ParaZoid Simming

The first night in the new house, Amica snuggled into her husband.

"I have such a good feeling about this house, my love."

"Do you?"

"Truly. We will raise our family here. It's peaceful. Not like the city."

"You used to like the city," he pointed out, kissing her cheek. "If you are happy, Ami, then so I am," he promised.

Amica was indeed happy. She watched their efforts grow into a cozy little cottage overlooking the sea. Sometimes she sat on the beach behind their house and watched the waves roll in and out. Dreaming of the days when little Beatrice could splash and play.

And that day was soon coming.

Beatrice was growing, every day a little more curious and more adventurous.

Soon enough, she was toddling around on her legs, following Amica and Roman around as they spruce up the house and browsed Interent for new properties to invest in.

She attended day care while they worked their other jobs, and came home babbling happily about friends, toys and games.

The timing couldn't be more perfect! Roman had received not one, but offers for the house they had just finished renovating.

Time seemed to be on their side...

Until...

It wasn't...

Amica was working on one of thetown requests for the community boards, just talking to a new neighbor about her problem... when she went into labor.

And lacking a speedy ambulance service, gave birth to their daughter, Beatrice, in the park, while Roman was at work.

Instead of a nursry in a beach house, they had to set one up in the hallway of the house they were trying to sell!

Amica admit to Roman that she has been dreaming about a little house near the beach and in her dreams, it has a nursery.

"A baby?" asked Roman as he held her, listening to her dreams like her always did. "Do you want one?" he asked her.

Amical grew quiet because neither she nor Roman had discussed expanding their family before.

"I think... yes, it would be nice," she admitted to him.

"I think so, too," he agreed. "A little girl , beautiful liker her mother..."

This house, the one they are finishing up, doesn't have a nursery, but does have a small, decorative yest still functioning outhouse.

"Why an outhouse?" Amica asked her husband when she showed her his work.

He shrugged. "It used up the wood?" he explained. Neither of them liked unused resources anyway.

"It's adorable!"

In between their jobs at the restuarant and the school, and the renovations on the house, Amica still finds time to do odd jobs around the town. There are a lot of them posted on the community bulletins.

She is surprised one day to learn that she and Roman have earned places of honor in the town library. For their services to the town.

But the biggest news of all came one day after both of them fell ill.

Roman came home from the school, having caught a cold bug from the students.

Colds are for sharing, so naturally, Amical fell ill as well.

They both went to see the doctor.

Roman was given medication and told to rest.

Amica... they gave her medication, told her to rest... but also took more tests. They waited for the results, nervous because they didn't know what it meant.

Finally, the doctor called Amica back for the results.

"I'm pregnant," she told Roman when they were finally alone. "About a month along."

"Our baby!"

Roman hugged her tight, and then kissed her.

"We'd better started on that nursery then," he reminded her.

"We need our house by the beach first," she reminded him.

"I know the perfect spot," he said with a twinkle in his eyes. When he took her there, Amical knew he was right... this was place, the exact place, from her dreams.

Our happy couple scoped out their next property, always thinking one step ahead while they worked out the final details of the townhouse. Amica had a goal to see it sell for over $40,000, so they lingered there, fiddling and tweaking until they drained their funds.

As a result, they decided to pick up part time work to help fund their efforts, at least until they started making more money on the houses.

Roman got a job as a janitor at the elementary school and Amica became a server at Chez Maurice. Through her work at the restuarant, Amica gradually began to learn more about Melino, it's people and the things they stood for. She also began to pick up that there were a lot of odd jobs which could be done for extra side cash.

Thus began the Architettos' era of exploration.

Life was not all work, though. Roman often showered his wife with affection.

They even went out to lunch together, although they wound up sitting at separate tables!

Their first lot was a vacant piece of property on the side of the hill. It served as a border between the town of Melino on one side and the sprawling farm land on the other.

Roman brought it state of the art equipment to clear out the land. It caused quite a bit of buzz with the neighbors on both sides of the divide.

Finally, it was starting to take shape. Roman and Amica ventured into town to get a feel for what the people were looking for. If they were going to stay a while, it wouldn't hurt to be social.

During their explorations... they found some... questionable things...

And their next potential property. :-)

After months and months of hard work, they were ready for the big reveal...

RA Architetto ~1

A Note From ChillyzGrrl: I didn't plan to play them, just use Roman & Amica as the builders/testers for my builds, but somewhere along the way, I decided to have them live in one house while they renovated the next one, sell, and then move on... they are growing on me and I hope they don't die before I get Amica prepgant with the next generation of Architettos.

Paralives isn't perfect or polished, by any means. It has bugs and glitches.  It's missing what most Sims players would consider ‘key features.’   As should be expected in early access. 

 But…  the vision is solid.  It has a strong foundation to build from.  

I say this after playing over 40 hours, almost equally in Paramaker, Build mode and Live mode.  This game has the goods.  

There are so many things I LOVE about it already:

The color wheel

Being able to resize everything by just dragging it

Being able to place items and clutter anywhere without special modes or chest codes 

The terrain paint is GORGEOUS and detailed 

The beautiful, naturally asymmetrical landscape of the town/lots

Being able to own multiple lots at the same time

Being able to own NO lots and still live in the town (hello Rags to Riches)

 Being able to have more than one job at a time

Together Cards (I was iffy about them at first but they have grown on me and honestly feel more lifelike than the Sims model where you just spam an NPC or Townie with interaction until you get what you want) 

A personality system that evolves as your character grows

The Requests board, which serves to help you explore the town, meet new Paras, make money and help the town grow 

Layering clothes, jewelry, makeup and facial details 

The sliders in Paramaker.  All the sliders.  

An intuitive build mode with so many features that aren't hiding behind a pay wall 

I am having so much fun exploring this game and seeming what it can do… and what I can do with it.  Is it buggy at times?  Yes.   Are there glitches?  Yes.  Did the mods I installed a couple of days ago suddenly stop working for no apparent reason yesterday?  Yes.  

But you know what?

I expected bugs and glitches in an early access game.  

And the mods I installed were just for me to try out… not the only things making the game playable.  So I can turn them off and try again later.  It’s not going to ruin anything if I don’t use mods right now.  

Is this Early Access title for you?

That depends on you.  

For me, Paralives has the best aspects of the Sims 2 and Sims 3, combined with the ultimate Life Sim Wishlist and all wrapped in it’s own unique flavor.  

If you purchase this game, go into it knowing that it’s not a finished product, but a very promising prototype.  It doesn’t have decades of content or a high paid team with all the latest tech at their disposal.  Report the bugs.  Make constructive suggestions for better gameplay.  Support the team.