Info about The Sims™ 4 Paranormal Stuff Pack:

Official game description:
WHAT'S INCLUDED IN THIS PACK
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About the Game
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Light the candles and prepare the rituals to appease your ghastly new roommates in The Sims™ 4 Paranormal Stuff Pack\*! Spectral guests cause mischief and mayhem on Haunted House Lots, but Sims can perform a séance, befriend Guidry the Ghost, become a Paranormal Investigator, and restore order.  
**Meet Ghastly Roommates** — Your new-to-you home might be home to someone else, too, if it’s one of the new Haunted House Lots! Appease the mischievous specters to relax in serenity, or let them run amok for scares day and night.  
**Cleanse Your Home** — If you want to send your new roommates packing, Guidry the Ghost is happy to advise you. Remove accursed objects, perform a séance, commune with the dead, and receive gifts from specters! You can even summon Bonehilda the skeletal maid.  
**Calm the Spirits** — Master the Medium skill and impress Guidry to get a Paranormal Investigator license! Once you’re ready, take on some freelance gigs to expel unwelcome visitors for other Sims. With spooky activity on the rise, it’s up to your Sim to put a stop to it.

Release date: Jan 26, 2021

Categories: Life Simulation, Occult Gameplay, Ghost Banishing, Haunted House Setting, Job Simulation, Supernatural Powers


- Hardware Profile: No data
Feature extractions:
- Community Price:
  - Community fair range: $10.00 - $30.00
  - Reasoning: The reviews tie perceived value strongly to discounts and reasonable pricing, with full-price worth questioned and outright negative sentiment about cost. This suggests the community expects a moderate, sale-friendly base-game price rather than a premium full-price tag, supporting a fair range of roughly $10–$30.
- Playtime Metrics:
  - Game completion: N/A
  - Story completion: N/A
  - Session length: N/A
  - Endgame: N/A
  - Reasoning: The only time references are either in-game hours/days or refer ambiguously to The Sims 4 overall rather than the Paranormal Stuff Pack. The 800-hour claim does not clearly refer to this DLC, and 'short time' refers to earning income, not playtime. Therefore no usable real-world completion, story, session-length, or endgame hours are reported for the target game.
- Time-to-fun: No data
- Player Archetypes:
  - Occult Roleplayer (buy)
    - Motivation: To live out spooky occult fantasies through ghostly companions, seances, transformations, haunted houses, and paranormal investigation.
    - Playstyle: Uses seances, ghost companions, haunted-house lots, ghost/specter transformations, and the paranormal investigator career while managing ghost relationships to keep hauntings under control.
    - Experience: familiar
    - Purchase stance: buy
    - Labels: N/A
    - Reference games: N/A
  - Stuff Pack Value Analyst (buy)
    - Motivation: To judge whether Stuff Packs are worth buying by comparing their content breadth, value, and relative quality.
    - Playstyle: Catalogs CAS items, objects, and gameplay systems, ranks packs, and defends underrated Stuff Packs while calling out weaker ones.
    - Experience: veteran
    - Purchase stance: buy
    - Labels: N/A
    - Reference games: My First Pet's Stuff
  - Spooky Theme Comparison Shopper (sale)
    - Motivation: To find the best affordable spooky-themed Sims content and compare Paranormal against other spooky packs.
    - Playstyle: Tries spooky/occult packs, weighs theme against price, and recommends the pack that best fits the desired spooky vibe.
    - Experience: familiar
    - Purchase stance: sale
    - Labels: N/A
    - Reference games: The Sims 4 Werewolves
  - Culturally Conscious Refund Advocate (no buy)
    - Motivation: To hold game companies accountable for cultural respect and secure refund rights for buyers.
    - Playstyle: Engages in review activism and platform-policy advocacy rather than discussing in-game mechanics.
    - Experience: mixed
    - Purchase stance: no buy
    - Labels: N/A
    - Reference games: N/A


Below are summaries of things people say about the game per category.
Each point is assigned a weight that represents how often it is mentioned across all reviews.
What players like:
- Small pack worth its price (weight 0.45): The pack offers good value and feels complete despite being a small stuff pack. Reviewers describe it as well made and like a mini game pack with a cute aesthetic.
- New career is fun (weight 0.45): The new career, which allows becoming a ghost hunter or paranormal investigator, is described as fun and especially good. Players enjoy the gameplay it offers.
- Great boho furniture and carpets (weight 0.4): Furniture and carpets in the pack are consistently praised as beautiful and good-looking. Players appreciate the boho style and quality of the build items.
- New medium skill is fun (weight 0.35): The Medium skill introduced in the pack is described as fun and interesting, with players enjoying the new gameplay it brings. The skill is learned via the seance table and offers unique paranormal interactions.
- Bonehilda returns as summonable maid (weight 0.35): Bonehilda, a skeletal maid, can be summoned via the seance table and interacts with the household by cleaning and caring for children. Players also mention temporary possession that makes a Sim look like Bonehilda.
- Seance table enables summoning wisps (weight 0.28): The seance table allows players to summon wisps and poltergeists to the lot. It also enables summoning Ossilda, who can serve as a maid.
- Haunted houses are fun (weight 0.28): The pack includes haunted house lots that players find enjoyable. These lots can be added and are a popular feature.
- Gameplay is enjoyable and fun (weight 0.23): Overall, the gameplay is described as enjoyable and a lot of fun. The pack provides engaging content that keeps players entertained.
- Best content among stuff packs (weight 0.23): Many consider this pack to have the most content among stuff packs. It feels like a full game pack despite being a smaller DLC.
- Cute ghosts and specters (weight 0.22): The pack features cute ghosts and specters that players find adorable. The 'lil ghosties' are a highlight for many.
- CAS items are good (weight 0.16): Create-a-Sim items in the pack are generally well-received, with players calling them pretty good or awesome. The CAS additions complement the paranormal theme.
- Fantastic DLC overall (weight 0.16): The DLC is praised as fantastic and enjoyable. It is considered a really good pack that adds significant value to the game.

Common complaints:
- Placed houses disappear permanently (weight 0.45): The residential home from the pack often fails to place properly, disappears after placement, or becomes inaccessible. Reviewers cannot find or re-add the lot, and fear fixing it due to unknown original size.
- Medium skill shallow and capped (weight 0.45): The Medium skill only has 5 levels, lacks depth, and stops progression at level 5. Buying the certificate gives no sense of achievement, and there is no option to draw seance circles even at max level.
- Terrified sims become incapable (weight 0.41): Sims often become Terrified or Scared, which prevents them from performing normal activities and can delay or block gameplay entirely. This is described as infuriating and makes normal life impossible.
- Ghosts break appliances constantly (weight 0.36): Ghosts frequently break faucets and appliances, forcing repairs or costing a fortune. Living in a haunted house becomes a miserable resource management game where making a sandwich takes multiple in-game hours.
- DLC broke the game (weight 0.3): Multiple reports indicate the DLC causes crashes, prevents placement, and makes the game unplayable. Some buyers cannot play at all and do not know why.
- Ghosts not scary or exciting (weight 0.29): Ghosts are not genuinely scary and feel like Disney ghosts rather than the scary ghosts from older Sims games. They only give debuffs in early game, just scare and break things, and cannot be asked to leave.
- Paranormal investigations lack choices (weight 0.29): Investigations involve only looking at the map and clicking, with no planning or meaningful choices. Multiple Sims cannot help with one investigation, and the job is hard to understand initially.
- Pack lacks lasting enjoyment (weight 0.28): After purchase, the pack cannot provide lasting enjoyment, with not much new content. The diversity added to the paranormal part is so small that it questions if it was worth buying.
- Ghost Hunter career disappointing (weight 0.24): The Ghost Hunter career is described as average, not immersive, and lacking depth. It lacks ouija boards, demons, and poltergeists, and the investigator position is not fun.
- Brave trait costs too much (weight 0.23): The Brave trait costs 8,000 points to stop investigations from being frustrating, but it is a lost cause as sims still get scared. This feels like a cheat and makes no sense.
- Gameplay issues ruin immersion (weight 0.23): Pre-existing gameplay issues ruin immersion, and the maid is stupid and only stuffs food, not washing dishes or mopping floors as well as the player's character. Gameplay is described as garbage.
- Not enough apparitions spawn (weight 0.17): Not enough apparitions such as dolls, creepy hands, or goo monsters spawn to complete freelance work tasks, regardless of gig difficulty. This bug occurred repeatedly.
- Bonehilda misbehaves and voice changed (weight 0.17): Bonehilda has a higher toned voice than remembered and does not clean the home. Instead, she constantly runs to the pack tree's dirty grill from the werewolf DLC.
- Wanted ghostbuster or necromancer (weight 0.16): The pack is disappointing for those who wanted to be a ghostbuster or necromancer. Hauntings are exclusive to haunted house lots only, limiting the experience.
- Seance circle purification interrupts (weight 0.16): Seance circle purification can be interrupted, and items required to cleanse the house cannot be properly removed. This makes the cleansing process frustrating.
- No cemeteries or funerals (weight 0.16): Cemeteries were removed, and NPC homes can only have one urn, so funerals cannot be held for other family members who die. The supernatural pack did not improve this situation.
- Lights turn off automatically (weight 0.1): A game-breaking bug forces lights to turn off by themselves, disrupting normal gameplay. This issue is severe enough to be considered game-breaking.
- Ghosts stop max speed (weight 0.1): Ghosts on the property prevent the game from going to max speed when all sims are asleep. This disrupts the usual fast-forward convenience.
- Guidry seduces regardless of gender (weight 0.09): The ghost Guidry seduces sims regardless of gender, which is described as troublesome. This unwanted behavior disrupts gameplay.
- Drinking grants every skill (weight 0.09): Drinking a cup empty grants every skill, so a Sim can knit perfectly but has no way to knit without the knitting pack. This is an unintended cheat-like effect.

Gameplay feedback:
- Paranormal Investigator Career Included (weight 0.97): The pack adds a Paranormal Investigator career, often as a freelance or part-time job, allowing Sims to investigate and cleanse haunted lots. Multiple clusters confirm this career is a core feature.
- Haunted House Lot Type (weight 0.79): Players can designate residential lots as Haunted House, which activates ghost spawns, specters, and paranormal events. This lot type is essential for hauntings and related gameplay.
- Medium Skill with Five Levels (weight 0.68): A Medium skill is included, with five levels, enabling Sims to develop mediumship abilities such as summoning ghosts and performing rituals. This skill is central to the pack's gameplay.
- Ghosts Can Be Summoned (weight 0.64): Players can summon ghosts and spirits, communicate with them, and even transform into a ghost temporarily. Ghosts can also be dated and interacted with in various ways.
- Seance Table and Rituals (weight 0.62): The seance table allows summoning wisps, poltergeists, Bonehilda, and performing cleansing ceremonies or rituals to purify the house. It also facilitates learning the Medium skill.
- Bonehilda Returns as Maid (weight 0.48): Bonehilda is a returning skeletal maid character who cleans the home and cares for children. She can be summoned via the seance table and has associated possession effects.
- Freelance Paranormal Jobs (weight 0.41): Players can take freelance gigs to cleanse lots of evil spirits, with varying difficulties and agency choices. This allows earning high income quickly.
- Terrified Emotion Affects Sims (weight 0.39): Sims can become scared or terrified, which may cause them to stop performing actions or refuse to act. This emotion adds challenge to haunted environments.
- Guidry the Resident Ghost (weight 0.37): Guidry is a named ghost who appears randomly, sometimes seduces Sims, and provides advice on dealing with specters. He is tied to haunted house lots.
- Ghosts Cause Household Disruptions (weight 0.37): Ghosts can break faucets and appliances, and their presence may prevent maximum game speed when all Sims are asleep. They also roam and scare Sims.
- Includes Furniture and Build Items (weight 0.35): The pack adds vintage furniture, carpets, lighting, sculptures, and other build/buy objects. It also includes CAS items and collectible creepy items.
- Haunted House Lot with Visitors (weight 0.35): Haunted house lots attract ghost visitors that roam and scare Sims. Hauntings occur specifically on these lots.
- Limitations and Missing Features (weight 0.35): The pack does not add a new world or a seamless map, and it is considered a stuff pack. Some features like cemeteries were removed or limited.
- Story and Progression Elements (weight 0.29): The pack features a story where Sims start scared but can learn rituals, prevent hauntings, and uncover the narrative. There are named ghost Sims with backgrounds.
- Includes New Traits (weight 0.21): New traits such as Brave and Scared are introduced, affecting how Sims handle paranormal situations. Brave trait can be purchased with points and suits the career.
- Ghostly Events and Trials (weight 0.2): The pack includes ghostly events that present challenges and offer new rewards. Players may face trials and even fist fights with Temperance.
- Ghost Color Types and Behavior (weight 0.15): Ghosts come in different colors indicating their temperament: green (good), blue (indifferent), red (evil, destructive), and yellow (shy). Offerings can be given to receive Ghost Treasures.
- Ossilda and Other Ghost NPCs (weight 0.14): Ossilda is a ghost who can perform tasks like feeding babies and bringing the newspaper. Summoning Ossilda is a feature.
- Cursed House Aspiration Rewards (weight 0.09): Surviving each day in a cursed house grants aspiration points to all household members. This provides a challenge with rewards.
- Skill-Boosting Cup and Items (weight 0.08): A cup can be drunk empty to acquire skills, and there are other collectible creepy items. This adds minor gameplay perks.

Performance notes:
- Building placement causes crashes (weight 0.1): A specific crash occurs when players place buildings, disrupting gameplay. This is a concrete, reproducible bug that needs fixing.
- Game runs well overall (weight 0.09): Some players report that the game runs smoothly without major performance issues. This positive feedback is less specific but worth noting.

Recommendations:
- Positive purchase recommendations (weight 0.56): Multiple reviewers broadly recommend buying this pack, with several calling it worth buying and highly recommended. A few rate it five stars or describe it as essential due to its low price and substantial content.
- Best value during sales (weight 0.28): Many reviewers suggest waiting for a discount or buying on sale, noting that the pack is worth it at a reduced price. Some specifically recommend buying only on discount.
- Good price for content (weight 0.21): The pack is considered worth its price because it feels complete and offers a lot for a small pack. Reviewers note that it is inexpensive yet provides substantial value.
- Great Stuff Pack quality (weight 0.16): Some reviewers consider this one of the best Stuff Packs and a great addition. They feel it is well-made and stands out among similar packs.
- Appeal for paranormal fans (weight 0.16): Reviewers highly recommend this pack for fans of paranormal themes. It is seen as a strong choice for those who enjoy spooky content.
- Avoid purchase, magic DLC better (weight 0.15): A couple of reviewers advise against buying this pack, with one stating that the magic DLC is a more beneficial purchase. They do not recommend it.
- Supports noble shaman playstyle (weight 0.14): Players interested in a noble shaman playstyle are advised to get this pack. It is also suggested to pair it with the butler pack for that playstyle.
- Strong Build/Buy items alone (weight 0.09): The Build/Buy items are highlighted as a reason to get this pack on their own. Reviewers find the objects valuable and appealing.
- Intense aspiration point buff (weight 0.08): One reviewer recommends the pack specifically because it provides a strong aspiration point buff. This makes it appealing for players focused on aspiration rewards.
- Co-op werewolf fighting implied (weight 0.07): One review implies a cooperative element where players fight off Wara Wara together. It suggests a multiplayer or co-op experience.
- Underrated pack deserves higher rating (weight 0.07): A reviewer implies that the pack is underrated and deserves a higher rating. They suggest it is better than its current reception indicates.
- Can wait to buy later (weight 0.07): One reviewer notes that you won't lose anything by buying it later. This suggests there is no urgency to purchase immediately.

Other player notes:
- High content value for stuff pack (weight 0.29): Reviewers consider this pack to have the most content among stuff packs, offering a lot of cool content for a stuff pack. It includes a variety of features beyond typical items and clothes.
- Vintage and antique objects included (weight 0.27): The pack contains vintage or antique style objects, plants, and more traditional clothing. Reviewers note the pack includes a collection of build items and furniture.
- Integrates well with other DLC (weight 0.26): Reviewers note that the pack pairs well with other paranormal and supernatural DLC, such as Realm of Magic and Decor to the Max. It also requires the knitting pack for certain features.
- Priced cheaply and reasonably (weight 0.23): Multiple reviewers mention the pack is fairly cheap and reasonably priced, especially with a discount, offering a lot of content for the price. This makes it an attractive purchase for many players.
- Includes unique gameplay features (weight 0.23): The pack adds a new profession, ghost summoning, medium experience, skeleton maid, haunted house lot, and a pack tree with trials. It also includes the Brave Trait and a passive career with flexible work days.
- Supernatural themed content pack (weight 0.22): The pack is described as a supernatural-themed content pack, called 'Sobrenatural' (Supernatural) in some regions. It includes paranormal aspects that appeal to fans of the genre.
- Comparison to kits and packs (weight 0.21): Reviewers compare this pack to newer Sims 4 content that relies more on kits, and compare kit packs to stuff packs. Most stuff packs are considered underrated on Steam.
- Unfavorable comparison to Sims 3 (weight 0.15): The pack is compared unfavorably to Sims 3, possibly in terms of ghost behavior or content depth. Some players feel older games had scarier ghosts.
- More than just items (weight 0.1): Unlike the Fitness stuff pack, this pack includes a plot, profession, story, and trials rather than just items and clothes. This provides a richer gameplay experience.
- Positive review reception (weight 0.1): Reviews for the pack are mostly positive, indicating general satisfaction among players. This aligns with its high content value and reasonable pricing.
- Includes expected object collection (weight 0.09): The content is what one expects from an object collection, including furniture, build items, clothing, and hairstyles. This meets standard expectations for a stuff pack.
- Completes Life and Death expansion (weight 0.09): According to a reviewer, this pack completes the 'Life and Death' expansion, suggesting it fills a thematic gap. This may appeal to players who own that expansion.
- Werewolf pack tree bug (weight 0.08): The werewolf DLC's pack tree with a dirty grill causes Bonehilda to constantly run to it instead of cleaning. This is a specific bug that affects gameplay.
- Cemetery restoration suggested (weight 0.08): A reviewer strongly suggests restoring the cemetery feature, indicating a desire for more content related to graveyards. This could be a request for future updates or packs.
- Should be an update (weight 0.08): A reviewer feels the pack seems like something that should be an update rather than DLC. This suggests perceived lack of value or that features should be base game.
- Request for fairies and dragons (weight 0.07): A reviewer asks when EA will release fairies and werewolves and when they can raise dragons again. This reflects a desire for more supernatural creatures in the game.
- Comparison to butler pack (weight 0.07): The reviewer compares this pack to the butler pack in relation to the described noble shaman playstyle. This suggests similar functionality or thematic overlap.
- Expected high school haunted house (weight 0.07): A high school expansion pack is expected to come soon and apparently will include a haunted house. This rumor indicates anticipation for future content.
- Reviewer owns many DLCs (weight 0.06): The reviewer owns 35 DLCs and still has missing ones, highlighting the extensive amount of downloadable content for the game. This context shows the reviewer's experience.

Emotions:
- Enjoyment (weight 0.17): Players enjoy the new profession and ghost summoning, along with the medium experience and vintage objects. The pack offers excellent content including plot, career, and trials, making it a fun and interesting twist to The Sims.
- Disappointment (weight 0.15): The pack lacks substantial new content and diversity, with shallow medium skill and bland investigator career. Technical issues like disappearing houses and removed features like cemeteries contribute to disappointment.
- Satisfaction (weight 0.13): Players are satisfied with the clothing and furniture items, well-crafted paranormal detective gameplay, and high income potential. The pack offers a lot of content for a cheap price, including boho furniture and haunted lot traits.
- Frustration (weight 0.12): Technical problems such as crashes when placing buildings and disappearing houses cause frustration. Gameplay issues like terrified Sims refusing to act and insufficient apparitions for tasks also frustrate players.
- Annoyance (weight 0.06): Ghosts like Guidry seducing regardless of gender and specters being annoying contribute to annoyance. Bonehilda not cleaning properly and Brave Trait costing 8,000 points to mitigate frustrating investigations add to the irritation.
- Fear (weight 0.04): The house hauntings and ghostly events evoke fear, as does the concern that fixing the house might mess it up due to unknown original size.
- Nostalgia (weight 0.04): Players feel nostalgic for missing stuff packs and features from Sims 3 like full moon effects and raising dragons. The pack can also be a fun memory if bought to properly play one family.
- Amusement (weight 0.04): Amusement arises from funny situations like Sims getting scared and doing nothing, jokes about leaving the mortal body, and Guidry randomly showing up to smash Sims and fight Temperance.
- Enthusiasm (weight 0.04): Enthusiasm is driven by the cursed house granting intense aspiration point buffs, the guru outfit and new career, and supernatural features like summoning the dead and becoming a paranormal investigator.
- Confusion (weight 0.04): Confusion stems from initially struggling to understand how to play the job and the lot disappearing after being mistakenly set to residential.
- Excitement (weight 0.04): Excitement comes from thrilling moments while playing, anticipation for paranormal aspects even if not yet tried, and the return of Bonehilda.
- Dislike (weight 0.02): Dislike is caused by the residential home not being placed properly and requiring a cheat to compact, making parts inaccessible, and not being a fan of the build/buy and CAS content.
- Regret (weight 0.02): Regret is felt because the player bought the pack but cannot play it, feeling it wasted money.
- Anger (weight 0.02): Anger is triggered by a game-breaking bug with lights and the DLC breaking the game.
- Mild disappointment (weight 0.02): Mild disappointment arises because cardigans are not separate items.
- Love (weight 0.02): Love is expressed for the pack adding careers and depth to the game, and for the expansion pack overall.
- Surprise (weight 0.02): Surprise is felt because the pack is not rated higher on Steam.
- Appreciation (weight 0.02): Appreciation is directed at the paranormal detective career.
- Pleasant surprise (weight 0.02): Pleasant surprise comes from the vintage furniture being more usable than expected.
- Fondness (weight 0.02): Fondness is felt for the two named ghost sims with detailed backgrounds.}