Creating a Custom Name List
Hegelian:
Quote from: Soylent Sim on 2007 June 11, 23:10:14
If you're talking about the default townies dumped into every 'hood, changing the default name list won't do anything to Goopy and the other pleasantview regulars. You seem like the sort who already knows this, so I'm expecting you mean something different.
Indeed. I'm thinking of using SaraMK's "clean" neighborhood templates, which include only the Maxis playables and the townies they know. From there I would either create townies using testing cheats, or else let them self-generate one at a time. I also plan on making a custom lot with no pre-made townies, and then generating the townies using the mailbox. In the latter case, just dropping a modified Live.package in downloads would work fine, apparently.
I don't actually play in the Maxis neighborhoods, so to some extent it's rather a moot point; but I've been told that Strangetown can be fun to play, so I'd see the effects there.
jrd:
New names are pulled from the strings in Live.package no matter when these names are needed. So it works for normal spawning (new townie/service npc needed), and full-spawning (after DAC or starting from a clean 'hood).
There are several name lists:
-Male first names
-Female first names
-Male last names (base game: Last names for both genders)
-Female last names (uni and up only)
-Male pet names
-Female pet names
-Male pet last names (unused by the code, may have future use)
-Female pet last names (unused by the code, may have future use)
The package must have an equal or higher number of entries than the default (or default names are appended to it). Including a name list not understood or not used by your game version is safe (even though base game doesn't have a separate list for male and female last names, it will be able to use a package with this list in it -- it will just ignore the female last names and use the male list for them. Likewise pets name lists will be ignored for games without pets).
Courtesy of (I think) dizzy2 I have a small program that will take a text list of names in a format easily created with Word or another text editor, and turn it into a Simpe importable file. It's what I used to create the Live.package mods. Instructions and download are buried somewhere in one of the two threads.
Zazazu:
Quote from: Jordi on 2007 June 12, 07:45:24
Courtesy of (I think) dizzy2 I have a small program that will take a text list of names in a format easily created with Word or another text editor, and turn it into a Simpe importable file. It's what I used to create the Live.package mods. Instructions and download are buried somewhere in one of the two threads.
That's what I was trying to find. Got it.
Quote from: Jordi's MTS2 post for TS2BetterNames
Aya: there's a small program you could use for this.
It will take strings in the form
Code:
0,1
0,John
1,Mark
2,Luke
and convert them to .simpe files which you can import into SimPE.
Your lists can probably easily be transformed into the format required.
You can download the app here: http://members.chello.nl/b.kroonspe.../Name2Simpe.zip
Extract all files in a folder somewhere. You'll only want to edit the text files: leave the other file types alone.
Since in most cases you'll probably want identical last names for males and females, you can copy str98.txt after creating it to strCC.txt. Saves some time.
After you've changed the names in the text file, run name2str.exe
This will generate the four .simpe files containing the names in the right format, and the .xml files which allows you to import the .simpe files into SimPE.
By far the easiest way to make your own mod is to open Live.package in SimPE, and to "replace" the text lists in the existing package with your new files (select the .simpe files, not the xml files).
Hegelian:
Argh! I closed this tab instead of just coming back to it, and lost all I wrote! >:(
Anyway: So, putting a modified Live.package in Downloads is sufficient for it to be used when generating new default neighborhoods using "clean" templates?
I did see the link to the conversion program. Although it may be more work, I'm leaning toward editing existing text files in a copy of the Live.package file . . . . although I may change my mind. ::)
BTW, the Social Security Administration has a lot of interesting information about U.S. names. Did you know that from 1970 through 1984, the most popular girl's name was Jennifer (since then it has been Emily)? Or that with the exception of 1960, the most popular boy's name from 1954 through 1998 was Michael (since then it has been Jacob)?
You can do a lot of things at this Web site. You can find the 100 most popular names (100 each for boys and girls) by state for any year beginning with 1960. You can see the most popular 20, 50, 100, 500, or 1000 names for any year since 1879—this is quite interesting, showing the movement away from "traditional" names like Elmer and Bertha toward the "Romance Novel" style of naming babies that has been evident since around 1980. Perhaps most awesome for our purposes, there are lists of the top 1000 names by decade—I can't decide whether to use the 1970s list or the one for the 1890s: Out of 1.2 million male babies, 80,000 were named John, and 38 were named Admiral. ;D This would be useful for someone creating a themed neighborhood, Victorian for example, or Wild West. I may use the list from the 1930s or 1940s, since those come after the periods of large-scale immigration from Italy and central Europe. OTOH, there are a lot of obsolete names, especially for men, so I wouldn't want to use all 1000 names.
For surnames, I may use a block of names from the middle of the top 1000 from the 2000 census, maybe from 200-400 (depending on how many I need) to avoid all the really common names like Smith and Johnson, and to pick up more non-Anglo and non-European names. This would be fairly realistic for where I live now—Anglo-American surnames are probably a minority in my neighborhood. My neighbors are from Haiti and there are several Hispanic households nearby. And of course being in south Louisiana, French, Spanish, and German names are common (although in the greater New Orleans phone book, the names with the most entries appear to be Smith, Johnson, and Brown).
Khan of Wyrms:
On a tangent, interested in sharing lists of outrageous, unique, or funusual surnames that exist in real life? I have a peculiar fascination with this because I tend to build lots of houses and after doing all the work I normally feel compelled to fill the house with a family, often one that I have little interest in playing. In effect, I am filling my 'hoods with custom townies that own houses. (Not concerned with how this may or may not implode my game, my game is already hopelessly corrupt, and I have been doing this since the very beginning) I love strange and suggestive surnames that exist in real life, and have collected quite a few, such as 'Strangewayes', 'Sweetecok', and 'Deatherage'. I have quite a lot, but I am running out of names and I need more. If you or anyone else is interested I could compile a list and share, but only if I thought others would be interested and would contribute. If you would rather not clutter this thread with this, I could alternately start a new topic, but it seems to have some application here.
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