This is the first expansion pack for the Sims 4 game. This expansion pack features things not available in the base game. The most important is the ability to do a variety of different jobs. However these new jobs require you to play an active role in your Sims work life for the first time in Sims 4. The new jobs are divided into two categories: Careers and professions. Careers give you the option of joining your sim and actively helping them throughout the work day, while professions are inactive and require little effort on the player’s part. Each active career also gives unique interactions that only Sims in that career can perform. Additional game features include the photography and baking skills, new collectibles including three new plants and my personal favorite… aliens and their home land Sixam. I’ll give a brief description of the new additions as well as my opinion on each.
Retail
Owning a store or spa is simple now with the click on a button. You sim can now buy their own business! Is your sim interested in wellness? You can buy a spa if you have the spa day game pack. Other options are clothing stores, photography studios, and bakeries. From this game, I’ve found owning a store is hard work especially if you don’t have a large family since you can only hire one employee to begin. As time passes, you can work your way up by getting rewards.
Detective
This is the most realistic of the active careers. From cadet to Chief you start from the bottom and progress in a seemingly realistic way by going on patrols, questioning witnesses, collecting evidence and catching your very own criminal. That’s when the real fun begins you can fingerprint, take mugshots, and even interrogate them if you are high enough in your career. While the career isn’t that interesting, aspects of it is and the fact that my romantic sim seems to date all the criminals she catches, doesn’t hurt either.
Doctor
From intern to chief of staff, the doctor career path features the ability to deliver food and even babies if you’re high enough in your career. Doctors are even able to make house calls, develop resistance to illnesses, and tell the gender of unborn babies just by talking to the pregnant sim. Sometimes you’ll even get emergencies that need to be solved within a set time period.
Scientist
From lab tech to extraterrestrial explorer you can invent and travel to help your career grow. As you progress in your career your Sims can build inventions and even travel to far off alien lands including the illusive Sixam. With the new rocket science skill, the universe is your oyster. My favorite inventions would have to be the sim ray and the satellite. The sim ray allows Sims to transform objects and even do mind control to mess with other Sims.
Aliens
There are two ways to get an alien. The first and easiest way is to create a sim that’s an alien from the Create a Sim screen. The second is by having a male sim get abducted which is much harder than it sounds. It’s a difficult task even if you join the scientist career and build a satellite and contact the aliens. Aliens also add a new layer to interact with other Sims and they have unique interactions. An Alien to alien interaction include a secret handshake but it’s only available when they are in disguise. They can also empathize with Sims and even erase memories.
Sixam
There are two ways to get to Sixam. To get to Sixam, all you need is a maxed out rocket science skill and to install a wormhole generator on a rocket, Next is to build a wormhole generator while in the scientist career path the pros to this you earn simoleons while you work to get to Sixam. While the rocket science route doesn’t offer any simoleons at all, unless you learn it through a career, it also demands a lot of simoleons being spent. Once you arrive at Sixam the planet seems empty as you explore you may find an alien or two. There are also geodes, and plants which are nice to have but in general are just weird and have no consequence if not included in your garden.
Final Score: 7/10 Power Ups
