PMBD

Where'd they all go?   ???



http://thesims2.ea.com/exchange/search.php?&loginRequireMsg=true&asset_type=story&pid=Exchange_stories

The whole Sims 2 site isn't loading for me right now. Maybe they're having problems.

There must be some angry twelve year olds right now.  ;D

Oh this periodically happens.. you should have seen us all, about 2 and a half years ago the site went into meltdown and some of the most highly rated stuff on there just started randomly dissapearing.. First the image would go, then the whole thing.. That was one of the times a whole heap of good creators left the exchange. It hasn't done it on that scale since then, but it still periodically does this.

Well the images are gone on most of the stuff at the Official site (if not all the stuff) and the exchange home page is in French for me. o.O Everything else is english.

Wouldn't surprise me if they were just deleting the whole bunch and starting fresh to easily sift out pay items.

I just checked it out and according to their own count, there is nothing at all in the exchange.  I think Anouk is right about them starting fresh, it would have been way too hard to go through everything looking for pay items. 

nah guys, it's nothing to worry about.. barring that disaster, the stuff is always back within a few hours. They're just having server trouble again. I've seen this happen once every few months since that time we had the accidental mega-cull.

Just curious, why would they want or need to do that?

Okay, I admit that made me laugh.  :D

Although, I think it may be because too many twelve-year-olds posted a 'story' at once and the site couln't handle that much ugly crap at a time.

There's some really whacked out stories on there... :o

*laughs* yes, and at least one or two of them are mine, although mine at least involve correct spelling and a rought idea of grammar..

And nothing of value was lost.

(Well maybe about 10% of the content on there would be missed)

actually there's some early stuff on there from some of the creators on there that is fairly decent.. that woman who did the War Goddess, for example.. there's also another creator who was doing a ton of Ancient Greek stuff early on.. neither of them are active creators anymore. There are decent creators on there, they're just difficult to find in the deluge of mr-potato-head sims.

There are a whole lot of threads on the BBS, and not a Maxoid in sight. Go figure.

That too is fairly normal.. I just told them to not panic. This is about the sixth or seventh time I've seen this happen to my content and there's no need to ever stress or worry about it.

The official site is a travesty. TSR's hands are so far up these Maxoids butts to use as sockpuppets, that their fingers are poking out through the eyes. Do you remember the "ZOMG stop moaning about PAYSITES we LOVE THEM and we're changing the EULA with the NEXT EP and now STFU" - episode by one of those Maxoids? And that afterwards it uhm... never happened?
So just saying. Wouldn't be too surprising seeing how those people are in love with paysites, and actual EA not giving a crap about an official site because they're too busy assimilating companies that do make fun games.

I was looking through the next stuff pack they have coming out, the kitchen one, and thought to myself...
EA are selling CC. Except it's "official"  because they are using the content making magical machine that they use exclusively. But still, they are charging for pixels. Not game play, just polygons.

So of course they are not going to publicly outcry agaisnt paysites, they would be hypocrites if they do.
And if they outcry for GREED purposes (omg, we are not going to make money of TSR or Rose so they better stop going pay!) it won't sit well with the community.

They have their hands pretty firmly tied about this.

And my opinon? I could care less about this. It's a virtual dollhouse that costs way too much than what it's worth.
I paid for the base game and 2 expansion packs. Enough.

I arr'd the rest though. Damn completist in me hehe

I used to be OK with the exchange, and I'd post whatever I could there, recolors of maxis meshes, things like that. Then they randomly purged most of my stuff. I'm not a stellar creator, but it was better and more unique than most of the crap up there. I got lots of questions about why it was gone. Of course, I couldn't link to where it was posted on insim, since they've decided that's not allowed. It's not worth the trouble anymore.

And that's exactly why I don't buy stuff packs. Why should I pay 2/3rds of what I'd pay for a full expansion, just to get objects that tend to be buggy and/or unusable with expansions (like damn near all the electronics in every stuff pack)? Hell, even the Maxis-made stuff on the exchange only seems to work right half the time.

There's plenty of custom content out there that's free and actually works, and the creators try to keep it updated with expansions.

I don't have a problem with EA selling stuff packs - it's their property to sell.  I won't buy them, as there are far more generous and creative people out there sharing their stuff for the game.  And it's not even that it's free, it's that it's often better than what few bits and bobs EA will toss out for monies.

And it's been my experience that user made stuff doesn't have the great EAxian capacity for game fuxxoring either.  How do you fuxxor games with basically a disk full of CC, EA?!  Jeez.  I guess stuffpacks only have .exe files for the copy protection?

But the official site...it's probably just running amok, like a servo who fixed a showerhead, and will poop out and be back later when someone flips the lights on or something.

guys, there is no ulterior motive here, their site is just crashing. It's done it before. many times.
http://bbs.thesims2.ea.com/community/bbs/messages.php?threadID=34d24fd2b3c66aae5fd91a4b4b6fecd9&directoryID=2&startRow=1&openItemID=item.2,item.43,item.61,item.104,item.41,item.127,item.23

The exchange is melting! PANIC!! *runs around in circle*
...
Wait, i don't care. :D

About their stuff packs: they're mainly thievery, way too expensive for the items they contain. And no, i don't call walls & floor items.
I bought ONE pack and immediatly regretted it. Behold! A kids bed! A table! And... Hang on... A chair! Weeeee! 120 Walls & floors! Noooooo! At the fabulous price of 20E! (30 US$) >:(

The problem is that creators often do extremely beautiful recolors of these items or amazingly beautiful clothes based on horribles EA clothes by using their meshes. So i have to aaaarr these stuff packs.

The only SP I have purchased was H&M. It has some decent items, and the new menswear meshes are good to have, but there's more interesting content on free sites. It's just another way for EA to milk TS2 for all it's worth.

Jfed, I understand where you are coming from. I agree that it is EA's right to sell their content if they wish, if we are not happy with what the pack offers then we don't have to buy it.


Paysites take that attitude and take full liberty with it. Which irks me.

I don't think TSR even hides the fact that it's a business. It's just as well since we don't hide that we are pirates ;)

I hear ya, Dee.  You made me wonder - did paysites get the idea from EA or the other way round?  I think it was the other way round - no stuffpackage w/TS1, only cool free stuff on Thursdays.

They keep us nostalgic with MOAR FREE FOARDS! :D

And from reading Sherrie's post re: TSR doubled subs, they are openly operating as a commercial enterprise, indeedily.  Pretense has gone out the window and commands appeals to the brainwashed go up like the Batman signal.

I am a whore. I have purchased every single pack they have produced.  Most barring H&M were bought on the first day. I have more money than sense apparently.  :D

Bad Calalily! Bad! ;D

Mine was the first one, talk about a bad choice lol. Probably the less useless one :-\
The Xmas one had a food that was used for a lot of clones that needed that SP installed, H&M is probably the most useful one with all these little things for shops.
I thought of another reason to aaaarr the stuff packs: houses. Houses do love to crash yor game, mainly if you're missing any SP or EP...

Ditto.  I ordered every one from Amazon as soon as they were listed, including the Prima guides, which, despite their bad reps, are really not a total waste of money--I've learned a lot reading them.  Plus when you buy them together you get a significant discount.

As far as more money than sense, I have no comment.  Remember, I'm the one who misplaced the $800 check for several years  ::)

I bet I beat everyone here on the "EA buttsecks bitch" front.  I actually *re-purchased* OFB and FFS - they'd become scratched and I had to do a reinstall - for the ethics tutor there is but one choice.   :D

Glamour Life was probably of the most use, but Celebrations has some fantastic deco stuff, Teen Style has a gothic bedroom for all my werewolves, Fashion Stuff has mega clothes, and FFS and the Xmas Pack - which were a bit useless initially - gave me so much more variety with Bon Voyage. All that nautical stuff and Chinese clothing came to be of much use.

Glad I ain't the only one who noticed that there was nothing on the Exchange - all downloads and stories. Bet the BBS lot have having a 'it's the end of the world!' panic over at the forums  ;D

I won't be purchasing anything else EA after the whole securom thing, and will just Arr! anything I need (which won't be much as Sims3 seems to be all they're concentrating on)

Hahaha! I can't even view threads on BBS (i.e. the one posted a few posts ago)! Wonder if thats also something to do with the crash or just me :D

For me too the securom was the WTF?! thing that made me aaaarr their EPs afterwards, so my last purchase was seasons. Well i also started to arrr stuff packs after the first one which i purchased, what a huge ripoff! :-X
I also do not really agree with EA selling these stuff packs, not really because they're selling it (i do recognize they have the right to sell stuff),  but because of their SPs price. It's way too expensive for what thein contain, really >:(
And i'll arrr Sims 3 without any regret as it will have that dreadful securom for sure... Bad EA, trying to nuke all the computers!

Nope, it's really melting this time.. *laughs* They've usually got it fixed by now.. I wonder if the site has a virus or something?

SecuROM was the dealbreaker for me too.

SECUROM EVEN BROKE THE OFFICIAL SITE!   :D

Perhaps it collapsed under the weight of all the complaints about Securom...game bugs...neverending video card issues...and total lack of information on the official site no one can get to... :P

I've not bought an expansion pack since Pets, simply because my old laptop would die if it had anything like Seasons on it and when I got my new desktop, I read about the securom issues and refused to give a company that borked computers any of my money.

I guess what with the new Sims3 site being up, they're doing a big clear-out. But - no site message? Strange, you would think they would have something up saying what was going on, which leans towards it being more then just a spring-clean...

edit: The news section has also disappeared - it just says 'No News' :D

Stop encouraging them, Cala! *scold*

They shouldn't get any more of your delicious cookies and rum money until they fix their bad crap make amends for the SecuROM fiasco.

The Exchange is back to normal, i.e. the drudge that is sims and stories are there XD

Am I the only one who thinks that TS3 is going to be seriously delayed and we won't see it before 2009?  Based on what's going on with Spore, I think we'll have a little more time to wait than we've been told.

At least I hope so--I'm saving to buy a new computer for TS3...

Jfed, I think EA got the stuff pack idea from paysites. They realised there was a market for pixel objects for people stupid enough to pay for them.
They wanted a slice of the pie :P

Euterpe: March 19th for more news and information about The Sims 3. We shall hear then about a proper release date!

I plan to upgrade my processors with one of those fancy new ones and more RAM. Hopefully I should be able to afford it :D

I am going to buy The Sims 3. Because I am stupid that way.

*a little bit excited* hehe

I got bored in the middle of the night and went spelunking around some of the Sims 2 sites I used to download from and chanced upon Sapphire Sims 2, which was the first forum I ever joined when I found the community. (I know, I know, you may go ahead and ping me with your peashooters now!) Anyway, there were two different threads about Sims 3. After recovering from the blinkie fatigue and those huge damn avi's, I saw that all of them were parroting the party line about the game and kowtowing like mad. Any negative comments were jumped on and probably deleted. I like a good many of the people over there, but the baaaa-ing of the sheep was getting on my damn nerves. Reminds me of when I complained over there about the Sec-U-Rom and one of their "creators" jumped my shit and mocked me. Yeah, let's kiss the party line, or crack, so hard that the lips turn brown... Interesting shade... and scent...

Duh'. I downloaded several items from Sapphire but i really can't stand all that blinkness, flufiness and whateverness.
It just hurts my eyes, my brains and my monitor lol. You just read on 5 pages of 'i luv iou!' blinking horrors for each items trying to find a real 'report problem' message, eerk! :-X
I dare to say that even Peggy during christmas time is less blinky than Sapphire! ;D

Hey, there is a VERY REAL NEED for Enchanted Fairy Princess Brides of the Autumn Harvest Festival as well as Dragon Princes of Neptune During The Fourth Lunar Eclipse Cycle! Just because you choose to play the sims in boring old vanilla mode doesn't mean we all should! -  >:(

(twas a joke. I actually like Sapphire Sims and Dr House)

Yes, but Sapphire Sims does it because they like it and they are fluffy sweet people - and they always have new blinkies.  I quite like some of them - at least the background isn't pink.  Plus, not putting on the faux naive thing that Peggy does while selling you shit.

I've  known some of those guys on Sapphire for a long time and I was on the staff of Sapphire way back when *gasp*. 

Sapphire came out of the Yahoo groups - Specifically Mal and Mikey!'s old group M and M Needful things..  Yahoo Groups tend to be the domain of older American women.. There's a bunch of American housewives in the Sims community and most of them don't like things to be confrontational. They like to play with their dolls and they like their nice, safe environment with no conflict. And more power to them, if you're dealing with sick kids and not enough money to pay your bills, you've got enough shit to deal with IRL without having to deal with it in the community..

I like a lot of the stuff on Sapphire Sims, fits well with my fantasy game. The huge avis and blinkies do get to me, but it's nowhere near as seizure producing as Peggy's. A huge difference is that they are completely free. They had some trouble with bills and had a pay section back when, but that's long behind them. You can also snag a lot of meshes there that aren't available anywhere else. I've never really checked out their forum, but if they want everything nice, it's their call.

Just wanted to let you know that the EA site has finally got their act together and is back up and running.

HURRAAYYYYY!!!!

...

Wait... didn't I hate the official site?

Yeah, but we can point and laugh at them for how long it took them to fix whatever problem they had. ;D