I have a feeling that the Fall 2019′ s game pack for The Sims 4, The Sims 4: Realm of Magic is going to be rather polarizing in terms of how people feel about it. I must admit, I love what EA has done with The Sims and think that the expansions they have introduced so far are pretty darn awesome so I was excited to get my Harry Potter on with this eighth game pack.
How to Download The Sims 4: Realm of Magic
You can download the game pack from Origin store or from a console store for PS4 or Xbox One. Click on the Download button. If you like game packs, check also our review of The Sims 4: Jungle Adventure.
The Game Review
As the name suggests this latest expansion is all about magic. You need to create a spellcaster sim and become the best darn, witch, wizard or whatever you want to call in in the land. The setting for the game is Glimmerbrook and you soon get to go to a very enchanted kind of world.
It is pretty fun stuff, but the cast of characters you come across is relatively small. I think there is a lot of promise here and I know that The Sims is about creating your own story. However, I feel that an expansion such as this would have really benefited from being more focused and having more actual characters to deal with.
So what is it like having magical powers in The Sims 4: Realm of Magic? Well, it is actually pretty fun. You have three different magic skill trees that you can work on. You have untamed magic which is where you can just blast stuff or even start fires. You also have practical magic which is handy as you can use this to fix stuff around your house. Then we have mischief magic which is the most fun as it lets you screw with other Sims.
You do need to do some grinding in the game to get more magical power. You do this at the Magical Realm Academy. Here at the Magical Realm Academy, you have teachers that can train you so that you can learn new stuff. I really do love the idea of this, but it never quite gets to the Hogwarts level of magic learning that I want.
Potions are a big part of the game as well as spells. For example, pretty early on in the game, I created a potion that ticked all the boxes of what my Sim needed. This was great on one hand, but of course, took away much of the challenge. You also have spells that can do things like give you pretty much infinite money. Again, it is cool, but at the expense of any real challenge.
Despite The Sims 4: Realm of Magic being set in a magical world, at the end of the day your spellcaster is still a Sim and with that comes the standard Sim like things. For example, I managed to die of embarrassment twice early on when I started the game due to peeing myself!
You can have this as a stand-alone expansion if you want. However, I really think that combining this with the other expansion packs is how you get the best out of it. Being a badass spellcaster who lives on the beach thanks to the Island Living expansion and it was great.
I think that there are some great ideas with The Sims 4: Realm of Magic, and it is certainly a rather different take. I have a feeling some may like being an all-powerful Sim that can command others to do what they want. For me personally, I just feel this expansion is not quite as good as the others.
