Emotion Cheats in The Sims 4

One of the aspects that makes The Sims franchise stand out from others is the humanity of its protagonists. Many great games have taken people far and wide in emotional journeys alongside deeply fleshed out characters, but in just about all of them the feelings, actions and reactions are scripted parts of the story.

Some open-ended games give some power back to the players, but under the hood they still work ‘on rails’, despite giving you a choice of which path(s) to follow. With The Sims, characters act and react based on their dynamic environment, crafted by no other than you!

How Emotions work

Moods in The Sims are constantly changing, but much like real people, there are benefits and consequences to them, and sometimes you might need them to feel a certain way to fit the desired situation. Before diving into what mood cheats for The Sims 4 there are and which to use, let’s first take a look at how emotions and moods work in the first place.

Negative and Positive Emotions

There are fifteen primary emotions in The Sims, eight ‘positive’ and seven ‘negative’. While this separation exists, it’s worth noting there is no such thing as the perfect emotional state. Every situation, be it professional or personal, has its own reaction to each mood. For example, anger won’t be any good for a teenager, but it might be successfully channelled by criminal Sims in a way that boosts their work performance. Here’s a summary of which emotions they can feel:

Positive emotions:

• Fine
• Happy
• Energised
• Confident
• Focused
• Flirty
• Playful
• Inspired

Negative emotions:

• Uncomfortable
• Sad
• Tense
• Dazed
• Embarrassed
• Bored
• Angry

By default, a Sim default mood is Fine. When their Needs are satisfied, this makes them Happy. The Sims rewards momentum, meaning those who went from Fine to Happy have an easy shot at making it to elevated states like VERY Confident.

The Moodlet System

What Moodlets are about

Characters have their mood affected by moodlets. These can be best described as event-based effects – once a certain action or set of conditions is met, the moodlet is triggered and affects the Sim in question. The resulting effect from a moodlet can last anywhere from minutes to days. Moodlets traditionally add to an emotion, but this is not an exclusive process.

Primary and Secondary Emotions

A Sim feels its primary emotion – the one most moodlets have added to – but that is only what they express. Other moodlets may have added a significant amount to different emotions, but at a smaller scale. These are called secondary emotions. While not active in this state, the likelihood of them becoming a primary emotion once new moodlets are applied or old ones wear off is high.

The Emotional Aura

Besides moodlets, another way to affect a Sim’s mood is the Emotional Aura. This originates from items and works over an area of as much as nine squares within a single room. When a character is in a space with a certain number of auras active, they’ll receive a moodlet corresponding to the mood the objects are meant to inspire. These objects can be obtained through careers.

Emotion and Mood Cheats

Now that you’ve become an expert on Sims psychology, you probably know how to get them feeling the way you want. For those times when the normal way is much too hard, too slow or just plainly unappealing, we’ve put together a few cheats to get things going quicker.

To use them, open the Cheat Console (Ctrl+Shift+C) and type in ‘testingcheats true’. This activates the test mode, which enables you to use other cheats as you will.

The following table contains a list of mood cheat codes on the left column, with an explanation on the right. Use them wisely!