Tag: sims

The Sims FreePlay January 22 Update

On By Michel McDonaldIn Android, App, Games, Nook, The SimsLeave a comment

The Sims FreePlay

The Sims FreePlay has finally given us an update and not everyone is happy about it. Well, I should say they aren’t happy because EA still has not addressed some of the issues that some of us are having with the game.

There are really only two issues that I am having, like not being able to log in to Facebook in the game which would allow me to access the party boat to claim daily prizes based on how many Facebook friends I have who also play the game. It also allows me to visit those friend’s neighborhoods and interact with their Sims characters. They have tasks that you have to perform to earn a special currency called SP’s to spend on specific items in the store. If I cannot earn that currency then I will not be able to buy those items.

The other issue that I am having is that I cannot play the game on my new Nook HD+ that I got for Christmas. I have been playing this game on my Android phone since last year and I’m perfectly okay with playing it on there because that is mainly the only reason I even use my phone anymore. Ever since I got my Nook, I’ve uninstalled most of the apps that I used to use on a daily basis because they were causing The Sims FreePlay to constantly crash. Since I can use those apps on my new Nook, I don’t need them on my phone anymore.

Some people are reporting problems that they are having that I don’t seem to be having. They are also really irate that EA has not addressed their complaints.  Here are just 2 comments. I blurred out their names for their own protection.  The first one is negative, the 2nd one, well, if you can understand what that person is saying then you decide lol.  That person is having issues that I am not having.

sims freeplay comments

You know, I am just as miffed as the next person, but let us all have a little perspective here. This is a free game. You don’t pay for it, you get to play it for as long as you want for free. There are premium items you can buy with real life money, but you don’t have to buy them if you don’t want to. Be lucky they are giving us all of these updates because their other game The Sims 3 which is also available for your Android device will cost you $6.99 and from what I have read in the comments there, that game doesn’t have nearly as many cool features and items as the FreePlay game has.

Also, you should be so lucky to have your Android phone or tablet because there are many people in this world who don’t have such luxuries. There are children who are being abused by their parents, some even murdered. There are entire families who are starving and sleeping in the streets because they aren’t as lucky as you. There are people in this world who are being molested, raped and murdered.

There are teenagers who are kicked out of the house and end up living on the streets for years simply because they came out of the closet to their parents. There are gay kids being targeted, beat up, some even raped and then murdered in Russia because Vladimir Putin gave them the okay by making being gay illegal. There are gay people living in Uganda who are being murdered or raped, or both. And finally, there are people being stoned to death in the Arab countries for the same reason, because they are gay. So chill out, it’s just a silly little game. Count your lucky stars that you even have the money to play the game on your expensive little toy.

I am just as miffed at EA because the Facebook issue started when they put out the Halloween update and I have waited all this time and was let down yesterday when I couldn’t log in with the new update. I understand how frustrating it is. I was also let down when I couldn’t play it on my Nook, but even if I could play it on my Nook, if I can’t log in to Facebook to upload my progress, then how will I be able to continue from where I left off on my phone when I try to play it on my Nook?

Someone told me to just buy a Kindle. Um… I have a Nook. I can’t just go out and say “hey take my Nook and give me a Kindle.” It doesn’t work that way. My Nook is a Nook HD+ with 32 GB which only cost $150. The Kindle Fire equivalent is $444 (see below). So yeah, I will not be buying a new Kindle just so I can play The Sims FreePlay. Even if I did, I still have the Facebook issue. If I can’t back up my game, then what point is getting a Kindle Fire to play it on?

kindle fire hdx

One person even said to just go out and buy the cheap Kindle Fire. Again, even at the low price of $139, I still have the Facebook issue to deal with. Besides, why do these people think I have money lying around that I can just go out and buy all these new things? I just cancelled HBO and Showtime because I needed that extra $30 a month. How am I supposed to go out and buy a second tablet that I will only use to play The Sims with? I put $20 into savings and had to take it back out just to buy groceries. Come on, think it through people.

At any rate, I will continue to wait and hope that EA will fix these issues and I will continue not complaining because there is more to life than just a silly little game. I will continue playing it on my phone and be happy that I even have that luxury. How happy you ask? This happy…

sims freeplay shirt

SD card unexpectedly removed…

On By Michel McDonaldIn Android, Games, PicturesLeave a comment

SD card unexpectedly removed

Has anyone ever seen this issue before?  If you have an Android phone and a SanDisk memory card, you probably have.

So this is my problem today, well, last night anyway.  It was 8 p.m. and I was logging into The Sims FreePlay to send my 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. Sims to work.  As it was starting to load, it crashed to the home screen and I see this message “SD card unexpectedly removed.”  What the…?

I rebooted the phone and tried to load the game and got this message again, and again, and again.  I Googled the problem and read in a few forums that my microSD card is most likely no good and that I would need to buy a new one.  Well, I bought this card in January, how could it be bad after only 5 months?

One of my concerns was that I might have lost all of my pictures, because I never backed any of them up.  Some of them have automatically been privately synced onto Facebook, but not all of them, so if I lost all of my other images, I was going to be very disappointed.  I went into the pictures and they all had that triangle with the explanation point.  FRAK!  I rebooted the phone and they were all there, but then they disappeared… they came back and I was able to upload everything album by album onto Google Drive.  WHEW!

So another one of my concerns was that I haven’t backed up the Sims FreePlay in a few days, so all of the work that I have done will disappear and I will have to continue from where I left off the last time I backed it up to the cloud, which backs it up on Facebook.  Fortunately the game loaded last night and I was able to do a backup, but then this morning I got the “SD card unexpectedly removed” issue again, so I knew that I wasn’t out of the woods just yet.

This morning I went into the app management screen and saw that all of the apps on the microSD card were showing their icons, except for The Sims FreePlay.  Knowing that it was backed up on Facebook, I uninstalled the game and tried to reinstall it.  The first attempt wasn’t successful because it told me that it couldn’t install it, but then I tried it again and it worked.  I was able to send my 10 a.m. Sims to work on time.

I really don’t care if I have to buy a new microSD card, that is unimportant, what is most important to me is that I don’t lose my pictures, and I haven’t so I’m okay with it.  I only paid $20 for it which was a good price considering the Best Buy Mobile store at the mall was charging $35 for the PNY 32GB microSD card and $70 for the SanDisk 32GB microSD cards.  That is a lot of money.  Too much for my blood.

Last night after I backed up all of my pictures on Google Drive, I went through my apps and uninstalled a bunch that I never used that were on the microSD card.  I don’t know how many apps I uninstalled, but it was a lot.  I’ve been messing around with it after I reinstalled The Sims FreePlay today, and after rebooting it a couple of times found that one app is showing up weird in the App Management screen, so I uninstalled it.  I moved a lot of apps to the phone so that I don’t lose the data so those are fine.

Everything seems to be okay with The Sims FreePlay now after I have rebooted the phone and tried to go into the game.  I’m sure I don’t even have to buy a new card, but just in case I do, I will be very careful to back everything up.  Like if I take a picture, I will back it up with Google Drive and if I play The Sims FreePlay, I will upload my data to the cloud just to make sure I don’t lose any progress.  If I have to buy a new microSD card then no problem, but for now I don’t think I have to worry about it.

Have you had these same issues?  If so, what was your solution?  Enquiring minds want to know!

My New HTC One V for Christmas

On By Michel McDonaldIn Cell Phone, Christmas, Computer, Gadgets, Pictures, Products I Like, TechLeave a comment

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I got a brand new cell phone for Christmas thanks to IZEA paying me to blog and tweet.  I just love blogging and tweeting for money.  It’s not a very good living, but at least I get some cool things out of it.

It just so happened that when I got my new HTC One V from Virgin Mobile, my partner decided that he wanted to set his computer up and naturally his mouse and keyboard weren’t working, so I gave him mine which meant that I lost my computer.  So I’ve been using my new phone as a computer for a few days now.  I’m not used to using such a small screen so it takes getting used to.  I have my Chromebook, but the WiFi crashes after typing a few words.  I reset it to factory settings, but it still does it.  Resetting it helped make it faster because even clearing the cache and browsing history wasn’t speeding it up, but the WiFi problem still happens, which meant my phone is now my only means of being online.  I’m “borrowing” my keyboard and mouse for this lol.

So after a few days of using it, here are my impressions.  I read a few reviews and watched a dozen video reviews on YouTube before I committed to buying this phone just to make sure it was what I wanted.  Of course, I wanted a better one, but this was what I could afford that I could get before Christmas day.

I was under the impression that it had 4GB onboard, but when I went to install the Sims free play, it said I didn’t have enough room which told me that I only had 1GB available.  I figured I’d be okay until I could buy a MicroSD card, but apparently not.  I am using a 2GB MicroSD card from my previous phone, so that is working for now until I get my new 32GB MicroSD card.

I am very impressed with the performance compared to some of the reviews that I watched.  It’s not slow at all.  I mean, sometimes I have to wait for a page to load or a game to load, but I’m not spoiled with a faster cell phone since this is my very first smart phone so maybe I just don’t know the difference yet.  It is slow however when I am not at home on my WiFi.  We were at the movies yesterday and it took forever for Foursquare to load so I could check in.  It finally checked in by the time we got home.  So the 3G isn’t great so far, but it’s wonderful on our WiFi.  I will have to see how frustrated I am the next time we have a doctor’s appointment lol.

iphone folder screenshot The OS is pretty impressive, well to me anyway.  It has the big clock with the weather, then room for 8 icons underneath.  There are 2 screens to the left and 2 screens to the right.  I decided that I didn’t want a bunch of icons, so I downloaded the iPhone Style Folder app.  I tried another one that allows me to put the icons in folders, but it only allowed me to have one folder, which is not what I was looking for.  This is perfect for me.

Oh and by the way, I downloaded an app to take screenshots and it was nice enough to tell me that my phone already has a way of taking screenshots by simply pressing the power button and then the home button.  So that’s one less app that I have to worry about taking up room or putting a watermark on my screenshot.  The background image is of our Christmas tree btw.

Before I got the phone, I typed out a post about how to make money using your phone.  I installed those apps (as you can see from the folder in the image above) and here are my impressions so far.

1. iPinion was a pain to sign up on because it insisted that my email address was currently being used, but when I tried to get the password, it said that email address wasn’t even in their system lol.  I had to use another email address to sign up with and even then they didn’t have any surveys for me to fill out.  I’m not giving up on it just yet.

2. IconZoomer wants me to take pictures of things like what my fridge, coffee maker, my form of entertainment etc.  But they haven’t paid me in credits for any of the pictures I have taken.  They each say they have so many days left, so maybe when the question expires I might get credit.  If not, delete…

3. CheckPoints wants me to scan barcodes of products at the grocery store, but I am broke so there isn’t a reason for me to go to the grocery store.  I’ll do it when I get some money.  I don’t want to look suspicious if I go in, scan barcodes then leave LOL.

4. ShopKick wants me to go to the mall and walk into specific shops for points, that would be fine if I went to the mall all the time, but I don’t and I don’t think I would be willing to walk around just for this because of my back pain issues.  It’s fine for some people, but not everyone.

5. Cash King wants me to download apps, watch videos and fill out surveys.  I only get 1 video a day to watch so that’s not what I thought it would be.  I downloaded 1 app which is a game which I actually enjoy and it connects to Facebook and is a game people have been wanting me to play anyway.  They don’t have any surveys yet.

6. Viggle is a wonderful app.  All you do is turn on the TV and let Viggle hear what you are watching and you get points which you can use to buy stuff.  They mostly want me to watch college football games on ESPN so I turn it to ESPN and let it hear the game then I just wait for the next one.  They will give you credits for everything you watch, but specific shows they give you bonus points for.  I have almost 2,000 points after just 2 days.  It’s not going to take long to get some decide rewards if I continue to check in and watch videos everyday.

7. Staree is from IZEA and I will never question them, but… what the heck is this app for?  I have taken a few pictures and haven’t gotten any credits lol.  Maybe they will ask you to take pictures… who knows.

One of my favorite features of this phone is how it takes pictures and video.  This doesn’t do 4:3 like most cameras do, it does 16:9.  In fact, I have it set so it takes pictures that are 1280×768 which is the resolution of the wallpaper on my desktop computer.  Videos are 1280×720 which is the same resolution as my HDTV.  Also I am loving the flash lol.  I know it’s funny to hear but every digital camera I have ever had was missing one thing, the flash, so I am in heaven.  It also uses the light from the flash for video which is pretty cool.  My camcorder doesn’t have a light so now when I need to take video at night, I’ll be able to.  Not that I will have a reason, but you never know.

Here are some pictures I have taken with the camera on my new HTC One V.

So I think I will have a lot of fun with this new phone.  It is so much better than my other one and I love that I can post pictures directly to Facebook and Twitter and I can email pictures to myself instead of having to move them to the MicroSD card, then putting it in my printer to copy to the computer.  It sure takes out so many steps.  I also love the voice recognition.  I don’t mind typing, but I make tons of mistakes with the on screen keyboard.  Although, the voice recognition isn’t perfect, but it’s still better than typing.  Yep, this is going to be a beautiful friendship.

Oh and I gave my other phone to someone who really needed a cell phone so that makes me feel really good.

My House in Lord of the Rings Online

On By Michel McDonaldIn Games, LOTRO2 Comments

I have been having so much fun playing my hobbit in Lord of the Rings Online the last couple of weeks.  I even bought a house for 1 Gold.  Although, I had to get my farming skill up to the highest it could get in order to make the money to buy the house but it was fun to farm.  It really didn’t cost me that much to farm and I didn’t have to kill anything to get any of the ingredients either (which is another form of farming).

So my house is a standard house with 2 rooms, you can see the main picture has me standing in front of the house then the 2 little pictures of the living room and bedroom.  No need for a kitchen or a bathroom since I would use my cooking skill just standing anywhere and video game characters have no reason to use the toilet, this isn’t the Sims after all.

I have to keep paying the game 50 silver a week to maintain the house but it doesn’t take that long to make 50 silver, actually it’s very easy and I have plenty of it.  I can even pay 5 weeks in advance so if I know I’m going to be away from the game for long periods of time, I won’t have to worry about my house being abandoned and having everything in my chest auctioned off.

The only point to having a house is for the extra storage, the chest.  Also you get a discount on the merchants in the zone that the houses are in.  Other than that it’s purely for show.  It’s fun to have and to decorate and to invite your friends over to look at.

One of the issues that I have with this game is that when I exit in a well populated area then when I get back in the game, all of those graphics make the game crash.  So if I log in to the game in my house then there aren’t all of those graphics to crash me.  I can log in, leave the house and go play.  So that’s a very good advantage of having a house, for me anyway.

Google Chrome OS?!?!

On By Michel McDonaldIn Computer, CR-48, Google ChromeLeave a comment

This is coming straight from the Google blog…

Official Google Blog: Introducing the Google Chrome OS

Wow.  That’s so cool.  This is going to be neat to be able to turn your computer on and once it gets past all those tests that you see, you know, where it shows how much memory you have, then all of a sudden you’ve got desktop.  No more waiting for the Windows screen that shows that animated bar at the bottom of the screen.  Instead you are instantly taken right to your desktop so you can immediately start browsing the web.

The only thing that concerns me is if this will allow me to install my Windows programs like the Sims, EverQuest, Adobe Photoshop Elements, Adobe Premiere Elements, Autodesk 3DS Max 2008, my webcam software, my mp3 player software etc.  And will it allow my hardware like my webcam and my Kodak printer?

One of the things that I really look forward to is if this will allow me to play my old Win 98 games that Win XP won’t let me run.  I just hope that this isn’t something like Mac and Linux where you have to buy the Google OS software only which will probably only be a few programs at first and will always only have 10% of the software compared to the 100% that Windows offers.  That’s always been an issue and why I won’t ever have a Mac or Linux again because I want to be able to buy whatever program I want.  It’s really depressing when you go to buy software and the aisle for that OS is just a shelf while the rest of the store is for Windows.

Of course I’ll have to wait until the 2nd half of 2010 for this to become available so I look forward to all of the blogs and pictures and possibly videos showing how well it is on Netbooks.

Edit 2011-02-15: I have been using Google Chrome OS CR-48 since mid December and it does not allow me to install anything and it does in fact have apps that you can install from the Google Chrome store.  They apps install a link to your desktop which are basically just a link to a website.  There are also tons of extensions that you can use and it does work with my printer through the cloud.  No I can’t play those games I listed above but there are other games I can play that are web-based.

I would not want this to be my desktop, it works great as a netbook only in my opinion.  You would still need your regular desktop for your other programs and MMO games.