Massive Distribution

When you're happy with your creation, click on the Import To Game button. Confirm it and your object is saved. It'll appear in the Downloads Folder as a .package file. This you can distribute to other people with an instruction to dump it in the Downloads folder, located at:

C:\Documents and Settings\xxx\My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Downloads
(Windows 2000/XP)

C:\My Documents\EA Games\The Sims 2\Downloads
(Windows 98/ME)

When you go back to the browser in Homecrafter, notice the new * that appears. This is the tag for custom material. When you select one of these, notice how the Edit button becomes available, as this is an actual file and not one that lives in a compressed archive

The same idealogy works for creating Floor tiles and custom grass - grass is a fixed 5x5 repeated tile, while floors is a fixed 10x10 but you can alter how many squares one tile takes up - the bigger the square area, the more diverse the pattern. Experiment with this option to see what happens. Sound type is for ingame use - click each one to hear a sample and that's what will play when your sims walk over that carpet.

Getting It In The Game

For your material to show up in the game, you must put it in your Downloads folder. Just like the original game, this is a dumping ground for all those lovely new items that will appear over the next few hours, days, weeks, years (delete as appropriate).

Now the custom material is in your Downloads folder, load up the game and pop into the appropriate section - in our case, Build -> Wallpaper. As you can see from the screengrab, it works. It's also marked with a star to imply its custom.

Written at 20:39 2004n Wednesday 22 December 2004 by Neil.
Last updated at 20:44 2004n Wednesday 22 December 2004.