Hello Simmers!
Since the first installment of The Sims, we have supported player creativity. In-game tools such as Create A Sim and Build Mode have grown and improved over the years, adding more powerful functionality while simultaneously becoming more intuitive to use.
We know some of our fans have pushed the game’s boundaries even further by lovingly and painstakingly making their own Custom Content called “Mods” for The Sims. Your endless imagination has been so inspiring to us, and we don’t want to inhibit that passion for creativity. And, that’s what this blog is all about; Custom Content and The Sims 4.
Our guiding philosophy for The Sims 4 is to enable player creativity, to enable your creativity.
We’ve built The Sims 4 on top of an entirely new technology platform that not only powers this new generation for our game, but is also flexible enough to adapt to the needs of the future, including providing a foundation for those players who want to create Custom Content.
It’s still early days but we are hard at work on features that will make it easier for you to add, manage or remove Custom Content. We also want to reduce the chance that your Custom Content will be affected when we enhance or update the game.
• The first step is the Mods Directory. For those of you who have already installed The Sims 4 Create A Sim Demo, you can find the Mods Directory added to your User Data folder. This is where you can start putting your Custom Content so you don’t have to dig deep into the game files*. This directory is going to make your Custom Content more manageable by keeping it from becoming too embedded within the game itself.
• In the next few weeks we’ll post a guide to the basics of file structure and “decoding” our files which will help you understand more about the interaction between Custom Content and The Sims 4.
• We are creating a dedicated section in our forums for discussing Custom Content and Modding. There you can provide feedback on your experiences, seek out help from other Simmers, and talk to the Studio team about your ideas.
We’ve already spotted a couple of pieces of Custom Content for The Sims 4 Create A Sim Demo and can see how excited you are. We love the creativity of our fans and our mission is to help you share that creativity with the whole Sims community. We are at the start of a new and exciting journey of discovery in The Sims 4. We look forward to taking that voyage with you, hand in hand.
Thank you!
Lyndsay Pearson (Sr. Producer)
Darren Gyles (Technical Director)
*Please note that we do not pre-screen Custom Content and that players should always exercise caution when adding Custom Content to their game files.