Sims 4 Update - Life as a Man Ho

Since ArcheAge happened, I've not played as much Sims 4.  With all the queue times you'd think I would have time but I just have not found it.

Picking up where I left off, Roger Tate has not been as busy in the ways of love.  He has become more career focused.  There are perks with that as well!

Roger has 48 children now.  With the career goals, it has been tough to manage his extracurricular activities.  Now that he has become a successful author and a start up genius, Roger can refocus his efforts and wrap up his lifetime achievement of becoming a serial romantic.  Only 4 more "Gold Level" dates to go.

BIG TV

As a matter of fact, the ONLY way to get the huge TV is to become a Start Up Entrepreneur.  I don't feel that is appropriate but I don't make the rules.  

 Staying Fit

With all the woohoo going on, it is important to stay in shape.  NO Sim likes to see my flabby body and man handles, so I hit the treadmill a few times a week to keep my, erm, stamina built up.

Showing Up for Action

As a lover of the ladies, I get many callers.  Some of them even show up at the door ready for action.  This is a true testament of Roger's prowess.

Trust Me

You are the only girl for me!  Trust me!

Too Little Time

Unfortunately, Roger cannot sex all the women when they need it.  Leaving some women around town sad.  Understandably so.  

ONE of Roger's Families

Sometimes Roger has dinner parties with his extended families.  Fun times are had by all.  

Look Familiar?

I found these guys at the park one night.  Do they look familiar?

Some Poetry, My Poetry

As a teenager I used to enjoy writing poetry.  I dabbled with some stories but never stuck to it.  A few years ago I jotted down a few things again.  It was a good feeling to put those emotions on a page.  Going back through some things I found a couple.  Time to share!

Summary

If I could erase myself

From the written page,

If I could live my life,

But never age,

If I could find my freedom,

From inside this cage….

What once was love

Is now lost forever.

What once was always,

Has become never.

What once was healthy,

Is now my fever….

To have the whole world,

And still have nothing.

To finally live my dream,

Only to die in my wailing.

To hold her in my hands,

And to lose everything….

My Little Girl

Curly brown hair

Cascading down in ringlets

Just below her perfect little ears.

Sweet chocolate eyes

Looking up to me with love

Innocence shining though.

Ten little fingers

Ten cute little toes

Held high in the air for me to tickle.

She smiles at me

Knowing she is my all

Everything I ever wanted.

Even though she is gone

My love for her endures

Always she will be my little girl.

Sims 4 Recap So Far - Is Man Ho a Profession?

I'd like to do one of these a week to chart progress for this Sim and others I might begin to play.

Meet Roger Tate!  

Roger is an alluring romantic, self-assured, but noncommittal.  Roger's goals so far have included becoming a best selling author.  His screenplay for "Twilight Bound" was a huge success!

Roger's goal in life is to father as many children as he can.  No matter the consequences.  He's not concerned with who might get jealous.

Holla at a playa if you see him in the street!

Making his move

Notice the bucket in the above picture?  These are VIP buckets and give off a romantic aura from completing romantic tasks.  There are 4 in Roger's bedroom and NO lady can resist his charms in that sacred space.

Where the magic happens!

The Re-Production Line

So far Roger has fathered 41 children with 12 different women.  There is no family tree view for Sims 4 to show.   

Sims4 Here I Come!

Already on my gaming plate is ArcheAge, Planetside2 is a main staple, and I'm really getting back into Star Wars:The Old Republic.  With the new Sims release I was dying to play it as well.

My gaming problem?  I LIKE TOO MANY AT ONCE.

Maybe I should change that question to a statement: GAMING IS MY PROBLEM.

The day Sims4 launched I debated on buying it but wanted to hold off knowing I had other things I was enjoying.  My 12 year old niece, Lexi, stayed with us over last weekend and Labor Day.  She loves playing my Sims and really got into DC Universe Online.  Subconsciously I think I got Sims4 for her for when she returns another weekend.  Yeah!  That's it!

After she left Monday I got to thinking about Sims and something that Mogsy had told me via Twitter about one of her sims having 100 offspring. Here is the blog entry she linked to me about it.  To me this sounds like a worthy challenge.  So I made a sim in Sims3 to work on this.  I'm up to about 12 kids now.

I stayed up almost 20 hours straight playing Sims3!  Doh!

Here is the proof...

Honestly I cannot think of when I stayed up that long playing anything else.  I'm sure I have before, just cannot recall it.  

Blaugust is Ending - What I've Learned

I have REALLY enjoyed participating in Blaugust.  During the month I have found some of my blogging voice I'd hoped to find when I started a blog.

Along the way I have made some new acquaintances I hope can blossom into friendships.

My goal was for people who read my entries to get to know me and some of the major events in my life that shaped me into the person I am today.  I feel like I have achieved that.

While many participating generally blog about gaming, my personal entries were well received.

I was telling Belghast on Twitter there are are so many active blogging communities out there.  Diabetics are very active bloggers for example.  Maybe next year we can find another community and do a "Blaugust Crossover Event".  That probably sounds corny, but I think it would be a great thing.

Thank you to everyone who took a moment to read at least one of my entries.  Thank you to Belghast for throwing the party.

NOW.... if you will excuse me, I have to go tweak my Steam wishlist!

Did Your Wife Leave You for Someone She Met In An Online Game? If So Call 1-800-96-JERRY

Blaugust is winding down and I've been saving my best story for last.  In keeping with the personal gaming experiences theme I started the month off with, I thought I'd share the most personal one I have maybe.

For those that I do interact with on Twitter or in a game, you may have heard me say something to the effect of "It's all fun and games until your wife leaves you for some rogue in Nebraska."

When I first started playing online games in my early 20's, I thought it would be a cool place to meet members of the opposite sex.  Gemstone was full of people who would go off to the local inn in game, lock the door, and roleplay their encounters.  You can get extremely descriptive in a text based MUD!

One story from Gemstone in particular has stuck with me all these years.  There was a mature woman living with a comfortable lifestyle in Boston who was married with two kids who had graduated college already.  She fell in love with this teenager from New Orleans.  After a time, she left her husband, and paid to relocate this guy to Boston.  He had never seen snow before and was awestruck by it.  She helped the guy to get a real estate license and they struggled to make it all work.  It was a struggle too.  I'm not sure how that story ended, but I'm certain many of you know of similar cases.

Fast forward to my own experience.  My first wife, we'll call her 1.0, had never been a gamer.  Never seen an online game.  Most of us feel it would be cool if our spouses/SO's played games with us.  When we met, I was playing EVE a lot and I knew this would not be a game for her.  A new game was about to come out and I was in the beta.  World of Warcraft it was going to be called.  I'd played the stand alone PC game and loved it.  Blizzard makes the best cut scenes!

Once I showed her WoW, she fell in love with it.  We were sharing the computer, so when I was not playing, I was showing her how to play.  She had decided an undead mage was her favorite, and she just chose the first randomly generated name that popped up.  "Olis" it was.  Thus wife 1.0's gaming identity was born.

We get a second computer so we could play together at launch.  Took time off the first few days to play a lot together.  She'd found a guild for us to join prelaunch and I was OK with that.

Fast forward to 2006ish, I'm bad with dates.  A lot had happened in our lives since WoW launched.  We'd lost a child, got married, I'd found a new job at Dell that would turn into a nice 8 year gig.

We were just not the same people after losing the baby.  Understandably so.  She began to spend ALL day in WoW, and was not going to work due to medical leave.  She had became an officer in our guild and took on a leadership role.  Pretty soon she was talking with guild members over the phone that lived across the US.  Chatting about strategy and guild drama.

One day I came home from work and she informed me she was leaving.  Moving to North Carolina to live with a friend of hers that lived near the beach.  Being near the ocean she felt would help her find herself again.  All I wanted was for her to be happy and whole again.  If being by the ocean was what she needed, by all means, go do it.  I knew she was leaving me and I would never see her again.

We did argue about it, I fought for her to stay.  After all, she was the only tie I had with the child I lost.  Losing her was losing that tie.

Then she did something strange.  1.0 packed up her car with all it would hold, including our dog, and drove away.  That was strange because she left about ALL her clothes, personal effects, furniture...just left it with me.

A few days later I began getting mail about the checking account change of address for her.  It was in Nebraska.  NEBRASKA.  Who in their right mind would move there under their own free will?  Besides, she TOLD me she was going to stay with a friend near the ocean.  My very limited Tennessee public school education had taught me there was NO ocean in NEBRASKA!  This upset me greatly to say the least.

After some lengthy phone discussion with her I was able to drag the story out of her.  All of her time online in WoW she had bonded with a guy playing a rogue in our guild.  I knew him a little from the game but not well certainly.  She had essentially packed up her car with all it could hold and moved to Nebraska to be with him.  Her plan included me packing up the rest of her stuff and shipping it to her.  LOLOLOL  After informing her if she wanted those things she needed to come back and get them herself, she resigned to leaving them with me to do as I saw fit.

Over the long distance we worked out the divorce.  It was a fairly painless process.  I'd later discovered she fed the same "moving to the ocean" line to our marriage counselor.  That really let me know how invested she was in working things out.

I could go on but that's a great overview of the situation.  My current wife, 2.0, is not a gamer.  Will never be a gamer, but I did try to turn her on to it despite my past experiences.

If you are curious, 1.0 and I still speak from time to time on Facebook.  It sucks far more energy out of me to hate someone that it does to forgive.

Just What Are Echoes From the Abyss?

For the 29th of Blaugust I wanted to mention the "why" behind the name of my blog.  Rowan did a similar blog entry yesterday and asked others to speak about the name behind their blog.  I've written many posts this month about gaming, however, I did not start out the idea of a blog with that in mind.  I didn't know one gaming blogger until I played Rift.  That is where I first met Rowan, his wife, Scary, and a few others were in my guild.  They may not even remember me in that game.  Usually I would send them my collectible items via in game mail I could not use.

For me, the intention of doing a blog was more of a therapeutic tool in many ways.  Life is what we make of it, and sometimes life just has a way of happening to you.  Things out of your control either lift you up, or beat you up.  

Since I was a teenager I've always sort of felt like I was in some dark place.  Depression really.  The "abyss" speaks of that place.  A part of me will always reside in it.  

The "echoes" are the feelings, events, and ideas that emanate from that "abyss" out onto the blog.  

Not all of the echoes are depressing, there is plenty of light coming out of that abyss from time to time.  Right now, today, the light is winning.  Tomorrow, next week, could be a different result.  It is a constant battle.