Busy But Nice Saturday
Jun. 8th, 2024 11:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickWeather was -- well, the temperature was lovely, but we had a lot of passing clouds that looked like rain (never actually rained, though), and a HELL of a lot of wind. Still nice, though! And while I didn't get off to the greatest start today, and ran into some concentrations near the end, I still got a lot done --
Tumblr: Reasonably productive day over here –
Victor Luvs Alice – Despite a later-than-I-wanted start thanks to being distracted by my parents’ finds at a yard sale they went to this morning (they got a special edition of Clue that looks like the original 1949 release of the game! Complete with GIANT weapons and classic cards and everything! It’s very cool), I DID manage to clean up the main text and add tags to all five posts making up this upcoming week’s Chill Valicer Save update! So now I just gotta get the image alt text sorted and I am golden. :)
Oh, and after I got my story stuff finished (see the “Writing” section below), I posted a link to the latest chapter of “Start At The Beginning...Sort Of” for all to see. I mean – we’ll see what happens!
Valice Multiverse – Nothing happening over here, so I just queued up the link I posted to Chapter Two of “Start At The Beginning...Sort Of.” *shrug* Again, we’ll see what happens.
Sims 4: Back into the building save today, for more work on the Ministry Of Joy Nightclub lot – though I DID spend a little time searching the #tinytown hashtag on the Gallery when I first booted the game up, just to see what was what. There were a lot of re-uploads of and variants on Deligracy’s original Henford-on-Bagley lot (which is just a large lot with a bunch of fenced-off mini-lots with tents, pee bushes, and a couple of other odds-and-ends for each resident), but there were also a few finished builds that were pretty neat to look at. Plus a few variants where people were specifically doing tiny towns with occult Sims, which made me happy because one of the first things I thought of after learning of the Tiny Town Challenge was “it would be really easy to combine this challenge with James Turner’s Every Occult Challenge!” So it’s great to know I wasn’t alone in that regard. XD But yes, after that diversion, it was straight over to the MOJ –
A) Where, as my first act of the day, I took everything I wanted to save (a couple of yellow pipes, one bathroom stall, the diaper changing station, and one sink out of the bathroom) out of and off the main building and then just DEMOLISHED it. Because, as I believe I stated last Friday, I found that the video CablesTwisted made of all the various AR stuff accessible using the scanner in The Smiler Game actually contained a pretty decent representation of what The Smiler station actually looks like, at least shape-wise. So I pulled that up on my phone and found the right spot, and paused it while I rebuilt roughly what I saw in the video on the lot. So now the lower level is roughly two rectangles (one with a bump-out on the front) joined almost diagonally at the corner (upper right to lower left), and the upper level is a much smaller blocky vaguely-L-shaped deal atop the first, larger rectangle. *shrugs* Makes the whole thing more visually interesting, that’s for sure! And it’s closer to the actual station, which is exactly what I wanted. :) Though I did stick with making the exterior of my build black (using base game black bricks) instead of gray like the actual station, as I feel that is more true to the actual Smiler color scheme. :p
B) With the building rebuilt, I took a moment to put the yellow pipes I’d saved on the front and find that nice black-and-yellow art deco door I used in the original build again and slap it into the notch beside the bump-out on the first rectangle to designate the entrance, then lined the two roofs with tiny half-walls since I planned on them being flat, and it just looks better if you have some sort of lip on them. Doing this made me realize the top of the first floor could maybe be adapted into some sort of rooftop party space – seems like the kind of thing Advocates would do! :) Haven’t done anything with it yet, but it’s definitely on my mind.
C) Anyway – after getting all the tiny half-walls up and putting appropriate trims on them (the fancy glass trim from Dine Out for the lower “balcony” walls; a plain black stone trim for the second story roof’s lip), I turned my attention to trying to figure out a floor plan for the building. I quickly decided that the stairs to the upper level should be on the far left wall, to keep them as out of the way as possible, and that the bathroom should be tucked in behind them. . .
D) Leading to me basically spending the rest of my time in the game working on said bathroom. XD I’m pretty proud of it, though – the entrance is one of the clouded glass Spa Day doors in purple (as I didn’t see anything good when I looked through the “yellow” door swatches), and it opens onto a bathroom with three black-and-yellow High School Years stalls, and a mostly-separate boxed-off area for infant diaper changes (using the Growing Together public infant changing station) and toddler potty time (since I wanted to give the kids some privacy – there’s no actual door, just an open section of wall on the right side, but it still provides some cover for what’s going in in there! I originally made the area with very tall half-walls, as I thought that would be a better look, but quickly realized that the fact that half-walls do NOT go down when you go into “walls cutaway” mode for the view would make things very frustrating for me playing it, so regular walls it is). Next to the door is a bank of Jungle Adventures Selvadoradan counters in black and white, with black and gold base game sinks in them – over each sink is a fancy gold Vintage Glamour mirror, and between them is a handful of the Snowy Adventures double-soap-pump sets, in the yellow swatch of course (I was so pleased to see those fit between the sinks and mirrors! Usually once I get the mirrors in I have to use ALT-key free-placement shenanigans to place my soap dispensers in public bathrooms. . .then again, I’m also usually using the big hand sanitizer thing from Get To Work, while these soap pumps are a LOT smaller, so. . .). There’s also a couple of Get To Work wall-mounted paper towel dispensers (in black) and square garbage cans (also in black). Oh, and the infant-and-toddler area has its own sink, paper towels, and garbage can to make things easier for parents. :) The floor is tiled in a nice black base game tile with occasional gray speckles, while I went with the same High School Years fancy black-and-white-with-gold-trim tiles that I used on the exterior of the Bubble Tea and Thrift Store. XD What, I like the look, and it went well with the stalls! Oh, and before I quit, I made sure to stick in some small black-framed windows on the outer walls, and put in those nice bright round lights that I used in the Thrift store, in a black-and-white swatch to match the rest of the room (I was going to use a fancy flower-themed High School Years light in yellow, but it just wasn’t bright enough).
And so yeah, that was my day in Sims 4! Fairly productive – I was very glad to get the shape of my nightclub better matching that of the actual coaster station, and I’m looking forward to figuring out the layout and what should go where. I want it to be a rocking party destination once I’m done with it! Fit for any “Advocates” clubs that I may make in any future save files. ;) I’ll keep you updated!
Writing: I finished up my final editing past of Chapter Two of “Start At The Beginning...Sort Of” after lunch today, then went ahead and posted the chapter. . .and then, after I was done with my Sims 4 building for the day, I went back and updated all the author’s notes on all the chapters to be more extensive and explain more stuff (mainly about Smiler’s deal and Duskwall, since I imagine that’s what will confuse most readers). Because, well, I worried that one of the reasons I got absolutely no comments on the first couple of chapters is that there was too much of a “barrier to entry” to the fic, so I wanted to try and make things more understandable to people. I have no idea if that did anything or not, but – I tried? *sigh* Anyway, here’s the link for anyone who wants to check it out – Duskwall’s Specter Bride. Feel free to comment over there if you liked it! It would – honestly mean a lot to me.
YouTube: Welp, I didn’t get through as much of the Watch Later as I wanted, but I did get the video that I wanted to watch, watched, along with the daily Subs video, so that’s a win there –
A) First up, from Petey Plays It, we had “I Made A Perfect Teen Sim | Super Sim Series 7!” This episode saw the end of his Super Sim Tina’s teenage lifestage (after a couple more potions of youth, of course), with a focus on her mending her chaotic ways from the last episode and completing those last few teen-exclusive goals that she needed to conquer. Specifically, she:
I. Went on a retreat to Granite Falls with her mom Sally to start working on her “Inner Peace” aspiration (at a REALLY NICE wellness retreat build that Petey created) and start her bug collection
II. Gave Mars another Potion of Youth so they could try the whole romance thing again (unfortunately, that didn’t work out, as Mars is as hot and cold as a certain Katy Perry song)
III. Saw her mother become an elder, and then – after Sally died somewhere in the world and Petey couldn’t find her tombstone – used the power of cheating to summon her ghost to the lot, revive her, and kill her again via a Death Flower flower arrangement so she could have Sally’s grave with her and make sure she could continue to bond with her ghost
IV. Left the Wildfangs to join and take over the Moonwood Collective werewolf pack instead, spreading werewolf diplomacy far and wide before leaving the pack in the wake of her mother’s death
V. Maxed her Mischief skill in the least-disruptive way possible by buying a water slide and adding soap to it regularly (apparently if you max Mischief as a teen, you get a special trait for it! Did not know that!)
VI. Became an Admired Icon at her school through the power of friendship, parties, Trendi, and cheats because Social Bunny and the “get 250 followers on Social Bunny” milestone of that aspiration are both bugged as all hell, ugh
VII. Attended two proms and managed to get Class Jester at the second, though she never got a chance to actually go with Mars, even as a friend (hot and cold!)
VIII. Became Captain of the Football Team, the Cheerleading Team, and the Chess Team, before finishing off by becoming a Junior Artiste in the Drama Club
IX. Got all of her Character Values into the green for bonus traits – though, hilariously, getting “Conflict Resolution” up required her to re-embrace her chaotic lifestyle for a bit, as the best way to do it was to insult people, then immediately apologize to them XD
X. Finished off her high school years by asking the principal for an early graduation, which felt ironic given that she’s been a teenager at least three times as long as any normal Sim on Petey’s chosen lifespan XD
So yes – Tina has finally Done It All as a teenager, earning a bunch of bonus traits, a ton of trophies and other awards for all her after-school activities, and the respect of both packs in Moonwood Mill. Now Young Adulthood awaits – and I presume university, though perhaps Petey wants to pursue a few other things first. We shall see in the next episode!
B) And second up, from GrayStillPlays, we had “Potholes vs speedbumps in GTA 5!” A Head-To-Head Torture Board that saw Gray having to conquer four challenges to unlock a final boss challenge (and the car to win it, as the opening text explicitly said none of the cars that Gray had originally be given to try could win). The challenges were divided into two parts, each with a Speedbump Path and a Pothole Path –
Part I: “Baby Mug, Mama Mug, Papa Mug” Speedbumps (where Gray had 44 seconds to get across three sections of increasingly larger and higher speedbumps made out of his mugs to reach Unlock 1) vs Growing Mug Potholes (where Gray had 40 seconds to bounce his way along a winding path made up of increasing large mug bottoms, with the dips getting deeper as the mugs got bigger, to reach Unlock 2)
Part II: Speedbumps But It’s Only Speedbumps And They Only Get Worse (where Gray had to basically drive on a bunch of triangles, which got more and more spaced out as he went along, making it more and more likely a vehicle would be caught in the wedges between the “spikes,” to reach Unlock 3) vs Potholes But It’s 1% Of A Road And 99% Of A Pothole (where Gray had to basically drive on a metal framework of diamond shapes (think a bunch of giant metal sideless cube frames turned diagonally), which got a little more spaced out as he went on, to reach Unlock 4)
Pretty rough challenges, right? And they did indeed claim a lot of cars – including the Weiner trike, Mom’s milk-colored Smart Car, and a six-wheeled truck that Gray thought would do really well on the starting potholes. Though the ridiculous bus that Gray took out as the “baseline” actually did SHOCKINGLY well – it got to the end of both the initial “Mug” speedbumps and potholes! Not within the time limit, but still. XD So which vehicles got which unlocks?
Unlock 1 – The fucking SCOOTER (which came with 400 rear-view mirrors and a free John Wick on the back) actually made it across the “Mug” speedbumps – though, admittedly, Gray was able to cheat the very first bit of the board because the mugs didn’t go all the way to the curb of the street. XD Still, it did it, and better than Gray ever expected! (He also tried the “Only” Speedbumps with it, but while it did the first section great, the minute the triangles spread out, it got stuck.)
Unlock 2 – The fastest gold car on offer made it past the “Mug” potholes due to sheer speed making up for any handling issues. Sometimes, you just gotta go fast!
Unlock 4 – The Dragur bounced its way perfectly across the “99%” potholes, due to having an amazing suspension – unfortunately, it was bested by the invisible wall the board creators put between it and Unlock 3, so Gray couldn’t cheat his way over there. XD
Unlock 3 – The final one Gray opened up – and he did it with the SHERP. Yes, our favorite Box On Mega Wheels actually did FANTASTICALLY against the “Only” Speedbumps THANKS to its giant powerful wheels. Gray was shocked and delighted that the Sherp can do MULTIPLE things right. :D Favorite Failcar!
Of course, this was all just a teaser for Gray unlocking the Final Challenge – which consisted of a UFO going in a circle, dangling from its tractor beam a giant spinning speedbump wheel. Fortunately, in order to take on that challenge, Gray had unlocked the Ultimate Speedbumps And Potholes Champion, our beloved Wastelander. :D Gray thus hopped into the front seat –
And was teleported back to the beginning of the challenge. To redo his run down there. With the timed challenges having had their time limits go down by 10 seconds each (34 seconds for the “Mug” speedbumps, and 30 for the “Mug” potholes), and the “99%” potholes having a bit of a different framework at the beginning to throw Gray off. Oh man. XD But as he now had the Wastelander in his possession, Gray was easily able to overcome the upgraded initial challenges, and make his way back to the ACTUAL final challenge –
Part III: Survive For “Guess How Many Seconds!” Where Gray had to ride the top of the spinning ring of speedbumps, bumping along and turning along with it, avoiding being thrown off until he made it around to a second UFO with a teleporter beam ready to bring him to the win. Oh, and he didn’t have to just survive for the funny number (69, as always) – he also had to actually be in the right SPOT to get in the teleporter, as he learned to his rage. So yeah, this one took a couple of tries before he finally managed to beat it. Fortunate that this kind of bullshit is the Wastelander’s specialty! XD Hell of a challenge board, that’s for sure! But it’s nice to see them getting a bit more creative.
(Oh, and if you were wondering – Gray personally thinks speedbumps are better than potholes when it comes to vehicular torture. The more you know!)
Other: A nice (enough) day meant that we had our usual five rounds of weekend beanbags – and I fortunately FINALLY found my rhythm again and actually WON a couple of games! Though, admittedly, my second win was mostly because my Dad managed to screw up the throw that would have at least tied me and knocked the tying beanbag off the board. XD Final scores were me 3-W-2-W-2; Dad W-3-W-2-3; Mom 2-2-3-3-W – which means we all won one, yay. :) Always glad when that happens!
Whew -- well, that was a lot. XD But hey, I'm glad to have gotten all of it done. :) And tomorrow is Victor's birthday, so THAT'S special -- gotta get in the Plushy Celebration picture and find ways to enjoy all the Victor content! :) I also have to get all the image alt text done for the Chill Valicer Save update in the wings on Victor Luvs Alice; play Fallout 4 and get my Sole Survivor!Victor over to Rust Devil headquarters; update the FO4 Playthrough Progression appropriately; get in my workout (with Corpse Bride videos, of course), and keep up with GrayStillPlays and Jon's latest offerings. Hopefully this is all doable -- I mean, it'd better be, I want to have a nice Victor!Birthday tomorrow. :p Night all!
Tumblr: Reasonably productive day over here –
Victor Luvs Alice – Despite a later-than-I-wanted start thanks to being distracted by my parents’ finds at a yard sale they went to this morning (they got a special edition of Clue that looks like the original 1949 release of the game! Complete with GIANT weapons and classic cards and everything! It’s very cool), I DID manage to clean up the main text and add tags to all five posts making up this upcoming week’s Chill Valicer Save update! So now I just gotta get the image alt text sorted and I am golden. :)
Oh, and after I got my story stuff finished (see the “Writing” section below), I posted a link to the latest chapter of “Start At The Beginning...Sort Of” for all to see. I mean – we’ll see what happens!
Valice Multiverse – Nothing happening over here, so I just queued up the link I posted to Chapter Two of “Start At The Beginning...Sort Of.” *shrug* Again, we’ll see what happens.
Sims 4: Back into the building save today, for more work on the Ministry Of Joy Nightclub lot – though I DID spend a little time searching the #tinytown hashtag on the Gallery when I first booted the game up, just to see what was what. There were a lot of re-uploads of and variants on Deligracy’s original Henford-on-Bagley lot (which is just a large lot with a bunch of fenced-off mini-lots with tents, pee bushes, and a couple of other odds-and-ends for each resident), but there were also a few finished builds that were pretty neat to look at. Plus a few variants where people were specifically doing tiny towns with occult Sims, which made me happy because one of the first things I thought of after learning of the Tiny Town Challenge was “it would be really easy to combine this challenge with James Turner’s Every Occult Challenge!” So it’s great to know I wasn’t alone in that regard. XD But yes, after that diversion, it was straight over to the MOJ –
A) Where, as my first act of the day, I took everything I wanted to save (a couple of yellow pipes, one bathroom stall, the diaper changing station, and one sink out of the bathroom) out of and off the main building and then just DEMOLISHED it. Because, as I believe I stated last Friday, I found that the video CablesTwisted made of all the various AR stuff accessible using the scanner in The Smiler Game actually contained a pretty decent representation of what The Smiler station actually looks like, at least shape-wise. So I pulled that up on my phone and found the right spot, and paused it while I rebuilt roughly what I saw in the video on the lot. So now the lower level is roughly two rectangles (one with a bump-out on the front) joined almost diagonally at the corner (upper right to lower left), and the upper level is a much smaller blocky vaguely-L-shaped deal atop the first, larger rectangle. *shrugs* Makes the whole thing more visually interesting, that’s for sure! And it’s closer to the actual station, which is exactly what I wanted. :) Though I did stick with making the exterior of my build black (using base game black bricks) instead of gray like the actual station, as I feel that is more true to the actual Smiler color scheme. :p
B) With the building rebuilt, I took a moment to put the yellow pipes I’d saved on the front and find that nice black-and-yellow art deco door I used in the original build again and slap it into the notch beside the bump-out on the first rectangle to designate the entrance, then lined the two roofs with tiny half-walls since I planned on them being flat, and it just looks better if you have some sort of lip on them. Doing this made me realize the top of the first floor could maybe be adapted into some sort of rooftop party space – seems like the kind of thing Advocates would do! :) Haven’t done anything with it yet, but it’s definitely on my mind.
C) Anyway – after getting all the tiny half-walls up and putting appropriate trims on them (the fancy glass trim from Dine Out for the lower “balcony” walls; a plain black stone trim for the second story roof’s lip), I turned my attention to trying to figure out a floor plan for the building. I quickly decided that the stairs to the upper level should be on the far left wall, to keep them as out of the way as possible, and that the bathroom should be tucked in behind them. . .
D) Leading to me basically spending the rest of my time in the game working on said bathroom. XD I’m pretty proud of it, though – the entrance is one of the clouded glass Spa Day doors in purple (as I didn’t see anything good when I looked through the “yellow” door swatches), and it opens onto a bathroom with three black-and-yellow High School Years stalls, and a mostly-separate boxed-off area for infant diaper changes (using the Growing Together public infant changing station) and toddler potty time (since I wanted to give the kids some privacy – there’s no actual door, just an open section of wall on the right side, but it still provides some cover for what’s going in in there! I originally made the area with very tall half-walls, as I thought that would be a better look, but quickly realized that the fact that half-walls do NOT go down when you go into “walls cutaway” mode for the view would make things very frustrating for me playing it, so regular walls it is). Next to the door is a bank of Jungle Adventures Selvadoradan counters in black and white, with black and gold base game sinks in them – over each sink is a fancy gold Vintage Glamour mirror, and between them is a handful of the Snowy Adventures double-soap-pump sets, in the yellow swatch of course (I was so pleased to see those fit between the sinks and mirrors! Usually once I get the mirrors in I have to use ALT-key free-placement shenanigans to place my soap dispensers in public bathrooms. . .then again, I’m also usually using the big hand sanitizer thing from Get To Work, while these soap pumps are a LOT smaller, so. . .). There’s also a couple of Get To Work wall-mounted paper towel dispensers (in black) and square garbage cans (also in black). Oh, and the infant-and-toddler area has its own sink, paper towels, and garbage can to make things easier for parents. :) The floor is tiled in a nice black base game tile with occasional gray speckles, while I went with the same High School Years fancy black-and-white-with-gold-trim tiles that I used on the exterior of the Bubble Tea and Thrift Store. XD What, I like the look, and it went well with the stalls! Oh, and before I quit, I made sure to stick in some small black-framed windows on the outer walls, and put in those nice bright round lights that I used in the Thrift store, in a black-and-white swatch to match the rest of the room (I was going to use a fancy flower-themed High School Years light in yellow, but it just wasn’t bright enough).
And so yeah, that was my day in Sims 4! Fairly productive – I was very glad to get the shape of my nightclub better matching that of the actual coaster station, and I’m looking forward to figuring out the layout and what should go where. I want it to be a rocking party destination once I’m done with it! Fit for any “Advocates” clubs that I may make in any future save files. ;) I’ll keep you updated!
Writing: I finished up my final editing past of Chapter Two of “Start At The Beginning...Sort Of” after lunch today, then went ahead and posted the chapter. . .and then, after I was done with my Sims 4 building for the day, I went back and updated all the author’s notes on all the chapters to be more extensive and explain more stuff (mainly about Smiler’s deal and Duskwall, since I imagine that’s what will confuse most readers). Because, well, I worried that one of the reasons I got absolutely no comments on the first couple of chapters is that there was too much of a “barrier to entry” to the fic, so I wanted to try and make things more understandable to people. I have no idea if that did anything or not, but – I tried? *sigh* Anyway, here’s the link for anyone who wants to check it out – Duskwall’s Specter Bride. Feel free to comment over there if you liked it! It would – honestly mean a lot to me.
YouTube: Welp, I didn’t get through as much of the Watch Later as I wanted, but I did get the video that I wanted to watch, watched, along with the daily Subs video, so that’s a win there –
A) First up, from Petey Plays It, we had “I Made A Perfect Teen Sim | Super Sim Series 7!” This episode saw the end of his Super Sim Tina’s teenage lifestage (after a couple more potions of youth, of course), with a focus on her mending her chaotic ways from the last episode and completing those last few teen-exclusive goals that she needed to conquer. Specifically, she:
I. Went on a retreat to Granite Falls with her mom Sally to start working on her “Inner Peace” aspiration (at a REALLY NICE wellness retreat build that Petey created) and start her bug collection
II. Gave Mars another Potion of Youth so they could try the whole romance thing again (unfortunately, that didn’t work out, as Mars is as hot and cold as a certain Katy Perry song)
III. Saw her mother become an elder, and then – after Sally died somewhere in the world and Petey couldn’t find her tombstone – used the power of cheating to summon her ghost to the lot, revive her, and kill her again via a Death Flower flower arrangement so she could have Sally’s grave with her and make sure she could continue to bond with her ghost
IV. Left the Wildfangs to join and take over the Moonwood Collective werewolf pack instead, spreading werewolf diplomacy far and wide before leaving the pack in the wake of her mother’s death
V. Maxed her Mischief skill in the least-disruptive way possible by buying a water slide and adding soap to it regularly (apparently if you max Mischief as a teen, you get a special trait for it! Did not know that!)
VI. Became an Admired Icon at her school through the power of friendship, parties, Trendi, and cheats because Social Bunny and the “get 250 followers on Social Bunny” milestone of that aspiration are both bugged as all hell, ugh
VII. Attended two proms and managed to get Class Jester at the second, though she never got a chance to actually go with Mars, even as a friend (hot and cold!)
VIII. Became Captain of the Football Team, the Cheerleading Team, and the Chess Team, before finishing off by becoming a Junior Artiste in the Drama Club
IX. Got all of her Character Values into the green for bonus traits – though, hilariously, getting “Conflict Resolution” up required her to re-embrace her chaotic lifestyle for a bit, as the best way to do it was to insult people, then immediately apologize to them XD
X. Finished off her high school years by asking the principal for an early graduation, which felt ironic given that she’s been a teenager at least three times as long as any normal Sim on Petey’s chosen lifespan XD
So yes – Tina has finally Done It All as a teenager, earning a bunch of bonus traits, a ton of trophies and other awards for all her after-school activities, and the respect of both packs in Moonwood Mill. Now Young Adulthood awaits – and I presume university, though perhaps Petey wants to pursue a few other things first. We shall see in the next episode!
B) And second up, from GrayStillPlays, we had “Potholes vs speedbumps in GTA 5!” A Head-To-Head Torture Board that saw Gray having to conquer four challenges to unlock a final boss challenge (and the car to win it, as the opening text explicitly said none of the cars that Gray had originally be given to try could win). The challenges were divided into two parts, each with a Speedbump Path and a Pothole Path –
Part I: “Baby Mug, Mama Mug, Papa Mug” Speedbumps (where Gray had 44 seconds to get across three sections of increasingly larger and higher speedbumps made out of his mugs to reach Unlock 1) vs Growing Mug Potholes (where Gray had 40 seconds to bounce his way along a winding path made up of increasing large mug bottoms, with the dips getting deeper as the mugs got bigger, to reach Unlock 2)
Part II: Speedbumps But It’s Only Speedbumps And They Only Get Worse (where Gray had to basically drive on a bunch of triangles, which got more and more spaced out as he went along, making it more and more likely a vehicle would be caught in the wedges between the “spikes,” to reach Unlock 3) vs Potholes But It’s 1% Of A Road And 99% Of A Pothole (where Gray had to basically drive on a metal framework of diamond shapes (think a bunch of giant metal sideless cube frames turned diagonally), which got a little more spaced out as he went on, to reach Unlock 4)
Pretty rough challenges, right? And they did indeed claim a lot of cars – including the Weiner trike, Mom’s milk-colored Smart Car, and a six-wheeled truck that Gray thought would do really well on the starting potholes. Though the ridiculous bus that Gray took out as the “baseline” actually did SHOCKINGLY well – it got to the end of both the initial “Mug” speedbumps and potholes! Not within the time limit, but still. XD So which vehicles got which unlocks?
Unlock 1 – The fucking SCOOTER (which came with 400 rear-view mirrors and a free John Wick on the back) actually made it across the “Mug” speedbumps – though, admittedly, Gray was able to cheat the very first bit of the board because the mugs didn’t go all the way to the curb of the street. XD Still, it did it, and better than Gray ever expected! (He also tried the “Only” Speedbumps with it, but while it did the first section great, the minute the triangles spread out, it got stuck.)
Unlock 2 – The fastest gold car on offer made it past the “Mug” potholes due to sheer speed making up for any handling issues. Sometimes, you just gotta go fast!
Unlock 4 – The Dragur bounced its way perfectly across the “99%” potholes, due to having an amazing suspension – unfortunately, it was bested by the invisible wall the board creators put between it and Unlock 3, so Gray couldn’t cheat his way over there. XD
Unlock 3 – The final one Gray opened up – and he did it with the SHERP. Yes, our favorite Box On Mega Wheels actually did FANTASTICALLY against the “Only” Speedbumps THANKS to its giant powerful wheels. Gray was shocked and delighted that the Sherp can do MULTIPLE things right. :D Favorite Failcar!
Of course, this was all just a teaser for Gray unlocking the Final Challenge – which consisted of a UFO going in a circle, dangling from its tractor beam a giant spinning speedbump wheel. Fortunately, in order to take on that challenge, Gray had unlocked the Ultimate Speedbumps And Potholes Champion, our beloved Wastelander. :D Gray thus hopped into the front seat –
And was teleported back to the beginning of the challenge. To redo his run down there. With the timed challenges having had their time limits go down by 10 seconds each (34 seconds for the “Mug” speedbumps, and 30 for the “Mug” potholes), and the “99%” potholes having a bit of a different framework at the beginning to throw Gray off. Oh man. XD But as he now had the Wastelander in his possession, Gray was easily able to overcome the upgraded initial challenges, and make his way back to the ACTUAL final challenge –
Part III: Survive For “Guess How Many Seconds!” Where Gray had to ride the top of the spinning ring of speedbumps, bumping along and turning along with it, avoiding being thrown off until he made it around to a second UFO with a teleporter beam ready to bring him to the win. Oh, and he didn’t have to just survive for the funny number (69, as always) – he also had to actually be in the right SPOT to get in the teleporter, as he learned to his rage. So yeah, this one took a couple of tries before he finally managed to beat it. Fortunate that this kind of bullshit is the Wastelander’s specialty! XD Hell of a challenge board, that’s for sure! But it’s nice to see them getting a bit more creative.
(Oh, and if you were wondering – Gray personally thinks speedbumps are better than potholes when it comes to vehicular torture. The more you know!)
Other: A nice (enough) day meant that we had our usual five rounds of weekend beanbags – and I fortunately FINALLY found my rhythm again and actually WON a couple of games! Though, admittedly, my second win was mostly because my Dad managed to screw up the throw that would have at least tied me and knocked the tying beanbag off the board. XD Final scores were me 3-W-2-W-2; Dad W-3-W-2-3; Mom 2-2-3-3-W – which means we all won one, yay. :) Always glad when that happens!
Whew -- well, that was a lot. XD But hey, I'm glad to have gotten all of it done. :) And tomorrow is Victor's birthday, so THAT'S special -- gotta get in the Plushy Celebration picture and find ways to enjoy all the Victor content! :) I also have to get all the image alt text done for the Chill Valicer Save update in the wings on Victor Luvs Alice; play Fallout 4 and get my Sole Survivor!Victor over to Rust Devil headquarters; update the FO4 Playthrough Progression appropriately; get in my workout (with Corpse Bride videos, of course), and keep up with GrayStillPlays and Jon's latest offerings. Hopefully this is all doable -- I mean, it'd better be, I want to have a nice Victor!Birthday tomorrow. :p Night all!
