ENGULFED in a BLAZE!

 

Having killed one Sim at the Day Spa, Willow is feeling a little chilly so heads home to warm up.

Greeted by her familiar Tabitha, her beloved cat, she decides to better her relationship with her by giving her treats and playing games.  Willow also takes this time to practice some magic in order to progress to the next level of "wand" spells, thereby gaining strength and notoriety as a witch.

Now Willow, being evil, loves starting fires and causing misery to other Sims so it isn't long before she decides to return to the Unity Day Spa to cast a few more spells and generally cause havoc.

After casting a couple of fire blast spells, a couple of Sims turn up to shout and jump about.  As we know, this is the worst thing a Sim can do, especially with an evil witch on the lot.  The best thing a Sim could do is to just stay away unless of course they want to help by putting out the fires or other Sims but even this, as we have seen in the past, can turn out to be fatal.

Of course, you always get at least one do-gooder join the party, ready with fire extinguisher in hand, standing in one space for a period of time.  And that's the problem.  For them anyway.  Standing in one spot for a period of time can only mean one thing.  The evil witch has time to cast a fire blast spell at your feet, causing a terrible blaze that can engulf you and lead to your demise.

So whether you are a Sim trying to extinguish fires or just standing jumping about and screaming, you're a sitting duck where Willow is concerned.

And that's exactly what happened at the Day Spa on this particular day.  One do-gooder and plenty of other Sims jumping up and down, waving their arms in the air and screaming.  Willow has a field day!

But, will anyone die?

- Minicart (Jules)

Snow in The Sims 2

Getting snow in The Sims 2 was a little different than in TS3 and TS4.  You couldn't skate on an icy pond like you could in TS3 although there was an ice skating rink venue that you could place to send your Sims to.  Much like in TS4 where the ice skating rink shows up in parks in various worlds.

You could build a snowman and create a snow angel and of course have a snowball fight, just like in future games although building an igloo wasn't a feature until The Sims 3.

A couple of things I do miss from The Sims 2 regarding snow that we never had again was when it starting snowing, children and adults alike would run to the window and look outside.  Children would get excited and so would some adults.  They would also get a memory of "first snow"!  However there were adults that weren't very happy with this and would shake their heads, just like in real life!

Another thing was the way Sims would walk in the deep snow; I don't believe we have had that type of animation since.

And of course the penguin!  Who could forget that lovable penguin that ventured onto your lot when it snowed!  If you had a snowman in the yard, the penguin would walk up to it and chat to it.

In this video I have pieced together all the little video snippets that I have of snow in The Sims 2.  I hope you enjoy it!  Don't forget to comment below and let me know what you think!

Cheers!

- Minicart (Jules)

 

Delivering the Ancient Writings

 

The Resolute Fist Retreat holds many treasures and also traps that John has overcome.  There is a long corridor at the side of the Retreat that John needs to go down to reach the door at the end.  However, it is full of fire traps.

Being an adept in the martial arts skill however, John is able to easily pass through these traps, disabling them on the way, to reach the door at the far end of the corridor.  A treasure chest lays within where John collects more loot and safely places it into his backpack.

John decides to spend the night at the Retreat and in the morning delivers the Ancient Writings, earning simoleons and ancient coins.

Completing this adventure, John embarks on a new one but first he must set up a Martial Arts Tournament with a spar tournament contender for an opportunity he received at work.  Unfortunately however, Maya Wang isn't available.

Hopefully next time, he will be able to set up this Tournament to get ahead with his job and maybe earn a promotion.

- Minicart (Jules)

Unity Day Spa INFERNO!

 

Willow tends to have her favourite spots in Dragon Valley to light fires, such as the graveyards, park and grocery store.  She has killed many Sims in these places and seemingly enjoyed every minute of it.  One place that she hasn't been to for a long while is the Unity Day Spa.  She had forgotten that she had great success in killing a Sim there quite a while ago and so decided to give this community lot another shot.

Willow was going to take Tabitha with her but decided against it as Tabitha was quite tired and needed to sleep.  Besides, she didn't want Tabitha getting hurt.

After lighting a couple of fires, not surprisingly, a few Sims turned up on the lot to shout, scream, jump up and down and wave their arms around.  Sitting ducks, (which is a phrase that I use quite often these days), Willow lights a couple of fires very near these Sims to see if she can catch them alight.

As is quite normal in these situations, the Sims just carry on jumping around and screaming.  Sometimes they run off still on fire and return to their homes where you can see the flames emanating from them through the windows.  But not today.  Today they are sitting ducks.  One Sim passes out as the Grim Reaper returns to the realm of the living to reap yet another soul.

- Minicart (Jules)

Overcoming the Fire Traps

After finding and retrieving the Ancient Writings of Qin Shan Hu, John decides to venture further through the dungeons of the Resolute Fist Retreat.  

There are two more doors that he hasn't been through.  One is open which has a long corridor leading to another door but is full of fire traps.  The other door also contains corridors with fire traps but there are holes in the walls that John can inspect.  Maybe these will disarm the traps, enabling John to get through.

Our hero proceeds to inspect the holes and does in fact disable a few of the fire traps.  However, not all are disabled (again due to the players 'misunderstanding' of the message on the plaque by the door) and so John attempts to cross these traps.  As John is proficient in the martial arts skill, he does this with ease, rolling through the flames like a ninja.

At the end of the corridor another door awaits him which leads to a small room containing yet another treasure chest.  John collects the loot and safely packs it into his backpack.

Carefully looking around, John finds another secret door which he nearly missed.  Using his strength to open it, he finds himself in yet another room containing treasure and ancient coins.

But John isn't done yet.  There is still the long corridor containing deathly fire traps with a door at the end.  Will he manage to defeat the traps?  If he does, what will he find?

- Minicart (Jules)

Death at the Fall Festival

 

In this episode of The Evil Witch of Dragon Valley, we see Willow up to her old tricks again.  In fact, she never really stopped.  Being evil is Willows speciality.  Not only does she annihilate Sims, she laughs at their misfortune and demise.  It's a wonder that Willow has any friends but of course the Friendship elixir helps with that.  Being a friend of Willows means that you stand less of a chance of getting burned to death.

As it's Autumn in Dragon Valley, the Fall Festival has come to town.  Full of Halloween fun things to do such as pumpkin picking and the Haunted House, the Fall Festival is also a great place to start fires.  Especially near the haystacks which lay conveniently by the Haunted House attraction.

Willow, being evil, takes advantage of this and proceeds to light a couple of fires.  Four in fact.  Just little ones which turn into an inferno.  A few do-gooders come by and try and put out these fires to no avail.  Even a ghost tries to help.  However, Willow has got this!  And before long a poor Sim who just happened to be in the vicinity of an evil witch perishes by the blaze.

Another Sim therefore bites the dust and the flames are put out with the grand entrance of the Grim Reaper.

The Grim Reaper reaps very quickly in The Sims 3 and with a wave of his scythe, he is gone in a puff of black smoke.

So Willow has struck again and goes on to create more devastation.

- Minicart (Jules)

Building a Car

 

When The Sims 2 Freetime was released, we were given the One Man's Junk Car that Sims could build from scratch.  This was a hobby item which allowed Sims to gain the mechanical skill.

The Sim had to work on the car engine and body parts and in the end gained a totally usable car which the Sim could take to have a car alarm installed.

It took a long time to build the car and sometimes whilst working on the engine, the car would backfire and set off black smoke at the Sim.  It was well worth it in the end though, to have a totally usable car to get around in.

This car was reintroduced in The Sims 3 Roaring Heights pack which was only available from The Sims 3 Store, albeit it looked a lot different.

This video takes you through a Sim building the One Man's Junk Car in The Sims 2 and as it took a long time for him to build it, I have edited it through.  However, you can see that he worked on it through day and night and the seasons!

Cheers!

- Minicart (Jules)

The Ancient Writings of Qin Shan Hu

At the Resolute Fist Retreat in China, John is on a search for the Ancient Writings of Qin Shan Hu.  He has been given a keystone which unlocks a door in the depths of the retreat and is faced with a large room containing stone statues and yet another locked door.  There is however another door which is unlocked so John proceeds to venture through this one first which leads him into a corridor with many doors which, one by one, he enters into. 

After finding a secret door and taking what treasure he could find, he decides to advance further into the depths of the Retreat by entering the other, previously locked, doorway and descending the stairs.

John is now faced with a dive well and three more doors, each with a plaque which contains a helpful message.  John decides to take the middle door.

Now, as a player, you can place your cursor over things that, if there are secret doors or traps, will give you a little starry thing to let you know that something is there.  This room contained many traps but only on the dark tiles of the floor, not the lighter coloured ones.  However, John doesn't know where these traps are and I, as the player, didn't want him walking into them so I decided to let him inspect them one by one, just so that he knows not to walk into them, after all, they were fire traps and could kill him.

Well, there was an easier way.  I could have just guided John over the lighter coloured tiles to lead him to the statue which he could have pushed to the tile in the middle of the floor, breaking the traps on the way.

I should have done that.

Burning to death, John's quick thinking of using a shower in a can puts out the flames, only to be consumed again by more fire which rages up instantly about him.  Ignoring my instructions to walk away, I lost count of the amount of shower in a can's that he used.  Luckily, I was able to cancel out the use of these shower cans and get him to safety.

Looking back, this was quite an easy quest, made harder by the players inability to take note of the writings on the plaques by the doors.

John now enters a room behind which houses a treasure chest containing the Ancient Writings.  John takes them and puts them in his backpack.  However, this adventure isn't over.  There are more rooms to enter and possibly more treasure to find so John stays and searches further before returning the Ancient Writings.

- Minicart (Jules)

Tabitha

 

I haven't posted in a long while about the Evil Witch of Dragon Valley, so I thought it was about time I started again.

A great deal has happened in the little town of Dragon Valley since the last time I wrote.  Willow has become more skilled and proficient in her witchy abilities, so much so, that she has started more fires and killed more Sims than I care to remember.

In this episode, Willow decides to get a cat.  Now this is no ordinary cat.  This is a witches cat, or a "familiar", as is more commonly referred to.

Willow has named her Tabitha (from the old American TV series "Bewitched").  A befitting name for a cat who is a witches familiar.

However, as I found out, there is more than just creating a cat in CAS.  Once you have the pet in your home, there is so much more you need to buy such as a pet bed, toys, feeding dish and litter tray.  And of course, as Willows house is quite large, these things need to be purchased more than once to be placed on each floor of the house.

But, it's all worth it in the end as Willow feels stronger with her familiar around and Tabitha seems happy too!

- Minicart (Jules)

Resolute Fist Retreat

 

In this episode of The Sands of Time, John continues with his adventure to the Resolute Fist Retreat to search for the ancient writings of Qin Shan Hu.

This monk retreat is situated at the top of hills in China and John has to climb a fair way to get to it.  Once he arrives, he proceeds to climb the many stairs to a room which contains a kitchen and bathroom to the side.  More stairs take him up to bedrooms, more like dormitories, on the top floor.

John has been given a keystone and he searches high and low to see if there are any secret doors but alas, there are none.  He wonders if there are any trigger items, such as flushing the toilet that would open anything but after trying, nothing works.

After looking around outside and the surrounding grounds of the Retreat, John notices a floor plate at the bottom of the steps which he had run right past when he arrived.  However, as he was getting tired, he decided to sleep in one of the beds and start afresh in the morning.

After getting a good nights sleep, John proceeds to return to the foot of the Retreat and step on the floor plate.  A stairway opens up and he cautiously descends the steps down into the depths of the retreat.

Luckily no traps await him, just a couple of rubble piles and a locked door.  After clearing one pile, John notices a hole in the wall which after inspection, opens a secret door that leads to a treasure chest.  The other rubble pile reveals some more treasure.

Now, the only thing that remains is the locked door...

- Minicart (Jules)

Kids Stuff

 

As with my Bits 'N' Bobs video, there are a few things that kids done in The Sims 2 which are unrelated to each other but put together as another 'odds and bobs' make a great video.  Most, if not all, of the things shown in this video were ever given to us again, such as showing off to parents and jumping up and down on the bed.

The dancing with dad clip, where the child stands on her father's feet while he dances with her brings back so many memories of me and my father, who used to dance with me like this when I was a child at family get-togethers.

So much detail was put into The Sims 2 which made it a really great game to play.  Even today, I think it surpasses The Sims 4 for detail and gameplay.

Let me know what you think!

Cheers!

- Minicart (Jules)

Toy Making in The Sims 2

 

When Open for Business was released for The Sims 2 in 2006, we were given appliances in game to allow Sims to craft items for a home or community based business.  This expansion pack also introduced talent badges.  These badges were earned the more experience your Sim gained in a certain craft.  Once a bronze badge had been earned, the Sim then went on to earn a Silver Badge and then a Gold one.  Each badge enabled the Sim to create even better items within that particular craft or to be able to plant a wider variety of seeds and talk to plants in the gardening skill.

One such item that was introduced was the Toy Making Bench.  Sims can craft toys on this bench and work their way up from a simple brick to a water wiggler toy.  All of these toys can be played with by children and some can be played with by pets!  Adults can also play with the kite, as seen in the video.

As all of these toys were only in The Sims 2 (apart from the brick which made an appearance in The Sims 3), I decided to make a video showing how these toys were made and adults and children playing with them.

I hope you enjoy my Toy Making combo video!  Let me know what you think in the comment section below!

Cheers!

- Minicart (Jules)

Bits 'N' Bobs in The Sims 2

 

I have been playing The Sims 2 again in earnest for quite a while and it's amazing how, just after 20 minutes of gameplay, so much can happen as The Sims in TS2 are so quirky!  

I always have OBS running so that I can catch all the little things that happen and also the stuff that we don't have in TS4.  In fact, most of the things we had in TS2, we never had again.  

I have been uploading these snippets to my Twitter and TikTok accounts and Simmers have been loving them!  Some of the stuff is related, such as snow snippets and gardening but there are other things that remain one-offs.

As I have loads of "one-off" video snippets, I decided to put them all in a video and upload them to YouTube.

So "Bits 'N' Bobs" came about through having many snippets of little bits and pieces and things and stuff we had in The Sims 2, all unrelated and bunched together in a bigger video.

Now you may be thinking, "if I can see them on Twitter and TikTok, why would I want to watch your video on YouTube?".  Well, first of all, you may not have or even like Twitter and/or TikTok but there's also a catch!  I haven't uploaded ALL of the snippets to Twitter and TikTok, only some of them.  I kept some back for the YouTube video so there will be clips that you won't see on my other social media accounts!

If you're into The Sims 2 or have never played it, I hope you enjoy watching my Bits 'N' Bobs video!  If you do, be sure to follow me on my other accounts (if you're into Twittering or TikTokking) for more Simlish Shenanigans!

Cheers!

- Minicart (Jules)