One of the ten (10) basic careers in The Sims 4 base game is the Criminal Career. It has always been a popular choice since The Sims era as the Life of Criminal career track and carried on up to The Sims 4 as the Criminal Career. In this article, we will guide you through the basics and more information about this fun-filled job line of work for your daring and bold Sims. For more on job and careers in the Sims 4, have a look into our Job and Careers Mega Guide.
The Sims 4 Criminal Career: An Overview
“Not every Sim wants to play by the rules. You can make tons of Simoleons and have fun, too, as an outlaw.”
Unlike the other career tracks in the game, only the Criminal Career in The Sims 4 rewards your Sim for being mischievous, and, most of the times, evil. After reaching Level 5, your Sim would have to choose between two of the paths – The Boss or The Oracle. These branches will be discussed in detail below.
While this particular career pays a bit lousy compared to the other available jobs in the game, there’s one appealing aspect – bonuses! The Criminal Career gives more significant promotion bonuses than in other Sims 4 careers. Others even consider this as one of the best jobs in the Sims 4. It’s also one of the highest paying Sims job, specifically when you reached Level 10 at the Boss Branch as it that pays 12,460 Simoleons per week.
What are the best Aspirations for the Criminal Career track in The Sims 4?
Whether you’re aiming to be The Boss or The Oracle, it would greatly help for your Sims to have the Public Enemy or Chief of Mischief Aspirations. Both of these fall under the Deviance Aspirations category and would give the Dastardly Bonus Trait. The bonus trait will increase the success of mean interactions, which is necessary to advance in the Criminal Career track.
What is the ideal mood for the Sims 4 Criminal Career track?
The ideal mood for Criminal Career is Playful. However, playfulness does not actually help your Sim gain Mischief skills faster, but the Angry mood does.
Ideal Traits for Criminal Sims
- Evil
- Active
- Goofball
- Mean
- Hot-headed
- Hates Children
- Dastardly (Bonus Trait)
Daily Tasks
Daily tasks are tasks related to their jobs that Sims must complete every day. For the first five levels of the Criminal Career, the daily task is to perform mischief interactions.
As your Sim levels up and selects one of the two branches, the daily tasks vary. They range from performing mean interactions to upgrading objects for the Boss branch, and hacking or making viruses for the Oracle branch.
Criminal Career Cheats
Open the command line by pressing Control + Shift + C, then type testingcheats on to see to it that any cheat will work. Press enter. Then, use the careers.promote criminal cheat to get promoted.
Job Levels and Unlocks
Criminal Career Basic Levels (Level 1 to Level 5)
The first five levels of the Criminal Career in The Sims 4 is relatively easy. To climb up the career ladder, you just have to work on your daily tasks and reach the level of skills required for promotion.
There are several ways to gain Mischief skills. You canuse the Troll the Forums interaction on the computer or perform Mischievous interactions.
Here’s a summary of the Sims 4 Criminal Career from Level 1 to Level 5:
| Level | Job Title | Work Schedule | Hourly Wage | Daily Wage | Promotion Requirements | Bonus for Promotion |
| 1 | Tough Guy/Gal | Daily, 5:00 PM-12:00 AM | $9/hour | $63 | Perform Mischief Interactions | N/A |
| 2 | Petty Thief | Mon-Sat, 8:00 PM – 3:00 AM | $13/hour | $91 | Perform Mischief Interactions, Mischief Skill – Level 2 | $465 bonus Emblems of Espionage |
| 3 | Ring Leader | Tue-Sat, 8:00 PM – 4:00 AM | $17/hour | $136 | Perform Mischief Interactions, Mischief Skill – Level 3 | $558 bonus Duffle o’ Cash Pick Pocket Interaction |
| 4 | Felonious Monk | Tue-Sat, 7:00 PM – 2:00 AM | $23/hour | $161 | Perform Mischief Interactions, Mischief Skill – Level 5 | $670 bonus Vintage Baseball Bat Sculpture |
| 5 | Minor Crimelord | Tue-Sat, 8:00 PM – 2:00 AM | $32/hour | $192 | Perform Mischief Interactions, Mischief Skill – Level 6 | $804 bonus New CAS Parts |
Criminal Career Branches: The Boss and The Oracle
After you’ve reached Criminal job level 5, you will be prompted to select between the two branches of the criminal profession – The Boss branch or The Oracle Branch.
The Boss Branch
“The streets are your playground. You know there are only two paths: up to the top, or down with the fishes. You? You’re going up.”
What’s interesting about the Boss Branch is that it allows your Sims to focus not just on the Mischief skill but Handiness skill as well! You can always get a Woodworking Table to improve in Handiness. In fact, it’s one of the best ways available. You can also make repairs around the house or read a book about Handiness. Either will level your Sim’s Handiness skill.
The Criminal Career Level 9 unlocks the Search for Bank Blueprints ability, which you can find under Web on any computer. Doing this will help increase your Sim’s Mischief Skill. It will also give a +1 Inspired Moodlet for two days.
Here’s a summary of the Criminal Career Boss Branch for The Sims 4:
| Level | Job Title | Work Schedule | Hourly Wage | Daily Wage | Promotion Requirements | Bonus for Promotion |
| 6 | The Muscle | Wed, Fri-Sat, 10:00 PM – 4:00 AM | $106/hour | $636 | Perform Mean Interactions, Mischief Skill – Level 7 | $1148 bonus, Stolen ATM |
| 7 | Getaway Driver | Wed, Sat, 8:00 PM – 3:00 AM | $273/hour | $1911 | Perform Mean Interactions, Mischief Skill – Level 8 Handiness Skill – Level 2 | $2201 bonus, Bars of Gold |
| 8 | Safe Cracker | Sat-Sun, Wed, 6:00 PM-1:00 AM | $319/hour | $2233 | Upgrade Objects, Mischief Skill – level 9 Handiness Skill – Level 4 | $4211 bonus, Stolen Necklace of the Late Duchess Pinky |
| 9 | The Brains | Sun-Mon, Thu, 6:00 PM – 1:00 AM | $383/hour | $2681 | Upgrade Objects, Max Mischief Skill – Level 10, Handiness Skill – Level 6 | $6699 bonus, Search for Bank Blueprints (Computer interaction) |
| 10 | The Boss | Sun-Mon, Wed-Thu, 5:00 PM – 12:00 AM | $445/hour | $3115 | Perform Mean Interactions, Go to Work | $8039 bonus, Fisticuffs Punching Bag, New CAS Parts |
The Oracle Branch
“Why be part of the machine, when you can take it down? There are plenty of ways to skin a cat, or an enterprise, and you’ll figure them out.”
The Oracle career branch tells you one thing: crimes can likewise be done just by using a computer. Criminal Sims who selected this career path focus on hacking and making computer viruses.
While Mischief skill is still useful, it also helps if your Sim has Programming Skill, Genius trait, and Focused moodlet to get better work performance and faster job promotion. To get the Focused Buff, simply browse Simpedia on the computer and later Hack Mainframe. The Hack Mainframe interaction also allows your Sim to make more Simoleons by hacking.
| Level | Job Title | Work Schedule | Hourly Wage | Daily Wage | Promotion Requirements | Bonus for Promotion |
| 6 | DigiThief | Sun – Thu, 1:00 AM-9:00 AM | $43/hour | $344 | Hack or Make Viruses Mischief Skill -Level 7 Programming Skill – Level 2 | $1148 bonus Spy Satellite |
| 7 | Elite Hacker | Sun – Thu, 2:00 AM – 10:00 AM | $73/hour | $584 | Hack or Make Viruses Mischief Skill -Level 8 Programming Skill – Level 4 | $1723 bonus Hot & Cold Tech Spec Poster Hack Mainframe (Computer Interaction) |
| 8 | Anonymous Ghost | Sun – Tue, Thu, 1:00 AM – 10:00 AM | $130/hour | $1170 | Hack or Make Viruses Mischief Skill – Level 9 Programming Skill – Level 6 | $2929 bonus The Indispensable |
| 9 | Net Demon | Sun – Tue, Thu, 1:00 AM – 8:00 AM | $234/hour | $1638 | Hack or Make Viruses Max Mischief Skill – Level 10 Programming Skill – Level 8 | $4686 bonus |
| 10 | The Oracle | Sun – Tue, Fri, 12:00 AM-7:00 AM | $316/hour | $2212 | Hack or Make Viruses Go to Work | $6560 bonus Mayhem Portable Computer New CAS Parts |
Non-Playable Characters (NPCs) in the Criminal Career in The Sims 4
- Nancy Landgraab (Minor Crimelord) from Oasis Springs
- Jacques Villareal (The Brains) from Windenburg (The Sims 4: Get Together)
Also, we’ve made a comprehensive guide about all the careers in The Sims 4, which you can see on this page. For a quick list of The Sims 4 careers, visit this link. Enjoy!
