The Sims 4 has a new Stuff Pack in Nifty Knitting, a cosy and alliterative title, promising a new type of crafting for your Sim family.
As a quick reminder, a Stuff pack is the lowest tier of Sims 4 add-ons, costing around £9.99 GBP and focusing more on cosmetic items than huge new gameplay or new worlds. That being said, there’s usually one or two gameplay additions within a Stuff pack, and with Nifty Knitting, it’s of course the new knitting skill.
Stuff Packs aren’t renowned for being anything super amazing when it comes to adding new elements for your Sims to get stuck into, and Nifty Knitting wasn’t a pack I was particularly keen to add to my collection. I enjoy crafting IRL, sure, but I wasn’t exactly excited to watch my Sims knit their hearts out.
Nifty Knitting is a community-voted Stuff Pack, meaning Simmers (myself included) were able to visit the Sims website and vote for their favourite themes, clothes, furniture and items. The highest-voted pieces made it into the pack, but even this community element wasn’t enough to have me sold on the prospect of Nifty Knitting.
However, against the odds, I found myself really enjoying Nifty Knitting.
Gameplay
The game introduces the new knitting skill which is levelled up through practice. Your Sim will knit various items ranging from cosy hats to rugs, gaining skill points as they go. Your items will be of various quality depending on your skill level, and maxing out the skill is incredibly quick and easy (almost too quick and easy).
Unlike most crafting skills, your Sim doesn’t need to be stood at a bench to create their goods – as long as you have a knitting basket in your Inventory, your Sim will knit anywhere and everywhere, even away from their own lot.
Your knitted creations can be sold on the new Etsy/Depop-inspired online market, Plopsy, which you can access via the goods in your inventory. Plopsy was a little irritating to use, as it takes a long time for people to offer you money for your listed items. It was more frustrating than fun, and I absolutely wouldn’t recommend trying to make a living from Plopsy. Hopefully a future patch will make it more user-friendly?
If you’d prefer, you can also donate your knitted items to charity, which is actually a nice touch for those who’re really invested in their storytelling.
If you don’t want to sell or donate, wearing your knitted creations will unlock moodlets, including Sad for the Sad Panda Hat, and Energised for the Owl hat. A nice touch, though I would like to wear the Panda hat without being Sad all the time.
There’s also the new Aspiration, Lord/Lady of the Knits, which is really easy to complete, taking just a matter of real-world hours.
CAS (Create-A-Sim)
Nifty Knitting’s Create-A-Sim offerings are, unsurprisingly, locked behind the skill wall. Though the pack will add new clothes for all ages and genders (finally! Something for everyone!) you’ll need to have unlocked the relevant knitting skill in-game and manually add pieces to your family wardrobe. Of course, you can cheat your way past this, but keeping it in adds another little goal you can work towards throughout your Sims’ life cycle. Although having locked items isn’t for everyone, I really enjoyed this extra level of activity which prompted me to push my Sims to unlock the whole catalogue.
New Items
My favourite aspect of The Sims 4 Nifty Knitting is, by far, the new furniture items. If you were hoping for little-old-lady aesthetics, you’re out of luck though, as each new piece sports pastel lilacs, pinks, teals and yellows. The colours of this pack are very reminiscent of My First Pet Stuff, though of course, the items themselves are much more useful. The room pictured above took me a matter of minutes to deck out, and this is my perfect aesthetic. From the decorative new house-shaped shelf to the new wall hanging planter, this is absolutely up my alley. If your look is kitsch and cute, this is a pack you need in your collection!
The game also adds in rocking chairs, which introduce the new “rock” ability, and will allow elders to reminisce about their past. Rocking will give Sims a Happy moodlet, though reminiscing about the past is a Russian roulette and you could end up with a negative moodlet.
Summary
Like all The Sims 4 packs, opinions on this one will be varied depending on how you play. If you’re a storyteller or a family-oriented player, there’s a fair bit of content in here which won’t revolutionise your game, but will improve it just a tad.
As a person with zero interest in having my Sims knit, I was pleasantly surprised with this one. I enjoyed watching my Sims rock on the rocking chair and knit by the fire, it was oddly relaxing to watch and it’s always nice to see a new animation in the game.
New items are a 9/10 for me, but if they’re not your style you’re going to be sadder than a Sim in an owl hat. There is lots of new swatches and varieties to suit your own look, but all revolve around the pastel purples and bright yellows. I would have liked to see a couple more additions, but what you get is by no means bad.
Stuff Packs aren’t designed to revamp the whole game, but instead add a few new details to improve the realism and playability of the game. Does Nifty Knitting do this? Absolutely, and yet if you’re not a fan of the colour palette and if you have no interest in knitting, it’s fair to give this one a miss.
For the price, I’d like to see a couple more items thrown into the mix, though all-in-all, this is a solid addition to The Sims 4, and is definitely one of the higher-ranking Stuff Packs in my book.
The Sims 4: Nifty Knitting Stuff Pack was reviewed on Mac/PC. Buy yours here!
Featured Image Credit: EA