Two WIP Updates Available

I have two Work In Progress releases for you this evening! Since they're both ready for review at the same time, and have sort of grown up together, I'll just combine them in this post.

Mine Crafting 1.0.2b Preview Release

First, Mine Crafting gets an update to 1.0.2b. Changes include adding a separate Explore adventure for mines on Sixam. It didn't make sense to me that you could get from a cave on Sixam to the Forgotten Grotto, etc. So I came up with some Sixamy stuff for this Explore interaction. 

As I type this, I'm trying to remember if I added bathroom to the Mall of Sixam -- if I didn't, I will. There are no other bathrooms on Sixam...above the ground. I did add a bathroom to the Armless Gnome tavern in the underground city.

Also balanced mineral output and effects of debris clutter. Mining was returning too many minerals each trip, so i reduced it considerably, and also increased the negative effect of debris build up on output (it will reduce it).

I made the effect of finding valuable mineral deposits temporary (eg., gold, silver, diamonds, plumbite), so that it switches back to Mixed output after a certain number of resources have been extracted (about 6 extraction trips). I kept getting stuck with Gold Mines or Diamond Mines when what I wanted was a source of metals and crystals for recipes. So now when the deposit is exhausted, it will go back to producing mixed metals or crystals.

If you want to review the last version, and the entire description of the mod, look here (Previous Preview Release). The new download is attached to this post.

Apothecary Kit 1.0.2b Preview Release

I found and fixed an incredibly dumb bug! I initially cloned the gummy bags from Herbal Potion objects (then swapped out the object mesh, etc), but left them 'tagged' as 'Drinks'. This lead to Sims autonomously treating Bags of Gummies as dirty dishes and destroying them in the sink...whoops! So I fixed that. No more pharmacies stripped clean by hordes of gummy washing customers.

Also set up better retail sales of both tablets and gummies, and fixed slotting issues on tablet bottles so they fit on most shelves now. 

Fixed a few bugs resulting in incorrect recipe products and/or mislabeled items. Product should also be buyable/sellable at Hensford on Bagley grocery stall now (under Miscellaneous).

If you want to review the last version, and the entire description of the mod, look here (Previous preview and full description) The new download is also attached to this post.

Otherwise

I spent a lot of January wrangling newfangled musical interactions and instruments for the freelance entertainer mod I mentioned earlier.  

I tried to make a Farfisa, but it sounds more like a Hammond B3. It's portable, though. :)  Also, a microphone that works like a Karaoke machine (that you can also sing with). It adds a backing band to a lounge performance, and they are more animated when they sing. 

I've been working on a set of lot traits to set a musical genre theme to lounges (and maybe bars, if I can get the NPC jukebox interactions to work). This means you can set up Jazz Bars, Blues Bars, Country Bars, etc, and the NPC lounge performers that show up will only play that type of music (and you have to play that type of music if you do a gig there). 

Got that working at a functional level with a few types of music, but then I look at the whole set of lists of musical genres available on all of the instruments (and singing), they don't match up very well. 

Some genres can only be played on one or two instruments (Gospel, for example, can only be played on an organ...hence my Farfisa/Hammond thing). So I've been trying to kind of group them together. Like Blues/Rock, and Jazz/Swing/Ragtime, Classical/AvantGarde, etc. 

It gets worse when I try to think about filtering jukebox music into these categories since they don't match at all, and there are many more of them. When I was trying to 'connect the genres' together though, I noticed a really glaring omission. There's no R&B! How do we get from Jazz to Pop without R&B? I'm probably overthinking this, lol. 

As always, if you have any ideas or suggestions,  let me know!

Thanks for your support!