THE NOW AND THEN CENTURY MANOR REVIEW

Hello everyone!

I hope you're all fine. As you all know, every time a new set releases on the first week of every month. The Now and Then Century Manor was released on May 1st, 2014. I hope you all enjoy the rest of my review!

This new content from the Store is a remake of the Mansion and Garden Stuff from The Sims 2. You must know the Second Empire roof pieces and the stairs. This set is also a part II of the Bohemian Garden set which was released in March. However, Bohemian Garden set focused mainly on garden, outdoor content etc. This set mainly focuses on building. A great set for simmers who like to build. The price of this set is 1,900 SimPoints. It was on sale for 1,700 SimPoints until 5/6/14 .There are total 42 items included and there are no CAS assets.The objects are not available for individual purchase as it's a venue.

I'm dividing this review into some parts for making it easier:

• Theme and The Venue (Then Century Manor)
• The Venue (Now Century Venue)
• Mansard Roof Kit
• Build/Buy Objects
• Overall Thinking

THEME AND THE VENUE

First of all, I'm starting with the theme and will talk about the style a bit. The theme of the venue is a remake of the Second Empire theme from The Sims 2 Mansion and Garden Stuff. Second Empire is an architectural style and was mostly popular in 18th century. As far as I've noticed, It's a mix of earlier European styles and this is how the venue looks like but the Store team added a creative touch in this one. There are two parts of the venue: One focuses on a beautifully built manor and has no broken objects or anything. It's perfect. The other one has broken objects and looks like it is abandoned and also has a gloomy and haunted look. Well, not haunted actually! Look at this picture below:

This is a gloomy and dark version of the Second Empire theme. This one is the nicer version:

And this is how the Store designed the venue. One's gloomy and the other one is elegant. Like the idea though! You can see in both of the pictures that there's four-sided gambrel styled mansard roofs. To say the truth, this venue focuses on building and the mansion aspects.

THE VENUE

THE THEN CENTURY MANOR

This is the first time that the Store created two venues in one whole set! Also there are same objects in two different forms - Gloomy and Elegant. The Then Century Manor is a 30x40 lot (residential) This venue is completely perfect and there are no broken stuff in here. The price of the venue in-game is 248,457 Simoleons! Yeah, that's expensive. There is a butterfly fog emitter effect in the lawn. There are 2 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. Here are some screenshots:

See the butterflies there? The Store used the butterfly fog emitter here!

NOW CENTURY MANOR

The Now Century Manor is the second venue and is 40x30 residential lot, quite different from the other manor's lot size. This one has the same objects like the other one. The only difference is that the objects are kinda broken and has a rusty look. The price of the lot in-game is 175,714 Simoleons. The price is less and cheaper than the other one. This is most probably because the objects here have the dark and rustic touch. There are also lots of fog emitters for bugs and fogs! 

Here are the fog emitters I found so far. I think this is it? If there's more be sure to tell me :-)

Here are the screenshots of the venue:

 

MANSARD ROOF KIT

There are 7 mansard roof pieces. All the pieces are used for decorating your roof and they are available in different shapes and corners. I think this is the first time I'm obsessed with roof pieces in the game. They are quite easy to use. I find them easier to put them on the edge instead of the whole roof. Here are all of the roof pieces with their prices and the tile space they occupy is included:

Mighty Mansard Angled Corner Roof (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 2x2

Mighty Mansard Corner Roof (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 2x2

Mighty Mansard Inverted Corner Roof (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 3x3

Mighty Mansard Single Straight Roof (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 1x2

Mighty Mansard Straight Roof (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 2x2

Mighty Mansard Straight With Window Roof (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 2x2

Mighty Mansard Roof Tower (200 Simoleons)

Tile space needed- 4x4

 

STAIRS

There are new stairs included with this venue. You must have seen these in The Sims 2 Mansion & Garden Stuff. There's no new animations included with these stairs which quite disappointed because animations would have been appreciated for these beautiful- looking stairs. Keep in mind that while placing the stairs, you have to put the railings separately and as you see on the picture above, you can increase the length of the stairs. This doesn't work like the L-shaped stairs as you've seen in the Prism Art Studio venue. The L-shaped stairs had all the railings and everything properly arranged while in this one, you have to arrange it yourself. Here are the three types of stairs:

Manor Stairs and Railing (200 Simoleons)

Hang Left Curved Colonial Stair Rail (200 Simoleons)

*FOUND IN BUY MODE NOT BUILD MODE

Hang Right Curved Colonial Stair Rail (200 Simoleons)

 *FOUND IN BUY MODE NOT BUILD MODE

This is how it looks like when you join them all together:

There's a bug with the stairs:

Notice how the yellow carpet mixes with the blue one? I tried with every colours but didn't work. So here's what I did:

Press alt, move it away but not too much.

BUILD/BUY MODE OBJECTS 

 As always, new buy/build mode objects are included. Almost all of the objects are used for building and most of them are decor stuff too. There's a new dead hedge and you can place it diagonally. There are same objects in two different forms. One consists of broken objects and the other one consists of "un-broken" objects. I expected L-shaped stairs to be in the venue but unfortunately, there are no L-shaped stairs this time. If you look closely at the broken objects, you'll see some objects, such as the doors, look almost real (just like a real broken door!) This impressed me. However, the mansard stairs are quite disappointing because of the bug I mentioned earlier. And did I mention that spider webs are included?! Best thing for creating a haunted house.There's a Forgotten Ironwork Fence which is a replica of the one from The Sims 1:

Found this while playing in Old Town in The Sims 1. Thank you Store for including this. I really love when they include objects from the past Sims series!

Here are all the objects:

Here's a recoloured version. You can recolour almost everything of the stained glass windows

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Additional Stuff (Examples)

Just to show an example like always, I've built a lot using the roof pieces. Unfortunately, I've only built the exterior as It takes me a lot of time to do the interior. As always, I'm not good at building but I tried my best to utilize the new roof pieces. I really apologize for not being able to show the interior. Hope you guys understand <3 build:="" font="" here="" my="" s="" so="">

OVERALL REVIEW

I think the price is okay this time. There are total 40 objects! Plus there's a venue actually two venues! So 40 objects + two venues= 1900 SimPoints makes pretty much sense. I'm so glad the price wasn't 2000 SimPoints and it wouldn't be fair at all if it was 2000 SP because there is no PC this time. Al right, enough of the ranting; I love the venue. The fact that the Store created two venues in two different forms just made me a bit surprised. We never got two venues in one single set and it's so perfect. I've always wanted broken windows, doors and spiders webs in The Sims 3. It was clever and a creative move, Store.  The theme? YES. I love it. Like I've said, I always love things from the older Sims series. I'm really not a fan of the European and Second Empire theme but seeing this content come to life in The Sims 3 made me like it. So, no complaints here. Also, the roof pieces are beyond amazing. I'm using these almost everyday. Plus It's so much fun to join them and design them in your own way, you know. The Buy/Build Mode objects are okay but the stair bug is quite annoying, other than that It's not bad. Broken objects? Not bad at all *inserts Obama's not bad face* The fact that they included the Forgotten Ironwork Fence from The Sims 1 cheered me up a bit and It looks much better than the one in TS1 because of the graphics. I'm looking forward to build a house filled with broken objects. To say the truth everyone, at first I thought I was not going to like the venue and wasn't pleased at all (before it was released) but I was wrong. I like all the things overall. There are tons and tons of Buy/Build mode objects. No premium content this time but I'm actually quite happy, you know? The Store astonished us (in a good way) once again. So, I give this venue- 9/10 

 

Thank you so much for reading my review. I hope you enjoyed my review as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you liked my review, you can comment and recommend if you wish! Have a fantastic day!

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