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Mostly Productive Saturday
Apr. 16th, 2022 11:32 pmBit of a weird partly-cloudy/partly-sunny day -- kept looking like it might rain, then brightening back up again. *shrug* Decent temperatures, though -- which is more than I'll be able to say for Easter itself, if the forecast is right. But yeah, got through most of my to-do list without issue:
1. Free Writing Day – work on whatever catches my fancy: No check – I was GOING to find something before the final bit of YouTubery, but then I got caught up in looking at Sims 4 mods again. *shakes head* Ah well – guaranteed writing tomorrow!
2. Keep up with YouTube Subs and at least Plumbella in the WL: Check – actually got both videos out of the Watch Later today, so that was good –
A) Started this afternoon with the Plumbella in the WL – “i created perhaps the most horrific build challenge and i'm not sorry!” AKA, Plumbella decided, just for funsies, to do the INVERSE of a shell build challenge – instead of building a “shell” of a building that people could decorate how they liked without touching the walls, she put in all the OBJECTS of a house – a kitchen with island seating, a bathroom, a living room, and a bedroom – without any walls or flooring. As you might imagine, “moveobjects on” was used liberally, and she even found a way to put the bedroom and living room upstairs WITHOUT FLOORING. XD I’m not sure HOW – it seems to involve the use of temporary “columns” made of walls – but it was done. XD So now there’s a build on the gallery that is a kitchen and bathroom, and a floating bedroom and living room, where you have to build the walls around the objects without moving them (except to make sure that pictures and things don’t end up INSIDE the walls instead of ON them). Along the way, she talked about mental health struggles and how much she hates all of the base game couches. XD Weirdest video I’ve seen from her in a bit, but hey, it looked like fun! And it’s certainly a creative twist on the usual build challenge.
B) Then it was over to Call Me Kevin for his video of the day – “GTA 4 but it is 2022!” Yes, we traveled back to the strange days of GTA IV today, a game which is 14 years old this month! Yes, there was a joke or two about the passage of time. Anyway, this is the one with Niko and Roman, where the plot is SUPPOSED to be Niko – new to America – gets caught up in Roman’s stupid shady deals and has to constantly bail out his cousin’s idiot ass. In THIS version of reality, though, we had things like Niko throwing himself off a crane just minutes into the game; Niko stealing a police car so he could pretend to be a policeman; Niko beating up the very women the mission wanted him to meet and pick up because they wouldn’t actually respond properly unless he showed up in his car (including standing on top of Michelle, who will later become his girlfriend – and be revealed as a cop, apparently); Niko buying some glasses to look more intelligent; Niko ignoring Roman in trouble to go on the world’s most awkward date with Michelle, including jumping the fence into a closed amusement park to wade in the fountains and doing two seconds worth of bowling (during which he knocked down one pin); Niko crashing into Roman as he picked him up from the hospital; Niko doing a side mission with a dude on what I assume was a gun deal, only to kill their contact – and then, on the second run, showing up in a police car and calling for backup when he discovered the guy illegally sold a firearm; and Niko getting protection money out of a shop owner by firing an RPG through his shop window. XD Add into that the NPCs CONSTANTLY having trouble with doors for some reason (it looks like their AI kept trying to tell them to path in a straight line THROUGH the door, meaning they’d constantly bump into it and get stuck), and you had a recipe for GTA chaos! And Kevin didn’t even need a mod. :P
C) Then we had GrayStillPlays and some GTA V fun – “$1 vs $1000 Roller Coasters in GTA 5!” Yes, he has gone back on Fiverr to pay people to make him boards to play in GTA V – this time with a specific roller coaster theme! Let’s see what he got for his money, shall we?
$1 – Simple board where Gray had to take a roller coaster “motorcycle” over three humps to the win, with the last one requiring a simple jump. It was actually built to resemble his “noob-pro-legend” thumbnails from Happy Wheels a bit, which was fun! Also, the creator claimed to be nine in the “checkpoint” text, which Gray was like “I think you’re lying.” Also also, it took Gray three tries to complete the board, because first he got himself stuck sideways turning to read the "I'm nine" text, and then he missed the last little jump because he wasn't sure if it was there or not (you can't really see it before you get up the hump). XD
$10 – Creator decided to use the actual roller coaster track available in the game! (Yeah, there’s an amusement park on a dock with a roller coaster – don’t know if it’s rideable in the actual game though.) Gray had to parkour his way around it in his coaster car, while avoiding a few “untested” obstacles (like a boost designed to fling him off, and some tire columns indicating where he had to jump off and land on another part of the track). Took Gray a good few tries because of how fiddly the parkour was (especially with the “jump and land back on the track” bits), but he managed it in the end!
$100 – A straight track with a “ceiling” made up of dozens of windmills, a series of boosts – and pulsating ramps that will launch you up INTO the ceiling of windmills if they don’t just kill you outright. Also there’s a jump at the end into a thumbnail hole, and you need ALL your speed to make it. Gray and his coaster car suffered mightily, though Gray DID pull off some pretty cool saves from time to time. Took a few tries and a lot of concussions for Florida Man, but the board was beat!
$500 – Wall ride time! This one had a regular car, but a coaster track, with Gray having to wall ride said track in a big old loop – through a building no less – and then make a jump onto the floating bit of road that had the win at the end. Also, the longer he took, the more windmills spawned to make his life even worse. Gray SUFFERED for this one, as it was very hard for him to both commentate AND get the timing right, poor bastard. Just getting past windmill number ONE was difficult enough! He was begging everyone to stop trying to one-up each other by the end. XD But beat it he did!
$1,000 – The last person to do a $1,000 board decided to show Gray mercy – this creator, one Alex, decided to do the OPPOSITE. What Alex built can be summed up like this: “the last person made you look like you were perfect? Well, guess what Gray – now you have to BE perfect.” This was a “speed run” board with NO margin for error, NO checkpoints, and ALL the pulsating platforms. Gray had to drive his coaster car down the first set of pulsating platforms, bank into a wall ride, make it across the SECOND set of pulsating platforms, hop up the pulsating bits of roads with boosts, blow out a plywood wall with his rockets and do a loop, drive vertically down a chunk of road, blow out ANOTHER plywood wall, then make it down the ramp, get yeeted into a chassis slide, then hop across some more (fortunately non-pulsating) chunks of road from side to side (making sure to get the boosts in-between), before rotating sideways to fit through another thumbnail hole, before FINALLY getting boosted into the win. The first part of that took QUITE a few tries, but once Gray got that pattern down and got past the first plywood wall, he was ROCKING! :D It was a genuinely impressive finish, and I applaud him. And Alex. XD
D) And then, this evening, we concluded with the latest AT4W – “Dark Nights: Metal!” An event where Batman, thanks to shenanigans and getting stabbed with a bunch of different fictional metals (including one named after HIM, which is either stupid, awesome, or stupid-awesome), ends up the lynchpin of an invasion by a “dark multiverse” made of nightmares and ruled over by this evil “Great Dragon” character Barbatos, and the heroes have a pretty shitty time trying to stop things because there’s a ton of evil Batmen running around, plus Barbatos seems to anticipate all their moves in advance and make all the right deals to make sure they fail (especially poor Superman, who gets tricked into becoming a battery for a device to sink the entire multiverse into the darkness temporarily). But eventually Wonder Woman is able to kick some fuckin’ intense ass, save her friends, and get them all outfitted with pretty shiny “stuff of dreams” armor before using the hope and love of the entire Justice League to yank the Earth back into the light. . .a little too far, but that’s a story for another comic. It’s frighteningly fast-paced, and while there are a lot of good ideas here, it’s just – there’s too many continuity snarls and too much going on for anyone not familiar with the stories to keep up. I mean, it’s always funny to see Linkara rant about how the comic is ignoring the fact that “New 52” was supposed to be a reboot and whatnot, but damn. Also, terrible breakout character in “The Batman Who Laughs,” who LOOKS like the Joker in a spiky awful Batman costume but is apparently just an ultra-violent Bruce Wayne instead of anything more interesting. Ugh. I do not blame Linkara for deciding he needed a break after three pretty awful event comics and one “it’s not for me but I can see how other people might like it” event comic – poor guy is not coming back until May so he can catch up on other stuff. *salutes* Here’s hoping you can get your schedule back on track, Linkara!
3. Play Sims 4 and get through at least another day with Smiler Always: Check – I got through their Saturday, which had some highs and some lows:
Highs – Smiler successfully completed their term paper today, editing it to outstanding quality! They also attended the Foxbury School Spirit day at the campus, and discovered their friend Davion was part of that as well as the Bot Savants, so asked if they could join! They are now officially a member of the Spirit Squad, yay. :) They had a good time at school spirit day too, making insta-friends with Kazuki Miyamoto in the Larry costume and winning a game of juice pong with Thiago. :) Not to mention, all this friend-making has garnered them a Pristine Reputation, and the People Person lifestyle! And then, afterward, they were able to compel the passing Ivana for a drink and finally made Grand Master Vampire! Picking up the “Influence Emotion” power I wanted them to have all along, along with “Eternally Welcome” just for funsies. And they ended the day with an Incognito Costume Party over at the Von Haunt Estate (Smiler came dressed as a clown XD).
Lows – They also had an unsuccessful compel earlier that morning with someone they’d just insta-friended with a greeting, Cassie, meaning they lost that particular friend right away, whoops. They also got ANOTHER call from Alice where they had to tell her “no, don’t have kids without the player’s say-so” (seriously, is there a way to shut off these calls? I don’t care about the people I’m not playing, but Victor and Alice SHOULD BE EXCLUDED). Grand Master Vampire status also came with taking TWO weaknesses – I took “Sleep of the Undead” because who cares if Smiler has to sleep in a coffin, they don’t sleep anyway, but I agonized over the last one because there were no really good options. I ended up choosing “Guilty Drinker” as they’re kind of past the point where they have to compel people for XP, even if it means losing my fun “compelling Victor for plasma” animation. (Unless I find a mod that replaces the wrist drink with a neck drink. . .) And the Costume Party didn’t go as well as I’d hoped – I’d never thrown one before, and turns out there’s plenty of food-and-drink-specific goals (like make a hamburger cake). I managed to get done what I could, having Smiler bat-teleport into the kitchen to make that cake, buying a buffet table and “Don’t Wake The Llama” game set for the back porch, and chasing down guests to compliment their costumes, but it wasn’t enough to get more than bronze. :( At least Smiler seemed content with the outcome? (Oh, and I did figure out why my previous parties didn’t count toward the “throw three parties” goal of the Party Animal aspiration – you have to plan the party from your PHONE, not the calendar. Someone wanna update that?)
So yeah – not a perfect day in the Sims for Smiler, but at least we’ve finally got their Grand Vampire status, and the ability to influence people to be happy! :) And Sunday is Prank Day, and they DO have some Foxbury Spirit Squad organization goals to taunt some Britechester students. . .
4. Work on tumblr drafts: Check – worked on this before lunch, and finished up my write-up on pets in the “Fallout of Darkness” universe, plus got the initial pictures and some starter text for all four of the next Smiler Always Chill Save update posts. :) I also got some screenshots from Fallout 4 sorted if I want to do an update with them at some point!
Additionally:
-->We did indeed have beanbags this afternoon, right after Sims and despite rapidly-increasing clouds and wind – ended up playing the standard weekend five rounds too! I had a strong start, but then faltered in the remaining rounds, while Mom and Dad battled it out for a while – ended up me W-2-3-3-2, Dad 3-W-2-W-3, and Mom 2-3-W-2-W! Well, at least we all won one. :)
Not too bad, though I wish I had a little more inspiration for the writing side of things. Ah well -- won't kill me to have the occasional break, especially since I'm gearing up to edit the final chapter of part one of "Londerland Bloodlines" this upcoming week, then start part two. Plus probably the "official" version of "As Long As You Love Me." I'm going to be busy eventually, is what I'm saying! XD
And, according to this to-do list, I will be busy tomorrow too:
1. Keep up with the FO4 Playthrough Progression
2. Keep up with YouTube Subs, "Show of the Weekend" by OXtra, and Jon's F:NV "Utter Chaos" video
3. Play Fallout 4 and get Victor to Diamond City already
4. Work on tumblr drafts
5. Get in a workout
Reasonably standard Sunday stuff -- though "Show of the Weekend" is on there mainly because it's about video game Easter Eggs, and since we're probably not celebrating Easter any other way. . . XD Hey, it's what I like! So yeah, we'll see how all that goes tomorrow. Night all!
1. Free Writing Day – work on whatever catches my fancy: No check – I was GOING to find something before the final bit of YouTubery, but then I got caught up in looking at Sims 4 mods again. *shakes head* Ah well – guaranteed writing tomorrow!
2. Keep up with YouTube Subs and at least Plumbella in the WL: Check – actually got both videos out of the Watch Later today, so that was good –
A) Started this afternoon with the Plumbella in the WL – “i created perhaps the most horrific build challenge and i'm not sorry!” AKA, Plumbella decided, just for funsies, to do the INVERSE of a shell build challenge – instead of building a “shell” of a building that people could decorate how they liked without touching the walls, she put in all the OBJECTS of a house – a kitchen with island seating, a bathroom, a living room, and a bedroom – without any walls or flooring. As you might imagine, “moveobjects on” was used liberally, and she even found a way to put the bedroom and living room upstairs WITHOUT FLOORING. XD I’m not sure HOW – it seems to involve the use of temporary “columns” made of walls – but it was done. XD So now there’s a build on the gallery that is a kitchen and bathroom, and a floating bedroom and living room, where you have to build the walls around the objects without moving them (except to make sure that pictures and things don’t end up INSIDE the walls instead of ON them). Along the way, she talked about mental health struggles and how much she hates all of the base game couches. XD Weirdest video I’ve seen from her in a bit, but hey, it looked like fun! And it’s certainly a creative twist on the usual build challenge.
B) Then it was over to Call Me Kevin for his video of the day – “GTA 4 but it is 2022!” Yes, we traveled back to the strange days of GTA IV today, a game which is 14 years old this month! Yes, there was a joke or two about the passage of time. Anyway, this is the one with Niko and Roman, where the plot is SUPPOSED to be Niko – new to America – gets caught up in Roman’s stupid shady deals and has to constantly bail out his cousin’s idiot ass. In THIS version of reality, though, we had things like Niko throwing himself off a crane just minutes into the game; Niko stealing a police car so he could pretend to be a policeman; Niko beating up the very women the mission wanted him to meet and pick up because they wouldn’t actually respond properly unless he showed up in his car (including standing on top of Michelle, who will later become his girlfriend – and be revealed as a cop, apparently); Niko buying some glasses to look more intelligent; Niko ignoring Roman in trouble to go on the world’s most awkward date with Michelle, including jumping the fence into a closed amusement park to wade in the fountains and doing two seconds worth of bowling (during which he knocked down one pin); Niko crashing into Roman as he picked him up from the hospital; Niko doing a side mission with a dude on what I assume was a gun deal, only to kill their contact – and then, on the second run, showing up in a police car and calling for backup when he discovered the guy illegally sold a firearm; and Niko getting protection money out of a shop owner by firing an RPG through his shop window. XD Add into that the NPCs CONSTANTLY having trouble with doors for some reason (it looks like their AI kept trying to tell them to path in a straight line THROUGH the door, meaning they’d constantly bump into it and get stuck), and you had a recipe for GTA chaos! And Kevin didn’t even need a mod. :P
C) Then we had GrayStillPlays and some GTA V fun – “$1 vs $1000 Roller Coasters in GTA 5!” Yes, he has gone back on Fiverr to pay people to make him boards to play in GTA V – this time with a specific roller coaster theme! Let’s see what he got for his money, shall we?
$1 – Simple board where Gray had to take a roller coaster “motorcycle” over three humps to the win, with the last one requiring a simple jump. It was actually built to resemble his “noob-pro-legend” thumbnails from Happy Wheels a bit, which was fun! Also, the creator claimed to be nine in the “checkpoint” text, which Gray was like “I think you’re lying.” Also also, it took Gray three tries to complete the board, because first he got himself stuck sideways turning to read the "I'm nine" text, and then he missed the last little jump because he wasn't sure if it was there or not (you can't really see it before you get up the hump). XD
$10 – Creator decided to use the actual roller coaster track available in the game! (Yeah, there’s an amusement park on a dock with a roller coaster – don’t know if it’s rideable in the actual game though.) Gray had to parkour his way around it in his coaster car, while avoiding a few “untested” obstacles (like a boost designed to fling him off, and some tire columns indicating where he had to jump off and land on another part of the track). Took Gray a good few tries because of how fiddly the parkour was (especially with the “jump and land back on the track” bits), but he managed it in the end!
$100 – A straight track with a “ceiling” made up of dozens of windmills, a series of boosts – and pulsating ramps that will launch you up INTO the ceiling of windmills if they don’t just kill you outright. Also there’s a jump at the end into a thumbnail hole, and you need ALL your speed to make it. Gray and his coaster car suffered mightily, though Gray DID pull off some pretty cool saves from time to time. Took a few tries and a lot of concussions for Florida Man, but the board was beat!
$500 – Wall ride time! This one had a regular car, but a coaster track, with Gray having to wall ride said track in a big old loop – through a building no less – and then make a jump onto the floating bit of road that had the win at the end. Also, the longer he took, the more windmills spawned to make his life even worse. Gray SUFFERED for this one, as it was very hard for him to both commentate AND get the timing right, poor bastard. Just getting past windmill number ONE was difficult enough! He was begging everyone to stop trying to one-up each other by the end. XD But beat it he did!
$1,000 – The last person to do a $1,000 board decided to show Gray mercy – this creator, one Alex, decided to do the OPPOSITE. What Alex built can be summed up like this: “the last person made you look like you were perfect? Well, guess what Gray – now you have to BE perfect.” This was a “speed run” board with NO margin for error, NO checkpoints, and ALL the pulsating platforms. Gray had to drive his coaster car down the first set of pulsating platforms, bank into a wall ride, make it across the SECOND set of pulsating platforms, hop up the pulsating bits of roads with boosts, blow out a plywood wall with his rockets and do a loop, drive vertically down a chunk of road, blow out ANOTHER plywood wall, then make it down the ramp, get yeeted into a chassis slide, then hop across some more (fortunately non-pulsating) chunks of road from side to side (making sure to get the boosts in-between), before rotating sideways to fit through another thumbnail hole, before FINALLY getting boosted into the win. The first part of that took QUITE a few tries, but once Gray got that pattern down and got past the first plywood wall, he was ROCKING! :D It was a genuinely impressive finish, and I applaud him. And Alex. XD
D) And then, this evening, we concluded with the latest AT4W – “Dark Nights: Metal!” An event where Batman, thanks to shenanigans and getting stabbed with a bunch of different fictional metals (including one named after HIM, which is either stupid, awesome, or stupid-awesome), ends up the lynchpin of an invasion by a “dark multiverse” made of nightmares and ruled over by this evil “Great Dragon” character Barbatos, and the heroes have a pretty shitty time trying to stop things because there’s a ton of evil Batmen running around, plus Barbatos seems to anticipate all their moves in advance and make all the right deals to make sure they fail (especially poor Superman, who gets tricked into becoming a battery for a device to sink the entire multiverse into the darkness temporarily). But eventually Wonder Woman is able to kick some fuckin’ intense ass, save her friends, and get them all outfitted with pretty shiny “stuff of dreams” armor before using the hope and love of the entire Justice League to yank the Earth back into the light. . .a little too far, but that’s a story for another comic. It’s frighteningly fast-paced, and while there are a lot of good ideas here, it’s just – there’s too many continuity snarls and too much going on for anyone not familiar with the stories to keep up. I mean, it’s always funny to see Linkara rant about how the comic is ignoring the fact that “New 52” was supposed to be a reboot and whatnot, but damn. Also, terrible breakout character in “The Batman Who Laughs,” who LOOKS like the Joker in a spiky awful Batman costume but is apparently just an ultra-violent Bruce Wayne instead of anything more interesting. Ugh. I do not blame Linkara for deciding he needed a break after three pretty awful event comics and one “it’s not for me but I can see how other people might like it” event comic – poor guy is not coming back until May so he can catch up on other stuff. *salutes* Here’s hoping you can get your schedule back on track, Linkara!
3. Play Sims 4 and get through at least another day with Smiler Always: Check – I got through their Saturday, which had some highs and some lows:
Highs – Smiler successfully completed their term paper today, editing it to outstanding quality! They also attended the Foxbury School Spirit day at the campus, and discovered their friend Davion was part of that as well as the Bot Savants, so asked if they could join! They are now officially a member of the Spirit Squad, yay. :) They had a good time at school spirit day too, making insta-friends with Kazuki Miyamoto in the Larry costume and winning a game of juice pong with Thiago. :) Not to mention, all this friend-making has garnered them a Pristine Reputation, and the People Person lifestyle! And then, afterward, they were able to compel the passing Ivana for a drink and finally made Grand Master Vampire! Picking up the “Influence Emotion” power I wanted them to have all along, along with “Eternally Welcome” just for funsies. And they ended the day with an Incognito Costume Party over at the Von Haunt Estate (Smiler came dressed as a clown XD).
Lows – They also had an unsuccessful compel earlier that morning with someone they’d just insta-friended with a greeting, Cassie, meaning they lost that particular friend right away, whoops. They also got ANOTHER call from Alice where they had to tell her “no, don’t have kids without the player’s say-so” (seriously, is there a way to shut off these calls? I don’t care about the people I’m not playing, but Victor and Alice SHOULD BE EXCLUDED). Grand Master Vampire status also came with taking TWO weaknesses – I took “Sleep of the Undead” because who cares if Smiler has to sleep in a coffin, they don’t sleep anyway, but I agonized over the last one because there were no really good options. I ended up choosing “Guilty Drinker” as they’re kind of past the point where they have to compel people for XP, even if it means losing my fun “compelling Victor for plasma” animation. (Unless I find a mod that replaces the wrist drink with a neck drink. . .) And the Costume Party didn’t go as well as I’d hoped – I’d never thrown one before, and turns out there’s plenty of food-and-drink-specific goals (like make a hamburger cake). I managed to get done what I could, having Smiler bat-teleport into the kitchen to make that cake, buying a buffet table and “Don’t Wake The Llama” game set for the back porch, and chasing down guests to compliment their costumes, but it wasn’t enough to get more than bronze. :( At least Smiler seemed content with the outcome? (Oh, and I did figure out why my previous parties didn’t count toward the “throw three parties” goal of the Party Animal aspiration – you have to plan the party from your PHONE, not the calendar. Someone wanna update that?)
So yeah – not a perfect day in the Sims for Smiler, but at least we’ve finally got their Grand Vampire status, and the ability to influence people to be happy! :) And Sunday is Prank Day, and they DO have some Foxbury Spirit Squad organization goals to taunt some Britechester students. . .
4. Work on tumblr drafts: Check – worked on this before lunch, and finished up my write-up on pets in the “Fallout of Darkness” universe, plus got the initial pictures and some starter text for all four of the next Smiler Always Chill Save update posts. :) I also got some screenshots from Fallout 4 sorted if I want to do an update with them at some point!
Additionally:
-->We did indeed have beanbags this afternoon, right after Sims and despite rapidly-increasing clouds and wind – ended up playing the standard weekend five rounds too! I had a strong start, but then faltered in the remaining rounds, while Mom and Dad battled it out for a while – ended up me W-2-3-3-2, Dad 3-W-2-W-3, and Mom 2-3-W-2-W! Well, at least we all won one. :)
Not too bad, though I wish I had a little more inspiration for the writing side of things. Ah well -- won't kill me to have the occasional break, especially since I'm gearing up to edit the final chapter of part one of "Londerland Bloodlines" this upcoming week, then start part two. Plus probably the "official" version of "As Long As You Love Me." I'm going to be busy eventually, is what I'm saying! XD
And, according to this to-do list, I will be busy tomorrow too:
1. Keep up with the FO4 Playthrough Progression
2. Keep up with YouTube Subs, "Show of the Weekend" by OXtra, and Jon's F:NV "Utter Chaos" video
3. Play Fallout 4 and get Victor to Diamond City already
4. Work on tumblr drafts
5. Get in a workout
Reasonably standard Sunday stuff -- though "Show of the Weekend" is on there mainly because it's about video game Easter Eggs, and since we're probably not celebrating Easter any other way. . . XD Hey, it's what I like! So yeah, we'll see how all that goes tomorrow. Night all!
