Conference at Electronic Arts Redwood Shores Part 1 Greetings everyone! It has been quite a day today. Very interesting I might say. I've met quite a few people at Maxis including MaxisKitty and MaxisLucky IN PERSON! I'll try my best to bring you as much up to date information as possible on The Sims 2 as fast as I can read my notes and compose them up. Now, as for what happened today, there has been a LOT of discussion on the future of The Sims community and The Sims 2 itself as well as CaSIE (Create A Sim's OFFICIAL Name) We've seen a lot today including an Actual Game Demo with Lucy Bradshaw and Tim LeTourneau, the Importance of Community with Luc Barthelet, Asset Creation with Charles London and Dave Patrick, Object Engineering with Patrick Barrett III and Mike Lawson, Custom Content Creation Tools like CaSIE and SimCity 4 with Darren Futa, fansite hosting with MaxisLucky and MaxisDano, and last but not least, had a party with Will Wright :-p (and no I'm not joking either.) In this installment of The Sims 2 at Electronic Arts Redwood Shores, we are talking about the upcoming Create A Sim Tool December 2003 is officially when we can expect CaSIE, formerly known as Create A Sim. System requirements are the same as The Sims 2 itself. Now, the truth of the matter is that CaSIE is not just a tool for you to use now, but also a tool that you can use before, during and after your game. Create-A-Sim says it all where you can customize down to the various details of our sims. When you first start, you have two modes: Build/Edit and Package. Package allows you to export your finalized sims. You can currently export an entire sim from the head, to the body, to the legs and feet. Basically you can export from Top to Bottom! In Build/Edit Mode, you can basically create your sim in any fashion and do almost anything you like. You are only bounded by your own imagination (and the T Rating) There are several areas of CaSIE including Genetics, (includes Face, Skin Color) and Modifier, There is no limit to what you can modify where you are able to change cosmetics, hairstyle even CLOTHES! Even nicer is the fact that Clothes can be exported out from CaSIE so that you can open up in your favorite paint program. Modifiers allow you to modify eyebrows, eye region, facial hair. Heck anything you see in a thumbnail/preview picture in CaSIE is customizable. If you are wondering whether you should get CaSIE for your SIms 2 game, I HIGHLY recommend it as it allows you to edit your sim before, during and after gameplay where as the build in create a sim in The Sims 2 does not allow you to. CaSIE program is expected to be 6-7MB in size. The size is just the program. If you include a full collection of skins (which is 21 sets) and each is approximately 4-5 MB that each set's site, you are looking close to a 91MB download file. But just to make it easier on everyone, CaSIE will be released first followed by several installments of texture sets. Stay tune for more details on The Sims 2 at Electronic Arts Redwood Shores.