The KEY to the INNERMOST CHAMBERS

 

After sleeping the night in a tent at a nearby campsite, John returns to the tomb to continue on his quest to obtain the spear from the treasure chest.

But first, John must enter the large room which holds a treasure chest, some floor panels and a movable statue.  This room is also full of traps so John must be guided on the green or jade, path in order not to be hit by the darts.

First of all, John opens the treasure chest which contains a star key and even though he does have a few skeleton keys in his inventory which would open these star and moon shaped keystones, one can never have enough keys, especially when you're an adventurer!

John proceeds to move the statue and after placing this on floor panels together with standing on some other panels, he eventually manages to "hit the right button" and a staircase opens up allowing him to move deeper into the tomb.

As John descends the staircase, he sees a locked door with a star keystone.  He immediately places the star key into the lock and the door opens, revealing a dive well and 3 treasure chests.  In front of the chests however, there is a large boulder.  No problem for John as he has Pangu's Axe to annihilate it!

The treasure chests hold some money, ancient coins and a dive well fragment.  Nothing really of any large value but still treasure all the same.

John dives into the dive well and searches through the pitch dark depths.  He finds a secret tunnel which he swims through and comes out into a long corridor which holds some coffins.  One coffin is blue, another green and the rest are white.  John decides to open the green coffin first as it is the colour of jade, which seems to be the theme of this tomb.  John is correct in looking in this coffin as he finds a Key to the Innermost Chambers of the First Emperor!

Walking to the end of the corridor, John goes through another door which leads him to a floor panel which he can stand on.  This unlocks a secret door to the corridor which he has just been in which contains the 6 coffins.

John proceeds to look in another coffin or two.  Will he find more treasure or will he find a mummy?

- Minicart (Jules)

SEARCHING for the Spear

 

After returning to the elderly sim with the activated key, John is told to re-visit the tomb of the first emperor to search for a spear.

John heads back to the tomb and makes his way to the locked door.  He places the key into the keystone and the chain of the door breaks, opening up a couple of rooms that hold treasure chests.  John can see that the spear is in one of the treasure chests from the glow emanating from it.  Unfortunately, there is a fence that John cannot pass.

A treasure chest lays in front of him and so he proceeds to open it, hoping that this will allow him entry to the room with the spear.  Alas no, but two secret doors open, revealing two more rooms that John will need to investigate.

He enters the smaller room, checking for traps on the way.  After finding a trap on the floor and the wall, he places his hand in a hole in the wall which activates a switch, opening up a staircase going down, deeper into the tomb.  This switch also activates two more traps in the walls.  This tomb is full of dart traps so John must be extra careful of where he treads.

Heading down the stairs, he comes to two doors, one blue and the other green, with a plaque on the wall.  The plaque reads that the First Emperor always said that the path of the righteous is paved with jade.  As jade is green, John realises that he must go through the green door.  He also realises that the rooms have green walkways.  Obviously this must mean that John should stay on the green path to avoid the dart traps.

John makes his way through the green door which activates and disables a few more traps and also opens something else in a darkened room where John has not been before.  This must be for something else later on in the adventure.

John stands on a floor plate which activates something else but John is unaware of what it is.  He then makes his way along the corridor and up some more stairs where he stands on yet another floor plate.  This opens a secret door which leads him back in the small room upstairs.  He has come full circle and needs to sleep.

As he makes his way through the secret door, he gets caught by a dart trap and collapses (after walking around the tomb to find somewhere where he can collapse) for a few minutes.

Needing desperately to sleep, John makes his way back to a small camp site, avoiding the zombies as he goes, to rest for the night.  In the morning, he will continue his adventure.

- Minicart (Jules)

CAUGHT in a DART TRAP!

John proceeds to descend the stairs in the tomb of the first emperor and stands in awe of the vastness of the chamber.

On entering, John is told that he has searched the tomb and to report back to the elderly Sim.  However, John decides to search further before returning to report on what he has found.

A pushable statue stands at one end of the room and a locked door is visible at the end of a small corridor.  Two treasure chests lie in the middle.  Hopefully John can retrieve a key to the locked door from one of these.

The player (yes, me!) looks around for traps but doesn't find any.  Now, when looking for traps, it is advisable to move your cursor over the ground very slowly in order for the cursor to recognise any traps that may be there by turning the cursor into a little star.  If you go too quickly, traps can be missed.  Unfortunately in this case, the player moved a little too quickly.

John proceeds to walk towards the first treasure chest but unfortunately gets caught in a dart trap!  This puts him to sleep for a while but doesn't harm him any way.  This is very fortunate for John as if you have ever played The Sims 4 Jungle Adventures, traps like these can poison your Sim and having been given just a few hours for it to get worse, you must purchase an antidote via computer otherwise your Sim will die.  This antidote costs 1,000 simoleons so unless you are rich...

After awakening, John looks (very slowly) to see if there are any other traps of which he finds three more.  He then opens the treasure chests one by one, to see what treasure he can find.  Unfortunately, the key to the locked door isn't inside either of these treasure chests but he does find an artefact and some ancient coins.

John then pushes the statue on to the floor plate behind it and a staircase opens up to a room below on the other side of the chamber.  John proceeds to go down the stairs and enters a corridor which contains two floor plates that he can stand on.  Each of these plates opens up another staircase to the first room where he finds more ancient coins and disarms the dart traps.

As John can do no more until he obtains a key to the locked door, he reports in to the elder Sim who is most pleased with John and gives him a key to the First Emperors Secret Rooms, the key to the locked door!  However, there is a snag.  The key will not work unless it has been blessed with an incantation.  John needs to speak with Ho Sung Kim who will bless the key and then return to the elder Sim for more Simoleons and further instructions.

After completing this part of the adventure, John is told by the elder Sim to re-enter the Tomb of the First Emperor to retrieve an ancient spear.

- Minicart (Jules)

TOMB of the First Emperor

The opportunity for work that John must fulfil in China is getting a little long-winded.  He has sparred with a couple of Sims, namely Maya Wang and Shen Su but the opportunity has still not completed.  He calls for a third Sim to hopefully complete the opportunity but by this time, John is too tired.  Cancelling this opportunity is now a better idea as John still has a small adventure to complete before he returns home.

He needs to give some common relics to an elderly Sim which he does so and then is given a task to retrieve a relic from Hui Young Kim which was loaned to her years ago.  John is able to recover the relic and gives this back to the elderly Sim who in turn, gives him a key to the Tomb of the First Emperor which is where the Terracotta Army is situated.

So now this small favour for an elderly Sim has turned into a decent adventure!

John travels to the tomb and enters via the stairs below the terracotta army statues.  A small room below contains a few decorative items and a keystone on the wall.  Here, John proceeds to place the key in the keystone and immediately a staircase opens into another room below which holds treasure chests and a locked door.

It seems that what looked like a very small tomb is in fact a large one and hopefully full of treasure.

- Minicart (Jules)

Martial Arts Tournament

 

John has an opportunity at work which he must fulfil in China.  He needs to set up a Martial Arts Tournament with a spar contender, namely Maya Wang but unfortunately she isn't available at that moment in time.  So John decides to see what other adventures there are in store for him.

He secures an "adventure" from the board at base camp.  Now, I wouldn't call fishing for koi an adventure but John does what he is asked, earning more simoleons and gaining some fishing skill.

He returns to the base camp and finally secures a tournament with Maya Wang.  After a lot of fluffing about, she arrives at the base camp and John proceeds to spar with her.  Luckily for John, he wins the sparring match.  Normally, once an opportunity is executed, a message will show to say that he has to return to work to complete the opportunity.  Unfortunately, this didn't happen so I assumed that John would have to spar with another Sim.

He proceeds to call another spar contender and Shen Su arrives at the base camp.  John spars with Shen and again wins the match but unfortunately it seems that John is still not yet done.  How many times must he do this?  Hopefully no more than 3 but then I could be wrong.

John will continue with this quest next time but if it's going to take too long, he feels that cancelling this opportunity would be best.

It's a pity if this happens though as this could secure a promotion at work for him.

- 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)

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)

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)

Tomb of Discovery

 

In this episode of The Sands of Time, our hero John Linden, travels to Egypt for his first adventure.

On arrival he looks at the board at base camp to see what adventures can be had.  Apparently an organisation named MorcuCorp is working on a business opportunity with the Egyptian Government to locate three ancient relics in Al Simhara.  They are looking for someone to help them find these relics and if anyone is interested, they should report to Hassan Badawi.

Well of course John is definitely interested in this adventure and reports immediately to the person concerned.

Hassan Badawi is extremely pleased that John has decided to take on this adventure and awards John 10 visa points.  If you have ever played The Sims 3 World Adventures before, you will know that earning visa points means that this will grow your visa levels.  Once you have attained Visa Level 1, you will be able to stay in that particular Country for 5 days instead of 3 thereby being able to get more done and of course, go on more adventures.

Unfortunately for Hassan, he has lost some papers in the Tomb of Discovery and needs John to retrieve them for him.  John agrees and is given some dried food to help him on his way.

As with anything, one needs to be prepared and going on an adventure it is most important to be really prepared, especially when your life could be at stake.  John therefore decides to visit the market place in Al Simhara to obtain more supplies, such as a shower in a can and some more dried food.  He also purchases a motor bike to get him where he is going a lot quicker.

After he has finished buying what he needs, he makes his way to the Tomb of Discovery.

On entering the tomb, John ventures down the stairway to find some ancient coins and a treasure chest, which he hastily opens.  Although ancient coins cannot be used as normal currency, there is a market vendor who will sell special items for ancient coins.  We will delve into these special items in a later post...

John finds a moon shaped keystone in the treasure chest which he uses to place in the moon shaped crevice by the side of one of two locked doors.  The door opens and John is able to enter.

Throughout the tomb, John comes across ancient plates which he has to stand on to open other locked doors and he has to move large statues to reveal other ancient plates.  Although this particular tomb isn't filled with traps, John checks just in case.  During his adventure he finds more treasures, a secret door and of course the missing papers that Hassan Badawi had mislaid.

John runs back to Hassan with the papers and on arrival earns some more visa points and dried food.  Hassan Badawi was quite surprised that the Tomb of Discovery hadn't killed John which is rather strange as, after all, it was just an "Introductory Test".

John is then asked to report to Ahmed Diab who is employed by Hassan and is told to do what is asked of him.

John immediately goes to visit Ahmad who asks him to find 4 pieces of turquoise.  John accepts and starts the search.  Fortunately, when asked to look for gems and crystals and indeed insects when one is on an adventure, whether it be in China, France or Egypt, these "treasures" show up in map view, so they are easily found.  Unfortunately for John, only 2 pieces of turquoise are showing up.  This means of course, that he will have to wait for the next day to collect another 2 pieces, when in the morning they again spawn in game.  But John has a better idea.  He travels to the market place to see what is on offer at the store that sells pottery, broken vases, canopic jars and other interesting items and quite often, crystals, gem stones and metal pieces.  John is in luck!  The market vendor has 5 pieces of turquoise which John snaps up immediately.

He delivers the gems straight away to Ahmed Diab and earns some simoleons.  Ahmed then asks John to discuss MorcuCorp with three Egyptians to earn some more visa points.  Of course John agrees and sets out to meet some more Sims, strike up friendships and find out a little more about this mysterious corporation that everyone seems to be so nervous about.

- Minicart

The Sands of Time

 

World Adventures was the first expansion pack that came out for The Sims 3.  At the time, I wasn't very happy with The Sims 3 as it was so different from The Sims 2.  Having an open world, I felt that I didn't have much control over the sims that I wasn't playing.  So when World Adventures was released, although I thought the trailer looked pretty good, I waited for other simmers to post their reviews on YouTube before I even thought about purchasing it.

Most of the reviews seemed positive and, as a fan of games such as Tomb Raider, I decided to buy the pack and give it a shot.

At first it seemed really strange to play a Sim who was entering tombs, disabling traps, finding secret doors and basically looting the treasure chests as I felt that this wasn't like real life as opposed to playing families.  However, when you think about it, in real life there are adventurers who climb mountains and archaeologists like Howard Carter who found the tomb of Tutankhamen.  So The Sims 3 World Adventures, although new and different for The Sims franchise as something like this had not been done before, it was still true to life.

I really got into playing World Adventures and loved every minute of it.  EA certainly put a lot of work and thought into this expansion pack and it is definitely worth the money.  Getting three new worlds as opposed to just one was a first, plus all the new build and buy objects that came with it was a real bonus.

As I have said in previous posts on my Let's Play of The Glimmerbrook Witch for The Sims 4, EA seem to have calmed things down with The Sims.  By this I mean that in The Sims 3 for example, a witch could set fires on community lots, the Sims would run away and inevitably the ones that didn't ended up dead.  In The Sims 4, all Sims seem to be equipped with fire extinguishers on community lots and therefore not much damage can be done as fires are put out as soon as they are started.  My way of thinking is that you should be able to play The Sims how you want.  If I want to play an evil witch, she must be evil.  Simples.

With this in mind, even though The Glimmerbrook Witch is still an ongoing Let's Play on my YouTube channel, I decided to create a second Let's Play made with The Sims 3.  And what better than to create it around my favourite expansion pack of World Adventures!

So, "The Sands of Time" was born.

Set in Sunset Valley, our hero John Linden is a brave and charismatic adventurer.  Of course in this first episode (and also episodes 2 and 3), he is working his way up in his career in the military, gaining money and skills in readiness for his adventures.

Although it may be boring for some, getting some cash rolling in and skill building is a must during gameplay for John to be able to do what he wants to do.  Sending him to Egypt without any handiness skill will surely kill him as he will not be able to disable traps easily.  And of course, he needs money to travel and buy the things he needs from the market place, such as shower in a can and dried food.

The athletic skill comes in handy too for smashing the rubble piles that stand in his way.  This skill and also the handiness skill are needed for his job to gain promotions and earn more daily.  Preparation is underway for his great adventure, firstly in Egypt and then on to other climes.

I am loving creating this Let's Play and even though the game is a little old, I am having as much fun now as I did back in the day.

The Sims 3 music however is all copyrighted so I am having to mute the music in game and replacing it with royalty free music from the YouTube audio library where appropriate.  I have found some great Egyptian, French and Chinese style music which I am using.

I did make a few mistakes with this first episode but corrected this when editing, which you will see if you watch.

I hope that you enjoy watching The Sands of Time just as much as I am enjoying playing it!

- Minicart