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1571. New at TSZ: RSS Feeds

Written on Saturday 27 September 2003 at 23:53 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

As promised I've added a new feature to The Sims Zone: RSS Feeds. It took us a while to get it right, but it seems to be working fine now. These feeds (also known as RDF feeds) allow you to quickly get the latest headlines from The Sims Zone without having to visit this site. All you have to get is an RSS reader like FeedDemon or FeedReader, and add the proper urls to the reader. Then the reader will keep you up-to-date immediately. We currently have two feeds, one for the latest news and one for the community news. If you're already familiar with RSS, you can use these urls (note: these are NOT meant to be viewed by your web browser!):

News: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/rss/news.rss (Validate) Community News: http://www.thesimszone.co.uk/rss/cnews.rss (Validate)

If you want to know more about RSS and our feeds, then visit our RSS page. There you can find a lot more detailed information about how to use these feeds. You can always access that page by clicking the "RSS" buttons under News and Community News. Please post your comments and give us feedback about it. If you want to see the latest headlines and more in the side panel of your browser without having to visit The Sims Zone, you can still get our TSZ Sidebar.

1572. Chat Transcript

Written on Saturday 27 September 2003 at 14:20 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Contrary to what the original SimDay post said, last thursday's chat wasn't with Jonathan Knight but with Jenna Chalmers instead. She's one of the designers on Makin' Magic. Here are a few quotes from Jenna, about Rollercoasters, living in Magic town, spells for kids, a spell to get money, and careers:

"We wanted to give you pieces to play with...so that you could build your own rollercoaster. You will have various track pieces....and also larger "ride" pieces."
"Magic Town has three residential lots. In order to move there, it will cost you simoleons and magicoins. You earn magicoins by performing magic in magic town."
"There is a spell where the kids can send a "clone" to school in their place, which i guess means they could stay home and study :-)"
"Of course! Rain of Riches will create tresure on your lot that you can sell or enjoy of course, if it backfires you get.... Rain."
"Magic does not replace your career...but since you can create money, you may not be interested in going to work any longer. Like the kids, you can send a clone to work in your place. Even though you don't *need* a job, you will still want to work on those skills, especially logic, mechanical, and cooking."

There's a lot more about specific spells, the dangerous animals (dragons, snakes), content of the pack, and more. There will be chats every thursday at the same time (3PM PST, which is 11pm in the UK, and midnight in most of Western Europe). The next guest is yet unknown though. For the chat transcript from last thursday, click here. It's quite a long chat, but worth the read if you're interested in Makin' Magic.

1573. SimDay

Written on Thursday 25 September 2003 at 10:57 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Just like many other SimDays, this one has a few links to articles again. However, we've discussed them all already. This week there are 2: the Bustin' Out (GBA) interview with Virginia McArthur at IGN, and the third designer diary at GameSpot. Besides that, there's (still) the news about the chat tonight with Jonathan Knight. There's also something we expected: the second Double Deluxe Object pack. That's the second download with new objects from Double Deluxe. You can get it from Get Cool Stuff, where you can also get the first pack that was released last week. The new pack contains 8 objects including African and Asian house objects. Finally, there's something more about Fansites: There was a chat last week about Maxis hosting fansites. Now there's something that's just for the links: Webmasters have to re-add their site to the list. However, now you'll have more control over the link, plus you can add a description to it. You need to be product registered and logged in to be able to add your site. For a list of fansites, or to submit yours to the official site, click here.

1574. The Sims 2 Diary #3

Written on Wednesday 24 September 2003 at 17:56 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

GameSpot has posted the third edition of the designer diary of The Sims 2. This time VP PC Development Lucy Bradshaw and Creative Director Charles London. They mainly talk about moods. They talk about how Sims now do not 'live in the moment', but you can see their emotions constantly. Examples are shown of a happy, a depressed, a shy and an outgoing Sim. This diary is somewhat special: it comes with a few clips. They also talk about "memories" of the Sims. Here's an example of how that works:

"[...] Not only will a sim remember if he or she was jilted by a lover, but another sim who witnesses the event will also remember it, and will be able to share it with their friends. After the breakup, the jilted sim might still be reeling from heartbreak. A friend who "heard it through the grapevine" can lessen the pain with a simple pat on the back. However, salt can also be poured on the sim's wound when he or she sees his or her old flame with a new love. It's this type of context that introduces surprises, crazy successes, and failures to the game--along with a dynamic new strategy."

You can read the whole article right here. Along with that, they've posted 4 short clips showing the moody Sims in motion. Those can be found at the media page. You need at least a (free) GameSpot Basic account to download the clips. Together (High-res QuickTime versions) they're about 5 Mb, with more than half of it taken up by the Shy animation (2.9 Mb). There are also MPEG versions, which can be played by most regular media players (so you don't need QuickTime). Although those are smaller and thus faster to download, the quality is poorer compared to the QuickTime versions.

1575. Chat with JK

Written on Wednesday 24 September 2003 at 17:41 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Maxis will be hosting a chat about Makin' Magic with Maxis Producer Jonathan Knight (no, not J.K. Rowling). Tomorrow you can get your questions about Makin' Magic answered by him. The chat will be held at 3PM PST, which is 11pm in the UK or midnight CET. You can enter the chat from this page. Once the transcript has been posted we'll let you know.

1576. Double Deluxe ships

Written on Wednesday 24 September 2003 at 17:35 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

The Sims Double Deluxe has been shipped. This is the second repackaging of The Sims (collectors edition not included), and it has The Sims, Livin' Large, House Party, The Sims Creator and several other extras in one pack. It shipped yesterday and should be in stores today or otherwise very soon in the US, and Europe will get it before the end of the week too. Double Deluxe costs $50, but you don't have to buy it if you already have The Sims and the two expansion packs (or The Sims Deluxe and House Party): the extras will be made available for download for free on the official site. That doesn't include The Sims Creator though. For the press release about the shipping of the game, click here.

1577. Screenshot update

Written on Sunday 21 September 2003 at 18:43 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Several new screenshots have been posted recently, including quite a few from Bustin' Out on the GBA. But first 2 screenshots of Makin' Magic: they're rather small, but not too bad. They're from EAGames.com, and you can find them on the Makin' Magic page. More screenshots come from the official UK site of The Sims. These are 3 shots of Bustin' Out on the GBA. You can see those new ones, and of course several older pics, at this page. Finally, IGN has posted an interview with Virginia McArthur from Maxis. Here's a snippet about making money:

"There is also a whole new way to earn money on the GBA: you can play mini-games! Your Sim can visit several mini-game locations, where you can play games to earn Simoleons. Depending on the skills of your Sims and the number of their friends, you make even more Simoleons each time you play the games."

They also talk about a GBA-to-GBA connection, which will be included as well as the GBA-to-GameCube connection feature. Connecting two GBA's will unlock the "Paradise Island" location, which can become a second home for your Sim. Trading items with other Sims or even an "auction" system will also be available. All that new info comes with 2 screenshots, which are here. The interview itself, divided over 2 pages, is right here.

1578. Chat Transcript available

Written on Friday 19 September 2003 at 13:40 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

Yesterday Maxis announced a chat about web hosting on Maxis' servers. The chat was held and a transcript has been posted. It has some interesting things: the hosting features will contain unlimited hosting and webspace. It might also be possible to use a database (Oracle), and scripting (Perl, PHP) will quite likely be available too. The main catch is that the website has to be about one of the Maxis games (e.g. the Sims, SimCity, etc. etc.). Although it wasn't meant for it, the chat also answered questions about The Sims 2, e.g. that there won't be a demo. All that you will be able to download this year will be tools to create custom content. Back to the hosting: it will become available between now and Christmas. There will be another chat with Luc Barthelet around some time next week. To read the whole transcript (which answers many more questions), click here.

1579. Another Week, Another SimDay

Written on Thursday 18 September 2003 at 21:46 by ChEeTaH - 0 comments.

This week's SimDay brings some nice and some old stuff. First of all there are links to two articles, one we've discussed earlier about Bustin' Out going online on the PS2, and the other one is a preview of The Sims 2. It's from Yahoo! this time, and you can find it right here. Under Get Cool Stuff at the official site, you can download the first set of The Sims Double Deluxe (to be released very soon). There will be 2 more sets coming in the next week. Those three together are all the extras of The Sims Double Deluxe that didn't come with earlier versions (so Sims Creator won't be a download, unfortunately). Finally there's info about a chat at 3pm PST today (which is 11pm in the UK, or midnight CET). It's about having a website and the hosting of fansites. The chat will be held in the chatroom at the official site that's been closed last week (but will be reopened temporarily). You can find the link to the chat at this page. Maxis General Manager Luc Barthelet will answer the submitted questions. That's all from the official site this week.

1580. New screenshot(s) Sims 2

Written on Sunday 14 September 2003 at 00:23 by ChEeTaH - 1 comment.

The german SimsZone.de has posted another exclusive shot of The Sims 2 (after several new shots yesterday). Actually, it's 7 screenshots in one. It shows 7 screenshots on a 'film strip', showing some Sims getting up, showering/washing and having breakfast. These show quite nicely how detailed the graphics of The Sims 2 are. The screenshots aren't in the right order (by time). The image is 1.2 Mb. To see it, you'll have to visit SimsZone.de. You can find it in screenshots under "Die Sims 2" (scroll to the very bottom of the page), or on their front page for now. Here's a little thumbnail: