University Life - First Impressions

[Orange Iguana]

Regrettably, it looks like I'm wrong on the bill issue as I had a sim come home from University with a bunch of bills. He was living in a dorm so it looks like I was completely wrong on what causes it.

[Serena Darrin]

So, I've been puttering around with University Life and overall, I like it!  I actually like a lot of the new hairstyles and such.  I didn't get a chance to really dig into the new stuff. 

The immediate things I noticed and/or am still wondering:

1) I've got some questions about energy drinks (posted to the New Harvestables Thread)
2) If you rent a house for your first term, finish, and come back to University, will the house be the same?  I'm wondering that because the first Sim I sent to university started her own garden.
3) I don't know if this is just me (Some parts of Starlight Shores did this to me too), but a lot of community lots on the University are showing up without a title, just labeled 'community lot.' Is this a glitch?
4)My Science/Medicine Major didn't have interactive lectures -- the class congregated outside the Science building, instead, and started puttering around with the skeleton. I couldn't find the Professor, either.  The game still thought I was in class, so obviously I was doing something right!
5) I don't like some of the 'shells' for some of the buildings. (The student union, for example).  It can make it hard to get good screenshots or see what's going on sometimes.
6) I have noticed that it's way harder to make money in university then compared to Sims 2 university, which caught me a bit off guard.

Overall, it's quite fun, though.  I really like that you can split up your degree into multiple terms, and that everyone can go to university (including Elders).   I didn't really have much of an option with the social groups -- I found University life rather busy, actually, and would have liked a little more downtime, but that might be because I did a full course load with my Sim. 

Oddly enough, a few things cloned themselves in inventory, including the kicky ball, when I first sent her to University.  I figure that's just a glitch.

Generally, great fun.  I'm loving all the new harvestables.  I want to try more with the social networking (but there are a few associated bugs, so I might let that sit for now).

[Orange Iguana]

For #2: Yep. Any changes you make to the lot will stay if you go back. I was happy to see that on my rental unit, my backyard still had 8 juice kegs, the garage was still renovated into a full blown bowling alley, and Bonehilda was still tending to the house.

[Ricalynn]

Serena -

1 - is taken care of on appropriate thread
3 - Are you talking in edit town or when you're live in game?  Remove mods and see if it still happens.
4 - I had a lecture class on Tuesdays where they went to student union and sat for 2 hours.  But then on Thursday they had class activity where they all stand around the Science building and play with the skeletons.   One day is lecture and the other is class activity.  Sounds like you were at class activity.
6 - Donate organs day job.  So easy!  3500 right off the pop and more if you have the opportunity herb going on.  The day jobs in general has made it easy to get money for me.  Plus depending on what skills you're working on while there.


As for social networking - read the book!  Go to the library and read the book to get the skill up then have fun with it.  Otherwise it feels like a total chore. 

Speaking of library - Uni library is the worst building for me.  I've had fun with Union center and dorms but the uni library has walls that won't go down to first floor.  Not to mention that there are no skill books in the library.

I do like that even if you take a class in your home town it's offered again at Uni.  Yeah it's twice the money but it's quick learning to help keep up the grades while you do other things besides study.   It seems like if I'm not doing something major related then I'm stuck with my grades slowly decreasing over time.

[Lallaith]

All four of my sims graduated together with A's, but only one of them got the extra trait and job offers. I don't understand why and i feel ripped off.
Overall i like the expansion, but things like showing people videos of cats to be funny just make me cringe.

[AceOfFools]

I had a genie in my sim's inventory when he went to uni. He summoned the genie to find a brand new blue dude with three wishes (I had already spent two, one on wealth and one on happiness) thought people might like to know that.

[Branr]

FYI, the Photography skill book is now sold in the book store, no having to travel to Egypt to buy it.

[Ricalynn]

I had a genie in my sim's inventory when he went to uni. He summoned the genie to find a brand new blue dude with three wishes (I had already spent two, one on wealth and one on happiness) thought people might like to know that.

This happens with WA worlds too.

All four of my sims graduated together with A's, but only one of them got the extra trait and job offers. I don't understand why and i feel ripped off.
Overall i like the expansion, but things like showing people videos of cats to be funny just make me cringe.

People have been reporting this bug all over the forums.   They're trying to sort it out now as I understand.  The three that got did not receive an extra trait - did they have one already through social groups?

[AceOfFools]

This happens with WA worlds too.

I did not know that.

On an unrelated note, has anyone been bitten by radio-active insects? I wanna know what my sim is in for...

[RainBeau]

I did not know that.

On an unrelated note, has anyone been bitten by radio-active insects? I wanna know what my sim is in for...

Muahaha Spiderman!

[Serena Darrin]

3 - Are you talking in edit town or when you're live in game?  Remove mods and see if it still happens.

I mean when I'm live in game -- that's what make it so odd.  I'll pull my mods next time I play and see if that's the cause.

4 - I had a lecture class on Tuesdays where they went to student union and sat for 2 hours.  But then on Thursday they had class activity where they all stand around the Science building and play with the skeletons.   One day is lecture and the other is class activity.  Sounds like you were at class activity.

Oh!  Ok!  Thanks.   It sounds like I just haven't had a lecture class yet.  Thanks!  I didn't have any Tuesday classes, so maybe that's it.

6 - Donate organs day job.  So easy!  3500 right off the pop and more if you have the opportunity herb going on.  The day jobs in general has made it easy to get money for me.  Plus depending on what skills you're working on while there.

Oh, thanks!  I must have missed that one.  (I miss getting the scholarships in Sims 2 where you'd get over 1000 for having an A+)

As for social networking - read the book!  Go to the library and read the book to get the skill up then have fun with it.  Otherwise it feels like a total chore.

Now I feel like an idiot, I didn't realize there -was- a social networking book.

Speaking of library - Uni library is the worst building for me.  I've had fun with Union center and dorms but the uni library has walls that won't go down to first floor.

Ugh.  Yes. 

Not to mention that there are no skill books in the library.

Really?  That's. . . rather odd.  I didn't hang around the library long enough to find out.

I do like that even if you take a class in your home town it's offered again at Uni.  Yeah it's twice the money but it's quick learning to help keep up the grades while you do other things besides study.

Agreed.  It's also nice if you've got a sim who you want to pick up a new skill.

For #2: Yep. Any changes you make to the lot will stay if you go back. I was happy to see that on my rental unit, my backyard still had 8 juice kegs, the garage was still renovated into a full blown bowling alley, and Bonehilda was still tending to the house.

OOh, awesome.   Thanks!

[AceOfFools]

that's what i though, but the only thing that happened after the 4 hour radio-active bug bite moodlet was my sim got nauseous and threw up

[amarynth]

6) I have noticed that it's way harder to make money in university then compared to Sims 2 university, which caught me a bit off guard.

You can earn a ton of money by applying for aid! It's a menu option on the Administrative building.  There's a cooldown period, but it's relatively short -- my dean's list sim was getting close to 10k a week in aid!

All four of my sims graduated together with A's, but only one of them got the extra trait and job offers. I don't understand why and i feel ripped off.
Overall i like the expansion, but things like showing people videos of cats to be funny just make me cringe.

I had two sims graduate together, but only one actually made it in to the ceremony -- the other was stuck outside in a bottleneck of sims with routing issues.  I reloaded a previous save, and this time I had both sims outside of the arena prior to the ceremony start time (1 pm, IIRC), and they both made it in ok and both got the extra trait.

People have been reporting this bug all over the forums.   They're trying to sort it out now as I understand.  The three that got did not receive an extra trait - did they have one already through social groups?

When it happened with my two sims, both of them already had an extra (sixth) trait, and only the one that made it into the building got the seventh after the ceremony.  When I got them both successfully into the building for the ceremony, I was able to give both of them a seventh trait afterward.

[kinetophobia]

I've only played for a very little bit, but I have been messing around with GameplayData to see all the new metrics for the careers and majors.  In case anyone wanted to know, the game designer career has two branches, a programmer branch which has logic, "online games played", and nerd influence metrics, and an artist branch which has the the painting and/or street art metric as well as nerd influence and games played.  The art appraiser career has two branches as well, counterfeiter and appraiser, which both have the same metrics of painting, "artworks scanned", and rebel influence.  Finally the sports agent career has just one branch and its metrics are charisma, social networking, and coworker relationships.  Ahhh, I'm so excited for these careers, I do wish the degrees were actually associated with them though, as they don't seem to be now....

[lunaura]

One question I have, is if you reach level ten in a social group and get the job but refuse it, are you able to get it again? I refused it for my sim since I wanted her to go to Uni first, since she leveled her street art up and got level ten in Rebel before going.