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Sims 4: Country Livin' Review

The best Sims 4 Expansion to date

By Jade HadfieldPublished 3 years ago Updated 3 years ago 5 min read
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Image from GameRant

They’ve finally done it.

After years of fans asking, practically begging, daydreaming of an official farming expansion pack, The Sims 4 have finally given us what we’ve asked for. I’ve been playing The Sims for as long as I can remember, from watching my Aunty play the first game when I was too young to play myself, to getting my own laptop and a copy of The Sims 2 (and using every birthday as a chance to bag a new expansion pack), to buying my own gaming PC and every single one of The Sims 3 and 4 expansions (aside from Journey to Batuu). It’s safe to say that I knew a thing or two about the game, and that I had a lot of expectations for such an eagerly awaited for expansion as this. As soon as I got paid, I downloaded the game, barely containing my excitement to begin my farming adventure.

Previously, I’d modded the game with every kind of mod you could imagine (yes, even the serial killer one, who could resist?!), but I wanted to experience this expansion at its purest, so I disabled all my mods and got to work.

Meet Annabeth Galloway, a quirky city girl who has moved away from the hustle and bustle of the 9-5 business world for a countryside retreat, and her kitten Fae Fae.

Usually, I would create my own house from scratch in build mode, but I must confess, I was too excited to see what the actual gameplay was like, so moved into the ‘Cordelia’s Secret Cottage’ lot and edited it a bit to suit my tastes.

This lot was preloaded with two challenges to tackle – wild foxes and simple living. These challenges are a new edition to the game and can be turned off or edited in Build Mode. Wild Foxes is exactly as it sounds. Foxes will appear on your lot to terrorise your chickens, and you have the option to shoo them away or plead them to leave you alone. You can befriend the foxes, as you can with wild birds and bunnies, and build a relationship with them, which is just absolutely adorable. They look, behave and sound exactly as foxes do, which impressed me as I’d expected them to be just another cat reskin like the raccoons were in the Cats and Dogs expansion.

Simple living was the challenge I was looking forward to the most. This challenge means you can only cook with ingredients readily available to your sim, such as milk from your cows, eggs from your chickens, and other produce grown on your lot. There are an abundance of fishing spots dotted all over the new town, Henford-on-Bagley, too, so if your sim is a savvy angler they’ll always be able to bring dinner to the table.

And so, Annabeth got to work, using the last of her moving in funds to buy 3 hens, a rooster, a cow, and a llama, and planted some starter vegetables in her garden. I didn’t have any readily available produce to cook with, and since it was her first night in town, I took Annabeth to the pub and had her order some classic English Bangers and Mash. I should mention that there are other food options to keep your sims alive when going down the simple living path, including a grocery delivery service and a takeaway service similar to Delivero called Zoomers, but a trip to the local just felt right.

After a few days of farming away, collecting eggs, and getting kicked in the head every time I tried to milk my cow, I thought that I had this farming mallarcky down. There was so much to do, new recipes to play with, experimentation with treats (in this game, feeding your cow chocolate actually produces chocolate milk!), new skills to master… I was almost overwhelmed for choice, but kept my fingers to the grind, using the best fertiliser I could on my super crop mushrooms so that I could win that sweet ribbon at the fair.

And then, to my surprise, my chickens laid a hatchable egg! After a few days of waiting, with my hens looking after it and keeping it warm, my chick finally hatched and I immediately fell in love.

Her name is Nugget and she is very well-loved.

This wouldn’t be a review of Country Livin’ without the mention of everyone's favourite old hag, Agnes Crumplebottom. She’s back, and she’s as nasty as ever, but that didn’t keep me away. I couldn’t help myself, I took Annabeth over immediately to meet her, and realised I could run errands for her in exchange for some cash and some farm items. Agnes, being Agnes, first instructed me to plant a pumpkin, bring her some milk, and scold the grocery shop owner. Something about being too flirty at the pub? I’m not sure, but I wasn’t going to turn the offer down. I needed cash, and on top of everything else, she gave me a lovely new cross stitch pattern to use. How generous of her. Who knows, maybe we’ll become besites and I’ll soften her heart?

Maybe not.

I couldn’t finish my play session without trying out one of the new village competitions. I entered my Rooster into the best chicken competition and…he didn’t win. But we got a lovely participation ribbon and some farm treats for the rest of the animals, so not a total loss overall.

Overall, this is the most fun I’ve had with a Sims 4 expansion since the release of Get To Work. If you've ever dreamed of running away to the countryside and becoming self-sustaining, this is the pack for you.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a cow to milk.

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About the Creator

Jade Hadfield

A writer by both profession and passion. Sharing my stories about mental health, and my journey to becoming a better writer.

Facebook: @jfhadfieldwriter

Instagram: @jfhadfield

Twitter: @jfhadfield

Fiverr: https://www.fiverr.com/jadehadfield

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