The First 1000 Days - Custom Content for the Custom Content Creator Design

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	The First 1000 Days - Custom Content ... for the Custom Content Creator Design

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Custom Content ... for the Custom Content Creator Design

Custom content creators (and you know who you are) use sophisticated art tools to create new content for the game. This section is for those 1% of players who create this content and describes a possible path for uploading their content into TSO.
Once content is registered with TSO, other players can download it from Maxis in-game if they have appropriate permissions. But we will implement this in such a way that if the content creators want to drive traffic to their site before the content can be viewed in-game, they can do this. (See club-only content below.)

Registering Content with TSO

The "upload custom content" screen is brought up from the options menu: either from map view or in a house (not wanting your motives to decay while you're uploading content is a good reason to do it from map view). By uploading custom content from in-game (rather than from a separate tool), we can ensure that we can patch updates.
Since there are extra fields associated with custom content for in-game display in TSO, the upload tool will convert all content to TSO-friendly files. In order to do this, the person uploading the content will need to fill in some extra fields. (BTW, one side effect of this is that TSO custom content will not be backwards compatible with standalone Sims ... players wouldn't be able to copy files from one area of their hard drive onto another and use them in The Sims

Brand: chosen from a pull-down, where one of the options is "add new." The person who originally creates a brand can choose to associate a password with it. If there is a password, anyone trying to upload content under that brand will be prompted for the password.

Collection: all collections defined for that brand will be shown in a pull-down. There is a "create new" option.

Artist: all collections defined for that brand will be shown in a pull-down. There is a "create new" option.

Catalog Name: this will be the name the content will be called in-game. It is text-entry, up to 32 characters.

Catalog Description: used in-game to describe the content. Up to 128 characters.

File: browse to point to a specific file on the uploader's hard drive (for bodies/heads, they will point to two files: mesh and skin). The location of this file is not important. Once the file has been uploaded to TSO, it will be stored on Maxis db's.

Proxy: choose from the content on the Maxis CD what the custom content will appear like until people download the assets. (For example: I walk into a house with four custom wallpapers on the wall. While I'm waiting for the wallpapers to download, I see some stock Maxis content instead. The person uploading chooses which content to stand in for the one they're uploading.)

Rating: choose from two options in a pull-down: "adult-only," or "appropriate for all ages." There will be a button where a content uploader can read guidelines for setting ratings. Ratings can be overwritten by Maxis, and uploading adult-only content as "appropriate for all" is a bannable offense.

Upload button: checks for valid info in all fields, checks to see whether this is a dupe of existing content, etc. Then confirms whether the content has been successfully uploaded.

Club-Member-Only Content

Since many sites thrive off of having traffic at their websites (some via advertising, some via subscription), and since these sites help support a thriving Sims community, we want to come up with a plan that allows the content creators to determine whether a player must visit their site in order to "unlock" content in TSO.
If the person uploading content checks the "club-only" flag, this will signify that this custom content will not even appear as one of the options to someone stocking an in-game rack or buying from an in-game rack until they have been flagged as a club member.
Maxis will provide a website where fan site owners can manage the accounts who they have authorized to access their content by editing:
- A list of account names authorized for their brand's content.
- Date each account is authorized through.

In order to update the list of account names and dates, the content manager must enter a password.

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