSTER will no longer call for kids that are not part of the current family. Thanks to PrincessBubblegum for the report.
  (2) Optimised the Report Card routine so then report cards are deleted from the world as early as possible if not needed for later.
• 2024-07-01:
  (1) Added a Finnish translation. Kiitos paljon, gloomykantele!
  (2) Updated the French translation to make it more gender-neutral. Thanks to Nostural!
• 2024-05-19: Separated the memory token from the rest of the mod. The function remains the same so you do not need to re-download, but this should help people who wish to organise their Downloads folder better.

Today, this Yoshi decided to play archaeologist and dig out a relic from Sims 2's development, buried within the game files.
Plus, given that it's spooky season, I felt like I should make a contribution to add a little bit of scary stuff to my favourite Sims game!

Among many other obscure things that got scrapped eventually, one or the other may also know that there were meant to be phone calls from "MR. MONSTER", the public school's Headmaster, as a consequence of bad report cards. But while the private school's Headmaster is kinda nice if you treat him nicely, as his name already implies, the public school's Headmaster really doesn't mince his words.

However, I like some sass and rudeness in my game, plus, this is still Sims 2 we are talking about, a game that generally is less nice to Sims as well as players.
So with that, I decided to bring MR. MONSTER back from his grave.

To get there I had to fix several things that Maxis left broken, given it was an unfinished feature and such; and of course, I needed to make sure the phone calls are generated properly, as by default the code is simply skipped.

What does this mod do?
With this mod in your Downloads folder, MR. MONSTER will be there to haunt your Sim's children and teens.

• Each school day, if at least one kid brings home a report card with a grade of D+ or worse (an easy way to tell is when they stomp their report card out of spite), and the kid is not in private school, MR. MONSTER will pay the family a visit through a phone call the same day at 8 PM.
  -- That said, I think kids would fling out of private school with such grades, but I decided to include this check anyway.
• Depending on who answers, he will say one of four things, and you get to have a choice of dialogue options. These options do different things, but most are not exactly in favour of the failing kid.
• When the dust is settled, whoever got to hear MR. MONSTER's ranting on the phone will receive a memory of it.

Requirements
Expansion Packs: University or higher.
This is because I spawn the University Majors as representatives of the school subject that MR. MONSTER claims the kid is especially bad in.

Translations

Language	Available?	Creator
English (US/UK)	✅	Me (LimeyYoshi)
German	✅	Me (LimeyYoshi)
French	✅	Nostural, Monsieur_Oshima
Spanish	✅	Luandros
Finnish	✅	gloomykantele
Polish	✅	Meduza
Hungarian	✅	kaligi

If you know your way around SimPE and would like to translate into your own language, feel free to contribute! You shall be given due credit.
Resources to translate are: the CTSS 0x07D0 (Catalogue Description) for the memory, the STR# 0x0101 (School Subjects) for the subjects that MR. MONSTER will mention, and the STR# 0x012D (Text Lists) for the different dialogue boxes.

Overrides

Resource name	Type	Group	Associated object or semiglobal	Instance
CT - Handle Call	BHAV	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001002
Bad Report Card - Set Lecture Topic	BHAV	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001003
[Text Lists]	STR#	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x0000012D
Function - Main	BHAV	0x7FD70673	Accessory - Report Card	0x00001001
Person B - React	BHAV	0x7FE23914	Social - Talk - Lecture - Strong	0x00001004
Lecturer - Throw Balloons	BHAV	0x7FE23914	Social - Talk - Lecture - Strong	0x0000100B

New resources

Resource name	Type	Group	Associated object or semiglobal	Instance
School Subjects	STR#	0x7FBA59DA	Mystery Sim	0x00000101
Mr. Monster Dialogues	BCON	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001000
Tuning - Memory	BCON	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001003
Sub - Cry	BHAV	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001004
Sub - Throw Mr Monster Dialogue	BHAV	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001005
Sub - Motives Drop	BHAV	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00001006
Anims - Adult	STR#	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00000081
Anims - Child	STR#	0x7F10E2FF	Phone Call - Bad Report Card	0x00000082

In any configuration of the vanilla game up to M&G, these resources do not exist, thus don't override anything.
If any mod, however, contains a resource of the same group and instance, it will automatically conflict with my mod, so be careful!

Additionally, a new object, the MR. MONSTER memory, is included in the file. Its GUID is 0x000A8074. All associated resources of types BHAV, BCON, STR# etc are also found in the package. These all have the group 0xFFFFFFFF and thus don't conflict with anything.
The memory is negative, strong, and unique (meaning it can only appear once ever in their life).

Trivia

• MR. MONSTER may be one of few canonical alcoholics in the Sims universe, as in one of the dialogues that the game shipped with, he talks about failing a "field sobriety test" and his eyes swimming in "fine, oak aged scotch". The latter being replaced with nectar for my mod, as Sims contains no actual alcohol.
• The line "You, yes you behind the bikesheds" is a direct reference to Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall, pt. 2", ending in "You, yes you behind the bikestands / Stand still, laddy!". How thematically fitting.

Conflicts and Notes
Anything that also modifies the above resources will conflict with my mods; but currently, no such mods are known to me.
Please let me know if there are any conflicts reported with mods you use, and I will see if something can be done about them by load order or through plug-ins.

• All variations of Cyjon's No Random Calls mod can be used alongside my mod.
• phonehack from MATY also does not clash.
• Chastise Unlocked is compatible. For the toddler-enabled version, you will have to make my mod load after theirs. Otherwise, toddlers will float when being chastised.
• Do not use my mod together with the Bad Report Card file within Christianlov's No Incoming Calls mod, as MR. MONSTER is included in the calls that get banished. The other twelve call bans are fine, though.

Note that once this mod is placed into your game, if you did not toggle the memory off in the BCON 0x1003 resource, you should not remove it unless you are sure that MR. MONSTER is purged from both Sims' memories as well as their gossip. Otherwise you may risk corruption. It's not the critical kind of corruption, but I figured I should point this out anyway.

Credits
Maxis and EA for creating Sims 2 in the first place
The Creators of SimPE and its plug-ins and Instruction Wizards
My fiancée for contributing ideas, as well as just being sweet in general
kaligi for the Hungarian translation
Luandros for the Spanish translation
Meduza for the Polish translation
Nostural and Monsieur_Oshima for the French translation
gloomykantele for the Finnish translation

Have fun and happy Simming!
~ LimeyYoshi