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Downloadable Content (DLC) is spreading like the plague. Some games have always featured overpriced and unnecessary DLC, but more notable series such as Pokemon and Super Smash Bros now offer expansion packs to complement the original gameplay. As game developers can now release an incomplete product and make a bigger profit from it, gamers, including myself, are concerned. One notable trendsetter for the DLC craze and a big money-grabber itself is Sims 4, which is still producing new content over six years after its initial release.
Sims 4 Paranormal Stuff Pack is just the latest DLC in an already extensive and expensive list of add-ons that can cost over $750 altogether at their original prices. However, Sims 4 differs from others as the base game itself and its DLC are rarely sold online for full price, and the game still offers free updates that improve its gameplay. For example, an update in 2020 gave players the ability to make trans Sims. It also provided more expansive options for skin color. With the release of Paranormal, Sims 4 updated to give all sims the scared emotion without having to purchase the pack. To fully experience this update, though, players must buy Paranormal, which adds ghosts, haunted houses, and the paranormal investigator job. The pack promises to add on to the base game by creating more ways for its players to “Play with Life,” but does it do it well?
In the first five minutes of gameplay, I was in love with the content Paranormal had to offer. It transformed the game in a way that no pack has ever done before, shifting a relaxing game to the horror genre. Complete with random thuds, electrical shortages, and a fitting new ambient song, this add-on had me feeling a little spooked. The specters themselves are quite cute, but the woody hands and terrifying dolls that pop up all over your haunted mansion are unsettling. While it still isn’t Silent Hill level of horrifying, the whole tone had shifted.
After I had spent one night in a haunted house, a spiritual guide aptly named Guidry appears to help you through the game. Clicking on him reveals a new set of conversation options named “Guidry” that allow you to ask any question you (or your Sim) might have about surviving their fate as a resident of a haunted mansion. He tends to be quite helpful, providing you with items and tricks that aid in your Sim’s experience. And help is necessary. When your Sim experiences the new “scared” emotion, they will refuse to do anything but “Scream incoherently” and “Sleep?” These questionable reactions prevent you from doing any actual ghost hunting or doll smashing that you wanted to.
Despite my great first impressions, everything quickly went downhill. This pack is the least intuitive of any that I’ve played before. I constantly looked up how to play the new elements, such as building my Sim’s medium skill and joining the paranormal investigator job path. Guidry was a key in both, but that was difficult to figure out from the get-go. As days began to go by where my Sim only slept to prepare for the night awaiting them, it was getting a little dry. I wanted to advance. That said, once I figured out how to join the paranormal investigator career (which is disappointingly only a part-time job), I hated it. Entering the easy job, I couldn’t get my Sim to do anything to help decrease the haunted house’s spiritual presence because she was just too terrified. When the Sims that my Sim was supposed to help had concerns pop up in a dialogue box, asking me why I wasn’t doing anything, I shared their frustration.
I’ve been playing Sims for as long as I can remember and Sims 4 since its very release, racking up almost 950 hours of game time in the past six years. I own a handful of the expansion packs, two of the game packs, and until recently, none of the stuff packs. Contrary to the expansion and game packs, stuff packs have had nothing to offer as they don’t expand the base game. Appropriately named, they usually only include items, such as furniture, clothing, and so on. Personally, I steer away from them because I don’t want to pay $10 so my Sim can chill in a jacuzzi or rock a new haircut.
However, I thought that Paranormal could be worth it as it includes more than just the regular stuff pack. With a new lot type that allows ghosts to spawn in-game, new interactions, and a new job, I thought it could be an innovation to what stuff packs have been known for, but it wasn’t. To truly enjoy the pack, I immediately wanted to create a spooky haunted house. With only a couple items added on for spook factor and the medium skill, that ambiance was difficult to accomplish on my own, especially so if I didn’t have other supernatural-themed packs that provided me with what I was looking for. This pack falls short in that it doesn’t do enough to expand the gameplay it does have, and it fails to add enough stuff to make its new ambiance truly enjoyable. This pack feels explicitly like I’m playing an incomplete or partial version of a game that could have been so much better if they had put more into it.
The Sims 4 Paranormal Stuff Pack finds itself in a weird spot between a game pack and a stuff pack where it does not include enough aspects of gameplay changes to be a game pack, but it also doesn’t have nearly enough stuff as stuff packs usually do to properly be considered one either. Ultimately, Sims 4 Paranormal doesn’t know what it actually is, which drastically hurts the experience.
Closing Comments
Paranormal certainly isn’t worth the price, and it only increases concerns for the future of DLC. The first impressions of The Sims 4 Paranormal Stuff Pack were terrific, but continuing gameplay only led to frustration and rage quitting, ultimately making what it has to offer unplayable.
Version Reviewed: PC
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