The Sims 4 is granting my castle build wishes, and goths to live in them, with 2 new DLC kits this week

After some leaked screenshots from the EA app let the cat out of the bag last week, EA has revealed the full details on two new Sims 4 DLC kits coming this week. The Castle Estate Kit and Goth Galore Kit were both born out of themes voted on by players last summer and are launching this Thursday.

As a forever build mode player, the Castle kit is going to be my territory. The announcement post gives a preview of all 25 different stone structure choices including grand doorways, a portcullis, and several glass window options that I'm hoping have stained glass swatches. EA gave a pretty nice garden estate example in that post and I'm sure I'll see increasingly ambitious builds once players get their hands on all those arches.

The Goth kit, on the other hand, I'm less thrilled by. Even as someone who spends minimal time in Create-A-Sim, I can spot at least five items—a leather jacket, dress, two tops, and a full body outfit—that look rather similar to existing clothing pieces in the base game or other expansions. Hopefully the other 19 items are ones that the goth voters are psyched by but it seems they may also be underwhelmed.

As is usual, there's plenty of back and forth between Sims players on social media about whether the kits as revealed are bomb or bust. The themes were picked by vote, as mentioned, and plenty of folks do seem excited to see that come to fruition. I'm about 90% sure that I voted in the community poll and know for sure that I would have picked the castle theme over the «high tech futurism» that was also an option. So that's a win for me.

Much as I'll be glad to have some castle bits, it does remind me that for a game with such a prolific Sims 4 custom content community, paying $5 for a handful of items without new gameplay isn't my favorite value proposition. We've all long agreed that Stuff Packs, which come with Build items, Create-A-Sim items, and new gameplay for $10 are vastly superior. Luckily, the Sims 4 roadmap for early 2024 did reveal