The much-anticipated Sims 4 Discover University will drop on 15 November 2019.
The Sims team have kept much of the details lowkey and even the deep dive live stream on Friday left out a bunch of stuff. That’s all seemingly in anticipation of Game Changer content going into much more depth.
But the deep dive did answer many questions.
Some of the reveals expanded on the features we already know will be shipping with the pack, but there was also some brand new reveals.
We’ll also get to see more from the actual gameplay from Sunday when the Game Changers start sharing content, but, let’s have a quick debrief from the live stream deep dive.
We say quick ? there’s a lot more to the Discover University expansion than the points listed below, but these are some of the ones that stood out.
Create A Sim (CAS)
- The earrings category will be renamed piercings and it we’ll get a few facial piercings with it.
- New minimalist tattoos.
- New career outfit unlockable.
- New Academic aspiration but no now CAS traits.
Build/Buy
- Dorms will have similar lots to the penthouses from City Living and can be zoned as University Housing.
- University Housing on penthouse lots requires an elevator, trash chute, and penthouse mailbox. University Housing on regular lots requires at least four beds, one toilet, and one shower.
- The new lot type “University Housing” can be used both on the penthouse-style dorms and regular residential lots.
- University Housing in dorms also have some forbidden objects. Outdoor cooking appliances and stoves are two of the objects that cannot be placed here.
- You can place a cafeteria station in the dorms and you can still cook microwave meals and use your mini-fridge.
- You can customise dorms, but you need a cheat. While active Sims are living in University Housing, players can’t enter Build/Buy mode. The cheat bb.enablefreebuild will allow you to bypass this restriction.
- You can decorate the dorms to a certain degree. There are mew live-drag objects to personalise these spaces. New dorm objects can be bought from university kiosks which are located in the common space on both campuses – a bit like Casters Alley in Realm of Magic. Kiosk items can be found in Build/Buy as well.
- University Housing lots will come with a configuration panel. Here you can set the school the University Housing belongs to (UBrite or Foxbury and gender restrictions (if any). You can also restrict University Housing to specific university organizations. Organization restrictions only affect the roommates that spawn on the lot, not your active Sims. By default, none of the University Housing come with restrictions.
- Lot traits added: Study Spot and University Student Hangout.
- Bathroom stalls are coming and wall showers which can work as communal showers. Children and teens will not use the communal showers if there are other Sims around but Young Adults and older Sims will.
- No bunk beds or murphy beds.
- Multi-storey columns are being added for all players. Columns can now be dragged expand.
Live mode, degrees, the world and gameplay
- Britechester is a livable world with residential lots, uni housing and other lots. Sims can travel between worlds as they wish.
- Sims don’t need to be in university to visit the world or its campuses.
- There are two universities in the world – The University of Britechester and Foxbury Institute. Each of these have their own campus.
- You’ll find the cafeterias in the common areas. These close at certain times of days, to you must plan your Sims’ meals accordingly. Different menus for different days of the week, as well as different breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
- There’s a new street vendor, the “coffee cart”. Sims can get caffeine fixes or a snack from here.
- Open swimming areas are available in Britechester – like the open water swimming in Island Living.
- Britechester is a historic town. The town’s off-campus neighbourhood has a curious spot near the ruins of an old castle. Mysterious Sims in hooded cloaks like to gather here after dark.
- Both schools offer the same degrees, but their distinguished degrees are reversed.
- Both unis have a sporting arena, but it’s a rabbit hole.
- Any Sim can visit the arena to attend sporting events; they do not need to be enrolled at university to watch sporting events.
- The mascots will pick fights with each other.
- Students from your Sim’s rival school will often vandalise your school’s statue.
- Debating is available at both unis.
- Young Adults, Adults, and Elders can enrol in university. Teens can’t.
- Sims can apply through the mailbox or PC, there is no outright rejection, but if Sims did not perform well in school or have a low skill level, they might not be accepted for distinguished degrees.
- Acceptance depends on skills and there is a lengthy enrollment process involved.
- Each class will cost Simoleons. Sims can pay their fees from the household funds or take out a student loan. The repo man is back and will come to take their possessions if they do not repay.
- There are scholarships available and some of these have special requirements.
Some of the scholarships are:
- Building the Future ? Handiness and/or Rocket Science skill
- E-Sports ? Video Gaming skill, requires Sim to compete in E-Sports in order to keep the scholarship
- Food and Drink ? Cooking, Gourmet Cooking, and/or Mixology skills
- The Great Outdoors ? Fishing and/or Gardening skills
- Britechester Resident ? Must be a young adult living in Britechester
- Roommates will also make a return.
- Sims living off-campus can post an ad for a roommate on the phone or computer.
- Sims can fail and passing requires homework as well as an exam and presentation.
- Each term is five workdays (Mon-Fri). Weekends don’t count. Starting a term midweek is useful for catching up on homework and final exams. Terms are fixed and can’t be extended.
- Servo is back and in a playable state. You can Woohoo with Servo. And Servo is not immune to water.
Yep. This is a summary – there is much, much more. Keep an eye out for Game Changer content which can be released from 18:00 SAST on Sunday 10 November 2019.