Why I never delete my abandoned Sims save files

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[00:00:00] Gloria from Yellow Llama Co.: Hi, everyone. I’m back. I stepped away from the podcast at the start of the year to create this sim guardian. My dream system for tracking and organizing my sims in Notion. Building the sim guardian took over 9 months, much longer than I expected, but it was so worth it. I poured lots of love and attention into every detail. And now that it’s finished, I can finally enjoy it and share it with you. The feedback I’ve received from simmers has been incredible, and I’m deeply grateful for your support.

Gloria [00:00:26]:
It’s what makes it possible for me to even immerse myself in the 1st place into something I’m so passionate about and to keep creating for you. If you’re curious and wanna learn more about the sim guardian, I’ll leave a link in the show notes. Now that the sim guardian is here, I’m ready to return to making episodes. This time, I’m switching things up. I’ve been making some diary style videos over on YouTube where I dive deep into my personal save files and share how I find new ways to solve old problems. It’s been a lot of fun, and they are also quite listenable. So I want to share them as video podcasts with you here as well. There are moments when I refer to what’s on the screen.

Gloria [00:00:58]:
If you want to see what’s happening, you can watch along on Spotify or YouTube. I get better at describing what’s happening in later episodes. The episodes are also going to be a bit more off the cuff. I’ll take you along my thought process, which I hope will inspire your own gameplay. Wherever you’re tuning in, whether you’re listening or watching, I’d love to hear what you think. Your feedback helps shape what’s next, so feel free to leave a comment and let me know. I’ve been playing The Sims for years, like, since its inception. Okay? I’m I’m an oldie here, okay, an OG, but I’ve never deleted any of my save files.

Gloria [00:01:30]:
I would always make backups and I would never delete them though and I’m really happy I never did and I actually never will now because you never know what potential that save might have. And I’m not even talking about just your the safe files that you love. Also, your abandoned safe files, I really don’t think you should ever give up on them because you never know what story might still linger beneath the cracks. Like, that safe I got born at some point, but it doesn’t mean that the safe, itself sucked. Right? It could still like, you can come back years later. You might learn new things about story or about, you know, your characters or and, you know, how you can create your characters. The game might get new features, new mods, a new type of gameplay that makes revisiting that old save file interesting again. And, also, like, if you get bored with your current save file, why not revisit an older one? It it brings back nostalgia.

Gloria [00:02:22]:
You know, you can see the storyline with new eyes, you know, depending on how old that save file is with really, really new eyes. Like, I have a super old sim 3 save file that I got 5 generations, worth of legacy gameplay in, and that was from 2010 is when I started that save file and I haven’t played it for so long. I think I I like played it intensely for like 2 years back in 2010. So like between 2,010 and 2012 and then I stopped playing it. And I think that was right around when Sims 4 came out. That’s why I think I kinda discontinued it. I actually remember trying to recreate the current air and everything in the Sims 4 which didn’t really work out as I thought and as you might recall if you were there in those days, Sims 4 was a bit bare bones so it couldn’t really, you know, grab my attention anyways. And for some reason, there was a disconnect.

Gloria [00:03:19]:
I couldn’t really go back to the old sims 3 save file. For some reason I just couldn’t get back into it. And I mean it was a really old save file. It was like I was a different person when I played this old. And so now after I created the sim guardian which is, like my dream notion archive template system for keeping track of my sins, I wanted to collect all the lore from old save files and just, you know, reminisce a little bit and and have it all in one place. And I also thought, you know, wouldn’t it be cool to also maybe figure out a way to make that safe out interesting again? Like, one while I was digging through all the screenshots and piecing everything together, I was wondering like, hey. You know what? Maybe it’s not just worth saving all this lore just for you know, nostalgia sake. Maybe I could actually like still get some gameplay out of this but how right? Like I guess it went stale for a reason.

Gloria [00:04:14]:
So is it even possible to make such an old save file even fun again? Like, I I would First of all, I was tasked with the fact that I had a gazillion backups of this save file and I had to figure out which one was the latest version because I had actually saved a bunch of the photos of these sims in a family tree app called my family tree which I love and their faces were older than what I thought was my current latest save version of it. So I was like, oh, darn it. So I had to find the actual latest save file, which meant digging into the save file folders and looking at the date of the n h d file and what was the most latest one. I ended up finding it, thankfully. So I I think, currently, I am working with the latest save file version because that was what I needed also to find out all the information about the Sims and their traits because I wanted to save that on this notion. Right? And so, basically, I organized all the screenshots I’ve ever collected for that say well, in general for the sims, like, I had to just get it all in one place. Then I had to sift through that and try to make sense of, okay, when was what picture taken? Because when you copy paste things over, it changes the creation date. But luckily for some reason the modification date was the actual creation, like, the true one.

Gloria [00:05:27]:
So through those dates, I was able to piece together, okay, who was born before who which would make this person actually be this other person that I I I it was so confusing, but it really helped to put everything in Notion and to like, obviously, I had the family tree that I had created, a couple years ago which really helped also piecing together. Still people look different in their photos like the toddlers for example all look the same and it’s like okay who’s who and it really helped to have those dates, as well and because I also have the dates of screenshots. As you see here in this, sim guardian, I actually collect, lore. So I collect memories and the so the history and all that stuff. So, here we can go and check memories. So I was able to, like, input these screenshots into little memories, like, little stories and collect them. And based on their dates and everything and just seeing here, like, everything in front of me, I was able to, realize who’s who and just make more sense out of it because, actually, this is just one family. I actually haven’t, pasted in or and uploaded a lot of memories and photos from other families, other legacies that are part of the safe home.

Gloria [00:06:41]:
And then I have all the photos as well as you can see a ton and, like, you see here this baby and and this ghost is like, okay, who’s who? Because this could have been Sam who is this guy. This could have been obviously Eric is who I figured it must be and also who’s this baby and like figuring that all out. Like there’s also this one kid, Amanda. Where is she? Yes. Here. I for the longest, I thought this was Mercy but it’s Amanda and piecing that altogether but it was really fun And it’s really nice then after all that work to be able to review everything in one place and to actually know, like, okay, these things happened and in this order, and also the relation that the sims have to each other. Because, so this year, is basically the save file record. So we have, like, the summary if I wanted about the save file of the current year.

Gloria [00:07:37]:
So we’re in year 3, day 82. So overall day 82 in the save file, it’s currently winter. And so I think that’s also really cool to be able to keep track of what year I am in my save file. So I’m getting really nerdy with this. If you didn’t realize already, like, I spent a lot of time, collecting all this lore and I spent a crap ton of time creating this template. And, yeah, I sell it on my shop, but let’s be real. I created it for myself. Okay, girl? I do you know how much time it took me to create the documentation for this? And that was a lot of work.

Gloria [00:08:08]:
I could have just been like, you know what? Forget it. I’m just gonna have it for myself. That like, everything I make, that is what I’m thinking about. I’m thinking what would I want. Somebody else might want it too, so let’s make it public. Let’s make some documentation for it. But, yeah, I wanted this myself and I am so glad I have it now. So now I have a little tracker that I can see, I can complete the day and then, my day is done so I’m just gonna do that real quick.

Gloria [00:08:34]:
They’re still on day 82, but this is so cool. So I have, all my lore. Like I said, I have all the characters in this save file that I’ve collected. So, yeah, I think I’m at the stage now where I could say like the most important sims that matter to me I’ve collected in this save file. So as you can see it’s quite a few of them, and it’s basically a handful of different legacy. So we have the white legacy, we have the Parks legacy which the Parks legacy is like the main legacy in the save file. We have the Del Corvo’s legacy which is very special and dear to my heart. With the McDowell legacy which is actually everybody whose name is Cassie.

Gloria [00:09:09]:
It’s part of the McDowell legacy. So I think those are the main ones, and then there are people that married into the family and whatnot and so they are, locked here as well. But I just had a lot of fun collecting all these characters and as you can see this click into, this one for example. She’s an heir of the park’s legacy so she’s gen 5 so I would have collected everything and anything about her at least that matters to me and so if I open up this in, a large piece. So before we’re in the save file page where I have like a a bird’s eye view of everything like I of the households, of characters, of lore, but here I can see like information about her and like she’s Gen 5. I’m so proud of that Gen 5. I know how much money she has, her net worth, so net worth is basically her cash on hand plus the value of her, home. So home with all furniture and everything and then we have further details like, her career, her life goal.

Gloria [00:10:09]:
Oh, she got a naughty reputation. I did not remember that. Okay, girl. Yeah. And her home where she lives and any backstory if I had created one for her but since this is basically was me just documenting past lore, there wasn’t really a backstory that I created for her yet. I mean that were it it was part of the gameplay, I guess, it it came out of. But Yeah. So so her relationships so that’s also another thing.

Gloria [00:10:34]:
Like, I dug into the save file and tried to piece things together just on a first of all, on the level of the parts legacy just to make sense of who’s related to who and and to putting that into the, the sim guardian also with memories and whatnot. But I also wanted to see, okay, who are who is she actually friends with? And as you can see, so she’s together with Joaquin Riley. She has a bunch well, okay. Four friends. For some reason, I thought she had a bunch, but she has these 4 friends. So these are actually this is her mom and some sister, but Isabella is her really good friend. And Jasmine is from the delcazon delcovetz on legacy. So, obviously, it’s my important love interest.

Gloria [00:11:12]:
Tony can afford. Okay, girl. What’s going on there? So yeah. So I thought it was really fun to collect all those things, and I actually found out some funky stuff. So I’ll get into that. This is stuff I didn’t even know about other characters. But let’s go back. So what I also think is really fun, I can actually see on this leaderboard which legacy is worth the most, and also on a generation basis so the Parks legacy is in the front by far.

Gloria [00:11:45]:
I mean we have this is the longest standing legacy so they’ve had the most time to accumulate wealth, and they basically bought out the entire town I believe if I’m not mistaken because I had some notes that I had did take like from an old OneNote save file that, had some summaries and yeah. So Mercy Parks is from gen 4, I believe. No. Gen gen 3. She’s gen 3. And she’s, like, the richest by far. She also has this huge manor, Raven’s Rock Manor. That’s her lot, and it is also the one the most valuable property that is owned, in the, how do you say, in the safe file of amongst everyone else.

Gloria [00:12:27]:
And so I really love that I can see, like, okay. And also, like, who’s an heir and who’s a spare? Because you would think that the heirs would accumulate the most night because they’re the ones I focused most on are the most important, but actually sometimes these spares be creeping up with a lot of cash on hand. And depending on how you’re playing, you might decide, you know what? Richest is the one who gets to play or you wanna play the most the poorest, sim. Like, if you want this is just a legacy leaderboard, so this is just how you see, okay, like, how it is the net worth of each, generation. As you can see, generation 3 is the wealthiest of all of them in the parks legacy and whatnot. But you can also just see it from a character perspective. So I also have for you where it’s, like, listed by lowest and highest funds. And yeah.

Gloria [00:13:13]:
So here we can see Amber. Amber could need some help here. Maybe we should jump into her save file, hers her what do you call her? Her household and see if we can support her a little bit. Mercy doesn’t need anyone anyone’s help and her, successors will be very happy about that inheritance. Actually, yeah, I had an NROs installed and so that I’m sure there’s some sort of inheritance cool thingy that would, would work out there. The agency who’s the richest like the net worth but also, funds. It’s really cool. So I’m glad I was able to like not only collect all the characters and create their profiles and collect the lore which really is the heart of it all, but also to collect that supplemental information that it’s just like super interesting because that can inform how I wanna play the story moving forward.

Gloria [00:14:02]:
Like when I look at who’s rich and who has less, is there conflict there? Who would I wanna play because of the amount of money they have or don’t have, so it’s really fun to see all those relationships. And also I collected households, so I know who lives where and what house and which part of the town. So what’s really cool about Saint Clair, it actually has, so it’s a Sims three custom world and it actually has different regions or different neighborhoods in it itself, and so it’s cool to see okay, the Esparosa household is downtown, and, you know, I have an idea already what these, areas look like, how this world actually you know, the each area, its vibe. We have mercy in the very much wealthy, hilly area. And, yeah, here we can see also, all the properties that are in the safe file sorted by neighborhood. Megan is actually in this teensy tiny home while Jason, as you might recall, is is rolling in the money, he’s got this manner, the Benedict Town House, I still have to grab a photo of that one, but downtown you can see it’s very townhouse y or apartments, pent houses, In Fairview, it’s a bit more quaint and Ravensbourne is very wealthy. And Southbridge, I would say, is also quaint but it’s like near the water in the other coast. It’s very, very nice as well.

Gloria [00:15:29]:
It’s in the legacies views where I really can see, more about each legacy though. So let’s click in there. So I was really excited to start filling the sim guardian with my Parks legacy so I can actually see what they what they look like in, when I sprawl everything out and collect everything on one page. And so we have here 5 generations. I’m so proud. I’m so proud. So I don’t actually think they started in Saint Clair but I don’t remember the name of the town that they started in so found it in Saint Clair. Because I actually moved to Sinclair at some point.

Gloria [00:16:03]:
I actually recorded that as a memory somewhere. Yeah, in the family history where memory gallery oh, yeah. The park’s legacy moved to Sinclair. And so that was, somewhere in generation 4. They they’ve only been living there for a couple of generations. I think they might have started in Meadow Glen which is another custom world, but I really am not too sure because I tried to gauge it from the, screenshots. I think Meadow Glen, but that’s also a thing, like, this is so old. I don’t even know if that Meadow Glen custom world existed in 2010.

Gloria [00:16:39]:
Because I remember this house, I remember building it. Well, not not from scratch, but I remember building upon it. So many memories in this family and that’s also a great thing about this view here. I see per generation the different memories and as you can see, I don’t have a lot. I unfortunately wasn’t that great with keeping track back in 2010. Like I said, you know, it’s worth revisiting old C file. You know, an old dog learned new tricks along the way, and those tricks include keeping track. And so moving forward, I’m pretty sure the next 5 generations are gonna have a lot more memories collected, a lot more photos, and lore.

Gloria [00:17:24]:
Nevertheless, it’s still fun to see what I did have cataloged and organized where I can just, like, look back and remember. I also have here, in the generations so each generation’s page has its own overview, and I actually added, a summary section. This is actually quite new. Like, I’m constantly improving and working on this and guiding. We’re actually at version 3 right now, so, you know, I launched new improvements, fixes, and obviously, like, the latest, was the life and death update. So this, template like, I use it for all of my different sim, sims games. So for the sims 2, 3, 4, and it’s gonna be able to be used for future ones as well. So I’m, like, of course, updating it whenever a new pack is released.

Gloria [00:18:08]:
A lot of the stuff for life and death was already in here, but, like, there was some little minor core corrections or, like, 1 or 2 traits that, we became aware of first when it was released. But basically this here, isn’t actually part of the official template yet of the generation template. But I realized when I was collecting information about this really old legacy, as you can see, I didn’t have a a ton of memories to actually save in the memory gallery. So this isn’t, like, telling much of the story of generation 2, but I did have some notes in an old OneNote, file, like, just, like, really bare bones, but it was enough to scrap up a summary. So if I open up this in full page, we have here the founder and heir, which is, of course, Madison. And here I I just input a, summary. So I have, like, an overview of what actually happened in that generation, and so I think that’s really fun. So just real quick.

Gloria [00:19:05]:
So, basically, Madison Parks, she’s our founder, and she started, oh, Meadow Glen. I can correct that now. So it was Meadow Glen. Oh, yes. It’s confirmed. It is Meadow Glen. Okay. Very very nice.

Gloria [00:19:18]:
Cool. So I could correct that in the generations, founding, town. Perfect. But yeah. So it it the Eric was a brave firefighter. So I remember when I started playing this same file, it must have been when ambitions came out because she was a stylist and Eric was a firefighter and those are two careers that came with, the sims ambitions, pack which is one of my favorites by the way. I love anything that has to do with business and, I don’t know, I love the for me, it’s like you you can be an art artist or painter or you can make money with woodworking, that’s one thing, but I feel like if you put it into a level of a freelancer career or, creating your own retail store, I feel like that makes it I love the complexity that gives that, activity when it comes to money making. Right? It’s not just creative painting, sell it.

Gloria [00:20:09]:
It’s more like there’s more interaction going on tonight. I don’t know. I just love the depth of that brings and so open for business has always been my favorite pack anyways, from the from the Sims 2, but I really loved ambitions and how it, like, gave our Sims more interesting, like, interactive careers where I felt a skill that they had, I could really, like, put it to work literally and feel like I was progressing more than just something more simple. I don’t know if I’m being clear. But, basically, they were my little guinea pigs for the new pack. And little did I know, they would turn out to be my most longest play legacy. And as you may have seen already from the only two memories I have here, it’s being described here how Eric, you know, dropped down on both knees, proposed to Madison. She, of course, said yes.

Gloria [00:20:58]:
I was too lazy to, make a whole wedding venue and everything like that, so they eloped. So I was just eager to get to the game player. I remember that vividly. I just wanted to play and so the legacy part of things wasn’t my focus as much because in that moment because I just wanted like explore the new pack. So going all out with the wedding and everything wasn’t really a focus then, but obviously, I don’t really do that anymore now. I have to really try to find time to make a wedding and because it’s fun. It’s one of my favorite things. I mean, I did create a website called belovedsims.com, which is basically dedicated to collecting and curating content made by simmers, for, like, wedding venues, honeymoon destinations, dresses, of course, attire, accessories, shoes, just all in one place so that when, at least for the sims 4, I plan my next wedding, it is less scouring the internet involved but I digress.

Gloria [00:21:51]:
So yes, she said yes of course and then she continued her career as a stylist while Eric developed a love for traveling. Oh yes, oh my god I must have been exploring the freaking world adventures pack as well. I don’t even remember the order in which I got things, but I feel like I would have gotten things immediately after they came out. I don’t think I would have waited long for getting the expansion pack but I also don’t remember it right now in which order like obviously World Adventures was the very first one but I don’t remember how close after ambitions came out but, I remember having a blast with Eric. I think he’s the one semi actually really used the world adventures the most intensely with. He explored a lot of tombs. He collected a ton of artifacts, like there’s a whole museum in Saint Claire dedicated to the family, and literally the entire first floor is nothing but artifacts from Eric’s explorations. And I had totally forgotten this, but he earned visa level 3 in Egypt, which is wild, and they bought in a vacation home.

Gloria [00:22:56]:
I actually have to still record that vacation home. I totally forgot about that, but that’s really cool. So that’s something I could vacation home. I totally forgot about that, but that’s really cool. So that’s something I could add to, for example, the estate here. So here we have a collection of, things that are associated with the family. So we have the photo album. We have heirlooms.

Gloria [00:23:14]:
So far, I just have Eric’s firefighter equipment as heirlooms. The different homes in the family. Oh, yeah. This is generation 1, so we won’t see all of them, but this also exists on the legacy view. So in the legacy view, we’d see all the homes, but obviously if he bought a family, vacation home, it would be here as well. And he earned visa level 3 so that’s actually something I could add to his his, his profile as an achievement. So if we go to just so you know what I mean. If I open up his profile, I can go to, achievements.

Gloria [00:23:49]:
Let’s just open this up real quick and so everything that was important that he achieved is collected here. It was tricky actually that was also one of the challenges wasn’t only to figure out what was the actual true latest save all but also a lot of these sims like a couple of gravestones were missing I couldn’t like piece together everything. So I actually found a really really old save file and just save like some basic information about this is like their traits and stuff like that because in the earlier save file which another reason I’m glad I didn’t delete anything because I had those older save files, I was able to retrieve information because the since we’re still living or, we were still generations early enough before any buggy stuff happened with graves. Also, in my latest save file, all the photos were broken in the museum. So all the photos that had all the pictures that have been taken in game, they were all like black frames. I was like, oh, darn it. And so there was some corruption that went on there. I know I use a safe lock so maybe I didn’t have the right settings and like deleted all that, but I was able to retrieve those images by grabbing an old n h d file or whatever from an older safe file and just I I think the travel d b one and that helps to bring back all those images and so that was really cool.

Gloria [00:25:05]:
But, yeah, I wouldn’t have been able to do that if I had deleted past save file. So I think it’s worth keeping everything. Like, nowadays, files, hard drive space is cheap and these this is like these are memories that if you’re a a similar like me, super sentimental about your characters and about the experiences, the stories you’ve had with them then you don’t want you know, to save, like, I don’t know, 2 megabytes space because of, you know and then on in turn lose all these memories. Like, no. I want this information about my sins and so now I know, okay, he had a visa level 3 he said. Yeah. So I can add that here. Visa level next to add details.

Gloria [00:25:48]:
So it’s actually visa level 3. I give that information here, just here, so basically 3, and then we see that’s the full level so that’s great. Good for Eric. But back to that summary, so visa level 3 bought a vacation home. Oh, yeah. So adventure is super important to him. He loved raiding tombs so the world adventures pack was basically, you know, his oyster. And martial arts was very important to him, and even hanging out in the vacation home even long after his death, playing games.

Gloria [00:26:24]:
As you can see, like, he turned into a mummy and then he turned into a ghost or I don’t actually know which, order. If it was first, he turned into a ghost and then a mummy or a a mummy and then a ghost, but I thought that was super funny that he, must have been a ghost first. Yeah. Because this is the reaping of Eric parks Parks. So he was a ghost first and then he was a, what do you call it? A mummy. Going through these images, I just not realized and not really sorted by, date made. Right? So but that’s no issue. I can just change that here, date taken, and now they’re in order.

Gloria [00:27:01]:
Perfect. And so here, now we can just like if you look through, you see, like, how everything started, Madison at the fashion studio, Eric in uniform, them getting, you know, engaged and married and then having their first baby boy, baby Sam, and then we skip to the reaping of Eric Parks because I actually associated Sam and also his sister Amanda with generation 2, so their photos don’t really show up here, because they’re associated with a different generation and so we skip to, again what’s relevant, regarding Eric and Madison, and yeah, it’s such a beautiful love they had even after he died, you know, she was like, no, this is still by 1. Really really cute, and here we also read on to learn, that it’s not only Mercy that was, rolling in money, like, this family, I feel like ambition, adventure, and like, how would you say, like, business is important to them, like, even already early on Madison, like, both of them were in in very important professions, and Madison actually delved into her business ventures. It says here she invested in a venue near the beach. I have no idea anymore what that venue would be, but it’s now a local getaway with the drinks best drinks and music in town. Okay. Cool. And so the snack for investing seem to be inherited within the family.

Gloria [00:28:28]:
So now they own pretty much half the town, which means I like in the sims 3, you can invest in different lots, and so I bet you they just bought everything pretty much, and yeah they made the most out of life and paved the way for future generations to come. I love it. So that is generation 1, okay? 1 of 5, oh I love it. I like, see, it’s just so fun to, like, dig into all this history, this lore that was just dormant, like, for years, like, I haven’t touched it the safe file in years, like, in over a decade now, but so much had happened that so much rich story and you just don’t I you don’t wanna delete that. You don’t wanna remove the chance of being able to revisit that and maybe fall back in love. Right? It’s coming back to the family here. Actually, what I wanna do is I think I wanna add what I just now said to the family’s identity so that adventure and whatnot and by the way the family crest I haven’t created that yet like I don’t know for me like I just mocked one up real quick for another family I had and just put it in but for the park’s legacy I wanted to be special and I’m still trying to work out like I mean I just not worked out with you what, some important things are to this family. So, common features, traits, values.

Gloria [00:29:44]:
So values I would say is definitely like ambition, did I spell that right ambition? Adventure is important to them and, you know, business endeavors or striving for business. I don’t know. Business endeavors is not really value, but you put me on the spot here. I mean, I think those are definitely things that are, important to them and not necessarily businesses in the sense of making money, or lots of money, though that is kinda what happened in the end of being made. Because I think for Madison and Eric, that wasn’t their priority. Okay? That wasn’t their prerogative. But maybe in a later generation, you know, is the case for certain characters that they, you know, got kinda like, their mind was focused only on money because they had so much of it and was like, you know what? I I don’t know, you know, it could be conflict and like, they they just valued being in business like that fulfilled them, but then other characters in the family might end up focusing on the money aspect of business where it’s not just about having a fulfilling business one that is helps the community, and contributes to the community, but a business that just makes the most profit, right? Both value business or doing business, but for very different reasons. And so that’s something I could potentially potentially explore.

Gloria [00:31:12]:
Like, Jason, I feel like the life he’s kinda living right now, he could maybe be that type of sim, but I can actually look real quick what his traits are, if that actually would be realistic. Like, I don’t wanna pin something on him that wouldn’t actually fit his personality. But, yes, he’s neurotic, technophobe, dramatic, athletic, friendly. I mean, he doesn’t really sound like somebody who would, you know, have that kind of money mindset friendly. He he’s neurotic but maybe he’s somebody who just likes to hold on to money, and maybe not necessarily put it in the bank. I don’t know, but he doesn’t sound like he would have like a very profit revenue driven mindset when it comes to business. But yeah, that’s why I’m glad I have all that information collected here and can just have a quick peek at at his profile and see. Okay? Is what I’m pinning on him doesn’t even make doesn’t even make sense for him and his personality, or am I just taking them to that thin air? Who else could I pin it on? Who else does it make more sense to? Yeah.

Gloria [00:32:15]:
Yeah. You get my drift. In generation 2, the founder was Sam, and we can just real quick check that summary. What happened there? A lot. So yeah, this is just a bunch of, stuff that happened in the family. So he ended up making a living in a journalism career. Family oriented like his dad. Oh, that’s a value I could add to the legacy, values.

Gloria [00:32:44]:
I love that he ended up staying in the family home, and here we have Mercy coming into the picture which is I think this semi played the most during this, legacy, so, she’s definitely dear to my heart. And then they adopted little Lily, China still so Shang Simla, actually, let’s be correct here. Shang Simla. Let’s add that to the dictionary. So they traveled there and, you know, martial arts I think is also something that’s very important to the family throughout the generations, so, Mercy ended up being quite proficient in martial arts, the wife of Sam, Christine was quite proficient in it. Obviously, Eric was, you know, being a visa level 3, he was like an expert in everything, Shang Chi Minh, including martial arts. And, I think Flora, which is generation 4, she also delved into it. But, yeah, I love that like Mercy would practice martial arts on the, you know, kicking dummy that her grandpa had once brought home from her on his many trips.

Gloria [00:33:54]:
Yeah. So he was a real inspiration for her, and Lily actually wasn’t too interested in martial arts, but she ended up finding the love of her life in Shang Chiem La. She, yes, she met yay. And, first, I had, like, a long, distance relationship, but then he moved also into to to Meadow Glen and then ended up getting married. But I think I’m getting ahead of myself. I think that’s like the next generation because this is generation 2. This is Sam’s generation, so it’s not about them in this generation. And as you can see, I only have one memory for these guys.

Gloria [00:34:38]:
So Sam fell in love with Christine. They had a little hot tub date. I’m pretty sure this wasn’t their first date but it’s one that I got a picture of so because I think they look so pretty next to each other, post like this. I think this was I don’t think this was post with like a post blaring thing. I think this is like a natural in game post. But, yeah, he was he was a good one. So let me just add family to one of their values. So business and family, not in that order of course, but I mean it started with ambition and adventure.

Gloria [00:35:10]:
Ambition for Madison, adventure for Eric. Business followed something they both valued, and then family obviously is what they built together. And so I would say these are the 4 values this family has for sure. Who knows? Not every sim in the legacy carries these values in the same way or even maybe at all, but, I would say those are the family values that Madison saw for her family moving forward. It’s always hard to pick a favorite, but I think generation 3 is my favorite generation. The generation 4 is probably a close second, but I’ve really spent a lot of time with Mercy. So yeah, this is just a placeholder until I find time to actually write a proper biography. Like I said like, I mean at the same time like a crest is something that can change as well and as you can see I can click into this and that it just changes real quick, but I want to create, meaningful descriptions and so I’ll just remove this actually entirely.

Gloria [00:36:13]:
I just love Mercy. Like, she had great traits. She was brave, ambitious, disciplined. She loved martial arts, you know, just as much as, you know, her grandpa and her mother. And, so actually I wanna show off. I love the, memories that we have here. So we have Mercy and Christine’s training sessions. If I click into that, you can see like also the photos attached to it.

Gloria [00:36:38]:
I love that, Mercy reached Jen Zen at some point during that session. Of course they traveled to Shangriem La together and here’s the photo album of that trip of her you know climbing the mountains on the way to that temple and pushing through the pain and, pushing herself to the limit, during her training. And of course, her first date with Ian who, you know, later became her husband and Lily, got married to Yesheng but she, kinda basically splashed mom with some bubbly. Mercy and Ian’s wedding. Yeah. So I would say this was before I was really great at, weddings. It was quite tricky. I think I wasn’t, savvy about mods too.

Gloria [00:37:26]:
I mean, I had a ton of them already at this time, but as you can see, like, I had an issue with his outfit and people’s, you know, staying seated and I don’t know. It wasn’t the most, beautiful wedding. I just put put it together real quick. But, you know, I’m still proud of it. It’s still, I guess, got some cool photos still from it. It’s definitely unique. It was a unique experience, unique, wedding. And then maybe the most, key moment in, Mercy’s life is when she became the queen of the night, when she became a vampire basically.

Gloria [00:38:05]:
And that helped her gain all the wealth she has today because I mean, I was able to play her really long because she was a vampire. And I think at one point, I just said, you know what? I want her to be able to pass. So she’s actually still living even though we’re on generation 5 right now and the generation’s heir is like an adult now, like, we’re young adult. And so a lot of time has gone by, but Mercy will pass soon because she is an elder. But, yeah, I had some great times with her. I I think this is when the late night pack maybe came out around this time, because I was really discovering the, new club system and everything in the pack. So you can really see from this legacy also my journey from when you know, which packs I had and and with different packs coming out. I think, actually looking back, it’s really fun to consider, how I can see my journey in that aspect as well.

Gloria [00:38:55]:
Yeah, Mercy became a vampire, and I think she made a lot of enemies from that as well. Like, I was just looking into her, you know, amount of friends she had and everything. I can actually, go to her profile and show you. Like, she has quite a few enemies, and they’re, like, from all different legacies. So the white legacy, the back legacy, the Del Corazon legacy. Like, she made enemies with everyone. She even made enemies within her own family. So Flora is her daughter and Dina.

Gloria [00:39:24]:
Dina is I think her sister and Paia is the former wife of Dina. So, yeah, she’s got I don’t know why she has bad blood with her sister. That I mean her daughter that really, surprises me, but that’s something I’d love to explore like figure out and maybe also to redeem that relationship. Like I remember playing another family in a totally different save file. The, where I played this sim called Florita and she had a really estranged relationship with her daughter Palmyra that was in the Isle of the Paradiso world. And I just remember playing that household, like, it was one of the, pre made households, and I just thought it was so fun to just make it my goal to redeem that relationship and to make them close again. And, of course, I succeeded because that was my goal and my mission. And maybe I’ll do the same for Flora and Mercy like Mercy is, you know, no longer a vampire.

Gloria [00:40:14]:
She’s, you know, cast away that undead life that, you know, potentially bloodthirsty evil life. I mean, vampires aren’t necessarily evil but it seems like she didn’t do good if she got all these enemies but I think she also has quite a lot of friends. Yeah. So that’s also speaking for her. Funny enough, also, you know, well throughout different legacies, represented. But, yeah, I think possibly we could do something about that. But where were we? Generation 3 now, I think. Yes.

Gloria [00:40:45]:
So back to generation 3, to the summary real quick. Just I don’t wanna miss anything. So yeah, a wedding took place at the beautiful beach club venue the Parks family owned. Oh, okay. So they owned that property. Okay. Cool. So that was Mercy and Ian, you remember in the nice little ducky, swim, get up.

Gloria [00:41:07]:
And then Mercy gave birth to 2 lovely girls, Dana and Flora. Okay. Dana wasn’t Mercy’s sister. Dana was her daughter, which makes say, Morris. I mean, she’s estranged with both of her daughters. And, Dana’s oh, yes. Exactly. Paella was actually Dana’s childhood, imaginary friend, which, if I’m not mistaken, came with the generations pack.

Gloria [00:41:28]:
So it really seems like that pack dropped while I was playing gen 3 of, Park’s legacy. And yeah. So Dana basically brought, Paya to a science facility and helped her be changed into a real girl. And, yeah, Dana ended up falling in love with Paia. I mean, they already had a really close relationship. They were besties, but, yeah, and then Paia and Dana basically, made it official and got married and Flora ended up, becoming an avid rider, a horse rider. She’s very fond of horses which is actually a detail I forgot. So I just now realized this is actually part of gen 4 story.

Gloria [00:42:14]:
So, I will actually copy this, delete it from here, and I’ll add it to the summary here. Let’s see if it still makes sense. Yeah. It does. It actually makes perfect sense. So we know this part already, and this is Flora. So she ended up being the heir. And then as she grew older, the family so she and everybody really moved to Saint Clair.

Gloria [00:42:37]:
I just poured the whole entire lot, over there. Yeah. And she moved into our first apartment. She started working in the film industry, then she met met Donovan Del Corazon, who was a handsome young police officer. Yes. And so let’s go look through those memories. So we have Flora, going horseback riding, like I mentioned before. We have Dana and Peya’s wedding, their first day after she was, you know, turned real.

Gloria [00:43:07]:
We have Flor and Donovan in their first apartment together in Saint Clair. We have their wedding. Let’s just click into that because I think their wedding is absolutely beautiful. So as you can see, like, I took a lot of photos. I think this is when I was maybe starting to keep track a little bit more. But also, I feel like weddings are always a bit more fun to, take photos of because, you know, you prepared a lot. And so, here are just, you know, some photos from the wedding. I’m cutting the cake together, their first kiss, and you know at the altar, then exchange more rings and so this is really cute and I remember having an absolute blast creating these photos for their honeymoon.

Gloria [00:43:47]:
So basically, they had a honeymoon at that one sunlit tides custom world. Yep. I don’t know if I got it immediately after it came out, like, if this is again showing the timeline of expansion packs based on when I played certain things, but, I I had so much fun then traveling there, taking these photos, and skinny dipping. And I think ever since then, I try to, when people are having a wedding, I try to make it a honeymoon out of it as well, like a whole all around experience. Because I mean, in real life too, usually people go on honeymoon. They do a little vacation after they get married. And so instead of following the footsteps of a family founder, just getting eloped real quick in the living room so they can get on with their stylist and firefighter life, I really try to, have things a bit bit more elaborate. It’s a bit more of an experience for the characters.

Gloria [00:44:42]:
And that’s why I really wanted to make beloved Sims as well because it can take already a ton of time to find out your Sims outfit for the wedding, and that’s just for the, bride, right, to find the venue, clothing for everybody else. And then also honeymoon destination girl who has the time. And so beloved since I’ve come, I love that like it’s sorted also by destination, by, type of destination like the world and also whether or not it’s a hotel resort. You can also select, like, whether or not it is a luxury or more intimate and whatnot and so yeah. It’s all just for Sims 4. I, haven’t collected and curated for Sims 3 yet, but I mean, I might do that if there’s, like, enough demand. I can also include that in the sim in beloved sims.com. We’ll see.

Gloria [00:45:29]:
But yes. I this is one of my favorite memories. Just also just for me as a a simmer, it was so much fun to play and record. And then we have generation 5, Megan Parks, which there’s not much of a summary here yet, I haven’t added that to this one because not much has happened with this part of the family yet, so if I look in the memory gallery, I don’t think there’s gonna be anything. Okay. Elliot and Jacqueline’s first kiss. So Elliot is Megan’s brother, and so we can look here under member members how many are part of this generation, and so it’s Megan of course, Jacqueline. Jacqueline is only part of this generation because she married into it, so she married Elliot, and then we have, Roxy.

Gloria [00:46:09]:
So Roxy, Elliot, and Megan are, siblings. I just thought Megan was the most interesting of them all, so I chose her to be the, how do you say the, legacy heir. It was a toss-up, though, because Elliot is also pretty cool. And I love Jacqueline, so I I’m definitely gonna keep following their journey, and hey, I might just change it, like I might change my mind if Megan gets boring, I might say no, you know what? You’ve been revoked to the air privilege. And also like I don’t know if I clarified this how it works for me in choosing the air and how, like, the succession goes so I can actually show that best on the actual page of the legacy. So I do it by the principle of direct lineage, so we have, of course, the founder Madison Parks, Everybody who is a a daughter or son of her is fair game. They can be heir, and it ended up being Sam. And so now only children of Sam can become heir, not children of Amanda or, if anybody else was like a sibling.

Gloria [00:47:10]:
They can’t become it. And so that makes it the choice a lot easier for the air of the next generation. It has to be from Sam. If he ends up having boring kids or no kids and Amanda had kids, then I would have just changed my mind and she would have been air. But that’s how it flows down. And so, we have mercy ended up being the air amongst, so it was mercy and Lily where his his daughters, and then end up choosing mercy as the, air, and so not only children of Mercy are eligible to become the heir of the next generation. So we have, Flora was chosen as the heir for generation 4. Eligible would have been Flora, Jason, or Dana, but it was Flora.

Gloria [00:47:54]:
And so while I think Jason might have a kid, I’m not so sure. He they’re not even eligible to be heir because they have you can only be an heir if you are a descendant of an heir. And so again, we have the children of Flora, we had 3 for an option and we ended up going with, Megan. I can change this at any time if I wanted to, like, change my mind, but I think we’re gonna go with this for now. And so, yeah, that’s how basically the, heirs are chosen. But if you marry into the family you are considered at least a little bit part of the family just, you know, because it’s interesting to see who married into the family. Also, how legacies are combined, Like, Flora actually used to be married to Donovan who is part of the Del Corazon legacy. Right? And there, there would have been a conflict.

Gloria [00:48:38]:
So okay. What what is the legacy gonna be for their kid? So the kid will either carry on the Park’s legacy or it’ll carry on the Del Corazon legacy if it was Flora and Donovan. Right? And so the Park’s legacy was always my main squeeze, so the Park’s legacy I consider as the strongest one, and so any children of Flora will carry on the park’s legacy even as a spare. And so Donovan was out of the run for being heir for his family because it wouldn’t make sense to make him heir if all of his children would be part of the the park’s legacy. Right? And so he was out of the running. So I just navigated to the Del Corazon family real quick so I can better display this, but let’s see. So here we have Donovan as part of, the 3rd generation, and he was never considered to be, an heir because like I said, he was married to somebody who would have made it to where none of his children would have been able to pass on anything anyways, to carry on that legacy. And so instead I had chosen Fenia, who married, also into another legacy, but her legacy is stronger than theirs.

Gloria [00:49:44]:
So the Del Corazon is my second favorite legacy. So they’re just considered stronger than anything that comes before that. But thing, it turns out Donovan ended up, you know, divorcing, Flora or I think it was unanimous. It was fine. It wasn’t much, bad blood there, but they ended up getting divorced. And so Donovan was theoretically fair game again to be heir because now his children, could potentially not, you know, be involved with a stronger legacy, and that was the case. So he ended up marrying somebody he found abroad, ended up marrying, Dalita, and they have a daughter together called Dunya. As you can see here, the the parents are Donovan and Dalita Parks.

Gloria [00:50:21]:
Yeah. Donovan took on the Parks’ last name and never got rid of it. I might change that, but yeah. So theoretically, he could be air now. Like, I could decide that I find this more interesting, and it just basically, to be honest, what it comes down to is who I’m most interested in playing. So between these two children, I’m most interested in playing Emily as the heir. So Dunya is just not gonna be heir. She’s gonna be spare, which you can see here is the case.

Gloria [00:50:47]:
And so I kept my decision that Fenya will be heir so that her daughter Emily, who I want to be heir next, who I want to play as heir next, will be heir because, like I said, only children, and as you can see, Fenya only had Emily. Donovan only had well, he has those 3 children he had with, Flora, which would never have been eligible to be air anyways. Like I said, stronger legacy was Parks, but Dunya could have been. But I ended up deciding for Emily. If Emily gets born at some point, I might change my mind again. But, at some point, I don’t change my mind anymore. Like, if things got time has gone too, gone too far. But that’s kind of how I decide who becomes heir.

Gloria [00:51:30]:
So first of all, your parent has to be an heir for you to be an heir in any capacity. And second, depending on how you who you marry, it could, you know, knock you out of the running because you married into an, a legacy that is stronger than yours. And, 3rd, if your kids are boring, then I’m sorry. You’re not gonna be error because I’ll take that away from you, whatever, and then give it to somebody who made more interesting kids. That’s just the realness of it. Okay. That’s how I play. Okay.

Gloria [00:51:56]:
That’s how I play. And you know what I thought going back into the save file and rediscovering everything and logging everything, I really thought the park’s legacy the park’s legacy was gonna be my main focus, but it turns out that I found out a lot of interesting things about other sims living in the world as well, it’s really cute things. For example, when I was collecting the households and putting them together, I was also looking at the pets and like putting them together as well and you know creating profiles for them when I thought like they were relevant enough, because I mean I never really been a fan of pets in the sims 3 because I felt like they were popping out like babies like everywhere like bunnies, not like babies like bunnies and it was just too much. Like I felt like pets sometimes were too much of a hassle. But I looked into, Elliot who is a little cat from the Cassidy household which is part of the McDowell legacy. And I was looking into his relationships and stuff, and I happened to notice that he was married to another cat in the world, to Lisa Del Corazon, and I didn’t even put that. I didn’t make that happen. Elliot did that all on his own.

Gloria [00:52:57]:
And I mean, technically, they’re not married. They’re mated, but Elliot put a ring on it as we can see very clearly in the picture. So she’s wifey in my book. But and then I thought, wouldn’t it be cute if they they had their own little legacy, like a little cat legacy? I’ve never played that before actually, like, playing, creating a legacy from pets. And it actually lends itself to that in this mystery because you can control the pets and so you have a bit more agency. And Elliott is quite old now though, I think Elliott is an elder so we need to pick up the pace and so I’ve actually added it as one of my goals for this, save file right here that I want, definitely to, yeah, have kittens and start a new cat legacy with those 2 and see where things can go. I think that’d be cute. And I really wouldn’t have found this out if I hadn’t like painstakingly collected the households I thought was important.

Gloria [00:53:49]:
So basically, I just opened up the save file and clicked on households I thought were interesting, and then I would save their characters and their traits and everything, and then Elliot happened to be one of those households, and I was like, you know what? Let’s log on Elliot as well for funsies, and then I was looking at his relationships, he’s married, and so I thought it was super cute. I also found out that Shad is like really disliked by many in town, and so let me show you who Shad is. This is Shad from the Del Corazon Legacy, and when I was like putting, piecing together relationships, creating these profiles, and looking in everybody’s relationship panels, Shad was the enemy of a lot of people. So if I show you his enemies real quick, we can see. Okay. I feel like it was more, but mercy is also an enemy of a lot of people. But it turns out his traits, it makes sense because he’s evil, hot headed, and unlucky, so it seems like somebody who would naturally have maybe not a lot of friends. Actually, let’s test that theory.

Gloria [00:54:47]:
How many friends does he actually have? Because that’s something I would have also saved. Three friends. Okay. I thought that was interesting, and so it could be a character I’d be interested in maybe playing, knowing his traits and his current status with a lot of people in town. Maybe, you know, I could continue making enemies, reconcile with certain people. I don’t know. But, you know, as a whole, I’m really glad again that I did not delete these save files. For 1, certain ones were key to piecing together the, meaning of the one I’ve I’m currently playing, so a lot of, gravestones bugged out photos that were rescued thanks to old save files.

Gloria [00:55:27]:
But, yeah, I’m just I’m really glad because as you can see, there’s so much going on in the save file, and this isn’t even every household, okay, and every character in this save file. It’s really just, the ones that I found the most interesting and wanted to save. But after rediscovering all this lore that I had already created and, of course, discovering more about the Sims and their stories and and things I just didn’t even know about, you know, AKA Elliott and his little, you know, wifey. This save, like, this really old save literally haven’t been playing it in, like, probably 12 years. It’s 14 years old in total. It feels brand new now. Like, I am hyped. I’m ready to get back into the game.

Gloria [00:56:10]:
I mean, I was already hyped and ready to get back into sims 3 because of the sims 3, but I’m so looking forward to, like, not like, I had already started a new save file in sims 3. I was like, yeah. This is gonna wanna play with, but, no, now I just wanna continue really with this one and a couple of others that I have been logging into the sim guardian. It just makes you I just see it with new eyes, and just really get excited to play with it. So I’m really glad I didn’t chuck it, and, yeah, it’s like reading a good book. I feel like reading an old book again for the second time. You just remember all the twists and turns, and you get excited about things again because you kinda, like, forgot actually how the plot goes. But but when you remember it all again, it’s, like, oh, that’s really cool.

Gloria [00:56:52]:
And the beauty of the sims though is that the story never has to end, like, it seems like it ended when I abandoned the CFO so long ago, but I can choose at any time to pick it back up. Right? And that’s what I’m doing now. So I am basically going through a bunch of old save files, other legacies, for the sims 3 for now, but, you know, I’m gonna probably do that for the sims 4 as well. And just, you know, with new eyes, like, I’m a whole different person than I was 14 years ago. And just, I’ve also learned a lot of new things about how to create characters and storylines that, you know, actually, you know, captivate you in the Sims. And so and, also, the sims 3 was just great at creating super interesting sims that would keep you, captivated anyways on their own. But yeah. So I’m really looking forward to exploring that more and also sharing that with you, in the next few weeks.

Gloria [00:57:46]:
And so I hope I’ve inspired you also to just maybe take a look see into those old, old, old, old hard drives and backups. What are some save files that you might have that you can rediscover? Like, sadly, I don’t have any for the Sims 2, but maybe they have a Sims 2 safe file you could, you know, bring back to life that you haven’t played in years. Like, imagine like, you already the nostalgia you get when you play the Sims 2 again or the Sims 3, and it’s just the nostalgia even if it’s, like, a brand new save file, imagine the feels if you play a a save file that you haven’t touched in years. It’s like a time capsule of who you were maybe as a teenager or, you know, where you were, in your storytelling journey in the sims, and it just reminds you like, in this case, it reminds me of how much fun I had discovering these different packs that came out, throughout the years. Well, the 2 years, I think, when I was actually actively playing this legacy. And it’s just so fun. And so I just I want that for everybody. And, yeah, you don’t have to save everything in a super extensive ridiculously complex Notion template like I have.

Gloria [00:58:54]:
Though, for me, it is of the utmost necessity because I love having everything connected, and being able to scrap information at the whim. But, honestly, like, I started with this, like, puny OneNote file, which is where I got these summaries from and, of course, folders full of screenshots. And with that, I was able to piece together all this information. And so it’s really up to you how you, save that lure, but definitely save it and definitely save those save files and, yeah, take a look see again, revisit them. Let me know in the comments below what’s like your oldest save file that you still have like on a hard drive somewhere. What’s your oldest save file? And, like, tell me a little bit about it. Like, is it was it a legacy gameplay? Was it maybe, I don’t know. Just let me know in the in the comments.

Gloria [00:59:42]:
I would love to hear, about your oldest save file and, yeah, hopefully about you maybe rediscovering it and finding the joy in it again and falling in love with it again. Till next time. Happy Simming.