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s1ndle · 4 months

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Unique PC Appearances for Console Sims

6 months later and I have another bit of fun about The Sims for Console! And with a weird title to boot!

If you want to see more, read below!

In my previous post I had mentioned that I was able to open the .IFF files for the sims themselves. The reason that I was able to do that in the first place was because the console version and the PC version are, for all intents and purposes, the same game!

In fact, you can take sim .IFF files from the console version, plop them into the PC version, and they will function flawlessly! Except for their appearances…

In the PC version of Create-A-Sim, you were only able to change the whole head and whole body. But the console version featured a much more elaborate system, with the player being able to change the sim’s hair, face, and clothing independently, as well as do other things like change the color, as well as add and remove accessories at will.

The PC version uses a resource within a sim’s .IFF to keep track of their appearance, these are called bodystrings.

Sims from the console version still have this resource within their .IFF as well! However because the sims’ appearances are vastly different between the two versions, the bodystrings inside a console sim’s .IFF go unseen. However when a sim from the console version is forcibly brought into the PC version, these previously unseen bodystrings can be seen! But most sims, like the GOTH family pictured above, use a set of default heads and bodies for their respective age groups, see below.

However! There are a few exceptions to this rule, and a handful of sims have uniquely defined appearances in their body strings, despite never being used by the game. So… here they are!

Freeplay Sims:

Interestingly enough, only the unused sims get to have unused unique PC bodystrings. Not even Betty Newbie!

Get a Life Sims:

Some interesting notes and observations about these appearances though:

They don't correlate to their proper appearances within the console version, like at all. They also only use light skin for whatever reason, not sure why. I do think it's a little funny that BETTY ROOMIES ended up with the same head that Betty Newbie from the PC version uses though! I also find it to be rather interesting that several sims use heads or bodies from the House Party Expansion Pack, what, if anything, that means though, I don't know.

As mentioned before, every other sim, apart from these select 17 sims use the same bodystrings. Even the duplicates of the Get a Life sims that exist within the neighborhood used for Bonus Game lots don't have this quirk.

I'm honestly not sure why these are even a thing. They could potentially be early development leftovers, but what purpose they served, if any at all, is a mystery to me.

#research #ts1 #ts1 console #sims 1 #sims 1 console #really proud of the graphic design on the sim comparisons! ^.^#sometime soon i'm going to do a part 2 to lost sims #so be on the look out for that in another 6 months #jk #unless?

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manumigoya · 3 years

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A regular guy’s experience with a military graded phone and why you might want one

The Ulefone Armor 7 Pro is a smartphone designed for adventurers, construction workers and people who are routinely exposed to conditions that would endanger most modern devices. I’m not any of those things, but I still think it was the right choice for me, and it might just suit you too.

What use has a normal guy like me for a phone built to withstand such extreme conditions? I’m no couch potato, I regularly ride my bike to work and back, enjoy the occasional trekking and camping trip and walk around my city a fair bit. Even so, that is a far cry from the kind of person this phone was designed for.

After all, the Ulefone Armor X7 Pro has a IP-68 and a MIL-STD-810G rating, which means it can literally survive for a day buried under a meter of concrete, withstand half an hour under 1.5 meters of water, its completely sealed to dust or sand, and a bunch of other characteristics you can read about here. Essentially, it’s build to last.

About this review

This article is not intended to be a thorough technical review of the phone, but rather a list of reasons why I think it might suit you even if you are not the intended target for it. Therefore I will only go through some of the most important specs, highlighting what I personally consider relevant.

If you wish to know the full technical details you can visit the official Ulefone site or search for a traditional review. If you wish to skip to my conclusion, where I explain why this is also a great phone for normal users, scroll to the end.

Ulefone Armor 7 Pro specs

CPU: Mediatek Helio A20 1.8GHz

RAM: 4Gb

Storage: 32Gb (expandable)

OS: Android 10

Screen: 5’’

Back Camera: 13Mbx

Front Camera: 5Mpx

Battery: 4000 mAh

Size: 150 x 78,9 x 14,6 mm

Has NFC

Micro-usb charging

Okay, now that we listed the technical details, let’s consider what each of them brings to the table and how the final product behaves.

Slow and steady

If you are looking for a fast snappy phone with which you can simultaneously scroll through Instagram, watch a video with picture in picture mode, and have a graphic intensive game waiting for you in the background, this isn’t it. Nor is this the price range you should be aiming at.

The Armor Mediatek Helio A20 processor, with a frequency of 1.8GHz, isn’t anything to write home about. And the 4GB of RAM, though an improvement on previous models, pales in comparison to what even mid-range phones pack these days.

And you know what? That’s actually perfectly fine. The purpose of this phone isn’t to win any race, but rather to get the job done. And that it does.

I need my phone to perform what has become over the years a pretty basic list of tasks: social media, document editing, internet browsing, music and video streaming, taking some pics, and basic photo and video editing.

The Ulefone Armor 7 Pro is able to do any of those tasks without issues, even when I need to open two or three apps in the background. Yes, it does get a bit slow or even freezes for a couple of seconds from time to time, but not enough for it to interrupt my experience.

Battery life

Back when smartphones were a new thing, we used to complain about their battery life bitterly. Habituated to our old not so bright devices whose batteries lasted for days, we felt that the tradeoff wasn’t always worth it. Yes, we were now the proud owners of mind-boggling phones that could perform amazing tasks for us. But use them for a couple of hours and you better find somewhere to charge them (and have the time to wait for that to be done).

Luckily, smartphones are getting better at this by the iteration. With its 4000mAh battery, the Ulefone Armor 7 Pro is just another contender in the race for autonomy.

According to my digital wellbeing app, I’ve been using it an average of four and a half hours per day. That’s a lot. It actually puts me in the top 20% of screen time, but being excited for my new gadget and having to do this review I feel a bit justified.

Even so, I usually have at least 30% of the battery left when I finish my day, if not more. And, on the occasions I don’t use it as much, I can go two days without having to think about charging.

At a time when we are seeing affordable phones with 5000mAh of battery that can last up to three days without charge and that have better performance, the Armor X7 Pro’s battery life certainly won’t make any headlines, but it’s still a great perk for the price.

The Ulefone X7 Pro camera

As I said, one of the tasks I need my phone to perform on a daily basis is taking pictures. With a 13 megapixels main camera, a 5 megapixel front camera, and pro, night and underwater modes, the Armor X7 Pro it’s barely able to keep up with today’s standards.

I know, I know, nobody is buying it to start a photography career. But still, I was expecting a bit more, even from those low specs. Truth be told, the night mode usually just ruins the colors in most pictures and the pro mode feels terribly lacking. I still haven’t tried the underwater mode.

The first picture is taken on normal mode, the second with night mode. This kind of open dimly light landscape is the only instance where I found the night mode actually improved the result.

Pro tip: make sure to disable the Ulefone watermark, as I clearly didn’t.

Normal mode:

With night mode:

If your only purpose is to take casual photos for your personal social media, then the Armor X7 Pro will do the trick, but anything more than that and you will need to look somewhere else.

Other details and utilities

There’s a lot to say about this phone. From its unique set of apps to its thick rubber encasing. But, for the sake of brevity, I’ll just go through some of the features that I have noticed more in its daily usage.

Custom button

After using Motorola -and it’s amazing gestures- for years, I was afraid I would have too much of a hard time getting used to another brand. Luckily the Ulefone Armor X7 Pro comes with a custom key on its left side that can be programmed to do up to three different tasks. I have it set just to two: opening the camera and the flashlight. Simple, but incredibly useful.

NFC

A surprising number of middle-range phones lack this feature. But not the Armor X7 Pro, and I’m incredibly grateful for it.

Headphone Jack lids

In order to withstand an hour under 1.2 meters of water, the phone is completely sealed off. That includes the headphone jack, the charger plug, and the sim tray, which are all protected by thick rubber lids. Unfortunately, said lids are difficult to open without the dedicated tool Ulefone includes in the package.

This tool, while useful, is rather small and prone to getting lost. I have resorted to knives, forks, screwdrivers, and other such tools to open them, including my own nails (which I do not recommend).

Sadly, on a couple of occasions where my nails were trimmed and I had nothing pointy with me, I could open the headphone jack at all and resigned myself to just listening to the surroundings.

Though I understand the importance of this protection, I wish Ulefone had thought about some way of opening these lids without that tool. Or maybe even a way to carry it in the phone itself without fear of losing it.

Speakers

Oh my god are they loud! I really haven’t used my wireless speakers since I have this phone. Of course, it doesn’t have the same quality or sound level, but it’s more than enough for most situations.

Why I recommend the Ulefone Armor X7 Pro

Simply put, this is a phone for people that don’t want to worry at all about their phones. Which isn’t a new concept at all. The market for minimalist phones is growing as people realize that some device’s specs are so good they end up getting into the way of life.

And, while the Armor X7 Pro probably wasn’t designed with this in mind, it achieves it in an awesome and unique way.

First of all, its specs are good enough for the vast majority of tasks people normally need their phones to perform, while at the same time not being so appealing that they demand your constant attention.

Use it normally and you’ll have no problems, use it intensely and its shortcomings will start to annoy you. It might not be ideal, but it’s a great way to reduce your screen time (at least when you don’t have to write a review about it).

On the other hand, its ridiculous resistance to water, falls, pressure, and temperature, makes it so I don’t have to worry about breaking the thing. I’m not a particularly clumsy person, but I have been known to break a phone or two, so this is important to me.

Now, with the Armor X7 Pro, I just leave my phone anywhere, with almost no worries about its safety. If it can go through the 29 tests needed to get the MIL-STD-810G certification, It can withstand a fall while I’m riding my bike, the playful (and sticky) hands of my nephews, or having a pint of beer accidentally poured over it on a Friday night.

As long as it doesn’t get stolen, it will probably be with me for however long I want it to.

And I got all of this for just over a 100 euros on eBay -you can get it cheaper in Banggood, if you are willing to wait a bit longer. Really, I don’t think theres another phone that can deliver all of this by that price.

#phone reviews #ulefone #mobile phones #review

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