Sims 4 'incest bug' causes characters to want to date their parents

The Sims 4’s new High School Years expansion launched on Thursday - but a bug in the system makes the sims characters age rapidly and become attracted to family members.

The desire-gone-haywire is related to the new 'wants and fears' feature that was brought back from past Sims titles.

The characters' wants can be split into long-term, short-term, and reactionary categories.

Fears are what develop over time for characters and are related to what the characters' traits are like.

To avoid the incest bug, the fears and wants can be turned off.

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Polygon also reported that players that log into The Sims 4 will also get a pop-up warning about the bug, further encouraging them not to play Sims that have been marked with short or long lifespans.

Sim characters can still die in accidents regardless of the option chosen, but this also lets players choose the length of their natural life.

As for the aging bug, where characters grow from toddler to senior swiftly, a representative acknowledged it via a tweet on the Sims’ official Twitter.

“We are currently investigating instances involving Sims auto-aging up in saves using the Short or Long lifespan,” Electric Arts said via The Sims account.

“We recommend temporarily playing in or creating new saves with the default/’normal’ lifespan, as we work towards a solution.”

Sims 4 Quality Designer and Twitter user SimGuruNick also spoke about the bug and noted that the team is working to resolve it.

“I just wanted to acknowledge that the Want to date a family member is something we know about, we’ve reproduced ourselves, we’re working on it,” SimGuruNick wrote.

“We’re looking to get it fixed ASAP, thanks for all the bug reports, we appreciate it. We’re of course working on the aging bug too.”

Indy100 has reached out to game developer Electronic Arts for more information.

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