strangetomato | Discussion: Plastic surgery for premades

Entry tags:

discussion

Discussion: Plastic surgery for premades

I know that this tends to be a somewhat controversial topic for fans of premade sims, and I don't normally make adjustments to their faces (unless I had a good story reason for doing so, such as a character getting actual plastic surgery), but I'm considering making a couple of exceptions. Dora Ottomas is one of them.

I aged Dora back to adult for a project I'm working on and since I had her in Bodyshop, I thought I'd examine her wonky facial structure in more detail. I have no problem with Dora's "ugly" as such, but I do have a problem with the way her face is way shorter than the dimensions of the rest of the templates and thus does not line up properly, she has a super long neck, etc. My one rule for sim creation is never to shift the face or the eyes up or down (the mouth and nose can move a little, within reason), as this results in a sim with features that will not play nice in any genetic combination with other faces. The Ottomas family is a perfect example of this, as are some of the other latter day EP sims.

(From left to right: unaltered Dora as an adult, altered adult Dora, and Face Two)

The middle Dora is the one I've been working on, with her original face on the left and Face Two on the right for comparison. I've shifted the features up and down until they line up roughly with Face Two (and thus all of the templates, with maybe the exception of shorter Face One). I also made some minor changes to the shape of her features, including minor adjustments to the eye depth (in an attempt to fix that deep shadow and the way the brow crashes through her eyes), and a slight softening of her jawline. I think her face makes more sense like this, but she still looks like Dora. What do you think? I was hoping to make it so she could correctly wear eye makeup without it getting all distorted, but somehow that still doesn't work. I'm not sure what they did to her eyes to prevent that, but they did a pretty thorough job of it.

I've considered a similar shift for an adult Faith Goodie, moving her face down a couple of notches to match Face One. She's another premade sim with a shorter than normal face. You can barely notice the change, but she doesn't have the swan neck or the lack of forehead.

What are your thoughts on sim surgery? Do you consider these sorts of adjustments acceptable? Feel free to share your thoughts below, but please keep your discussion with each other respectful. I know many simmers can get pretty passionate about this issue, so let's be mindful of that.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

I agree that some people do have long necks and short faces, or long necks and long faces, or short necks and short faces, but all sims have the same sized heads, the same length of neck, the same height, ears that are located in one fixed place, etc. So having a short face will always mean they have a long neck, and a sim with a short face will automatically have ears that are way down near their jawbone. So while I'm all for diversity, I still think too much movement of the features up and down makes for sims that don't really make anatomical sense in the game universe. And they breed weirdly, because the game isn't complex enough to take those things into consideration and combine them as they would in real life.

I ran into this problem with my simself when I first created her. The sim design in TS2 gives them all quite long and narrow faces, which I (and many people) do not have. I adjusted her face upward to make her face shorter, but ended up with the swan neck, which I also do not have. She also bred weirdly with other sim faces, in a broken way and not an interesting way. Because she's my simself, I've since changed her to give her the standard long face that all TS2 sims have (and need to have to interbreed in a way that makes sense).

I can understand how you and many others would consider her "not Dora" after the changes, and ultimately that may be why I choose not to change her at all, but I will always think that the sims with this sort of adjustment in their faces look somewhat out of place in the game.

This is exactly why I'm not anti-plastic surgery for premade sims as a general rule. It's a feature of the game. The reward object exists, so why not have some sims use it? I think it makes perfect sense and can easily be part of a story. Or just because. It's there. It's not like you even have to use any mods to do it.

In my case, it's not really to fix future generations, because I won't be breeding Dora, so it's mostly just because this broken feature bothers me. And perhaps, for that reason, I'll choose not to make the change at all.

In this case, I think it's more to do with aesthetics than function, because I won't actually be breeding her. It's more about the principle of the thing and how those faces don't really make functional sense in the game.

I'm sort of torn about doing it, so maybe I won't, but I do wish the game designers had considered this when they designed those sims.

I like your explanation. Haha! "You're the milkman's son" is a classic.

Though I don't know if I'd say they're "not good people" because of that. :P Everyone makes mistakes and some people just really want sons, right?

On one hand, I like that idea, but I don't think I'd ever do it in my game (though who knows... I could change my mind one day). It's a little disappointing that some of the premade families have children with random lazy template faces, but we're also used to them at this point, so changing them would feel too different.

But I do like the idea of fixing Hal's face, because his is actually made with a broken template, and he really should have a different adult face.

I agree, and I will stand behind everyone's right to do what they want in their own game, even if that means changing all the premades to Face One and Two. That said, I know many fans of premade sims will check out of a story or image post pretty quickly if they see that a simmer has done that, so it's something to keep in mind.

Hal Capp is one of the sims that's based on a broken face template and changes once he ages up. It doesn't match his original face. That's one of the cases where I support correcting it to stay true to "canon" as his child face is the face he's presented to us with.

I wonder what's up with the Greenmans? I've similar results with their children. Maybe Rose has a longer face. Jason has (a modified?) Face One, which is short, so that could cause problems.

Thanks. I think she's still pretty Dora-ish, though I know it might not pass for someone who was really familiar with and/or fond of her face. I wonder how many people would have noticed if I hadn't said anything at all about it?

Oh no no. The Goth family are among the villains in my story just in general. The "I only wanted sons" thing is just an added dickish thing, lol.

To me, the surgery Dora doesn't look like Dora, and it's precisely because her face is longer. Note, I cannot recognize real faces of real people-prosopagnosia-so I really, really can't recognize most sim faces. So that's probably not all that relevant--I tell my sims by clothes/hair. Would she work for your purposes with a click or two shorter face?
My thoughts on sim plastic surgery are generally about why that character would have it. Dora wouldn't--at least not my Dora, who knows who she is and what she wants and has more confidence than everyone else combined. Gunnar Roque wouldn't have it. He doesn't care that he's 'ugly' as long as he gets lucky. Goneril Capp would--she's pretty insecure, especially when she's in a room with her sister, nieces and daughters, and she cares a great deal about being attractive and photogenic. Romeo Monty is another insecure sim who would, in spite of others finding him attractive, he doesn't find himself to be so.

This is her brow poking through her eyes:

You can see the skintone below the black eyelash area in this pic. It's probably only really noticeable in exaggerated facial expressions like this, but sims do spend a lot of their time in exaggerated facial expressions.

ETA: On further inspection, her brow actually shows through when her face is making no expression at all.

Edited 2013-01-23 14:07 (UTC)

Just curious, did you check to see how your adjusted Dora looks as a senior?

I like your thoughts on why some sims would get plastic surgery. I always thought one or both of the Pleasant twins might get a nose job, since they have very prominent noses and are TV stars in my story universe. I could also see one wanting to look less like the other. I've even considered making a short story about it, but haven't ever gotten around to it.

Thanks for your feedback on this.

I haven't, but it didn't seem like she changed a great deal going back from elder to adult, though I could be wrong. I'll check it out later when I'm in Bodyshop again.

I've decided to go with the unaltered sims anyway, so it's doesn't matter that much anymore. I still think it's an improvement, but in the end I think I'd rather show them as they are in the game. If I was a big fan of those sims and they showed up in a story I was reading, I know I'd be disappointed if they were altered, so I'm going to go with that.

I've seen this before, but I never put two and two together and realized it's caused by the brow. Interesting!

That's considerate of you ^_^

I asked because, while I think your logic is fine, and I can see that essentially the facial features are unchanged (except for eyes less deep-set, longer nose and mouth corners turned up) I was having trouble seeing the altered version as Dora. I thought maybe seeing her as a senior would make it click for me. But it's a moot point, so never mind!

I do think there is more messed up with Dora's face than having a short face. Her cheekbones are also freakishly low*. They're practically on a level with her mouth and that seems anatomically impossible. Humans can have low, prominent cheekbones, but they are set higher than Dora's. But, like Mme. Ugly, I think freakishness is part of the Ottomas charm...

*the Maxis version, I mean.

I had that swan-neck problem with my first self-sim, too. I tried to hide it with hair, not very successfully. Subsequent self-sims have looked less like me, but also less like giraffes. :P

Edited 2013-01-23 15:00 (UTC)

I have no problem with sim surgery when it's correcting broken face templates and possibly when it comes to fixing premade children who are straight face templates. I'm undecided on the 2nd because whilst I like my sim kids to look like their parents there is a reason I play with the premades and changing them feels weird. However I hate it when people show off pictures of the premades and they've been massively altered or even worse been made into face 1 or 2. Everyone's free to do what they want in their own game but in those circumstances I don't think they should show them off in Maxis match communities/threads because they aren't the premades anymore.

Personally I thought your altered Dora was great, she still looked like herself but was less broken looking. However I am not an Ottomas fan, I always turn them into townies and Tommy goes in the adoption pool. I am curious to see what you will be doing with them because you always write really interesting characters.

Edited 2013-01-24 01:41 (UTC)

n bbblo

(Little Tomato felt the need to add that. I'm not really sure what he's getting at, but it seemed very important to him. Haha!)

An astute observation! :)

Yes, we can always count on him to be the voice of reason around here.

That's an adorable pic. LT would love to have one of those to destroy. :P He's working over some pots and pans as we speak.

The low ears are another big problem, though for an elder it does give an interesting "granny glasses" effect, with them sitting low on the nose (or in Dora's case, through the nose). The face moves up, but the ears and glasses remain fixed in place.

Oh lord. That is strange.

I have no qualms about using simsurgery on premades for breeding purposes. It's quite difficult though to keep their unique look while still modifying the facial structure enough that it's compatible with other sims'. Oftentimes the endresult looks more generic, but I think you managed to avoid that pretty well here.

With regards to your Dora - try moving up her cheekbones so they're closer to her eyes, I think it would help with making her look more like her old self.

Yeah, there are a few other pre-mades that have recessive hair/eye colours, but it's been so long since I dug through that stuff that I honestly can't remember many specifics. I know the Montys have some recessives going on, Romeo and Mercutio actually look related to their parents - especially to Olivia. BTW, Buck should've had brown hair too, but otherwise, yeah, the Grunts are probably the best example of pre-mades with genes that make sense.

The Travellers' genes totally make no sense, by the way. But you're right, there's several of the later EP families that at least seem to have passed on plausible facial structures to their children, especially in Desiderata Valley and Belladonna Cove (and the Gavigans, too). Interestingly enough, this doesn't necessarily mean that their other genes make sense. Pauline Aspir, for example, totally randomly has brown hair, while her parents have black (with no recessive brown) and blond hair.

But of course I never have to think too deeply about these things ever again, since I already fixed it all. ;) (Well, not the facial structures, but yeah.)

I changed Hal, Desdemona and Ariel in my 'fixed dead' Veronaville (which I mainly made to use in my own game, so yeah). I've thought about doing the same to Cassandra and Alexander Goth, but I'm much more attached to their appearances. Not so much with the Capp children, so I mixed their original looks with their parents' faces. I really like the results, I think they look much more interesting than their default, plain faces.

Yeah, Buzz would need a recessive for Buck's hair to make sense. Did you add that in the uberhood? I've noticed you've done it for most (maybe all?) of the other sims. I do like Buck's blond hair, even if it's not genetically correct, since it's like his mother. I think that makes them more interesting.

That's funny. I pulled the Travellers completely out of the air there. I have no idea, really. I figured Trent might have recessives or something. Like I said, I like it when families have kids that turn after the recessive parent, even when the sims have no recessives in-game. It gives the family more variety and seems more realistic. Better if they actually had recessives, of course. Aren't the Ottomases like that too, with Sharla being blond like Samantha? Giving Peter a recessive gene would make it make sense.

I love that you've made those fixes in the uerhood. It saves us all that fiddling with SimPE, so thank you for that! There are a couple of things I do change from your version, but that's pretty minor compared to what it was.

Yeah, Face One and Two everywhere is boring. It's boring enough that those faces turn up in a lot of premades in the game as it is. That said, it would be great if someone were to make a premade story where every premade had been made into Face One or Two and just post it without comment. I would laugh.

Wow. Those Ottomas genes served your uglacy very well. Their eyes are so strange.

Thank you for explaining that. That makes sense now, because the Ottomases have extremely low cheekbones. Mystery solved! I've pretty much resigned myself to not using any eye makeup on any of them, because I always end up with spiders under their eyes or worse.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Page 2 of 3

Discussion: Plastic surgery for premades

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject