The Sims 4 Explores Afterlife in “Life and Death” Expansion

Credit: Electronic Arts

People who counsel the dying and their loved ones often remark that our culture has a difficult time accepting death because we don’t want to talk about it. But the new “Life and Death” expansion pack for the long-running video game The Sims 4 allows players to plan for the deaths and funerals of their characters, and even have robust adventures in the afterlife.

Death has been a part of The Sims franchise since its inception in 2000. Players create simulated humans, called Sims, imbue them with skills and aspirations and build communities and worlds around them where they pursue their goals. Eventually they die. Over the years, the game’s designers have broadened what happens to characters after they perish. The concept of Sims ghosts finding peace in an afterlife was introduced in 2009, and it has now evolved to an entire virtual playground for Sims to continue their adventures beyond death.

Ravenwood
Credit: Electronic Arts

Produced by Electronic Arts, the game’s description invites players into the “haunting realm of Ravenwood, where three distinct neighborhoods await exploration, each with its own connection to the shadowy passage between life and what’s next.” Players have the opportunity to create a bucket list for their characters, resolve unfinished business in the afterlife, and employ new ghostly powers to “unleash mayhem, kindness, or something in between, and even undergo a rebirth.”

Although the web page promoting the new expansion describes the various elements of the game in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, the depth of the options for players to explore death is actually educational. For example, there is a new undertaker career, in which Sims can serve both the living and the dead. From grave digging to embalming, the goal is to “ensure all Sims can move on in peace.” Specializing in deathcare prepares Sims for difficult moments like discussing end-of-life services or “contemplating existence.”

Players can also help their Sims create a will, assign heirlooms, designate other Sims to care for children or pets, and specify how they want their remains handled from a broad menu of options for funeral arrangements — all good things for a young person playing this game to be aware of and possibly consider for their own lives.

Credit: Electronic Arts

Also instructional, “Life and Death” now allows Sims to experience four types of grief: denial, holding it together, anger and blues. Sims experiencing grief can reach out to other Sims for comfort, attend grief counseling, or cope positively with grief by doing creative or productive activities while in the grieving process. When at a funeral, Sims can “offer awkward sympathies or offer a sympathetic joke.”

Or course, there’s the pure fun side as well. For example, players now have the option to “make death your life’s work with a career of reaping souls” by joining the Reaper Profession. Reapers are the spirits who harvest souls from Sims. The career path for this profession begins by becoming a “Grimtern.”

Credit: Electronic Arts

Players can also choose to have their Sims linger on as a ghost “and spend your afterlife helping or terrorizing the living.” Ghosts can grow their abilities to include levitating living Sims and hanging them upside down to collect the Simoleons (Sims money) that fall from their pockets. And, as an ultimate payoff, ghostly Sims may have the opportunity to reincarnate.

One thing is certain about “Life and Death,” players will be spending far more time thinking about death and the afterlife than the average person, and that may be to their benefit.