Merrick Legacy, 3.1
Feb. 10th, 2012 09:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I'm beginning to think it's a rule that I have to reference or link to Hyperbole And A Half in at least 75% of all Merrick posts.

General warning: sometimes I swear.
Last time: jerkface Derek joined the Merrick gen 2 kids in uni, in his capacity as spouse-elect to the gen 3 heir, Ruthie. Eula got uni pregnant! Edda got uni pregnant! Edda miscarried. Then she got uni pregnant again! Also, I proved to my satisfaction that the gypsy hated Edda, based on a series of blind dates with gay or bi guys who were more attracted to Mark. For his part, Mark broke a Family sim's heart by not seeing their one date together as the beginning of a lifetime commitment. Everyone graduated, Ruthie went back to the legacy house, she and Derek got married, and gen 3 became imminent.
This time:

Hayden finished a painting that was planned via the highly scientific methodology of "start a still life and then look around for anything interesting to screenshot". I did have to photoshop out the Z's, though. Arty!

I missed the pops, but here comes gen 3! And I do hit Random on the Trips And Quads window, as always, but it's a single birth.

It's azombiegirl!

Seriously. As a co-founder of the Zombie Rights Campaign, I'm hardly one to start slinging around the name of the undead in a negative context. But... damn.
Anyway, here's Cassandra. Brown hair, and jerkface Derek's eyes.

Oh, let's see how good jerkface Derek is at being a criminal.

GEE, WHAT A SURPRISE. IT TURNS OUT HE'S REALLY, REALLY GOOD. What a jerkface.

And he and Ruthie get into the hot tub as soon as he gets home. Babies is serious business yo.

Since we're in Hayden's last days, I'm making Titania use up her vacation days to stay home with him. Their brand of cute is generally more pillow fights and Punch Me Punch You than anything else -- in fact, I can't remember whether they've ever autonomously woohooed -- but they both enjoy the occasional hug too.

Babby!!!1!
...babby.

Then I have them sit down to dinner together, because I figure this is the last time they'll all be hungry at once before Hayden bites it tomorrow.
I've never had a sim die before. Well, in this game. I've had a few die in the original Sims. But this will be the first one where a death means anything besides "keep everyone away from the tombstone for 48 hours and then they'll never care again".

The next morning, Hayden throws a party, inviting over all his friends and children. (Eula is in another room talking to jerkface Derek.)

There's a Smustle-a-thon, which is srs bsns.

After the guests go home, he has one last dance with his wife while reflecting on what a great bunch his friends and family are to spend time with...

...and he even makes a little time for his new granddaughter.

Ruthie gets a hug too.

Oh, and he autonomously kisses his wife while he still has the chance. He totally knows what's coming.

Ruthie pops at 6:04.

And at 6:07, Titania finishes up the joke she's telling Hayden, and there's apparently a sudden chill in the air.

Ugh, do I have to pretend to care about Ruthie's ~feelings~ now or whatever?
SHUT. UP. JERKFACE DEREK.

:(

So long, Hayden. You were an okay kind of guy.

Today's insurance payout is helpfully modelled by our spectral Barker's Beauty over here.

It's all very sad, and TITANIA WHAT THE HELL.
Dude's footprints in the carpet shag haven't even filled in yet!

But it's not like she's a stone-cold bitch about it; she did take the aspiration hit, which briefly knocked her out of permaplat.
And I'm sure she'd be crying like mad, only she and Derek kept glitching throughout Hayden's entire farewell, so now they're just standing around like derp.
name: N005_User00370 - Titania
Stack size: 9
Error: Hit Break Point Primitive.
Iterations: 25
Frame 8:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 8
Tree: id 870 name 'Family - Are We Step-Family - NIDs' version -32757
from global
Prim state: 0
Params: 391 8 Locals: 0 0 0 0 0
Frame 7:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 5
Tree: id 869 name 'Family - Are We Step-Family?' version -32757
from global
Prim state: 0
Params: 204 392 Locals: 391 8
Frame 6:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 5
Tree: id 576 name 'Family - Are We Family?' version -32758
from global
Prim state: 0
Params: 204 392 Locals:
Frame 5:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 24
Tree: id 8199 name 'Interaction - Give Toddler a Bath - TEST' version -32750
from TubAndShowerGlobals
Prim state: 0
Params: 1 Locals: 0 0
I don't even want to know why Titania was trying to give the hula dancer a bath. I do know that it will be quite annoying if this happens every death. Maybe I can try to remember to chuck bathtubs into inventories or something.

...why does jerkface Derek's method of dealing with this not surprise me?

I set up a nice display cabinet thing with Hayden's urn and a bouquet that Titania once gave him after a date. Titania doesn't seem impressed, but under the circumstances I can understand why.

And that was depressing, so now that the baby's done sleeping through the whole mess, let's have a birthday!

Meh. Cassandra is pretty much an exact faceclone of jerkface Derek, including his eyes. Although her personality is an almost-duplicate of Ruthie's.
Eula: No, sweetie, we don't EAT dolls, we PLAY with them!
Cass: OM NOM NOM

Next thing you know, babby!

It's fun for the whole family.

...WHICH JUST DOUBLED IN SIZE AFJKSDFLAFJFF;L.

Oh, goody. This is going to be one of those "everybody hates the one baby" things, isn't it.
Anyway! Three blond boys: Jeremy, Michael, and Duncan, with: medium skin and jerkface Derek's eyes; bit-darker-than-S1 skin and jerkface Derek's eyes; somewhere-in-the-middle skin and Hayden's eyes.
It's gonna be a green-eyed gen.

HEY YOU GUYS
MICHAEL IS MY FAVORITE NOW
AIM FOR HIS EYE, KIDDO

The boys are pretty standard babies, really. They sleep, they poop, they make me glad for single-tile cribs. Jeremy fusses a bit, but these are definitely not demon children.

Babies are boring. Hey look! Lots of cake!

Everyone: :D

Cassandra's turn!

...grayish-blue is not your color, sweetie.

Granted, I'm honestly not sure what is her color, but I have a feeling it's probably warm. She looks a bit less zombile now. (Well, the different lighting probably helps too.)

Cassandra gets her own room for now! Everything in or complementing her signature color of red, and an easel that is not at all creepy for technically being Hayden's easel before he died. Someone should probably scrap the evil-eyed monster-thing Hayden was working on, though. That is a seriously messed-up thing to have in a little girl's room.
Makeovers on the boys...

Jeremy's birth skin actually had eyebrows painted on, so I wound up swapping him out for another one. Who the hell paints eyebrows on the skin, anyway? (Either Louis or whoever did this particular recolor of a Louis skin, apparently.)

My initial impression is that Duncan is pretty cute! Eventually I figure out that he and Jeremy have identical faces except for the forehead, though. Which doesn't make him less cute, just... slightly less unique. (Things can be more or less unique than other things. Allie Brosh explains it nicely.)

HEY
HEY YOU GUYS
MICHAEL IS STILL MY FAVORITE
No wonder he puked in Derek's jerk face.
The trips have a much better blending of parental features than Cassandra did. I'm quite pleased.

Sorry you're dead, Hayden. :( :( :(

See, this is the spooky image that makes it look like ghosts are stalking the hapless old woman. (Really he was just coming to cheer the fact that I hadn't sold his bed. He did wake her up with his ghostly yelling, though.)

NOT TEH BABBIES

Jeremy and Michael: DO NOT WANT
Duncan: *noms fist*

Mrr... look, Hayden, you're a ghost, and I get that. You want to do ghostly things -- like, say, haunt a kitchen chair.

You just might want to do it sometime when there is actually anyone around to see.

AGHSDLJAGHALJGH TODDLER DANCE PARTY.
Duncan's invite must've gotten lost in the mail.

Hayden celebrates his return to the land of the living by scaring Cassandra...

...then Ruthie...

...and finally Titania.

And then he goes back in his urn.
Not on the list of sims that got scared? Jerkface Derek, the Knowledge sim. Of course. Because he would've enjoyed the experience.

Jerkface Derek finishes Ruthie's heir portrait the next morning! I had her sit down on a chair near where he was poised ready at the easel. She looked up at him and smiled. It seemed a good enough pose.
Jerkface Derek's portrait will be next, although it'll be a challenge to capture his full jerkfaciness.

Oh, go ahead and lie, Titania. It's not it's the press's business to seek out the truth. Just ask the New York Times!

Tongue IN cheek, you ignorant troglodytes. (I wish EA had bothered to hire a proofreader. At least, I can only assume they never did. If there was actually a human being in charge of making the text strings follow something resembling the basic rules of English grammar... my god, the poor bastard's probably hung himself in shame by now.)

TRIPLE BIRFDAY YUS

You only wish your triple birthdays were this synchronized.

Of course, triplet boys means I have to repurpose the playroom, seeing as how none of the designated kidlet bedrooms have room for three beds. Titania tucks all four kids in because she is awesome.

Since daddy is working his way up the criminal track, I can only assume that these four-way cops-and-robbers games start off with everyone arguing over who gets to be the robber this time. Or maybe they don't even bother with cops. Everyone gets to be a robber, and they all fight over who gets to make off with the loot.

Even though Titania doesn't currently have a want for a family reunion, I throw a Merrick-only party anyway -- I've been playing the spares a bit, and they have kids of their own. (Eula has FOUR because first she had a singleton and then she triplet'd me. GEE WHY DOES THAT SOUND FAMILIAR RUTHIE)
So Titania plays with some of her non-heir children out by the swings a bit, and then gives each of her other-household grandkids a kiss.

While the grown-ups are swinging, there's a cousinly Smustle party going indoors. Don't be fooled by this picture -- I think that Tip (in yellow) and Marigold (behind him, in red) were the only two able to keep in sync for more than three seconds at a time. Marten (in blue, over by the couch) and Hannelore (in purple behind Marigold) are totally faking it here.

After the party is over, Edda comes back to swing and play Red Hands with Titania all night.
This is probably the last night that I will ever spend at my childhood home with my beloved mommy :D :D :D
:(

Titania spends the waning days of her lifebar productively.
I've discovered trees!
Of course you have.

The funny part is, it makes perfect sense that she would see trees, because there is nothing else over there. There are lots on the other side of the street, but they're all empty. Beyond that there's nothing but a hillside and the edge of the map.
Next time: Generation one fades officially into the past, and there are MORE CHILDREN YES BECAUSE WE NEED THOSE

General warning: sometimes I swear.
Last time: jerkface Derek joined the Merrick gen 2 kids in uni, in his capacity as spouse-elect to the gen 3 heir, Ruthie. Eula got uni pregnant! Edda got uni pregnant! Edda miscarried. Then she got uni pregnant again! Also, I proved to my satisfaction that the gypsy hated Edda, based on a series of blind dates with gay or bi guys who were more attracted to Mark. For his part, Mark broke a Family sim's heart by not seeing their one date together as the beginning of a lifetime commitment. Everyone graduated, Ruthie went back to the legacy house, she and Derek got married, and gen 3 became imminent.
This time:

Hayden finished a painting that was planned via the highly scientific methodology of "start a still life and then look around for anything interesting to screenshot". I did have to photoshop out the Z's, though. Arty!

I missed the pops, but here comes gen 3! And I do hit Random on the Trips And Quads window, as always, but it's a single birth.

It's a

Seriously. As a co-founder of the Zombie Rights Campaign, I'm hardly one to start slinging around the name of the undead in a negative context. But... damn.
Anyway, here's Cassandra. Brown hair, and jerkface Derek's eyes.

Oh, let's see how good jerkface Derek is at being a criminal.

GEE, WHAT A SURPRISE. IT TURNS OUT HE'S REALLY, REALLY GOOD. What a jerkface.

And he and Ruthie get into the hot tub as soon as he gets home. Babies is serious business yo.

Since we're in Hayden's last days, I'm making Titania use up her vacation days to stay home with him. Their brand of cute is generally more pillow fights and Punch Me Punch You than anything else -- in fact, I can't remember whether they've ever autonomously woohooed -- but they both enjoy the occasional hug too.

Babby!!!1!
...babby.

Then I have them sit down to dinner together, because I figure this is the last time they'll all be hungry at once before Hayden bites it tomorrow.
I've never had a sim die before. Well, in this game. I've had a few die in the original Sims. But this will be the first one where a death means anything besides "keep everyone away from the tombstone for 48 hours and then they'll never care again".

The next morning, Hayden throws a party, inviting over all his friends and children. (Eula is in another room talking to jerkface Derek.)

There's a Smustle-a-thon, which is srs bsns.

After the guests go home, he has one last dance with his wife while reflecting on what a great bunch his friends and family are to spend time with...

...and he even makes a little time for his new granddaughter.

Ruthie gets a hug too.

Oh, and he autonomously kisses his wife while he still has the chance. He totally knows what's coming.

Ruthie pops at 6:04.

And at 6:07, Titania finishes up the joke she's telling Hayden, and there's apparently a sudden chill in the air.

Ugh, do I have to pretend to care about Ruthie's ~feelings~ now or whatever?
SHUT. UP. JERKFACE DEREK.

:(

So long, Hayden. You were an okay kind of guy.

Today's insurance payout is helpfully modelled by our spectral Barker's Beauty over here.

It's all very sad, and TITANIA WHAT THE HELL.
Dude's footprints in the carpet shag haven't even filled in yet!

But it's not like she's a stone-cold bitch about it; she did take the aspiration hit, which briefly knocked her out of permaplat.
And I'm sure she'd be crying like mad, only she and Derek kept glitching throughout Hayden's entire farewell, so now they're just standing around like derp.
name: N005_User00370 - Titania
Stack size: 9
Error: Hit Break Point Primitive.
Iterations: 25
Frame 8:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 8
Tree: id 870 name 'Family - Are We Step-Family - NIDs' version -32757
from global
Prim state: 0
Params: 391 8 Locals: 0 0 0 0 0
Frame 7:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 5
Tree: id 869 name 'Family - Are We Step-Family?' version -32757
from global
Prim state: 0
Params: 204 392 Locals: 391 8
Frame 6:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 5
Tree: id 576 name 'Family - Are We Family?' version -32758
from global
Prim state: 0
Params: 204 392 Locals:
Frame 5:
Stack Object id: 392
Stack Object name: NPC - Hula Dancer
Node: 24
Tree: id 8199 name 'Interaction - Give Toddler a Bath - TEST' version -32750
from TubAndShowerGlobals
Prim state: 0
Params: 1 Locals: 0 0
I don't even want to know why Titania was trying to give the hula dancer a bath. I do know that it will be quite annoying if this happens every death. Maybe I can try to remember to chuck bathtubs into inventories or something.

...why does jerkface Derek's method of dealing with this not surprise me?

I set up a nice display cabinet thing with Hayden's urn and a bouquet that Titania once gave him after a date. Titania doesn't seem impressed, but under the circumstances I can understand why.

And that was depressing, so now that the baby's done sleeping through the whole mess, let's have a birthday!

Meh. Cassandra is pretty much an exact faceclone of jerkface Derek, including his eyes. Although her personality is an almost-duplicate of Ruthie's.
Eula: No, sweetie, we don't EAT dolls, we PLAY with them!
Cass: OM NOM NOM

Next thing you know, babby!

It's fun for the whole family.

...WHICH JUST DOUBLED IN SIZE AFJKSDFLAFJFF;L.

Oh, goody. This is going to be one of those "everybody hates the one baby" things, isn't it.
Anyway! Three blond boys: Jeremy, Michael, and Duncan, with: medium skin and jerkface Derek's eyes; bit-darker-than-S1 skin and jerkface Derek's eyes; somewhere-in-the-middle skin and Hayden's eyes.
It's gonna be a green-eyed gen.

HEY YOU GUYS
MICHAEL IS MY FAVORITE NOW
AIM FOR HIS EYE, KIDDO

The boys are pretty standard babies, really. They sleep, they poop, they make me glad for single-tile cribs. Jeremy fusses a bit, but these are definitely not demon children.

Babies are boring. Hey look! Lots of cake!

Everyone: :D

Cassandra's turn!

...grayish-blue is not your color, sweetie.

Granted, I'm honestly not sure what is her color, but I have a feeling it's probably warm. She looks a bit less zombile now. (Well, the different lighting probably helps too.)

Cassandra gets her own room for now! Everything in or complementing her signature color of red, and an easel that is not at all creepy for technically being Hayden's easel before he died. Someone should probably scrap the evil-eyed monster-thing Hayden was working on, though. That is a seriously messed-up thing to have in a little girl's room.
Makeovers on the boys...

Jeremy's birth skin actually had eyebrows painted on, so I wound up swapping him out for another one. Who the hell paints eyebrows on the skin, anyway? (Either Louis or whoever did this particular recolor of a Louis skin, apparently.)

My initial impression is that Duncan is pretty cute! Eventually I figure out that he and Jeremy have identical faces except for the forehead, though. Which doesn't make him less cute, just... slightly less unique. (Things can be more or less unique than other things. Allie Brosh explains it nicely.)

HEY
HEY YOU GUYS
MICHAEL IS STILL MY FAVORITE
No wonder he puked in Derek's jerk face.
The trips have a much better blending of parental features than Cassandra did. I'm quite pleased.

Sorry you're dead, Hayden. :( :( :(

See, this is the spooky image that makes it look like ghosts are stalking the hapless old woman. (Really he was just coming to cheer the fact that I hadn't sold his bed. He did wake her up with his ghostly yelling, though.)

NOT TEH BABBIES

Jeremy and Michael: DO NOT WANT
Duncan: *noms fist*

Mrr... look, Hayden, you're a ghost, and I get that. You want to do ghostly things -- like, say, haunt a kitchen chair.

You just might want to do it sometime when there is actually anyone around to see.

AGHSDLJAGHALJGH TODDLER DANCE PARTY.
Duncan's invite must've gotten lost in the mail.

Hayden celebrates his return to the land of the living by scaring Cassandra...

...then Ruthie...

...and finally Titania.

And then he goes back in his urn.
Not on the list of sims that got scared? Jerkface Derek, the Knowledge sim. Of course. Because he would've enjoyed the experience.

Jerkface Derek finishes Ruthie's heir portrait the next morning! I had her sit down on a chair near where he was poised ready at the easel. She looked up at him and smiled. It seemed a good enough pose.
Jerkface Derek's portrait will be next, although it'll be a challenge to capture his full jerkfaciness.

Oh, go ahead and lie, Titania. It's not it's the press's business to seek out the truth. Just ask the New York Times!

Tongue IN cheek, you ignorant troglodytes. (I wish EA had bothered to hire a proofreader. At least, I can only assume they never did. If there was actually a human being in charge of making the text strings follow something resembling the basic rules of English grammar... my god, the poor bastard's probably hung himself in shame by now.)

TRIPLE BIRFDAY YUS

You only wish your triple birthdays were this synchronized.

Of course, triplet boys means I have to repurpose the playroom, seeing as how none of the designated kidlet bedrooms have room for three beds. Titania tucks all four kids in because she is awesome.

Since daddy is working his way up the criminal track, I can only assume that these four-way cops-and-robbers games start off with everyone arguing over who gets to be the robber this time. Or maybe they don't even bother with cops. Everyone gets to be a robber, and they all fight over who gets to make off with the loot.

Even though Titania doesn't currently have a want for a family reunion, I throw a Merrick-only party anyway -- I've been playing the spares a bit, and they have kids of their own. (Eula has FOUR because first she had a singleton and then she triplet'd me. GEE WHY DOES THAT SOUND FAMILIAR RUTHIE)
So Titania plays with some of her non-heir children out by the swings a bit, and then gives each of her other-household grandkids a kiss.

While the grown-ups are swinging, there's a cousinly Smustle party going indoors. Don't be fooled by this picture -- I think that Tip (in yellow) and Marigold (behind him, in red) were the only two able to keep in sync for more than three seconds at a time. Marten (in blue, over by the couch) and Hannelore (in purple behind Marigold) are totally faking it here.

After the party is over, Edda comes back to swing and play Red Hands with Titania all night.
This is probably the last night that I will ever spend at my childhood home with my beloved mommy :D :D :D
:(

Titania spends the waning days of her lifebar productively.
I've discovered trees!
Of course you have.

The funny part is, it makes perfect sense that she would see trees, because there is nothing else over there. There are lots on the other side of the street, but they're all empty. Beyond that there's nothing but a hillside and the edge of the map.
Next time: Generation one fades officially into the past, and there are MORE CHILDREN YES BECAUSE WE NEED THOSE
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