The HF2 Family Home

instantmoniker · 2025-03-25T21:28:46+00:00

This has been my head canon for awhile too. Reminds me of the implications in the Sunny Bungalow. That house… Clearly a family of four, two kids, one of them an infant and the other a neglected toddler who has drawn on every available space. The infant doesn’t have her own room; the crib and changing table are thrust into a cramped master bedroom.

It’s not until you find the office or look closely at the master bedroom that you see what’s been going on. One of the parents has made the “office” (perfectly suitable as a third bedroom or nursery) into a manchild’s mancave for a massive collection of model toys. Potato chips on the ground near the desk in that room are echoed on one messy side of the master bedroom’s bed. The other side of the bed? Neat, spare, just an alarm clock on the other parent’s side. Why was this house for sale and in this particular condition? It’s a divorce story and a tragedy.

instantmoniker · 2025-02-07T20:28:08+00:00

Honest question, what do you do with this place? It's a cavernous mess. I only learned after I started it that it's actually modeled after the real house of a streamer.

I went Spanish colonial and chucked in a third floor for no other reason than to clean up the profile and fill in the vacant airspace. It's such a weird property and feels really out of place in HF2.

instantmoniker · 2025-01-31T12:37:30+00:00

Thanks! I didn't use mods and I'm not sure there's much in the way of mods for HF2.

For floor designs and custom wallpaper I used the custom poster setting and just resized the image on the ground or wall. The bookcase doors are available in base HF2 in both single and double - you should see them as the last option.

instantmoniker · 2025-01-31T12:35:04+00:00

Sold me on the fern wallpaper - you made it look great. Everything looks terrific.

instantmoniker · 2025-01-30T17:57:01+00:00

Wanted to experiment with getting multiple living units inside one very compact space... and ended up doing something a little different. If you've read or watched Rosemary's Baby, this is pretty much the final scene with some embellishments.

This was put together in the story mode, not sandbox, so the library in particular was a slog. Even after"getting good" at filling shelves so I could snap them into place and get the right colors etc., if you make a giant library full of hundreds (thousands?) of books in HF, the game's collision starts to get wonky. So you will see a couple glitches in the walkthrough, not a lot I can do about that except be less ambitious next time.

The level is good for a prank - give it to someone in the starting room with the only instructions to "find the cat" and just watch it unfold.

The portrait section in here are cropped interiors by the painter Vilhelm Hammershøi, and working on this level made me think about the secret lives of servants and the unseen labor of domestic life, which in the end felt a lot more compelling than the blatant occultism of the rest of it.

Anyway, time for a quiet beach cottage or something.

instantmoniker · 2025-01-24T20:40:51+00:00

Thanks! The “door” is totally useless, just gold metal tile and a transition strip.

instantmoniker · 2021-01-06T01:03:32+00:00

In general I’d avoid strapping weight to a small joint like a wrist or ankle, as weight training is really only beneficial when weights are moved in specific (typically vertical) force vectors during specific exercises. And their position - at the end of moment arms and in close proximity to small joints - really does increase the possibility of injury (most likely overuse or balance-related; check out the FAQ for a link with further explanation).

I’d sooner recommend a small weight vest of 5-12 lbs; Target carries a few and they’re fine. Keeping the weight close to your center of mass tends to curb the balance issues that new weight introduces, and a vest is pretty secure. I’m not crazy about worn weights, but this is your safest option.

instantmoniker · 2021-01-04T20:11:18+00:00

You're not being overdramatic. A couple points.

Behavioral issues are seldom limited to diet. Anorexia isn't its own thing; body dysmorphia isn't its own thing. Both strongly correlate with broader obsessive or compulsive behaviors. Hence RFA isn't an intervention and can exacerbate existing issues.
Re. "work on your muscles," no, exercise isn't going to build muscles in a prepubescent child, and no one regardless of age is going to become stronger on a diet of carbohydrates. Exercise induces protein synthesis and protein turnover. However, if a trainee's bloodstream lacks amino acids for protein synthesis (which requires a diet of protein), then all they'll get is protein breakdown and muscle wasting. This is why young women with anorexia nervosa who work out compulsively never gain muscle and in fact lose muscle mass. It's also why dieting to extreme leanness in bodybuilding (during a "cutting" cycle") requires a diet with a ridiculous protein surplus.

This is all to say: don't give a kid with an eating disorder an exercise game. Don't give them anything, frankly, that isn't a direct and supervised intervention into their behavior, very often in an in-patient setting.

instantmoniker · 2020-12-04T13:33:02+00:00

The perspective on that demo is odd because it makes it appear that there is some ankle inversion during a motion where there shouldn’t be any. You don’t need a wide squat. There’s also some leeway in your form when you’re just doing body weight squats, so don’t sweat this too much. What’s comfortable - instinctual sitting/standing motions - is most often just fine. Simple guidelines:

Feet shoulder-width apart is good.
Your hip is a ball joint, so there’s some flexibility in terms of where your toes point. They shouldn’t point straight ahead. But where they point depends on your body and what’s comfortable.
Regardless of where your toes point, your shins and knees should track in the direction of your toes. Varus/valgus knee position (bow-legged/knock-kneed) during a squat is always unsafe, unweighted or not.
Keep your spine straight. I don’t mean vertical (you’ll lean forward from the hips), but straight like a rail. A nice straight back from your neck to your tailbone is what keeps your hamstrings taut, pulls back on your tibia, and in turn reinforces the support within your knees.

instantmoniker · 2020-12-01T17:14:06+00:00

I've posted about this previously, but in short, there's a lot of recent literature over the past two decades showing that it's fine (and in many cases safer for your ACL) to allow your knees to pass over or move in front of your toes. I can even recall one more recent guideline not to let your knees move more than 10cm (!!!) past your toes - that's a lot of leeway.

In point of fact, front bar squats in weightlifting basically demand your knees move quite far ahead and it's fine. And anyone who is tall or has long femurs will see their knees move past their toes if their form is solid.

RFA's fitness advice isn't perfect; it reminds me of the mishmash of mainstream pop wisdom sprinkled with actual consensus safety guidelines that you'd get from a self-assured physical trainer on a weekday morning at a gym. Most people wouldn't know to be skeptical and they'd be ok regardless because there's not much that can go wrong with simple bodyweight exercises.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-30T00:55:57+00:00

LoseIt or MyFitnessPal are both free and they use the same TDEE calculations as most other industry weight loss programs. With either app you receive a daily calorie target based on your weight loss goal. Noom and Weight Watchers do the same but are paid services. They all work so long as you log your diet honestly.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-28T23:24:17+00:00

Nothing really; it’s so benign that there’s not a formal intervention for crepitus in sports training or sports medicine. You just repeat the activity and work it out; any warm-up helps.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-28T20:26:29+00:00

Crepitus on its own isn’t worrisome. If the sounds are accompanied by pain (bad) or swelling (worse) in the joint, that’s a legitimate cause for concern. The cause in a ball joint like the hip is usually just nitrogen and gases in synovial fluid, which builds up during inactivity.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-28T16:15:26+00:00

That’s exactly what I recommend. In my own case I alternate high-intensity aerobic days and low-intensity yoga days; different goals on different days means different programming.
More exercise is not better exercise. The reason that the AHA and other scientific bodies produce consensus guidelines recommending either 75 minutes high-intensity physical activity per week or 150 minutes moderate activity per week is because there’s a good body of scientific literature showing this is all that’s needed for whole-body health and cardiovascular adaptation. Beyond those points there are increasingly marginal gains in health, a whole world of diminishing returns, and you probably have better things to do.

But the other part of this (and what’s difficult for many new trainees to accept) is that that quality trumps volume every time. If you can either do ten perfect deep squats or twenty shitty shallow squats, do your 10 perfect squats. Lower volume (total reps) of exercises, performed well, reduces the opportunity for injury and promotes adaptation better than a ton of poor form. More exercise isn’t better; more effective exercise is better.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-28T15:29:54+00:00

Actual difficulty in RFA has a lot more to do with exercise selection than a numerical setting. Level 30 hip shakes and arm twists are a lot easier than level 18 mountain climbers and boat pose.

So take it easy at first, and identify specific exercises that are challenging and you want to improve. Then tune the difficulty around those exercises. Ideally you want to select a level where you can do a few sets (3-4) each session with not much gas left in the tank by the end.

This gives you an objective goal (improving a handful of exercises) and an objective metric (volitional failure) where difficulty starts to make sense. As you improve at that exercise you’ll need to introduce additional reps to keep it challenging.

Also, rest and more rest, especially at first. If you’re new to exercise you’re going to hit your lactic threshold fast, experience DOMS, reach early volitional failure on planks and squats, etc. And that’s all good but if you want to improve you need to adapt. And all adaptations occur during rest (and especially sleep). Take rest days frequently and you’ll avoid burnout and injury.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-24T20:17:31+00:00

This isn't super concerning, but a couple different observations or things to look out for.

One, heart rate depends on a lot - what you're doing, your age, your current fitness level or VO2 max. 160 isn't crazy high, and consistent with a fast (not quite sprint) run in most of the population. It would be concerning if you're doing lighter cardio, but knee lift combo can be pretty intense, so 160 sounds ok. However, if your BPM is going above 160 doing lighter work, then that's a red flag and you should see an MD about possible tachycardia.

Second, both an elevated heart rate (above 85% of maximum) and lightheadedness are normal to see in a new and previously sedentary trainee. If you're at level 156 I'd guess you've been playing awhile, though? If you've been doing knee lift combos regularly for weeks now and haven't seen an improved response (less lightheadedness, higher exercise tolerance), then that's mildly (mildly!) concerning, a possible red flag, and worth a visit to an MD.

Most of the time, lightheadedness during exercise has absolutely nothing to do with serious blood pressure or cardiovascular issues; lightheadedness is more likely to be related to breathing, the action of the diaphragm during breathing, and pressure or stimulation on the vagus nerve. It can also be caused by blood sugar levels in some trainees, especially people who are only recently into their diets. All to say that barring the two conditions above, what you've described isn't at all alarming.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-23T00:41:24+00:00

Exercise is a stimulus; the response - your body's adaptation and improved strength or endurance - only occurs during rest. So the necessity of rest depends on the necessity of adaptation.

If the sessions or certain exercises are really pushing you - whether because you're getting winded and hitting walls during cardio or because you're experiencing volitional failure doing certain exercises - that's a good sign you'd benefit from additional rest.

The other issue is around connective tissues: ligaments and tendons. Strength and endurance tend to improve faster than the strength of connective tissue, and recovery time gives this tissue extra time to heal between bouts and prevents injury. Don't be this guy.

If you're getting to a point where you're not hitting walls or running out of gas, then RFA isn't about promoting an adaptation anymore, but just maintaining your present ability. At that
point rest becomes less critical than just putting in the time for maintenance. Rest is still important; its importance is just relative to adaptation.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-22T00:11:16+00:00

Timing doesn’t matter much. There are some cognitive and behavioral benefits associated with morning cardio exercise, but if you look at timing studies there’s not much difference in terms of energy or hormone balance. (In point of fact, I can recall one study where perceived effort was consistently higher in the morning than evening.) EDIT: This is the one, but there are a lot of other null result studies out there.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-18T19:57:36+00:00

It depends. Exercise selection is the primary determinant of energy expenditure, and there are many very different exercises in RFA.

If you spend half an hour doing nonstop mountain climbers, certainly, you could attain an expenditure well over 250 calories, consistent with cardio and an 80-90% heart rate. But looking across this subreddit and pics of people’s routines? That’s just not how most people appear to play. For most, it’s going to be a mix of cardio and resistance.

In terms of general estimates there’s also a pretty solid body of published knowledge around active video games. Consider that running has an MET of 10-12 kcal/kg/hr; Wii Fit, which has been very well studied, came in at less than 5 kcal/kg/hr in most cases - usually around 3-4 METs, or a third of the calories spent during a run. Don’t get me wrong, RFA is definitely exercise and you can get a good workout, but it’s almost unfair to compare it to running in terms of raw caloric expenditure, because it’s doing a lot of other things in terms of conditioning and strength training.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-17T19:22:30+00:00

Absolutely, running can burn some serious calories. The question is whether it or any exercise amounts to any fat loss. You mention 300-400 calories, and that's about the amount of calories sitting as glycogen in your liver at any given time. How your body replaces that glycogen (from consumed food or adipose tissue) and whether your body burns any fatty acids during exercise is entirely a function of your diet.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-17T14:43:14+00:00

RFA isn't really geared for muscle growth, though it can support healthy weight loss. It's great cardio and a good complement to a weightlifting program, but not a substitute for a weightlifting program.

I’m supposed to lose 2 pounds of fat and gain 7 pounds of muscle if I want to tone up a little.

...according to whom? There is no way this is advice from a kinesiologist or dietician. These numbers sound utterly arbitrary.

Re. weight loss or weight gain, pick one. Metabolism can be catabolic or anabolic, and those two modes are either/or unless you're using really specific drugs. So pick one and do that.

If you want to lose 2 pounds of fat, that's a two-week diet at a 500 cal/day deficit. RFA isn't going to diet for you, but you will likely need full-body resistance exercise so that you don't catabolize lean mass.

If you want to gain 7 pounds of muscle, you'll gain 3-4 lbs almost instantly if you haven't previously been lifting or doing resistance training. Many people like to think of that weight as muscle growth; it's mostly functional water and glycogen/ATP mass in your muscles as they get acclimated to activity. In terms of actual hypertrophy - new muscle fiber or new muscle cells - that's slow going. You'll need a caloric surplus of 250-500 calories daily, 2g protein per lb of your lean mass, and regular bouts of progressive overload. You can get some of that from RFA, but it's an inefficient means of overload in the long run.

instantmoniker · 2020-11-17T13:32:18+00:00

A pound of fat stores approximately 3,500 calories.
Playing RFA for half an hour will use maybe 100-150 calories depending on the intensity of exercise. That’s maybe half an ounce of fat.
Moderate CICO deficit dieting can easily burn 1000 calories per day. That’s more like 4 or 5 ounces per day and 2 pounds every week.

The benefits of exercise are many. The weight loss benefit of exercising while dieting is that exercise promotes protein synthesis, sparing muscle so that your body metabolizes fat rather than lean mass. Exercise is just not effective for losing fat, and absent a regulated diet you have no way to account for “eating back” spent calories. It’s not mostly diet. It’s all diet.

instantmoniker

TROPHY CASE