Legacy Family Happenings

It’s been a long time since I peeked in on my Sims 4 legacy family (we’re only on the third generation and the goal is to get to the tenth) but they were still there, waiting. I’m not really sure what I was doing with their current home, but when I started up the game I didn’t like it at all, so the first thing I did was bulldoze the lot and start their home over again. Not a big deal as they were not moving and they still kept their important things, even though I’m only three generations in they’ve accumulated quite a bit of ‘stuff’.

EA has also revamped the purchase screen so I had a clear idea of what I own (and what I don’t). I’m missing a lot of the smaller game components these days, and it’s no wonder because they seem to publish them quite frequently. I never picked up vampires because there’s no easy way to deny them from your sim world – and I don’t have Parenthood, or a lot of the stuff packs like toddler stuff, fitness stuff, bowling night stuff. All of these packs add up, and to “catch up” as it were would be quite expensive.

That being said, I AM very excited about Cats & Dogs which releases November 10th. Pets?! Yes please! This was one of my favourite things in Sims 3, along with seasons which I’m still waiting for. Included in the game is not only pets and items that cater to the animals, but the veterinary career and the ability to create your own vet practice.

Yes please.

Have you kept up with the Sims 4 game packs, expansions, and stuff packs? Which one is your favourite? Are you looking forward to pets being released? Let me know in comments and as always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Bootstrap Buttons (and other Coding Adventures)

I know it has been a little while since I wrote, but I was having some issues with my web host and had to take care of a few things. Hopefully it’s all in hand now and I can get back to blogging! It has also been a little while since I wrote about my adventures with Freecodecamp and learning to code – but I’m still doing that, too. Just at a much slower pace than I had anticipated. The program is fantastic and you go at your own pace, it’s just that my pace has been interrupted by life (a few times).

I’ve completed 67 challenges so far which basically means I’ve touched on almost nothing. I’ve done a little HTML, some CSS, some HTML5, and I’ve just started Bootstrap. Most of the time (so far at least) I’m able to figure out what I need to do on my own. I like the way code is written, it’s easy for me to read and see what pieces need to go where, or what I’m missing. The way these challenges are framed it’s a lot of just inserting a new variable into something that’s already in the code some place, or a version that you’ve already done. Learning where it goes and how it affects everything in real time is neat. I’m eager to get a bit deeper into things but for now I’m content with the (incredibly slow) pace I’m working at. I’m restricted to learning during naps and after kiddo is in bed which doesn’t leave me with a lot of time (it seems like there’s always something more to do) but I’m determined to stick with it so I can develop some skills.

Right now I’m just making buttons that do stuff, that stretch across a certain space, that have colour (or don’t). For a lot of my friends I know this comes easily, but I’m still proud to be picking it up now. I’ll get there.

HTML5 and CSS was 5 hours (approx) of work. Now that I’m on Bootstrap it should be another 5 hours, and then I move on to JQuery (3 hours). From there, I move to Basic Front End Development Projects, 50 hours where I’ll be building a few things. Exciting, no? Yes! If you’ve never heard of Freecodecamp before I highly suggest you check it out, and if you have any other suggestions for me to check out please don’t hesitate to post them to comments!

Now lets get back to gaming!

Slow and Steady

I love achievements. When I can’t figure out what I want to do in a game I can look at the list of achievements and usually find something that appeals to me. Since I’m playing Guild Wars 2 on a newer account that has very little completed, I decided to spend some quiet time chipping away at map completion.

As an example of how very little I have completed on this account – I may have four level 80 characters but they certainly didn’t get there from leveling the traditional way. Rather, I crafted my way to 80. I have 5% world map completion on my main – and of course I want to slowly change that.

I started out easy. I never know when I’m going to have to jump away from the PC so I wanted to begin in a city. I haven’t explored much of Lion’s Arch since the destruction (and rebuilding) after Living Season 1, so I decided that was as good a place as any. I had about 50% of the map already unlocked, waypoints visited and two vista. It took less than an hour to complete the rest, and gave me a nice 2% bump to my overall world map completion.

The best part is that it was completely relaxing and very immersive. I lost myself in the music of the zone, and just bounced around. It was exactly what I wanted to do with my time, and I’m really glad that I did. Was it character progression? Not in the traditional sense of the word, but I did get a little experience for getting it done (cities give very little, I’ve found) and again, it was fun and just what I needed. Next I’m headed to Gendarran Fields, where I have 12% of the map completed. I expect this one will take me a bit longer (hearts, so many hearts) but again it’s a fairly relaxing pace where I can just run around doing my thing and not have to focus too much.

Now I just have to find the time..

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

 

Do You Use the Wishlist Feature?

Just out of curiosity, how many readers out there actually use the Steam Wishlist feature? What do you use it for?

I tend to wishlist games I want but can’t afford at the time, or want and don’t want to spend money on, or want and just.. want. Sometimes an incredibly generous friend gifts one to me and I try to return the favour as often as I can (which isn’t nearly as often as I want, I can tell you that). I try to keep the wishlist up to date and as recent as possible, weeding out games that I don’t REALLY want and that I can’t remember why I actually wishlisted (probably had something to do with a steam sale guiding my hand). My wishlist is a mixture of early access games I don’t want to forget about, and older games that I’m just waiting to go on sale.

If we’re not friends on steam yet, we should be! You can find me there as Stargrace.

Dragon Wings

In the market place today I noticed that there were some chests for sale – but the first one was free (one of each type that was being offered). I love free things (who doesn’t!) so of course I excitedly claimed them to see what was inside on each of my accounts.

I got an account bound pet, some food and oils, and some bits and bobs that you could use to claim other things – if you wanted the really good things you’d have to invest in more chests though. It just so happened that I had enough to purchase some awesome looking holographic dragon wings that fit over the backpack slot as an appearance item. Neat!

I don’t plan on purchasing any more of the chests for gems, but it was a great way to entice players to spending some gems (or gold, or real life cash) that’s for sure.

Pictured above is my Chronomancer (Mesmer) – Blesse. I haven’t played the character for quite some time, not since HoT came out I believe. I think at the time I was finding the class too difficult, and I wanted to swap back to my guardian so that’s the character I made next. I boosted a Charr ranger to 80 with my PoF boost, and I had enough random boosts to move my elementalist to 30 (from 20) which wasn’t too shabby. I also created a norn necromancer bringing the total characters on the newer account to 5, one of each race. I’ve never really played anything except my Guardian and the Mesmer, so I don’t have a lot of experience with those classes, but it’s always fun to have options.

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!