Post by commander on Feb 2, 2019 0:00:39 GMT -5
This is long, rambly, and pic-heavy. Consider yourselves warned lol
Like many of you, I was eagerly awaiting the P5 to P4 converter, and now that it's a reality I've been using it extensively. Converting all of my purebreds was of course exciting, as now I can offer purebred adoptions from my personal lines available to all (everyone prepare for an onslaught of poodles, IT'S COMING) and can also show more of them because posing Dogz is much easier in 4. Converting my mixed breeds, however, was exciting for different reasons. Most of my mixies in P5 were my very oldest Petz, originally bred in 3 or 4. When I got P5, I moved them all over, never thinking that the online Petz community as a whole would largely stick with 4, and by the time that became apparent, the computer that all of their original 3/4 files were on was long since gone and replaced. I'd always wished I could put them back in the game where they were originally adopted/bred, but it wasn't possible until now.
I first got into Petz as a whole in 1997, when my younger brother and I got two of the Petz plush toys for Christmas, which I recounted here: petzforum.proboards.com/thread/65306/petz-plush-toys About a month later, January of 1998, our family got a new computer, a Gateway 2000. Before this, our family computer was a 1988 Tandy that ran on DOS and used 3x5 discs, so going from that to a computer that had Windows 95 as an OS and a CD-ROM drive was a huge step up, as you can imagine. My dad bought a number of games for my brother and I to play, and two of them were the original Dogz and Catz games. I've always been more of a dog person and my brother's always preferred cats (in defiance of the usual gender assumptions... more children's toys of cats are for girls and more dogs are for boys, it was always a bit frustrating for both of us lol), so the Dogz game was mine and the Catz was my brother's.
Some time later, probably late spring or early summer of 1998, we got Petz II. These games installed together as one, as opposed to the original games that were separate, but we still kept the species separate--I only every adopted Dogz, and my brother only ever adopted Catz. We enjoyed the game, but being young kids and new to this computer we didn't quite understand how it worked exactly. We left town many times to spend a few days at grandparents' houses, our aunt's house, summer vacations, etc, and we were convinced that if we didn't open our game every day, our Petz would feel neglected and run away. So every time before we would be gone overnight or longer, we'd regretfully return all of our Petz, and when we returned home we'd adopt new ones.
Luckily, though, it was around this time that I started exploring Petz sites online, where I learned that the neglect only added up every day that you opened the game. I also learned how to open up folders and copy and paste things between them (I know, this sounds ridiculous, but I was young and this was a completely new computer to me, cut me some slack!) and that when you returned Petz, they just went into a separate folder. I remember opening that folder up and seeing every Petz we'd ever owned and returned. The Great Dane was my favorite breed at the time, and every time I changed my adopted Petz I always adopted a Dane and kept the suggested name of Bootz, so in my returned Petz folder I was greeted with Bootz, Bootz2, Bootz3, Bootz4, etc.
It was fortunate that we learned that we could keep Petz in the Adopted Petz folder without fear of runaways as long as we just paid attention to them every time we opened the game, as well as knowing just where the files were located on the computer, because at around that time my brother grew exceptionally attached to one of his Catz, a Siamese that had been named the default name of Sophisto.
Here she is, obviously in a newer game.
We still regularly adopted new Petz and moved out old ones, but Sophisto's spot in the Adopted Petz folder became permanent. She was unquestionably my brother's favorite.
Petz 3 was released around this time, but we didn't get it right away. We enjoyed reading about the new game online and looked forward to being able to breed Petz whenever we did get it.
And on December 23, 1998, we did! Dogz 3 and Catz 3 were Christmas presents that our parents allowed us to unwrap early. Upon installing the game, we wasted no time visiting the adoption center and calling out two Petz to adopt. As I mentioned earlier, Great Danes were at the time my favorite breed, so that's the breed I chose. My brother chose an orange shorthair. A female dane and a male oshie came out the AC doors.
Had the dane been a male, I'm fairly certain I would have just named him Bootz again, but apparently I didn't consider that name befitting for a female. I mused aloud, my brother and mom both in the room at the time, "What should I name a female Great Dane?" My mom responded, "Why not Dana? Dana the Dane?" Thanks, Mom! Perfect name.
Dana's a sweet girl. She's not the most graceful, but she's friendly and curious and gets along well with most every other Petz. She's always kind of felt like a den mother to me.
After everything I've said so far, you'd probably assume that this guy's name is the default name of Scaredy, but nope! My brother named him Aaron. In many ways, he's your typical oshie, but he does seem to be made of tougher stuff than other oshies. He's also more than willing to stand up for himself when push comes to shove, which may have come from learning to deal with his demanding mate.
Because, of course, the main draw of Petz 3 was that we could actually breed Petz, so after adopting Dana and Aaron, we quickly went back to the AC and adopted two more Petz. I can't remember if we had to try a few times to get a male Dogz and a female Catz, but in any event, these are the next two that were adopted.
Rufus the sheepdog (yes, I was very unimaginative with names!) and Princess the tabby.
Rufus is 10000% goofball. It's hard to get a "normal" picture of him because he's always jumping around, hamming it up, flinging his body all over the place, etc. I'm not sure if I chose a sheepdog because they were my second favorite Dogz breed at the time, but they're definitely my second favorite breed now, and Rufus is a huge reason for starting or solidifying that. (My favorite breed now is poodles, which is a whole 'nother post entirely...)
Princess is... well, she's something else, that's for sure. On the surface she's your average friendly tabby, but various terms I've used to describe her over the years are "grouchy", "grumpy", "high-strung", "irritable"... you get the idea. It seems like almost everything has set her off over the years, and she's not afraid to let you know about it, either.
We had our four Petz, and my brother, of course, converted his favorite girl Sophisto from Petz II.
She's pretty much your typical meezer--thinks she's better than everyone else and doesn't really socialize much with other Petz. Just as well, as my brother didn't want to breed her at the time, so he spayed her upon importing her. She's worn the crown ever since first entering P3 because she's the queen.
Those were our only five Petz in Petz 3 at first, but of course, once our four new adopted Petz grew to adulthood, we were anxious to have them breed. Luckily for us Dana and Rufus got along well from the beginning, as did Princess and Aaron.
I remember Princess and Aaron were the first to have the heart pop up, while Dana and Rufus followed suit later that day. On January 2, 1999, Princess and Aaron had their first kitten, a boy we named Antar, and Dana and Rufus had a girl named Xena.
Here they are.
So this is an interesting pic. This is one of only three pics I still have from way back in the day, obviously of Dana and a newborn Xena. You can see that Dana wasn't fully grown yet when Xena was born.
Here are the other two. Dana and Rufus being silly in boxes (while the other Petz' clothes have stayed constant, I played around with Rufus's style for awhile before finally settling on the camo hat), and a grown-up Xena with her first pup, Splash.
It's safe to say my brother and I were getting hooked on breeding our Petz. In fact, it wasn't long before my brother was wanting to breed Sophisto. But wait--he spayed her, and this was long before PetzA, so there was no way to undo it, right? ...Well, luckily, we still had Sophisto's original Petz II file safe and sound, so my brother simply deleted her Petz 3 file and imported her again, leaving her unspayed this time. This is why Sophisto has an adoption date of January 1999, despite the fact that she was originally imported the day we got the game (and is in fact even older than that, probably originally adopted in summer or early fall 1998).
Actually finding a Catz she liked was a whole nother story, though. Sophisto didn't really get along well with anyone. I remember my brother had another meezer named John that he hoped to breed with her but the two absolutely hated each other's guts and fought every time they were out together. There were probably other attempts that I can't remember as well, all unsuccessful. My brother and I thought that maybe Sophisto would never breed.
Then, one day, I sat down to the computer to play Petz, but instead of opening up Petz 3, I opened up the original Dogz game and played with whatever pet I had there, then opened up the original Catz and played with that pet. Then I opened up Petz II. The original Sophisto came out and I played with her for a little bit, and while I was, a random pet we had adopted came up to the door... a B&W shorthair named, you guessed it, Pouncer.
I went ahead and let him out too. Now remember, Sophisto was the only Petz II pet we'd ever imported into 3. We didn't have much of an emotional attachment to the others. Pouncer was just some random cat my brother had adopted and then forgotten about. I didn't have much reason to think anything of taking him out with Sophisto in II.
But then, to my utter amazement, the two Catz not only got along, but they started cooing and nuzzling and generally acting like any two Petz 3 Catz in love. Except... this was II. The Petz didn't even have genders in that game. I'd never seen that before, and I was floored. I quickly closed II, opened 3, imported Pouncer, and brought him out with Sophisto.
I don't think I even had to wait a minute before the heart popped up on the screen.
Pouncer's quite the character. He puts on the the usual grumpy B&W act, but he's actually one of my most affectionate Petz--definitely one of the most affectionate Catz I've ever known. When out by himself he's always licking the cursor. I've told his and Sophisto's story before, and I'm always a bit taken aback to realize that if I hadn't opened Petz II that day, I would have never discovered the bond he and Sophisto had, and I would have never imported him and he would have been long discarded and forgotten many years (and many computers) ago. I'm glad that I did open the game and let him out, of course--not only did Sophisto finally find a mate, but I found a very sweet Catz.
Here's their first child, John. Yes, my brother named him after Sophisto's failed first suitor. Don't know what Pouncer thinks about that.
I bred each of these three pairs multiple times in Petz 3 and 4, and when 5 came along, I imported them and bred each pair twice. (My brother had basically quit playing by then, but I still consider these four Catz and their first offspring/grandchildren just as much his Catz as mine, and keep his name listed as their owner.) Like I said earlier, their original 3/4 files were left behind many years and many computers ago, and while I was definitely glad to still have them in 5, I did always kind of wish I could have them all back in the game they started. (Well, sort of. Sophisto and Pouncer started in II!) Getting to finally, after all these years, bring them back set off a huge wave of nostalgia in me. It even made me decide to let them breed again if they wanted to...
And obviously, they did!
(I somehow failed to get a screenshot of the Catz' birth certificates. oops. Princess and Aaron have a girl named Marionette, and Sophisto and Pouncer have a boy named Floyd. With all of them I tried to come up with names I might have given their babies 20 years ago.)
So if you actually read this far, I commend you lol. As you can tell, these six Petz (and their offspring) are very near and dear to me, despite being "ordinary" 1st gens. They were the ones I was the most anxious to bring (back) into Petz 3/4, and I'm so happy I finally got the chance to.