This is hands down the best custom world of the year so far! I've seen some amazing Brynmar makeovers by other players before, but they were for personal gameplay and never shared publicly. This version by EliOrni is incredibly impressive. Every lot she built matches the style of this world flawlessly. The warm lighting from Dragon Valley also adds the finishing touch, creating a cozy town vibe. My favorite part is the woodlands. With lakes and various lots scattered throughout, it holds an endless beauty and serenity, making it the ideal area to enjoy a relaxing day. I'll definitely pick this world for my future legacy challenges. Thanks again to @floweringash for bringing us such an amazing world!
“Once was Midnight Hollow, now it’s Ravinehood. The town, known in the past for its gloomy and dark atmosphere, is now a vibrant community which hasn’t forgotten its roots, still noticeable in the abundance of Victorian and historical buildings. And its inhabitants aren’t exactly ordinary either: rumour has it that some of them returned from the dead…”
I don't remember exactly how (my love of Victorian architecture must have played a part, though), but at some point last year I decided that I needed to remake Midnight Hollow without the dark atmosphere and dead trees, and to update the lots beyond the base game. So here you have Ravinehood.
Credits to Cawster for the CAW files. I used 9 textures (one by Nilxis, the others by EA – from World Adventures, Dragon Valley, and Sunlit Tides), while the custom lighting is from the University world.
Details
Size: Large (2048x2048)
EPs: World Adventures, Ambitions, Late Night, Generations, Pets, Supernatural, Seasons, University Life (See the Requirements paragraph for more info)
SPs: none
Store content: none
Custom content: none
Lots: 91 (See the Lots paragraph for more info)
Populated: Yes (See the Population paragraph for more info)
DOWNLOAD: SFS
(No Exchange link because I made a test upload earlier, and now it won't let me reupload it even though I deleted the previous file. Just normal Exchange things.)
Requirements
This world requires the following expansion packs: World Adventures, Ambitions, Late Night, Generations, Pets, Supernatural, Seasons, University Life (so all but Showtime, Island Paradise and Into the Future). Supernatural is particularly important as it's the expansion that contains most of the Victorian-esque items that match this world; also, the world is home to a few occults which were introduced in that pack.
Ravinehood does not require Stuff Packs, there is no custom content or store content. You don't need Midnight Hollow to make it work. This also means, tangentially, that the world does not have a distant terrain – which, for those who don't know, is a special object which usually surrounds all worlds that are not islands to hide that the worlds are essentially a square-shaped area with an ocean around them. No worries, though: the mountains around Ravinehood are so tall that during regular gameplay you won't even notice its absence.
Lots
This world has 91 lots: 37 commercial, 41 residential, and 13 empty ones. (Midnight Hollow originally had 92 lots: I replaced two adjacent lots with a single bigger one to fit the combined school/stadium rabbit hole. The deleted lots contained the theater and the police station/military base combo, which were moved elsewhere.) Because of the mountains, you can only place additional lots on the shoreline.
All lots are the ones originally designed by EA for Midnight Hollow, renovated by me. Community lots have seen the most changes to add content from the aforementioned expansions, while for residential lots I've taken a more conservative approach, mostly adding color and removing store content. The lots around the city center that were intended for using the Savvy Seller set have become clubs and an apartment.
The world features a library, a graveyard, a junkyard, a consignment store with a dry cleaner, a nectary, a gym, a public pool, a beauty salon, a fire department, a nerd shop (paired with an elixir shop), a dog park, a cat jungle, a horse ranch, two art galleries (one of which includes a relic shop), two beaches, two fishing spots, two parks (including a festival lot), and five hangout spots of different types. All rabbit holes from the base game, Late Night, Pets and Supernatural are included. There are two bistros. The film studio from Late Night is in the basement of the university building shell (which also includes a bowling alley, a cafeteria, and a fake movie theater).
Ravinehood also includes four extra lots posted by EA on The Sims 3 Store: the Gothique Library, the Golden Ticket Toy Shop, the Now and Then Century Manor, and the Grim Ghastly Manor. The store contents have been removed and the lots have been reimagined as the nectary, the consignment store, and two houses, respectively. The fire station, salon, and horse ranch are modified versions of the ones that came with the Pets EP.
Population
There are 40 Sims and 8 pets living in Ravinehood, divided into 23 households each with its own story. Their ages cover all life stages from toddler to elder, although most are young adults and adults; 13 of them are occults. There are also 2 pregnancies in their early stages. Most Sims know at least one skill, have a job, and have relationships and friendships outside their household.
Most of the Sims were created by EA as ghosts for their worlds, but they appear in Ravinehood resurrected and with new stories (so you'll find Lolita Goth raising a fairy in what was once the Specter house, and the Remingtons from Riverview striving to catch a unicorn). My thanks go to the simmer community who kindly shared them on the Exchange. The other Sims were created by me, sometimes drawing inspiration from my reading, particularly Terry Pratchett's "Discworld" series and Herbie Brennan's "Faerie Wars Chronicles".
NPC Sims will be randomly generated by the game, so I recommend installing the Random Sim Fixes 2.0 mod by LazyDuchess to avoid them all looking the same.
Overviews
CJplays
(All screenshots were not edited, but the snow might look a little different because I use the Snow but better! Mod by Liralei. Other than that, that is exactly how the world looks in-game, with its own custom lighting.)
For the next world after Ravinehood I want to use as few packs as possible – just the necessary ones – to make it more accessible, but my mind keeps going "oh but I need that pack too..."
For now, I have settled with Ambitions, Late Night, Pets, and University Life (especially the latter two). I'm leaving out World Adventures, Generations, and Supernatural. I still need to decide whether I want the seasonal lot to already be in the world or as a separate download.
I bring you an update on Ravinehood (my Midnight Hollow revamp). As of today, all lots are done and placed! Now I only need to create households, populate it, and test that everything is working right (it never is). Updated ETA is June!
Here some raw random screenshots I took from EIG 5 minutes ago:
[TS3 custom world] Brynmar (EliOrni version) by EliOrni
The world I am releasing today is my version of Brynmar by Rope. It took around 7-8 months of building, and at one point, I almost gave up because I was exhausted, but I'm happy to have made it to the end. I've never built so many lots since I started playing The Sims 3 when it was released, and I don't consider myself a builder, but I'm satisfied with the result.
My version of Brynmar is slightly different from the original, mostly because I removed some lots and replaced them with larger ones to accommodate the combined rabbit holes; I also planted more trees and added a couple of lots that were absent from the original. Credits for sculpting, coloring, and routing all go to Rope, while the lots are mine. Credits to EA for the lighting (I used the Dragon Valley INI files).
This world is not a replacement of Brynmar, so you can have both my version and the original one installed in your game.
Details
Size: Large (2048x2048)
EPs: World Adventures, Ambitions, Late Night, Generations, Pets, Supernatural, Seasons, University Life (See the Requirements paragraph for more info)
SPs: none
Store content: Earth Day set (free)
Custom content: none
Lots: 101 (See the Lots paragraph for more info)
Populated: Yes (See the Population paragraph for more info)
DOWNLOAD: Exchange // SFS
Requirements
This world requires the following expansion packs: World Adventures, Ambitions, Late Night, Generations, Pets, Supernatural, Seasons, University Life (so all but Showtime, Island Paradise and Into the Future). It does not require Stuff Packs, and there is no custom content.
In the library and some houses I used potted plants from the free Earth Day set released on The Sims 3 Store. It is entirely optional, and if you don't have it the plants will be removed or replaced with a base game one. Even if you are missing some EP, the items associated with it will be removed, but the world will still function.
The world has its own custom lighting, the same one you find in EA's Dragon Valley, but you don't need Dragon Valley for it to work. It's a very golden, warm light, and provides some pretty beautiful sunsets.
Lots
This world has 101 lots: 51 commercial, 32 residential, and 18 empty ones.
All rabbit holes from the base game, Late Night, Pets and Supernatural are included. Since the town is spread out across the island, there are two grocery stores/diners and two bookstores/spas.
The world features a library, a graveyard, a junkyard, an art gallery, a dry-cleaner, a consignment store, a nectary, a gym, a public pool, a horse ranch, an arcade/bowling alley, a beauty salon, a fire department, two cat jungles, two dog parks, three fishing spots, four beaches, and six parks of different sizes (including a festival lot). The town is roughly organized into neighborhoods, and I tried to include at least one hangout spot in each of them. All of the community lots are my original creations, but the salon might look familiar: it's a mirrored and modified version of the Serenity Retreat EA created for Sunlit Tides. The skating rink in the park near the nectary changes according to seasons.
Almost all the houses were built based on actual plans from various architectural sites (the credits for each are indicated in the lot descriptions). All of them are furnished and decorated. They come in different sizes (but mostly 20x30) and prices; 4 are starter homes, while the most expensive (Broken Bow) is around 236k Simoleons. Sometimes you may find empty rooms: it's by design so that you can do what you want with them. Some houses are already prepared to accommodate pets or even horses; in general, I'd say they are quite pet-friendly because many are single-story and have no stairs.
There is room in the world to add more lots, particularly on the road going to the nectary and the ranch area.
Population
There are about 60 Sims (evenly divided between males and females) and a dozen pets living in Brynmar, divided into 20 households each with its own story. Their ages cover all life stages from toddler to elder; none of them are occults. There are also 3 pregnancies in their early stages. Most Sims know at least one skill, have a job, and have relationships and friendships outside their household.
Not all the Sims were created by me: some families actually come from EA's Roaring Heights (say hello to the Capps and Thebes). Store content that came with them has been removed.
NPC Sims will be randomly generated by the game, so I recommend installing the Random Sim Fixes 2.0 mod by LazyDuchess to avoid them all looking the same.
Overviews
Cjplays
(All screenshots were taken during the testing phase, so there may be some slight differences with the final world, mainly regarding the number of trees. The snow looks a little different because I use the Snow but better! Mod by Liralei. Other than that, that is exactly how the world looks in-game.)
Diving right through the roof of the gym lot in Ashington by @floweringash
This world is a remake of Eriu Fe' by @gruesim without the custom content. Eriu Fe' is one of my favorite worlds, but the houses are unfurnished. I really love the waterfalls and the lakes in this world. I didn't know my Sim could jump so high on the diving board. She went right through the rook, hilarious!
Quick Brynmar update: I've finally finished building the very last lot! Below you can find really quick, so-and-so photos of it, but I quite like it.
Now the biggest challenge is, fixing an annoying visual glitch that you can spot in the first photo, on the left: in short, all lots look green from map view, and apparently, the way to fix it is delete all lots in CAW, so that's what I'm gonna do, hoping it goes well because it's really bugging me. Then I'll add families and proceed with testing. Next time you hear about Brynmar is when I release it!
While working on a beach in my version of Brynmar by Rope, I checked where the West was, so that Sims could marry with the sunset behind them – and I must say, with the Dragon Valley light it's absolutely stunning.
gummygunk
turnnoffyourmind
tangentwithtanner
theartofmadeline
romaincrisis
kaledo-art
jacobvanloon
jbbartram-illu
