In a further effort to reach out and communicate with fans and players of The Sims 4, the team behind the game started the first of a series of streams called Behind the Sims where they shared lots of sneak peaks and updates about what’s happening and what’s coming soon. I didn’t watch the video myself but have seen plenty of the news that’s been reported on since, and some of it is very exciting.

Base game updates

This week an update to the base game dropped that includes some more accessible features. I know the pace of some of these updates frustrates people but it seems to me the game designers are trying to do the right thing and make Sims more and more accessible as they go along. This time the update included binders and top scars, as well as medical wearables such as hearing aids.

Very cool.

There’s also talk of an upcoming base game update that will make infants more interesting. I generally never play the early life stages, preferring to focus on young adult or adult. Sometimes if I’m trying a generational thing, I’ll have to live through a child’s life but most of the time it’s just getting it out the way to get to the good stuff. I’ve not even explored the high school expansion as much as I should have. (Note to self: Play more Sims.)

But making the infants do more interesting things might make it more meaningful to play… although if I’m honest I can’t see it making too much difference to me.

Upcoming expansion

The updates to infant gameplay tie in with the new expansion pack that’s been announced: Growing Together. This one is very focused on the family unit, bringing more options to the younger generations and elders as well, but also making interactions between members of the same family more interesting.

We’re talking about siblings feeling competitive against each other, or parents having a favourite child, or grandparents sharing their nostalgic memories with the younger generations. It all sounds great and fun to have more family dynamics involved. It also sounds a little scary. As I was reading the details, I just started thinking about how this game is really digging into the depths of social norms and interactions and that sent me on a spiral loop of disaster dreaming that inevitably ended with our Matrix-style machine overlords.

But hey, for now, we can replicate our childhood fights with our brothers and this time we can win.

Hooray!