Royal ball is coming up!

(Year 235, Spring) Yesterday HRM Tazal King Slomar of Sea gave a press conference. The attendees worried it would me another tax claim, but no. The only point on his agenda this time, was the invitation to a royal ball!

The monarch was laughing when he revealed the news, that he was giving a ball to honor his younger son, Prince Weever (35), who is still a single man. It's time to kick him out from the royal palace at Verdemar, and a wife would be nice.

Equestrian Heir Tribute in Simerinia

(Year 235, Spring) Last night a traditional tribute to a newborn took place at Dambele in Simerinia, Empire of Snorthia. Nobody can tell for sure how old this tradition is, some say it was always there, which in this setting might mean nearly 200 years. The equestrian tribute takes place when one of the protected families gets an heir to their dynasty. In each of the original three kingdoms there were originally seven proteced families, and Head of highest ranked dynasty of each kingdom would join a nightly ride to fulfill the tribute in order to honor the newborn.

The riding event is never announced beforehand, it was intended as a secret event. The focus is on the newborn, not on crowds cheering along the way, and not on the three wise and highly ranked men. Over the decades a few protected families went extinct, meaning this won't take place as often as before, making it even more special to those involved. There were a similar nightly ride last year, and the year before.

Nobility Reform: Nobility Career

(Year 234, Winter) The second part of the Nobility Reform, is the new Nobility career. It is totally separated from the first part, the Dynasties. Technically a noble person won't need a dynasty, and a Dynasty member don't need the Nobility Career. In Mazaloom these two features do connect, though, as we use the career slightly different. Here, you can't have a peerage without also being member of a House, and all Houses had to register as dynasties in order to obtain their new crest emblem.

By design, the career is like most other careers, where you start on the lowest level and climb your way up through promotions. In Mazaloom and our neighboring nations, the career is used for categorizing nobility. This means you immediately get the nobility career level that suits with your highest ranked peerage. This category is static, and no promotions will be involved.

The Sims 4 Royalty & Legacy - Hoods and geography

Oh my! The elegancy, nobility and scandals of the new EP makes it one of those packs flying straight into my game. It would be pointless to wait for a sale, and it would be wasted to debate with myself whether I want it or not. That I could have survived without it, is another dish - right now this is not so much about survival, but desire :)

Hoods Bellacorde, Dambele, and Verdemar. Each comes with dynasties claiming the vacant royal throne.

The worlds look awesome and different, and content seems promising. My only concern is that my royals already have crowns and most of what they need in their palace. And the throne is definitely not vacant. I play most of my nobility with quite regular lives, just a bit better outfits and more spacious estates. CAS look great on the ball/historical side, but we don't know yet whether there will also be a few more everyday high nobility outfits for a modern kingdom.

My biggest puzzle so far was to place the new world geographically into my existing map. And I found a surprising way!

Butterflies and Moths

(Year 234, Summer) Entomology is gaining more attention these days, and Simmerville community pages now provides a list of the most actual butterflies and moths. Landgraab Science Lab has focused on insects for decades, and is now hiring a Scientist Entomologist. This big focus on our tiny bewinged friends is nothing new, it just gained recent popularity.

But first, let's take a quick look to Empire of Snorthia where butterflies have been a big deal for several centuries!

Mazaloom/Snorthia Conflict Solved?

(Year 234, Spring) The culture conflict between Mazaloom kingdom and Empire of Snorthia has been ongoing for a couple years. It all started by Miss Patricia Maiden revealing that the Snorthian historical painting and cultural national treassure, in fact was a portrait of Miss Maiden's mother, the long gone actress Limia (Oceanus) Maiden. In other words the motif was not as old as Snorthia claimed. The Emperor accused Mazaloom to have offended Snorthia deeply, and from there it all escaled. One example is that the Snorthian borders were closed to foreigners, and Mazaloomian atheletes were not allowed to enter the Snorthian Winter Games. We also saw that Patricia Maiden was taken hostage by Snorthia.

This week an international meeting took place in Mt. Komorebi, Snorthia.

Prime Minister Wilder and Grand Marshal Calves in front of the Council building in Mt. Comorebi.

Both Prime Minister Rob Wilder (73) and Grand Marshal Robert Calves (64) attended as the Mazaloom kingdom's representatives. While the conflict was not completely solved, the meeting helped descaling the negative impacts, and most important to many residents - the border is again open.

Latest News from the Snorthia Conflict

(Year 233, Fall) There has been very few news regarding the ongoing Snorthia-Mazaloom culture conflict. Early Spring the Royal Palace Chief Attendant, Miss Patricia Maiden (52), accepted an invitation from Emperor Orchor of Snorthia. She has been accused for starting the conflict by recognizing her late mother as the mothel of a paintet portrait, «Moon Liza», that was claimed by the Emperor to be a very old national treasure. Now they claimed Miss Maiden to travel to Snorthia to help solving the problem. She was warned, but insisted on going. And now it seems like nobody heard from her ever since.

No, it is not Miss Maiden in that hopscotch.

As result of the conflict, Mazaloonians is no longer granted access to the empire, to which we share a long border. Our Winter sports athletes can still not visit Mt Komorebi to practice - Miss Maiden was a rare exception.

Mazaloom News - Year 232

Year 232 has closed, and Mazaloom NEWS is here with the highlights! The format has changed and the main focus i sno longer on just one region, but the entire kingdom, and even covering a few news from other nations like Empire of Snorthia and Sea kingdom. This time there is a new Sports section, too! Six minutes video with news, job openings and family notes, presented by Simmerville Studio's news anchor, Paulo Caliente.

Royal Palace Office Announcement

(Year 232, Winter) Early this week Royal Palace Office (RPO) called for an important press announcement in three days. Speculations have been going all over the place. Someone even suggested that an early engagement involving HRH Crown Princess Emireza could be the issue. But no, it turned out to be about the ongoing cultural conflict between Mazaloom kingdom and Empire of Snorthia.

HRM King Tarriot and Royal Chief Attendant Ms Maiden in the King's office.

HRM King Tarriot (64) and Royal Chief Attendant Miss Patrica Maiden (51) met the press. Maiden opened by giving a brief introduction to the well known conflict. Talking about the innocent event where she was seeing the exhibited painting "Moon Liza", just to reveal that the portrayed woman was indeed Miss Maiden's own late mother, Limia (Oceanus) Maiden. Emperor Orchor of Snorthia got furious as the painting was their very old heirloom seen as a national treasure, now exposed to be only one generation old. He claimed that the entire empire was deeply offended. It did not help much that Limia turned out to be a Princess of Sea, actually sister of their current King. At young age she broke with her royal family to rather dedicate her life to acting.

- My mother was a very shy actress not wanting any attention to her own person, and she died from embarrasment when papparazzis noticed her, drowning her with their blitz rain. Unfortunately, she dragged even more unwanted attention to herself by falling to the ground right on Judith Ward's fame brick at Starlight Boulevard.

Miss Maiden then introduced King Tarriot. He explained that Grand Marshal Robert Calves, Prime Minister Rob Wilder and himself have been searching a peaceful end to the two years long splitting conflict. The King has reached out to Emperor Orchor of Snorthia on multiple occasions, and now there has finally been some response!

Military Meeting

(Year 232, Spring) The Mazaloom-Snorthia conflict, also known as the "Moon Liza conflict", has been ongoing for more than a year already. It makes communication between the two nations very challenging, and this week Gran Marshal Robert Calves initiated a meeting including HRM King Tarriot and Prime Minister Rob Wilder. The conflict was frozen for a while, which might make this a good moment for attempting to debate good solutions.

Left to right: HRM King Tarriot, Grand Marshal Calves, PM Wilder.

The three Mazaloom leaders met at Calves office at Old Penelope Military Base in StrangerVille. They agreed not to bring any secretaries or other staff, making it easier to discuss freely. This first step will not lead to any big decisions, but might pave the ground for future possibilities.

The Sims 4 For Rent - new EP coming soon!

December 7th a new Expansion Pack is released for The Sims 4. I am excited, although I'm not yet sure whether it will be a release day grab, or not. More about that further down. Main reason for this post is to highlight a few of the features I'm looking forward to, the most. Well, with the upcoming gaming stream session hosed by EA, we will probably learn more about features we did not yet know about...

My biggest ahoy is the world Tomarang. It looks tropical, colorful, bright and inviting. Like a more urban Sulani, with more focus on builds and street life, and less beach life. The main selling point is the management of rental units, meaning you can play as a Landlord or Tenant. To many of us this will be a game changer, because households will be more diverse, and it will also be a fun build challenge creating a functional lot wit multiple rental units and shared areas etc. It's fun having a feature that won't get repetitive so soon, because there are so many sorts of complexes that can be built, and there might be more to it than what we know today. Another big thing for me is the new culture that I can't wait to explore.

Mazaloom Excluded from Snorthia International Winter Cup!

(Year 231, Fall) Only weeks before the big event takes place, the Emperor of Snorthia has announced that Mazaloom's athletes are no longer welcome to participate! The sudden boycott affects several of our elite athletes that were already planning to participate in Snowboarding and Skiing.

Tomarang: Emperor Orchor of Snorthia boycotts Mazaloom's athletes!

There's no doubt that Emperor Orchor of Snorthia did this in response to the ongoing cultural conflict between Empire of Snorthia and Mazaloom kingdom. What started with our king's Royal Chief Attendant, Ms Patricia Maiden (50), revealing that Snorthia's "old" and highly treasured painted portrait actually showed Ms Maiden's mother. Emperor Orchard claimed that Mazaloom had offended the empire deeply by ruining their cultural treasure, and that it will take a long time to mend the relation. And, now he shows that he is serious by boycotting Mazaloomian winter sports athletes.

Sulani: Royal Wedding

(Year 231, Summer) This week several members of our royal family are visiting Sulani (Sea kingdom), as guests to the wedding of HRH Crown Prince Longjav.

Mazaloom always had a good relation to Sea kingdom, but recently also Sea was criticized by HRM King Tarriot for their old fashioned look at women. However, opinions are not enough to stir up the balance between the two nations, and King Tarriot and Queen Venezia have been steadily topping the Mazaloom guest delegation for this wedding. And they did not go alone - both Crown Princess Emireza and Prince Cecil joined them.

HRH Crown Prince Longjav (34) and Princess Lia (35) of Sea.

The Sea's royal family resides in Sulani, and while the ceremony would have certain modern elements, like the bride wearing a bright dress with a veil, the many old traditions of the area are essential. They still believe strongly in having the spirits' bless, definitely not less important for a royal wedding.

The wedding started at 3 AM - yes you got that right! Formal weddings take place at night, in order to have the newly wed couple meeting their first sunrise as part of the ceremony. The elements are important, such as nature, the spirits, the fire and of course the water. The bride normally carries no bouquet, as stealing from nature could be offending to the spirits. The floral decorations were massive, though.