Sim Healing

The Kim Family were probably the last remaining claim to fame Strangetown had. They just can’t understand why their ratings dropped off! Surely it was because when real honest to watcher aliens started showing up, their show just seemed dated or tacky next to the real thing. It’s definitely not because their production crew were still using cardboard sets, flickering film-rolls for backdrops, and a camera handed down from the 60s, in an age of technology and innovation. They had been hoping for a move to the city, like any self-respecting washed up tv star. Finding that too pricey for their new salaries, they’ve remained in what’s left of the once expansive Kim Family sets that drew people into Strangetown to gawk at. (The non cardboard one, the actual family home.) They’ve also been obliged to keep the pets, introduced in the final season as a desperate ratings gimmick. 
 

The Curious name is famous in Strangetown and stretches all the way back to the original research team. But Chloe and Lola are more than a little estranged from it. They only ever ‘team up’ with the rest of their family because they happen to agree that General Buzz is a General Asshole and aliens are cool. Abandoned by Glarn and his picture perfect new family, and ignored by PT9 even after their earth father rejected them, the twins would rather be associated with Glabe than their ‘biological’ family. They’re trying to ‘reconnect’ with their half-siblings but relations with PT9 and their half sister / step-mother are, if you can’t already tell from that fucked up dual-title awarded to Jenny, strained. It just feels like everyone they know except Glabe replaced them with something more normal, even PT9′s Better Homes And Gardens house. So, almost to spite the world, neither of them are too keen on forming a ‘nuclear family’. They just need each other. 

 

However, Strangetown had barely been christened when it began to fade. The strange occurrences in Strangetown declined as the population grew that may be true. It was as if the more people came looking for its secrets the harder the desert held on to them. People moved on to more successful sites of interest, abandoning dig sites as they left them. Only the most reclusive and single-minded scientists remained. At the same time funding to SimNation’s space program was cut dramatically, and so the personnel at the military base were reduced by a great number. Strangetown lived for one moment in glory and then became something of a ghost town in the SimNation desert.

 

When you leave the most secretive and reclusive people behind in a ghost town with a military base that has to be tight-lipped around outsiders because of its secret research, you create an extremely insular society. Fashion and architecture in Strangetown has remained mostly unchanged for over two generations now, mostly thanks to a lack of construction or outside contact. A blend of mid-century modern in the houses that were built by (and are still supplied with amenities by) the military base, and retro-futurism (futurism at the time) in the old scientists’ houses. Some believe this oddity is a symptom of the supernatural influence over the town, and that the residents are trapped in some sort of time loop. This is, of course, absolute nonsense… PT-9 only made his house look Like That because he actually believes sims all have houses like that. Earth tv broadcasts reach Sixam with a delay of years.

Far from Belladonna Cove and Downtown’s politics, far from Pleasantview’s suburban nightmare, closer perhaps to the bizarre road of Strangetown than any other town in Sim State, a town not quite as rural as Riverblossom Hills but not quite as suburban as Pleasantview has spiraled out of control. The Capps and the Montys, both equally involved in crime and legitimate business alike, have been feuding for so long that nobody can truly remember how it was started - nobody except for Patrizio Monty, Consort Capp, and Contessa Capp’s urn anyway. Every citizen of the town has been told a different story about the feud’s origins. One thing they can all agree on though, the feud has cost at least five lives and has moved from a spat to a bloody war, bringing out only the worst in each family. The split has transformed from a metaphorical one into a physical one, with both families drawing the line in the map along the river and grabbing up land just to stop the other family owning it. The ugly wall and the extortionate housing make it almost impossible for new families to move into the town. Aside from a few stragglers renting from Consort Capp, the Summerdreams, and the boarding students at Veronaville Private School, Veronaville has essentially become the playground for their feud. Now, with the younger generation rebelling against the feud, Veronaville faces another bloody crisis.