🏖️ Tansan

[dizzy bone]

Bathroom
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I'm in the process of redoing some of my rooms to have a darker color scheme now that I'm preparing to move my house to a new location. I currently live in beach town, a bright and colorful strip of shops and bars. Before I moved here, my interior choices had always been quite dark and chic, but I changed it to match the vibe of beach town. I'm thrilled to go back to a more stylish theme that I'm familiar with! After finishing my kitchen remodel I worked on switching up my bathroom. I love the convenience of working with similar layouts and simply customising the colours. Here are the results!

Spoiler: More Photos...

Before​

After

 

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There's a new area coming... the spirits are moving in. ​

 

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The only winter I enjoy is in Erik's house ​

 

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Hilltop Life
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I've been meaning to do this for some time now, but I've finally up and left the seedy beach town district that has been my home for 1 year, and I am living large on a hilltop with my own personal farm. I loved beach town, and it was super convenient because shops, town hall, and the airport were all nearby, but I was itching for something new. Since writing this journal entry on Hyuji's house location (where I low key wanted to evict him and take his spot) I decided my solution to my indecisiveness would be to rip the bandaid off and experience a change of scenery. I had this cliff area to the north that was a scenic nature trail dedicated to my gyroids but was rarely visited. I decided to use my executive powers to plonk my new mansion in that nature reserve! Haha don't worry, the gyroids were relocated and a new forest community was created in its place - more on that later. I'm absolutely loving my new location even though it's a dang work out to get to town. Mini terraforming projects like this is what keeps this game fresh for me. Anyways, peep at my new lifestyle in the spoilers below:

Spoiler: Read More

View of the wind turbines in the distance​

My new house location sits atop the cliffside overlooking my much loved Big Lake™ and my work out park area. Originally, this area was one of the two entrances to the nature trail. This entrance featured a little work out spot that was inspired by asian style outdoor gyms that you'd often see in parks where old ladies and men would swing their hips wildly and glide in the air on these simple equipments.



In Korea I lived near Namsan tower, and my mom and I would hike up the mountain every weekend and stop at one of these gyms. The old nature trail itself was my "Gyroid forest" and it was inspired by Namsan, but I never quite got it the way I liked. I always found it frustrating to terraform 3rd tier cliffs because it's a hard balance to add "stuff" without blocking out the beautiful views I aimed to capture. I wanted to keep the outdoor gym even though the mountain was destroyed, so I moved it right below the cliff. Instead of an upper cliff nature zone, I decided to create a ground tier forest, the new home to my gyroids.

Here are two angles of the surrounding area, with a glimpse of my new gyroid forest zone. ​

A new move comes with new neighbours. In my earlier Tansan days I lived a luxurious life on a giant hill next to my dear buddy Dizzy. In Beach town, I ran an auto repair shop with Cyd. I always found it hard to create a balance between living too lavishly compared to my villagers vs living like a complete hobo. Living like a king overlooking my villagers on my hilltop just didn't seem right back then. But two years in and all my efforts building this island, maybe I do deserve to live on a personal hilltop?! At least in this new location I don't feel too boujee because the area has an older neighbourhood vibe. Now my new neighbour is Jambette, who lives by the cliffside below. Between us is a cosy neighbourhood coffee shop run by Jambette. It might not be as fancy as Brewster's, but at least she's not adding frog milk to the drinks...

The summer heat makes me drowsy
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My favourite feature of my new house location is the fact that I have a backyard! Living in beach town meant that I didn't have much personal space for myself. My front porch was basically the main road and the shop front to the auto repair shop. I could barely squeeze out of my doorway without knocking over a stack of tires or stubbing my toe on a gas pump. Now I have my own personal garden overlooking the big lake, the sea, and the forest! I knew a little farm might clash with my front yard decorations, so I love how it is hidden in the back behind the beautiful Pergola.

All my efforts to revert to the humble life of a farmer and I forgot to water my crops one of the days... smh.
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One night I saw Celeste trespassing on private property. Even Celeste wanted a taste of my juicy tomats. ​

Well that's all for now! I'll continue to post the redesigns of my house interior, since I made a few tweaks to match my beautiful new exterior. Before I sign off, here's a before photo of my old house in beach town. I'll miss this place, and Cyd. But I'm ready for the fresh air and some morning yoga and power-walking with Jambette!

 

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I thought moving to the hilltop would be good for my health... but humid summer nights just drain all my energy.​

 

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Courtyard-Inspired Garden Room



I recently scrapped my music room and turned it into a garden room! I tried to create a half covered, half outdoors room that was inspired by asian style courtyards. I love how it turned out! I found it really hard to make it look like "outdoor lighting" so in the end I settled for it always being "night" in here. The lighting and the rainfall background noises makes it feel really nice and cosy!

Spoiler: See More...

 

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY CYD! ​

For Cyd's afterparty a few of us went for more cakes and drinks at his favourite bar.
(We had to sneak Dizzy in)​

 

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The gyroids may have moved off the mountain, but now they have their own little village by the sea. ​

 

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Checking in on Cyd and the auto repair shop now that I've moved out!
Looks like Cyd got a fancy car to fix. ​

 

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Tansan's little corner stationery store 탄산문구 is one of the few shops on the island that has survived since mid 2020, even after many island upgrades. Definitely an island staple! (no pun intended) ​

 

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Ice cream break ​

 

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THE Bridge
Time Machine: Tansan bridge over the years​

Inspired by this pic comparing my stationery shop now to then, I decided to compile a picture dump of the oldest landmark in Tansan: *THE* Bridge, and by proxy, the graveyard. This bridge was built roughly in June of 2022, possibly even earlier. Originally it was more of a useless feature that connected a small strip of land to an even tinier burial ground. The bridge remained, but the land around it eventually evolved into a larger graveyard after Tansan’s murder sprees. There was always a viewpoint from the south-east side of the island that captured the bridge in all its glory. It was always one of my favourite projects, so it’s no wonder I continued to include it in my plans whenever I knocked down and rebuilt Tansan. Unlike before when it was only used for aesthetic purposes, Tansan’s oldest bridge is now the hardest working connection between the villager district and the countryside. I had a lot of fun combing through old photos so I may continue this before/after series with other shop houses that have moved around and upgraded over time.

Spoiler: Read More...

Then​

When I first built this bridge it connected a small strip of land around my nature zone (a huge waterfall to the north I called Tansan Falls) to a burial site. On one side was my rep's personal farm and on the other side was more forest. This was very much when Tansan still followed a predominantly foresty theme rather than the urban town it is now.

I always tried to build some kind of farm in the tier below this bridge in the earliest days of the bridge. This was around the time pumpkins were introduced so I thought it was necessary to have farmland just to grow pumpkins. In my current version of Tansan I do not have near as much farm space as I did previously, even though we have more veggies to grow. Back then I had a lot of river ways so this double bridge view was my proudest terraforming project. The bridge lead to the east side which was my thick forests. I built an old japanese style village on that side where Ken and Hamphrey lived (now they both live on the east but in a fishing village). You can see the old view point from their village below:

This bench with this view point was hidden behind Hamphrey's house​

And another view of the bridge seen from the road near Freya's old flower shop & laundromat. The little picnic blanket in that exact location also survived several layout changes until I decided to remove this walkway and expand the villager district.

A few more versions of farm type landscaping. In the picture on the right I started filling in the ground level with cliffs which eventually became the foundation of my current villager district.

Eventually the land around this bridge expanded and I made a larger graveyard. The views from below stayed pretty much the same with a few decoration changes, but I started landscaping and expanding more of the 2nd tier rather than the ground tier.

The biggest jump from a more foresty theme to an urban feel started when I removed my eastern forests and added a neighbourhood for my alternative character Hyuji and Erik. I wanted to create the same bridge view point as Ken & Hamphrey's old village, but this time on a 2nd tier. I thought the view from above was so much nicer than ground level and it inspired me to start making other viewpoints where you would look down from the 2nd tier, usually water views. I eventually went hardcore with this concept and almost drowned my entire island in water.

Now​

I've posted several photos of this bridge in my current Tansan before so I'll just copy and paste them here to keep it nice and tidy:

Erik and Hyuji's little neighbourhood got a huge make over to make room for several shop houses and some farm land, but the bridge stayed unchanged! Back then I was obsessed with windy rivers, but in my newer version of Tansan most of my rivers are straight and wide. Because of this I had to get rid of my double bridge, but I still love how the old bridge looks with a more urbanised transformation. It even got a nice roof top view!

Hyuji's house was basically built right on top of the original grave site cliff... It probably explains why his house feels slightly haunted. I actually never considered making a haunted house for him until I wrote this post, but I love creating evolving lore for Tansan so now I know exactly how I'm going to redo his house!

And finally, here's the view from the other side, the same area that Freya's house and my old walkway used to be. I really love comparing all the different versions of Tansan because it's nice to see how much it transformed. There are a couple shop houses that I have rebuilt over and over again throughout many versions of Tansan, so I'll probably write another longer journal entry showing those sometime soon! Thanks for reading!

 

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HAPPY BIRTHDAY SCOOT! ​

Scoot's idea of a birthday party was withholding cake until everyone completed 100 laps around the track. ​

 

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Bodega cat ​

 

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Flick visits the new pottery shop​

 

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Met Sable at the Roost and was reminded of her existence. ​

 

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My favourite secret hideout behind the gyroid village. Those little guys can sure drink. ​

 

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The Evolution of Tansan Pocha
and the
Fortune Teller Shop

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Continuing my "Time Machine" series, I'm going to post about two of my island's oldest establishments... Tansan's tent bar (탄산포차) and Tansan's fortune teller shop! I originally modelled the bar around pojangmachas, which in simplest terms is just a tent that sells snacks and alcohol. The fortune teller shop was inspired by similar tents with fortune tellers that you'd typically see outside subways of busy office districts. Eventually, Tansan's versions evolved to have more structure as better items were introduced and my designing skills improved. I also just love the improvement of the signage because they were really... basic back then, haha.

Spoiler: Read More...

Tansan Pocha: Then
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When I first decided to take my island in a more city-like direction, Tansan pocha was always the starting point. I wanted whatever surrounded it to have more of a beach-town vibe with a lot of lights and would look great at night. This resulted in the surrounding areas always being full and lively. Back then, we didn't have the electric light up signs, so instead I made a (very crappy) Tansan Pocha wooden sign with floor lights to illuminate it. It didn't exactly look the way I intended it to... but everyone remembers that we had a lot of "faking" to do to accomplish certain real life similarities. Above is the very first version of Tansan Pocha that I could find in my archives and my "menu sign board" with some of the food items available like ramen, tteokboki, fishcakes, and soju. I eventually opened it up so visitors could sit inside. Here's @IKI enjoying an upgraded version of my earlier pocha.

After it was apparent that the rise of tourism in Tansan was due to introducing alcohol, I decided to continue upgrading it. The left is @poqu and @Peter visiting for a Tabby fan club convention. And the right is my sign's upgrade with a more stylised font! This sign design is still used in my current version as well!

Around December 2020 I started significantly changing Tansan's layout to suit my slow city expansion. Tansan Pocha was eventually moved further back in the beach town strip in an area where my marketplace was. The island still had a lot of traditional and foresty elements to it, so I decided to simply replace my pottery shop with Tansan Pocha. The bridge next to it was another landmark foundation that I kept around even in my current island layout. The pottery shop had disappeared for a long time, but it finally made a comeback in my newest version of Tansan.

Eventually I got round to designing actual tiled roof designs to use on stalls, so Tansan Pocha and the marketplace got a significant structural upgrade! In the photo on the left you can see a glimpse of an old mattress/textiles shop I made. I ultimately removed it after the 2.0 update because I didn't feel like it matched the beach town vibe. At this point, Tansan Pocha's sign also got a dual colour-way because I reused this type-face design to create my stationery shop.

Tansan Pocha: Now
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Aaand this is Tansan pocha now! Even though pojangmachas are traditionally tents, the name is still used in actual bars and bunsik shops, so I felt it was okay to upgrade Tansan Pocha to be in a "shop" as well. Still, I wanted to try to show that the food/alcohol is served through the curtains with outdoor seating. I'm also very happy with the sign upgrade using the electric standing sign. It looked exactly how I wanted a bar sign to look like back when I attempted to replicate it with floor lights. I'm so glad that Tansan Pocha was able to have a glow up because of it!

Here are a few more views of the surrounding area. I decided to move my internet cafe next to the bar to replace the mattress shop. The foundation of the shops in the back next to the stone incline are still there too, but instead of an ice-cream shop and fish market I replaced it with a flower shop and sauna. While the beach town area is super colourful and lively, the area beyond the incline has an older neighbourhood feel with more brown tones.

Tansan Fortune Teller: Then​

I had a verrrry early fortune teller table in maybe the first 2 months of the game, but I eventually wanted to include a more detailed version in my city expansion! This one had a yellow-red-blue theme with very graphic letters to look like an actual fortune telling tent. The sign reads "the four pillars of destiny" and tarot card. I've never actually believed in fortune readings, but it's a big thing in Korea and has been important to my mom. She would often base a lot of her decisions off her fortune readings with her "go-to" fortune teller. It honestly upsets me a little but I can't do much about it.

When the fortune teller shop got another upgrade it moved closer to the pojangmacha. Because what's better than getting your fortune read after getting absolutely sloshed? I changed the font to match Tansan Pocha's sign and the tanuki made a return as the fortune teller. Like above, this font-style version stayed with me until the current version!

The fortune teller shop then moved to another villager district in the south-east beach. This neighbourhood had a brown colour scheme to match Erik and Hyuji's house nearby, so I changed the colour scheme of the signage too. Instead of creating a "tent" or enclosed feel for the stall, I started using changing rooms to look like little cubicles you can go into.

Tansan Fortune Teller: Now
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And finally, here's the most recent version of the fortune teller shop! This is probably one of my overall favourite shop upgrades that my older shops got. I kept some of the elements from the past build, like the pattern design, changing room, and items, but I made a whole house for it. And dishing out the fortunes is none other than den den the tiny snail. I might not trust fortune tellers... but who wouldn't trust this lil dude?

I absolutely love this location because this awkward peninsula was always SO hard for me to decorate... but I think I'm finally happy with being able to build shop houses on it. Right next to the fortune teller shop is the bunsikjib and beyond the gate is the outdoor movie theatre. Anyways that's all! I might cover Tansan's museum next because that also went through many many landscaping changes but in the end, it moved back to the same location from where it first was. Ok~ Thanks for reading!

 

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Evening workouts ​

 

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K.K. begins to realise how exposed he is during group stretching activities. Ursala has seen too much. ​

I hadn’t realised that group stretches gives you actual awards until I was mailed this leotard after completing a whooping 3 stretches (I’m about as inactive in this game as I am in real life haaa). Now that I have more time to play the game I’ve been working on grinding some old nook mile achievements. I guess I have a lot of time to practice my stretching coordination!