Today I finished up some fanart for the Neon East urbz! Been working on this on and off for last few days because I really want to play console sims games but don't have a ps2. Though if all goes well I should be able to buy one later this week! Then I can play my games ✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧
As for this fanart I had a lot of fun translating these characters into my style. In my last post I had already drawn Mazuiko but I did decided to switch from drawing her with monolid eyes to double lid eye look and I think I'll stick to this look for her ^u^. Also I learnt that apparently Venus has braided pigtails??? They don't look super braided to me so I only drew some braids in her pigtails but, I might change up who I draw her hairstyle in future.
Also professor Chewy's jacket was definitely the hardest thing for me to colour as I tried my best to replicate what I assume is marble texture but idk how well I pulled that off, at least it still looks nice :D and overall I really like this drawing XD.
I've mostly been sharing Sims stuff on Bluesky and a Sims FB group these days but I thought a perfect time for an update is now that I've officially added my first thing to the gallery! Originally meant as my practice build before I got really going on the sim Halcyon, I've been making Kandri's Coruscant club for Sim!Kandri to make some money.
It is now FINALLY on the gallery! EA id: ithiliel4
(It's a restaurant lot. bb.moveobjects was used. It's a busy lot!)
Pics below and the full ramble under a read-more because it's really really long...
And now for the ramble:
Originally there was no way for a Sim to actually own a bar or nightclub, so I devised a way to build it as a full restaurant, and then made Kandri a Get Together club for a few of the dancers in be in so that they could show up at her beck and call and be sexy for the patrons while the actual restaurant employees did their thing.
BUT with the release of Businesses & Hobbies, I realized I could finally have her actually own something that functions more like a club where people show up just for drinks and entertainment, not a full service meal. (Another downside to a restaurant is that full families with kids show up, and it's meant to be an adult establishment, so if I can solve that I'm gonna jump at it!). So I'm going to play with things and try to convert it to a small business instead to force it to skew more bar-like. Though I'm going to have to come up with a new creative solve for the dancers now, because it turns out you can't call club meetings in a small business, and apparently employees can't be given the 'dance' task for some reason?! Uh oh. (I'm on console. I cannot use mods. I'm just gonna have to get crafty.)
SO: what I did today was—after many weeks of perfectionist fidgeting with the outside Coruscant street decorations—finally deem the property worthy of other eyes, I'm uploading the restaurant version of the property to the gallery in case others want it and so that if the small business conversion is a disaster and I want to revert it, it'll be there for me to grab again.
Now, there are some clear signs that I've already been working towards it becoming a small business lot that people may need to adjust for if they want it in its restaurant form:
The way I made the stage work is that it's only accessible from the dressing room, and the dressing room doors are locked for everyone except the dancer club members, so you will need to make that adjustment to keep everyone else out of the back rooms and the stage. (Also: The back stock room door and kitchen door should be marked as employee only.)
I started complicating the build with more rooms than a Dine Out restaurant can probably handle, trying to build the private booth I depicted in my fic. All the activities on the balcony second floor get ignored by restaurant patrons, so the extra private rooms didn't really become an issue until I added a tv on the wall in one of them, and then suddenly customers were getting lost up there, distracted by the tv and not getting served properly by the waiters. If keeping the building as a functional restaurant, you may want to delete the tv, or simply lock the door. (I locked the door, because I wanted the rooms as is.)
I built the building as tall as possible for maximum Coruscant vibes from the outside, meaning the top 2 levels are mostly empty and just for show, but I originally built it with the implication that maybe there were apartments in those floors. Once I realized I was going to be converting the lot to a 'residential small business', I built a little apartment up on the third floor for Kandri (and "friend"? 🤫) to live in, with space to imply there are more surrounding it. This is 100% not needed for the restaurant lot, so you may want to just delete the contents of the apartment for the sake of the lot running better, since I filled the streets with lots of stuff that can bog processing down. Another door to lock so as not to confuse your restaurant customers: the one going up to those residential levels.
I wish I'd chosen a bigger lot to expand the surrounding buildings a little more (of course the gallery makes them just look like a giant cement wall from the angle it chose), but I chose to build it in place of the museum in San Myshuno because I wanted it surrounded by other tall city buildings (another option was replacing the San Myshuno gym for maximum Coruscant platform vibes, but the lot is just too small), so I sacrificed a bit of wider lot expansion for that feeling of deep city surroundings. That said, I tried to at least fill the sliver of a building edge across from the club by making it look like a little shop in there. My plan is to fill it with crystals and gems for actual sale once the building gets converted to a small business, pretending it's a different shop but it'll be an extra bit of income on the side as part of the whole lot. But you guys can decorate it as you see fit if it remains simply set dressing for the Coruscant street.
I added tables in the alley as set decoration implying that they were meant for the street food vendor I tucked in there, but in my last restaurant test, it looked like customers started getting seated out there too, so maybe keep an eye on them and possibly delete or swap the dining chairs if that becomes a bigger issue. I honestly have not yet tested actually hiring a street vendor to open that booth while the restaurant is open either. So I'm not sure how well it even functions on a restaurant lot. I mostly tucked it in there for decoration!
Yes. This is a Star Wars build. There are a bunch of packs and kits I used that you can get away with not having because there's just just random filler clutter used from them, but you definitely need Journey to Batuu to make it load properly. Sorry not sorry. (Also Dine Out should be a given here too.)
I utilized some chimneys for some street smog... they only work if a fireplace is lit, so I'd recommend the fireplace I put in the dining room be set on auto-light when someone's in the room so that the chimneys keep chugging along producing some awful air quality for my city pals. 😅
Anyway that's all the head's up I think people need for the build. If I successfully do the small business conversion, I'll upload that one too and leave both in the gallery for whatever option people want to download it in. But it's probably going to take some creative problem solving and research, while I'm also still trying to get work done on the Halcyon (the actual end game of this whole 2+ year save file!) and I'm juggling other games, so there's no estimated timeline there. Just a whole lot of fingers crossed! 🤞
