The Sims 4 update introduces major aging, romance incest bugs

Sims 4’s new Year of High School expansion launched Thursday, but the base game update from earlier in the week had some unintentional side effects: It’s making some Sims age up way too fast, while other Sims are becoming attracted to family members.

Representative for Sims 4Recognized the Sims-Sims Bugs for Auto-Aging in a tweet on the official Sims Twitter account. “We are currently investigating instances involving Sims auto-aging up in saves using the Short or Long lifespan,” EA said via The Sims account. “We recommend temporarily playing in or creating new saves with the default/’normal’ lifespan, as we work towards a solution.”

Image via Polygon: Maxis/Electronic Arts

Players logging into Sims 4You will also be prompted to close Sims marked with short- or long-lives. (Sims 4There are three options for sims’ lifespan: normal, short and long. Sims may still get hurt in accidents, regardless of which option they choose. But this allows players to decide how long their natural lives are.

Sims 4 players across social media and Reddit are reporting that their Sims are aging up way too fast — and old Sims are just outright dying.

Quality designer Sims 4SimGuruNick (on Twitter) mentioned that there was an incest problem and said the developer is looking into a possible fix. Players reported that their Sims were getting “wants” — a replacement for “whims” added in a recent update — to date their family members. Wants are typically based off a Sim’s personality and traits, and include stuff like calling a friend, dating a specific sim, or being abducted by aliens. There are also “fears” — things like death, failure, and cowplants.

Meeting a Sim’s wants earns points that can be used to buy things, as does overcoming fears.

“I just wanted to acknowledge that the Want to date a family member is something we know about, we’ve reproduced ourselves, we’re working on it,” SimGuruNick wrote. “We’re looking to get it fixed ASAP, thanks for all the bug reports, we appreciate it. We’re of course working on the aging bug too.”

Polygon reached out to Electronic Arts in order to obtain more information. We will keep you updated when we hear back from them.