If you played The Sims throughout the 2000s and 2010s, whether that’s on console or computer, you’d be forgiven if you thought you just overlooked where to buy cars in The Sims 4. After all, flinging around the neighbourhood in a cheap (and ugly) Sloppy Jalopy was a canon event in the early stages of any Sims 3 save.
The Sims 2 was also packed with its own fair share of clunky and quirky vehicles, including a few honest-to-god Ford vehicles. You could even build your own car from a hunk of junk until it was just about road legal.
With all of that in mind, we’ve generally been able to finish off our little virtual dollhouses with a nice (or nasty) ride ever since The Sims 1. So, where are cars in The Sims 4?
Well, it still doesn’t have them. In a manner of speaking, at least.
So, The Sims 4 doesn’t have… any cars?
It’s not that simple. The Sims 4 doesn’t have usable cars. It does technically have cars, though. If you know where to look.
You can grab shells for non-functional cars by using cheats. These items are tucked away in debug, meaning they’re purchasable items that aren’t in Buy Mode’s main catalogue. You won’t be able to interact with them, and they’ll basically just fulfil the same purpose as a statue. But at least it’s got cars you can add to builds.
Because these cars are purely for aesthetic purposes and can’t generally be accessed without cheats, they can look kind of janky. Some of the better examples are just a little compressed, bringing a kind of Kei car realness to your driveway. In other cases, they unfortunately just look straight-up wrong.
You can, however, pick up some custom content cars that look better. You just load them into your game in the same way you would any other custom content.
Why doesn’t The Sims 4 have drivable cars?
We don’t know exactly, but you could probably hazard a couple of guesses. One is that the closed-world-ish nature of worlds means that there isn’t as much of a need for them as there was in The Sims 3. The Sims 3 was basically entirely open world within a map, meaning the ol’ Heartbreak Hot Rod would come in clutch (literally) while your Sim sped from one side of Sunset Valley to the other.
The Sims 4, on the other hand, isn’t really open world at all. It’s more open than The Sims 2, insofar as you can explore tiny pockets of the neighbourhood at once, but when you go from lot to lot, you enter a loading screen. So, your travel time doesn’t really need to be sped up with a motor.
Of course, that theory doesn’t fully explain things, considering that The Sims 2 also wasn’t an open world, but it’s a thought.
Cross-pack functionality could get in the way
Another reason could relate to cross-pack functionality. Eco Lifestyle introduces short-term climate change and environmental pollution to your Sims’ worlds (yes, really). Linking this system up with a more fleshed-out vehicle system, beyond bikes and boats, could be tricky. Who wants Malcolm Landgraab smogging up the neighbourhood with his gas guzzler?
So saying, there are already presumably cars and carpools in-universe, so to speak, which don’t impact the environment at all. Because of that, I really don’t feel like asking for a Kit or Stuff Pack with a couple of carbon-neutral cars is that much to ask for.
In fact, it’s actually right at the top of my list of things I want added to the game. Which brings me to my next reason: I think that maybe we don’t have cars in The Sims 4 yet because they’re being added in DLC further down the line. At least, that’s what I tell myself, even though it’s been over a decade now.
