The Sims 4: The new update introduces the sexual orientation of the Sims

The Sims 4

Maxis has announced that Sims' sexual orientation will be added in the next free update for The Sims 4 to make the game even more inclusive. How will it work? Sims are currently attracted to people the player flirts with, regardless of their gender. In general the system works, but does not cover all possible cases.

With the next update, however, sexual orientation will become a selectable option, ie it will be possible to make it a fixed trait of a Sim. Then you can decide who a Sim is attracted to, or if they are aromantic and asexual (not selecting any options).

Let's read the explanation taken directly from the game's official blog:

How it works

With sexual orientation, you can assign a variety of attraction parameters related to your Sim. Below is the sexual orientation feature in Create A Sim.

My Sim is attracted to:

It's a simple statement from the Sims that your Sim is attracted to. If a Sim whose gender does not match your Sim's attraction settings attempts a romantic interaction with them, they are rejected.

The Sims 4 Sexual Orientation Options You can check any combination of attraction boxes (even all or none) to match your Sim's romantic orientation. In the future, we may expand the feature to include additional sexual identities not currently available.

I anticipate that objections will be raised regarding the initial sexual options, which are binary. Mechanically, non-binary Sims don't yet exist in The Sims 4. While we've made significant progress in portraying non-binary Sims with the pronoun update, we recognize that pronouns are not equivalent to sexual identities and that in this respect we still have some way to go. I'll talk more about this in the FAQ.

My Sim is romantically exploring:

This setting determines whether your Sim's sexual orientation may change over the course of the game and finally allows us to tell two important stories.

The first is the story of a person who understands who he is and has a clear and unchanging perception of the Sims he is attracted to. It is a condition expressed by a Sim who does not romantically explore. Sims whose exploration is set to "No" do not change orientation over the course of the game and firmly reject the advances of Sims they are not sexually attracted to.

The second story is about a person still being looking around. Sims whose browsing is set to "Yes" have an initial sexual orientation setting due to the previous stage, but this can change over the course of the game. As your Sim has romantic interactions, they may notice that they have changed a lot since they started.

My Sim is interested in wooing with:

This setting determines who they can woo with woo your Sim. If you are trying to tell the story of an asexual Sim, you can avoid selecting all the options. On the other hand, you could tell the story of an aroma Sim by selecting the interests of fiki fiki and avoiding checking all the romantic attraction boxes. Learn more in the FAQ.

You can also tell even more specific stories, for example about a Sim who is attracted to people of various sexual orientations but interested in physical intimacy with only one of them.

The team also wanted to clarify why there are only two sexual orientations:

Why are there only two sexual orientations?

It's an understandable question, since we have recently published the update of the pronouns.

I will try to answer with the utmost transparency: this is due to technical limitations. As anticipated, mechanically non-binary Sims don't yet exist in The Sims 4. At the time of creation, you still need to make a binary gender choice for your Sim, regardless of pronoun settings. We hope that we have shown commitment to improving the representation of sexual identities with features such as gender personalization, which allows you to redefine settings related to body size, dress preferences, pregnancy and toilet use. We believe that updating pronouns is another important step towards a better representation of non-binary genders, but we also recognize that pronouns do not equate to sexual identities.

The Sims 4 is now 8 years old and is based on systems that were originally designed with binary sexual options. In the following years we have reached important milestones such as gender personalization, pronouns and now sexual orientation. It's an ongoing journey that includes many other milestones, such as introducing proper mechanical systems that fully support non-binary Sims.

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