Saraswati5's Custom CAS Tutorial Link and My Custom CAS!

Saraswati5 teaches us how to make our own CAS at MTS: http://www.modthesims.info/showthread.php?t=180469

ijustneedsomeeyes's results:

Here Is The Skeleton!

Orange Highlights are anecdotes and examples.

All the Yellow-Highlighted Stuff is Crucial Information that will prevent you from glitching like crazy and crashing. If you know how to choose your game engines, carefully choose which stuff packs, installing custom content right and to play up to OFB at the very least, skip steps 0 to 1/2 and move on to step 1.

Green Highlights are download links.

Soo...Let's BEGIN!


This is pretty much the skeleton of creating a great custom hood and the first post of this blog. If you were like me and had to reformat your computer just to get rid of the effects of using the bad MATY guide by SarahMK to merge all the Sims 2 hoods together (didn't know which or whether it was a registry key or a .dll that kept Veronaville corrupt), then this guide is merely a collection of other peoples' links that I recommend, so give all credit to the people who made it, because it isn't mine, k?

Step 0: What Game Engine?:

I could have installed up to Apartment Life, but unfortunately, my computer was underpowered. :( The weather from Seasons also infuriated me to no end (I loved fishing and gardening though and will still miss them), I was sick of stray animals from Pets, etc. So before you do any of the steps below, you should review what EP you want to install up to.

Step 1/4: Beware of Stuff Packs!!!: (and custom mods)

Stuff packs use different game engines, such as H&M using the OFB game engine and Teen Style Stuff using the Pets game engine. What this means is:

ijustneedsomeeyes has up to OFB. Therefore, they can only go up to H&M Stuff.

maybesomethingdunno has up to Bon Voyage. So long as they get every stuff pack but Mansions and Garden Stuff (which uses the Apartment Life game engine), they're good.

HasUpToApartmentLife can use any stuff pack, with no glitchy repercussions.

You should always get the custom content that is suitable for your EP/game engine.

Step 1/2: Some Advice

It is recommended that you play up to at least Open For Business, because apparently, Nightlife, University and Deluxe\Double Deluxe game engines are screwy and unstable. Plus, there is a weird glitch for a downtown, where you can only have one. o.o
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Step 1: What Kind of Hood?

- Do you want a full custom neighborhood, with some good addons? Then skip to step 2.

- Do you want a custom neighborhood, but with a prehood as a sub neighborhood, like a shopping district or a downtown? Or do you want to go the full she-bang and get a prehood with the other pre-hoods as subhoods? Then:

1) Get Fix Subhood Selections (allows multiple default subhoods to show up and prevents the error that I got) by Mootilda of MTS.

2) Shop for main towns\subhoods\stealth hoods\bin families at Tarlia's Cleaned Up Hoods! Tarlia's hoods don't have the default townies, (clean hoods) keep this in mind if you set Strangetown as a subhood and all of a sudden, you're like, "Where the **** is River Smith?"

Step 2: Cheats, Cheats, Cheats...without breaking your game!

If you have up to OFB: The insanely awesome Sim Blender by twojeffs at Simbology will not work for you! (needs at least Pets) Oh no! What to do? Get the Sim Manipulator by Aaroneous (you need to register at his forum to download) instead!

If you have Pets: The insanely awesome Sim Blender by twojeffs is for you. :)

Step 3: BoilingOil's Must-haves to cut down on sim files and duplicate memories!

BoilingOil's No Trash Memories

BoilingOil's No Sim Loaded

Step 4: Stuff to look for from Flying Fish Systems: (my favorite Pescado mods)

antiredundancy - Stops the spawning of unnecessary NPCs.
nounlinkondelete - IMPORTANT! Prevents tombstone\urn deletion from utterly borking your game forever.

nocorruptdeath - Prevents jagged line gossip from corrupt dead sims.
notownieregen - Stops new townies from spawning after old ones die. Crucial NPCs will still be spawned as needed.
ffsdebugger - I use this to fix stuck face errors. This is also called "the bat box", for the batman logo on it.

moneyorder - I used this to get Olive Specter to send all her money to Heri Curious, the soon to be new owner of 13 Dead End Lane. They weren't friends, but Olive had 25 STR for Heri, while every other non-family sim were mutually in the negatives. Ophelia and Nervous were living with their spouses.
noreassign - Prevents the manager from reassigning your employees away from the tasks they are skilled for.

Of course, this is just a small list featuring the bare basics. You really should browse the MATY wiki to see other FFS mods that might also be best for you. Also: the nodateflowers mod didn't work for me.

Step 5: Beyond FFS, leefish and Sim Blender/Manipulators

I'll make this quick:

Squinge's Fight Anyone Anytime

Inge's Auto Cash Register and Auto Restock Sign How do you say, "They took our JERBS!" in Spanish? 

Jack's Alien Eyes

Croquignol's nomorecrumple

Treeag's Sim Templates Hider So unwanted default CAS sims won't lag BodyShop and CAS.

Autonomous Casual Romance by twojeffs

College Adjustor by twojeffs

Find A Mate Crystal Ball and No Friends Needed for Careers by twojeffs

jaxad0127's No Naked Emitter (No Reaction to Nudity) You need to register at sexysims2 to download it.

Squinge's Teen Adoption Mod I don't use the gender preference, because I adopt from the default adoption pool, after adding in a teen with the Sim Manipulator. (Under Family, I think.)

Sim Wardrobe's Automatic Bill Payer (electronics) and Home Incinerator (kitchen appliance)