Thanks to the Game Changer program, for the Early Access of The Sims 4 Paranormal stuff.
Any opinions in this review are my own, but I try to keep things objective so you can make your own decision.
This pack is all about Paranormal stuff, those odd things that happen in your house that no one can explain. So, what will your Sims be able to investigate or experience?
Haunted house
Haunted House Residential is a new lot type, it’s actually similar to a Tiny Home Residential. It’s a ‘normal’ residential lot, but with some added lot features. To make a house extra spooky, you can also add some lot traits as well.
Highly recommend you place DoctorAshley’s build by the way, it’s really well done. (the only minor thing is she forgot a bin, but that’s easily fixed)
But if you don’t want to place it right away, or you don’t get the pop up anymore, don’t worry, you can find it in your library under Maxis lots.
If you just moved into your new Haunted home, the welcome wagon will appear as they do. But, they might not enjoy the experience as much waiting at the front door. As they will be teased by Specters while they wait.
On your first night in the haunted house, when darkness has fallen, a message with pop up. Are you ready for the paranormal experience?
The Lights will start to flicker, your Sims will wake up wondering what that was. Maybe even see the Specters. Do they dare to go back to sleep, or go on an investigation?
Once you have survived the first night, the next day will be fairly normal. But then the night comes again. Will your Sims get any sleep?
But fear not, Guidry the ghost will appear and he has some tips and tricks for you. Chat with him and ask him questions. Maybe your Sims will be less afraid then.
Also, placing “Sacred Candles” around the house help your Sims feel more at ease as well. You can get wax to craft them from the Specters or you can buy them from the reward store.
With the “Helping Hand”, that you can find in Build mode, you can turn off the visits from Guidry. Or back on if you turned them off before.
But not only that, if you find your expirience in the haunted house too mellow, you can also “Enable Heroic Mode”
Medium Skill
Do your Sims have a medium in them? You can now build up the Medium skill. This skill is gained by using the seance table, and only the table. There is no skill book available.
As you work up your Medium skill, you get more and more abilities.
- Level 0/1: On the seance table you can “Sense spiritual volatility”, “Commune with the departed” or “Perform Ceremony”, though Ceremonies are only available in Haunted Houses.
- Level 2: When your Sim has reached Level 2 of the Medium skill, they can also perform group seances, so you can do the ceremony or commune with the departed together. These are stronger ceremonies than doing them alone.
- Level 3: Bonehilda can be summoned through the seance table once you reach level 3 of the Medium skill, as well as “Invoke the dead”.
- Level 4: From level 4 onward you can perform the “Ghastly Ritual” at seance tables now.
- Level 5: The final level of this skill. You can now draw Seance circles anywhere, so you don’t need the table for it anymore. You also don’t need as much energy anymore for seances, such a relief. And interactions with specters are now more successful
The seance table can be used by kids till elders. And kids even also gain the Medium skill from it.
And the Crystal ball is not needed on the seance table to have it working. It’s just the table and at least 1 chair that you need for it to work. The Crystal ball however does have an added effect, of showing random faces in the ball when you do a seance.
Specters
Specters are the little ghosty creatures that haunt your haunted house. They come in different colours and variations.
So far I’ve seen the green ones, that seem to be the playful specters. They can sprinkle your Sims with ‘something’, your Sim will then be playful for a while and sparkle a purple aura. I do wonder why the specters are different colours than the emotions are.
Blue Specters are a bit harder to read if they’re nice or mischievous. So try to communicate with them, offer them gifts or even your soul, to please them
There are also red specters. They seem to be a bit more angry/mischievous, and also welcome anyone who comes at the door. They cause all sorts of trouble, and can even start a fire!
Then there is the yellow specter, which in my case even had a name, Dina. Dina had cute glasses on as well. She is a special Specter, the only one that talks, that has a name, and she’s quite rare!
Specters can leave gifts around. One gave me a Specter Sip, that when you drink it, you gain a little knowledge from somebody’s soul.
In my case my Sim gained 2 levels from the Rocket science skill. They ended up dazed from the experience though.
But there are also other gifts, like the Ectocake made from Ectoplasm. The unassuming Candy jar, with candy
And Wraith Wax, that can be used to make Sacred Candles.
Paranormal Investigator
We will be covering this a little bit later. As we ran out of time.
But can say this, you can get the license to unlock this Freelance career in 2 ways. Either get the Medium Skill up to level 5 (the highest), and ask Guidry the ghost for the license.
And the second way is to buy it in the reward store, you do not need the medium skill for this, but you do need the points. Medium skill is recommended for the freelance career though.
CAS
I’m not going very deep into CAS for this pack, there is not a whole lot. Though I think that what is there, is pretty nice.
There are hairs for every age, but as always, most of the clothing is for female teen-elder.
Build mode
Build mode is for me the reason I would get this pack. But then again, I am a builder. But the stuff that is in this pack is really great.
There are a ton of swatches for most of the items. Both in the Queen Anne and Bohemian kind of style, but for once, lots of neutral tones, and they can almost all match to each other. This is something I have missed in previous packs.
But the items I was most excited for, were the sofas and chairs. All of those have 12 colour swatches.
I also made a Starter Haunted House so you can move right in, if you dare at least.
Gallery Link
Livestream
Saturday 23rd of January we will also be going live on Twitch to showcase things live. We can play with the career, go through CAS and build mode. Or if you have questions, you can also ask them!
So feel free to join us at 1pm GMT.
https://www.twitch.tv/platinumsimmers
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