Sims 4 Tips and Tricks – Things You Didn’t Know You Could Do In The Game

Last month, EA decided to offer up the base game of The Sims 4 on Origin for free, leading lots of on-the-fence potential Simmers to nab the bargain and subsequently lose 53 hours of their lives in just a matter of days. Surely that wasn’t just me, right? Here are the Sims 4 tips and tricks that you didn’t know you needed.

If, like me, you’ve already absolutely rampaged through the base game and are now considering cracking on with the many DLC options, there’s some surprising things about the base game that you might not know of – without using the cheat box.

Credit: EA

Here’s a list of the best things you didn’t know you could do in The Sims 4, if you’re a new player.

Cow Plant

You’ve probably come across these plants before when browsing the internet, seeing as they’re pretty meme-worthy.

If you want to grow your own you’ll need a Cow Berry. These can be found when fishing, digging, Exploring Space and Grafting.

Credit: EA

Grafting is available when your Sim is a high level at Gardening, and you can splice plants together.

Firstly, Plant Snapdragon and Strawberry and take cuttings of each when they’re big enough. Graft one plant with the cutting from the other which will give you Dragonfruit.

Plant a Snapdragon and Dragonfruit, take cuttings of each and graft one to the other. You’ll end up with the Cowplant Berry. Plant it and voila! Your very own killer Cow Plant.

Enlarge Objects

You can make yourself a giant bed, cooker, toys and you can even make the world’s biggest television thanks to this handy hack.

Credit: EA

While in Buy Mode hit the square bracket key (right) to stretch an item to any size, and use the square bracket key (left) to shrink it back down.

Very handy if you want to make a movie theatre in your Sim household, without having to pay for the pack…

Object Free Roam

The Sims games have definitely come a long way when it comes to placing objects in your home, but you can make things a little more flexible by pressing and holding down the ALT key. This will bypass the placement squares in the game, meaning you don’t have to make sure your items are placed in line with the grid.

While rotating an object you can also hold down ALT to give you 360 degrees of potential placement.

Postcards

You might have noticed the Pen Pal option on your Sim’s PC. If you Check for Pen Pal on the computer after posting a request for one, you should eventually get a reply. After communicating with your Pen Pal for a while, the Ask for Postcard option should pop up.

Credit: EA

If you’re lucky you’ll get a postcard from your pal the next day. Place them on your walls – or collect them on the Postcard Corkboard item – to help your Sims get Inspired. Postcards range from from common to very rare. There are 14 to collect in total, and you get a plaque if you collect them all. Enjoy!

Grilled Cheese Aspiration

The iconic Grilled Cheese Aspiration makes a comeback in The Sims 4, but it’s something you’ll have to unlock.

Eat three grilled cheeses in a row and it’ll unlock in the Food category. Although starting off fairly simple, the latter goals to achieve can be pretty tricky. You’ll need to “Eat a Grilled Cheese Sandwich in Space,” for example.

Credit: EA/Reddit

Once you complete the milestone, you’ll be able to paint pictures of grilled cheese and summon up a grilled cheese on command, which is nice to have. Try summoning one when your Sim is in a bad mood, and it’ll be spoiled though, so watch out.

Trash Plant

Giving new meaning to the phrase “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” is the Trash Plant.

Credit: EA

Leave Trash on the (outside) ground for too long and it’ll become a Trash Plant. Tend to and water it like a regular plant and it’ll drop little trash bags known as Trash Fruit. Trash Fruit is edible and won’t even make your Sims ill. Wonderful!

Sims 4 Tips and Tricks: expansions

Don’t forget, there’s a huge amount of Stuff Packs, Game Packs and Expansion Packs to help develop your Sims world. Right now you can make your own Sims bundle with one of each for a discounted price!

Check it out on Origin right here.

Here is our review of the latest expansion.

Featured Image Credit: EA