Revision as of 08:14, 11 April 2008

Creator Guidelines - Pets

Uploading a pet to MTS2? This guide will walk you through every step of what we require on MTS2. Please make sure you read these guidelines carefully, as our standards have changed over the years, and there may be some items you weren't aware of before.

At the end of the guidelines after full explanations of each item is a checklist, so you can make sure you've done everything you need to.

Quality

The first thing moderators look for when moderating uploads is quality - simply, is what you've uploaded good or not?

Creativity/Effort

Quite simply, have you put some work into creating a unique, interesting pet? Could someone else recreate the same thing in a few minutes of work, or have you really put some true effort into it? We want unique, original, and quality uploads, so take some time and really put some work into it.

No plain colours unless we get to the point of being able to do our own textures. It takes 10 seconds to make a plain black or white or orange cat in Create a Pet.

Pet uploads should NOT look like the standards Maxis breeds that came with the game. If you have made a pet based on a real life breed, it should closely resemble that breed. Just like celebrity sims, realism is important.

Weird Colours

Though the rainbow colored fur provided to us by Maxis is cute, it's not realistic. Do not upload pets with rainbow fur, stars, or fur colours to fit a holiday theme. They will be rejected.

Special instances will be pets like as Dino, or a character pet (from a cartoon) that requires a strange colored fur will be accepted. But no green kitties and blue doggies please.

Alien Pets

We do allow, in rare circumstances, unusual, unrealistic, or alien pets. However, these must represent a truly unique and interesting effort - just taking a regular cat and making it green does not make it an alien cat.

It will be rare that we accept animals like this. For good examples of strange creatures in the style we're looking for, see:

• Klinny's Long-Eared Dogs
• Klinny's Psychotic Demon Hound
• Kwillag's Borlak Lobe
• Kwillag's Darluthian Slugmar

Cartoon Pets

We do accept pets that are based on animals from cartoons, movies, anime, etc... We do understand there are limits to what can be done with pets, but at the same time, we also expect that if you make a pet based on a cartoon, etc., that it needs to bear an immediately recognizable resemblance to that pet. If you cannot achieve an immediately recognizable resemblance, or if you find after working on it that it really just looks, for example, like a generic white cat, then please do not upload, as it will be rejected.

For good examples of cartoon pets, see:

• Bonemouse's Rolf
• Kenji336's Scooby Doo
• Tiggerypum's Dino

Other Animal Species

While we were only given options to make dogs and cats, simmers love to make all sorts of other non-cat and non-dog creatures. We understand the limits to what can be done with the sliders we're given, but we also expect an immediate recognizable resemblance to the animal species you're attempting.

For good examples of other species pets, see:

• Bubbleeye's Fawn
• Munchies's Panda
• Robokitty's Hippopotamus

Screenshots

Right Info/Right Files

Checklist

Photos Required

Be sure you have IN GAME screen shots of your pet. All Pet uploads will require the following two photos both of which are to be taken at CLOSE range and in DAYLIGHT:

One face shot up CLOSE of the animal.

And one body shot showing the full length of the animal:

• For more information and tips on taking excellent photos, please read Screenshots 101 - Or Better Picture Taking

Creativity

No plain colours unless we get to the point of being able to do our own textures. It takes 10 seconds to make a plain black or white or orange cat in CAP.

Pet uploads should NOT look like the standards Maxis breeds that came with the game. We want original, unique and quality uploads. Any Pet that is created to resemble a real life breed MUST include a photo of the actual breed for comparison purposes. Just like celebrity Sims, realism is important.

Though the rainbow colored fur provided to us by Maxis is cute, it's not realistic. DO NOT UPLOAD PETS WITH RAINBOW FUR or fur w/ stars, smilies, or symbols, or fur to fit a holiday theme. They will be rejected.

Special instances will be pets like as Dino, or a character pet (from a cartoon) that requires a rainbow colored fur will be accepted. But no green kitties and blue doggies please.

Multiples

DO NOT upload one breed in an array of colors unless it makes sense. Labrador Retrievers come in yellow, black, and chocolate. Do not upload green, blue, purple versions of them, too, in the same thread.

How to Package Your Pets

Packaging pets is done via the Create-a-pet screen in your game.

1. After you have finished creating "Spot" or "Fluffy", you will want to save your pets breed for future use. You can do this using the icon shown here:

• You'll see the package icon located to the right of your CAP screen- Select the icon to package your pet into a file.

1. Pets will be saved to your My Documents/EA Games/Sims 2/Packaged Sims folder in a sims2pack format.
2. You can now zip or rar this file, and upload with your jpeg IN GAME screen shots to the new Pets section of the forum.

Lets see those critters!

Quick Tip

If your pet has a litter of pups or kittens in game that are not created in CAP, and you'd like to share one, it's super easy now! Just pick up the phone, and register your breed. This will create that pet in CAP so you can now go in and package second, third, and further generations of born in game pets.

Credits

Daysies for the original article.