Questions From a Newbie

[Louise]

Hello all,
As you might notice i'm new to this forum. So I have to admit that I do not have The Sims 3 (but I will be getting it soon) how ever I have a few questions to ask. I got most of my questions answered by Carl's Sims 3 guide and after watching many Sims 3 gameplays but I have some more to ask :
- On The Sims 3, is one able to manage many families at a time and how?
- Is one able to buy many lots?
- If I purchase anything from The Sims 3 store will I be able to use for different families in different games?
- What is the currency used in The Sims 3: World Adventures?
I know I asked many questions and it will be nice to get answers for them.
Thank you
~~Louise

[Pam]

Hi Louise!  Welcome to the Forum.

It's possible to manage more than one family in a town, but you can only play then one at a time.  You'd have to go into Edit Town and change your Active Household in order to play another family.  When you do this, you lose all the wishes, family inventory, and refrigerator items of your original family.

You can buy only one lot at a time.  If you play multiple families as described above, each family can move as many times as you want, but can only have one lot at a time.

Yes, anything purchased from the Sims 3 Store is available for use in any game file.

World Adventures uses Simoleans, the same as the original base game.

I hope you're able to get the game soon.  It's a great deal of fun! 

[Swede1992]

1. Either by having several save files, or by regularly changing the active household in a menu called 'Edit Town'. However, if you're playing several families in one save, you may want to have a feature called "story progression" turned off since it may change your other families in ways you didn't want to. Also, you could want to turn off aging since those other families would otherwise age. This may cause some problems as well, since then no other families in the neighbourhood will age or get a job, a child, a new house, move etc.
My personal preference is to try to keep one save per family, but that's just me.

2.In the normal neighbourhood, no. One lot per famliy at any given time (you may of course move). However, you can buy several vacation homes if you have WA, but you can only designate one of them as your current home lot when you're in the actual vacation (you may of course change this as well, so in practice it's just a minor note).

3. Sorry, someone else may have more info. I have only downloaded Riverview. Ever.

4. You can buy at the stores with usual simbucks, but there is a 'special merchant' that only takes "ancient coins" which you can find in tombs. These are not always necessary, but can be used to buy a nice reward.


EDIT: Pam you made it before me, but I have some other info above.

[Louise]

Hi Louise!  Welcome to the Forum.

It's possible to manage more than one family in a town, but you can only play then one at a time.  You'd have to go into Edit Town and change your Active Household in order to play another family.  When you do this, you lose all the wishes, family inventory, and refrigerator items of your original family.

You can buy only one lot at a time.  If you play multiple families as described above, each family can move as many times as you want, but can only have one lot at a time.

Yes, anything purchased from the Sims 3 Store is available for use in any game file.

World Adventures uses Simoleans, the same as the original base game.

I hope you're able to get the game soon.  It's a great deal of fun! 

Thank you so much Pam.
And yes, I hope I will be able to get the game soon!

[Louise]

1. Either by having several save files, or by regularly changing the active household in a menu called 'Edit Town'. However, if you're playing several families in one save, you may want to have a feature called "story progression" turned off since it may change your other families in ways you didn't want to. Also, you could want to turn off aging since those other families would otherwise age. This may cause some problems as well, since then no other families in the neighbourhood will age or get a job, a child, a new house, move etc.
My personal preference is to try to keep one save per family, but that's just me.

2.In the normal neighbourhood, no. One lot per famliy at any given time (you may of course move). However, you can buy several vacation homes if you have WA, but you can only designate one of them as your current home lot when you're in the actual vacation (you may of course change this as well, so in practice it's just a minor note).

3. Sorry, someone else may have more info. I have only downloaded Riverview. Ever.

4. You can buy at the stores with usual simbucks, but there is a 'special merchant' that only takes "ancient coins" which you can find in tombs. These are not always necessary, but can be used to buy a nice reward.


EDIT: Pam you made it before me, but I have some other info above.

Why thank you very much Swede1992 for the information!
I'm so happy that I got my questions answered from both of you.
Thanks alot.

[Leto85]

- If I purchase anything from The Sims 3 store will I be able to use for different families in different games?

When you download anything from the store the site will remember that you have downloaded it, while using your username there. That way you can always download it again and therefore use it in more games or even on different computers.
I believe that it is even possible that you could download something, use it yourself and also use it for your brother or sister in his or her game on his or her computer.
That way the use of the store can be a bit more cheaper when cooperating with others. But like I said, I'm not sure about that. Can't try it either, because I don't have a little brother.

Edit: and of course, welcome to the forum. I've forgotten (or forgot, don't know which one it is ) to say that before.

[pallyndrome]

It's possible to manage more than one family in a town, but you can only play then one at a time.  You'd have to go into Edit Town and change your Active Household in order to play another family.  When you do this, you lose all the wishes, family inventory, and refrigerator items of your original family.

I hope no one minds if I ask a further question on this topic. If you do change families, as mentioned in the above quote, do the individual sims inventories get lost too?

However, if you're playing several families in one save, you may want to have a feature called "story progression" turned off since it may change your other families in ways you didn't want to. Also, you could want to turn off aging since those other families would otherwise age. This may cause some problems as well, since then no other families in the neighbourhood will age or get a job, a child, a new house, move etc.

I was considering controlling an entire neighbourhood (which would make everything happen slowly in comparison but I enjoyed it in Sims2), and I understand I would have to turn story progression off, but I hadn't considered turning off aging. If aging is turned off, does that affect the current household you're playing, or just everyone else in the neighbourhood? Because that could stick a real thorn in my plan.

[Louise]

- If I purchase anything from The Sims 3 store will I be able to use for different families in different games?

When you download anything from the store the site will remember that you have downloaded it, while using your username there. That way you can always download it again and therefore use it in more games or even on different computers.
I believe that it is even possible that you could download something, use it yourself and also use it for your brother or sister in his or her game on his or her computer.
That way the use of the store can be a bit more cheaper when cooperating with others. But like I said, I'm not sure about that. Can't try it either, because I don't have little brother.

Edit: and of course, welcome to the forum. I've forgotten (or forgot, don't know which is it ) to say that before.

Thank you very much for the additionnal information.

[Swede1992]

I was considering controlling an entire neighbourhood (which would make everything happen slowly in comparison but I enjoyed it in Sims2), and I understand I would have to turn story progression off, but I hadn't considered turning off aging. If aging is turned off, does that affect the current household you're playing, or just everyone else in the neighbourhood? Because that could stick a real thorn in my plan.

The thing is, pallyndrome, that story progression and aging are two separate options in Sims 3. If you have aging on, everybody in the neighbourhood is aging, even with story progression on (which might ruin your neighbourhood since people die and nobody moves in).

If you have aging off, not even your own family will age, but you can instead age them yourself with the birthday cake. A tip for that approach: 'trigger age transition' (an option with testingcheatsenabled true) can make old people die of old age. The bonus of this is that you can yourself determine when they've lived long enough to be aged up one level .

[Pam]

I hope no one minds if I ask a further question on this topic. If you do change families, as mentioned in the above quote, do the individual sims inventories get lost too?

Yes.  The only things that were saved were items in the chests.

[Louise]

Oh, and may I know how much is 2,000 SimPoints worth in dollars please?

[Saltypaws]

I have not had that problem anymore for quite sometime, not sure if something was fixed or not.  I know I use to lose everything, no matter what I tried, but come to think of it, I have not lost anything for a couple of months and I have one neighborhood that I change active households alot, I must have six or seven families in that town that I play and another town that has all of the young adults from my first BBI challenge.  I still try to put things away or in chests though, all it takes is once, so it is best to be careful.

[Pam]

Oh, and may I know how much is 2,000 SimPoints worth in dollars please?

SimPoints are purchased at http://thesims3.com.  2,000 SimPoints cost US$20.00 plus tax.

[Louise]

Oh, and may I know how much is 2,000 SimPoints worth in dollars please?

SimPoints are purchased at http://thesims3.com.  2,000 SimPoints cost US$20.00 plus tax.

Ok. Thanks alot Pam! 
You're the best!

[bshag]

There is a trick I learned from the sims 3 site that someone had  posted when it was common to lose everything in a sim's inventory.  It is:  1. Save game by using Main Menu;  2. return to to same game you just saved:  3. then click edit town and switch households from there.  I've never lost anything yet from using this method.