More Awesome Than You!

I would have asked in the technical modding section but cannot as I have not demonstrated any technical knowledge of the game on this forum.

So, as the title would suggest, I wondered if the photography skill could be enabled in non-WA games. I hate the fact that I have AMB but all that my stylists and architects can add to their portfolios are shitty little thumbnail pictures.

I've already cloned and enabled the WA cameras but realise that despite having the associated pie menus for skill level related options such as changing the image size available, they cannot be made use of as there is nothing to track the skill, thus no level to reach which would enable them. I hope that made sense.

Can anybody point me in the direction of where I should be looking to do this if it is indeed possible?

I would have also asked at MTS but realise they would shout at me for trying to get a feature from a pack I don't have, and won't install.

If you are unwilling to install Ambitions, you are pretty much SOL. There are many, many modders with more knowledge than me kicking around here, but I'm sure that the code needed to properly support Photography is only in Ambitions.

So. http://tinyurl.com/2f7acel

Er, Wyn, you DO know he HAS Ambitions installed, and it's WA that has the photography stuff, right?

He probably lapsed and was thinking WA instead of ambitions, happens sometimes :)

Anyways i don't know if this what you're asking can be done and if it can if it will work properly, i think these things are coded in the exes.

I seem to have adopted Jelenedra's shtick.

In any case, "Ambitions" is to be read as "World Adventures" in my previous post. Thank you, Senator.

For the record I have already PirateBayed World Adventures which is how I got the cameras in the first place.

The reason I don't want to install it is because of how bug ridden it seems from what I have read and how photography is the only feature I would use from it. I am not bothered about travelling to distant lands, exploring tombs or having mummies overrun my towns.

Or are you suggesting that I get a hold of the game files to see if it is possible to extract the photography skill? If so, I unfortunately wouldn't know what files to look at/in without somebody telling me, hence the reason for me creating this thread.

If the camera interface works apart from the skill progression, you might get away with editing the photography xml in gameplay data. The instance number is 0x8B614033DD63DBF2. It's the same one that I edited to fix some errors here (http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,17436.0.html). You could look at the changes I made to enable the different sizes and styles, but then also change it so that there's a low failure rate. It might work.

(The fix itself might need updating. Due to graphics card breakage I haven't been able to do anything sims 3 related for a while, so I don't know whether the latest patches has changed anything in it. )

This is a fucked up statement.  If this were true you wouldn't even be playing the base game or ambitions as they were/are just as bugged and fucked up as WA was/is.  It is only through the tireless work of the FOJ that the games are even playable.


In this case don't use anything else.  As far as I know there isn't anything, or anyone, that forces you to use any of the other features of the EP.  I have been playing with WA since it came out, and I have yet to have a single mummy appear in any town (main neighbourhood, not tombs), so I think you are overestimating how that work, and how frequently it happens.  If I don't want my sims to travel they don't, it is that easy not to use those parts of the pack.

If the camera and photography skill were added at the base with a patch, then it might be possible for someone to activate them, if they are in the WA files then your shit out of luck unless you install WA.  I think your paranoia about the bugs and glitches you have supposedly read about is a bit misplaced and extreme.

I would go with Merlin in everything he said mate. If you're asking me for a hands-free opinion i would go ahead and install the WA if i were you. I don't know a single thing about these bugs you mention since i haven't had any at all and i've been more than happy with WA since i got it and i think that in all the SIMS series (1, 2 and 3) its the top 5 expansion pack.  i feel like i got 2 EPs for the price of one with the adventures expansion. The ambitions EP pales in comparison. In your case the only thing you're going to lose is 1 hour at most to install (and then uninstall it if you don't like it that much) and a gig of HD space. In my opinion its 10 times easier than going around to extract some files that there's a high probability are not even there in the form you need.

It just seemed as though people ranted about bugs in WA a lot more than in the base game or in later packs. People still complain about broken dig sites now.

I would say I can be quite OCD. I don't like to think I have space being taken up on my computer by something I won't use.

Goggalor, I'll take a look but think I tried it in the past with no effect. I guess without WA the game doesn't bother looking for the XML. Although if I give a Sim a camera they can successfully ask other Sims to pose who will then do so.

If you have no intention of going to the WA neighbourhoods how does this problem affect you?  There are mods to fix this problem if you look for them.


Unless your computer has the smallest harddrive available, it shouldn't be that problematic.  These days storage is cheap.

Regardless of whether you want to travel or not (and I actually would encourage it; the WA foreign locales are rather well-done), WA still adds quite a bit of worthwhile content and extras.  If you are deadset against travel, there are several mods on MTS that will still allow you to access a lot of the "foreign destination only" content without leaving your neighborhood.  I've had WA installed since it came out, and I have yet to see a mummy pop up in my home neighborhood.

You cannot avoid WA's bugs by not installing it and just installing Ambitions: All versions of the game use the same core and therefore, any WA bugs are already contained in the Ambitions core: However, WA is utterly unsafe to use without AwesomeMod due to the "suddenly married to a dead vacationlander and forced to have his spawn" bug.

There really is no need for mods past Awesomemod to get this. All WA objects, spawners, and plants, even those only present in the foreign 'hoods, are available for purchase in either community lot build mode or in regular buy mode/debug tab.

For all I know, this could be available with Awesomemod, but you'll rip that thing from my cold, dead hands.

I very rarely take a sim on vacation. Really, the only time they go is if they roll an adventurer want (I wait until they hit YA stage to give them a LTW, and then roll for which one they are given. Otherwise they all end up wanting to be illustrious authors). But the WA objects make beautiful additions to museums and household decor, plus there are several community lot/hood decor objects that fit in well with my 'hoods. Good plants, too.

Install WA. Install Awesomemod.

You're making this much more complicated and dangerous-seeming than it is. I've had WA since it came out, play the other worlds from time to time and have never had a mummy invade the home world. Also, it takes a rather long time of playing WA to even see a mummy, and they are no big deal. I had one adventurer Sim who collected a ton of stuff from the tombs and excavation sites and put it back together at home. Voila! Instant woohoo and sleeping quarters in the sarcophagi. Plus you can sell that stuff for income, or as Zazazu says, use it for some nice decoration.

Mummies CAN'T invade your homeworld. The only things which bring back mummies are the Time Machine, which is a device is pure evil anyway, and the sarcophagi, which can only place in the homeworld by cheating.

Okaaaay, you guys really latched onto that off hand comment about mummies. I know they won't randomly invade the main 'hood. I was just saying in an exaggerated manner that I'm not fussed about mummies.

Just install WA; Awesomemod takes care of any major bugs. It's really no big deal.

Alright, I concede. I shall install WA.
You people happy now?! You've forced me to do something I should probably have just done in the first place anyway.

Also, please read the above sentence with a light hearted tone.

I built my household sarcophagi from the parts I found in foreign dungeons.

Which, like I said, CAME FROM FOREIGNIA. You can't place them in your homeworld otherwise unless you cheat. Mummies cannot "invade" unwanted.

How is collecting parts you are SUPPOSED to collect, cheating?

It's not. But you can't place the mummy-spawning kind of sarcophagi without cheating, which limits their origin to foreignia.

Well that will be why I've never had a mummy!   ::)