The Sims 4: Life & Death Expansion Pack Review

Life, Death… but mostly Life.

Life & Death, dropping in the Halloween season, had me quite excited!

Death is a big part of The Sims 4, especially for a player like me – the one who tends to play a long-lasting legacy of Sims whose ghosts stick around to watch future generations grow up. I have a whole crypt in the basement of my family residence with pictures, paintings and urns of all the previous sims played and their partners, with some trophies of their achievements. After spending a while playing around with the pack I must say I’m quite impressed. Life & Death is one of the more worthwhile expansions to buy if you’re into the occult, deathly vibe of the pack. It adds a new lot type, a new type of event, several new festivals, a beautiful new world with quite a bit of lore, several well-made sim-families, most of the lots that come with the expansion are built extremely well (usually I feel like replacing them with a gallery lot or making adjustments – which still happened here as well!) and a ton of great create-a-sim and build items. Let’s dissect the pack bit by bit.

Create-a-sim

I decided to use my original Legacy save to see how Life & Death would affect this existing family of mine, with some of the Sims being quite close to death, and ghosts from previous generations often visiting the lot. I decided to mainly play the pack with a younger, vampire Sim, who just became a Young Adult – Erin Vatore. Part of the 5th generation of the family. Life & Death comes with many great new clothing & hair options for both male & female sims. Usually male sims get the short end of the stick, but I’m very glad to say that they have some fantastic options – like a gloomy mohawk! Besides that, male and female hairstyles can suit the other gender perfectly fine as well. When it comes to clothes the same can be said. The style this pack goes after, with some old-timey vests, sweaters, macabre & gloomy clothes & colours, is one I really like. You won’t be disappointed. The clothes also suit Erin, with her being a vampire. Mind you, these are base game updates and features that are available to anybody without the pack.

Build & Buy

When it comes to build mode, Life & Death also does a fantastic job at adding new items. New beds, fireplaces, bookcases, desks, beautiful art & grim looking posters, gloomy wallpapers, wooden roofing, stone masonry for the walls, paneled floors and so forth alongside some beautiful looking rugs and of course – tons of cemetery and funeral related items, make for great additions to my household. There’s also a placeably crypt. Urns & tombstones are now customisable with lots of new designs coming along with the pack, and if you own other packs that have custom urns (like Vampires), you’re able to customize the urns into those ones as well. Overall, I have no complaints about the CAS or Build items.

Ravenwood

Life & Death brings in a new world – Ravenwood. Split into 3 different and various neighbourhoods, with 13 lots in total, the world quickly became one of my favourites.

The new world is fantastic, with lots of points of interest, beautiful areas to build at, and special locations or behaviours unique to the world. However, unlike most expansion packs, Seasons have no effect on the world of Ravenwood. Winter, Fall, Spring or Summer make no difference, which would make sense for one of the gloomier districts which acts as its own little ghastly world, but less so for the other neighbourhoods. On the other hand, the world is beautiful regardless of it being filled with snow or not. EA has been reaching out to Sims creators for the last few years now to have them build some of the lots in the pack, and they’ve done so again this time around. The result makes for a beautiful world where most of the vanilla lots are fantastic. Despite them only using the base game and expansion items for their builds, the creators managed to build some lots I would not replace with anything else for the most part. There’s a fantastic, giant Cemetery, several beautiful mansions & manors, and the “Headless quarters” for the new Reaper career is also a fun build – but more on that later.

This lot needs no replacing.. it’s perfect.

And part of the base expansion! Mourningvale is easily my favourite neighbourhood in the new world, with an eerie atmosphere yet a comforting occult look to it. There’s a ghastly nightclub at which ghosts gather, and in general you will mostly find ghosts here. It’s a neighbourhood for ghosts specifically – so a good place to retire your dead family to! Several points of interest are around as well, from a Whispering Tree, a lake which can turn you into a ghost temporarily, or allow actual ghosts to Rebirth once they’ve gone far enough on their Soul Journey.

You’re more prone to run into ghosts around Mourningvale, and my Sim happened to run into her magical grandmother.

Crow’s Crossing is a more cobbled together district with several manors and estate adorning the town. It has a main square, park with a fountain, swingsets and more. Specters wander around the playground, which you can have a chat with. Should you be grieving, your Sim can be consoled by a Specter. Close to Mourningvale, there’s a wishing well. But beware of it’s guardian… My Sim got quite spooked by the guardian and decided to stick around and talk to Freddy instead at the playground.

Getting to know Freddy, one of the cute spirits wandering around the playground. He offered me a hug.

The Whispering Glen consists of large fields adorned with many homes, with a large rock called “The Ancestor” watching over it all.

It’s a beautiful area to build at and even has the ruins of Ravenwood castle adorning the mountainside, but it’s quite disappointing that most of these lots look like they’d be able to be edited – but aren’t. None of the lots displayed in this image are lots you can visit or build at. However, this neighbourhood is large, and there’s plenty of other houses around to build at.

There’s many weekly & daily festivals around Ravenwood, from the Moon Revelry which has you bathing in the moonlight, to Afterlife Anonymous where Ghosts can gather to talk about their regrets or to be helped with this new (after)life. You can even get your fortune read at one of the festivals by a Tarot reader. On top of that, you’re able to buy your own Tarot deck – or to go on a quest around all of Ravenwood to put together an ancient Tarot deck that was used by Lady Ravendancer, an ancestor of the Goths. (As in, Bella Goth from the base game.) Mind you, the search for those cards will take up quite a bit of time and requires you to do favours for the Order of Lenore, or to find them around points of interest in the world.

Reaping what you sow

Life & Death brings two new careers – Reaper & Undertaker. Undertaker is a passive “rabbit hole” career where your Sim vanishes to go off to work, but Reaper is an entirely different story. Much like the Scientist or Doctor career from Get to Work, you can accompany your Sims on their work day as they collect souls or complete other tasks for their boss – the Grim Reaper. The work day consists of going to the Headless Quarters in a different plane of existence, scrying with the Crows in a pool for an assignment, and then heading out to complete that assignment. You even have a weekly quota… of souls.

You may spend time at the workplace practicing your reaping, sharpening your scythe, checking the death trends or investigating if any souls are avoiding their reapening. Often enough you’ll be sent on an assignment, which might range from collecting some Grimbosia to make Grim his favourite snack, closing tears in reality, or even having to do Grim’s job, and to take a Sim’s soul. As you rise in the ranks you will gain benefits, from a new outfit, to being able to mentor fellow co-reapers, to being able to decide how you wish to swoosh your scythe. And at the very top of the career? You become Grim’s right hand. Which comes with certain benefits.

When being sent out for any assignment, you’ll be sent out to any random lot in the world. When sent out to collect a soul you’ll be sent out to a random residential lot. I happened to end up with the neighbours, with one of the Sims being dead on the floor, several witnesses being about, and one Sim having a plea to save the dead Sim’s life. Your job is to gather witness reports, to listen to the plea, and to make a decision about sparing or taking a soul. If it were up to Grim, he’d just want that soul. But you’re the one in charge, so perhaps you can offer a helping hand… or a heartless slash.

When returning from any assignment with new souls in tow, you’re required to send them to the Netherrealm. Later on in the career you can even disappear into the gate to check up on the realm. Overall, this new career is amazingly fun, never got old, and has the perfect kind of Sims 2 humour I’ve missed in some expansion packs. It’s wild.

Funerals & cemeteries

Life & Death brings in a new lot type – the cemetery. Funerals are also a new social event you can organise from your Sim’s phone, or from the urn of the deceased Sim. One of my Sim’s cats, Bubblegum, unfortunately died. Their owner, Emma, was dead-set on getting Bubblegum to live a while longer. You’re able to challenge Grim to several new games now with the new expansion, instead of just pleading for your Sim’s life. But mind you, he is very good at everything. Pick your challenge wisely.

Emma opted to challenge Grim in a game of chess. With a high logic skill and an elderly life, she felt confident she could beat the Reaper. However, Grim decided to cheat as he was losing, knocking over the pieces, and taking Bubblegum’s life regardless… I and Emma were not happy about this, but more on that later… for now, it was time to create our first funeral using the new expansion.

Funerals are a new event in the same vein as Weddings in the “My Wedding Stories pack”, with more expansive options than the usual social gathering. You can set a dress code, coordinate colours and set activities Sims will perform during to shape the type of funeral you want to organise. You can make a choice between a light-hearted or a mournful eulogy and more.

I opted to grab a lot from the gallery that served as a pet cemetery to organise the event at. A beautiful build shared by a kind Simmer. It was called ”Pet Cemetery”.

Once the funeral starts, the leading sim will have brought the urn with them in their inventory. Place it on a memorial stand and link the stand to the deceased Sim so it can be customised in honor of them. Surprisingly, there were no bugs or flaws during this event. It went without a hitch, so props to EA for a bug-free experience come launch.

The lot the funeral was held at had a lot of strays wandering around, and one of those caught the eye of Emma.. they were welcomed to a warm home.

(After)Life & Death

Eventually, Emma would pass away as well. Upon a Sim’s death (unlike with a pet), Grim now gives you the choice to continue on as a playable ghost, Rebirth into a new family if you’ve completed enough of your Soul’s Journey through the Bucket List, or to let the Sim be a free roaming ghost – basically how ghosts used to function before the expansion. Emma remained a playable ghost in the household, as there was unfinished business to settle.

With a prompt flick of her wrist and casting an “Inferniate” spell, she gave the Grim Reaper her thoughts over his.. cheating behaviour. She is a Spellcaster after all, even beyond death.

Ghosts have access to a brand new skill tree, similar to vampire, spellcasters and other occults. You can be both a ghost and a spellcaster, having access to both abilities! However, after already spending a lifetime acquiring skills in cooking, doing a full career, raising children, and raising spellcasting abilities, another full tree that needs to be grinded up beyond death is a bit of a burn-out. High-level ghosts can either maliciously shorten people’s lifespans by devouring their life essence, or give Sims a bit of extra life. Personally, I’ll stick with ghosts as they are.

Completing enough of your Soul’s Journey through a Bucket List lets you Rebirth your Sim into a new household eventually, and going even further on the Soul’s Journey lets your Sim keep several traits and abilities they had in a previous life. Powerful Sims can be born this way, or live on.. eternally rebirthing. Unlike the Ghost Mastery, completing your Soul’s Journey is relatively easy given the right Bucket List objectives. Aspirations and other things also count for your Soul’s Journey.

Conclusion

Life & Death is one of the best expansion packs, if not the best one The Sims team has put out for The Sims 4. From beautiful CAS & Build items, to magnificent world seeped in tons of lore and mystery despite the lack of seasons, I have little to no complaints about the pack. Ghosts could have been made into a better occult, and this pack feels better at handling the “Life” aspect than the “Death” one with it’s fun new career and so forth, but regardless, it adds a lot for Sims players who like to play with Legacies, or wish to customise a passing more. The Rebirth aspect of the Soul’s Journey is an especially fun mechanic to keep a Sim’s story going.