The Sims 4 (and its builders at Digital Arts and Maxis) have come underneath hearth just lately for including microtransactions and paid mods to the sport, Bethesda Creation Club-style, with a brand new function referred to as The Sims 4 Marketplace. Naturally, gamers are sad {that a} sport with over 100 DLC packs (that may price you $1,600) is implementing extra monetization techniques, however the issues with The Sims 4 Marketplace go deeper than participant frustration with what they understand as EA’s greed.
To get a greater thought of what precisely is occurring in The Sims 4, I made a decision to take its new player-creation market for a spin, and what I discovered was disappointing, however not stunning. Maybe the very first thing to notice is that EA has now carried out a premium in-game forex, referred to as Moola, which gamers should buy earlier than they’ll purchase Maker Marketplace gadgets. And it seems, the Maker Marketplace is every thing Sims 4 gamers don’t desire in a sport replace, but it surely’s removed from the primary time EA has plugged its ears and yelled “I am unable to hear you!” in response to Sims gamers’ complaints.
To perceive how the sport ended up right here, we’ll should journey again to early 2025. It has been a wierd yr for The Sims, and the sport’s path to a paid mod market has been a bumpy one. The franchise celebrated its twenty fifth anniversary in February 2025, which EA and Maxis marked with a number of Sims 4 content material creator collaborations, promises to fix game-breaking bugs that had gone ignored for years, and naturally, the announcement of much more paid DLC. Naturally, gamers have been excited to see long-standing bugs addressed, and have been pleased with new base sport updates that fleshed out Sims’ personalities and romantic aspirations, together with DLC packs that launched romantic new locales and even new methods for Sims to kick the bucket.
All was nicely (comparatively talking) till October 2025, when members of EA’s Sims Creator Community–including massively widespread creators like Kayla “LilSimsie” Simms–left the program en masse within the wake of the announcement that EA was being offered to Saudi Arabia’s Public Funding Fund, Jared Kushner’s Affinity Companions, and controversial funding agency Silver Lake.
For years, EA had depended closely on its content material creators to advertise its growth packs, even collaborating with LilSimsie for a pack themed entirely around her most popular aesthetic. With almost each one its greatest The Sims 4 creators gone, EA formulated a easy answer: Discover new ones. Earlier this month, the writer put out a public name for brand new content material creators for its player-made content material market, which has apparently been within the works for at the least a yr.
“The Sims Marketplace Maker Program is now open for purposes!” the official Sims 4 account posted on X. “Be taught extra and apply at the moment!”
The backlash was prompt. Players have been already disillusioned with the sport’s just lately carried out login rewards and limited-time occasions, which supplied gamers underwhelming in-game items (and which have been swiftly duplicated without cost by modders). EA hid multiple critical replies to its announcement tweet, and did not handle comments from a creator who had just lately left the Marketplace Maker Program claiming EA was unclear in regards to the phrases and used promises of a steady income to financially manipulate smaller creators into becoming a member of or staying.
Then got here the reality: Members of EA’s Marketplace Maker Program can set their very own costs, however they solely get 30% of the cash from every buy of their creations, whereas EA takes house 70%.
This incentivizes creators to cram extra content material into their Marketplace choices, and cost as little for them as potential. In consequence, Customized Content material (CC) packs on the market on the Maker Marketplace are hardly ever priced at greater than 500 Moola ($5 USD), and their greatest promoting point–something talked about in almost each itemizing I got here across–is coloration swatches.
In The Sims 3, gamers may use a coloration wheel in each Create-A-Sim (CAS) and Construct/Purchase Mode to customise Sims’ hair, eyes, clothes, furnishings, and decor. This made matching outfits and creating the perfect lounge a cinch. However as a result of The Sims 4 was initially envisioned as an internet MMO meant to be playable on cell units, EA did away with the colour wheel and changed it with a small variety of coloration swatches for every merchandise. To at the present time, Sims solely have 24 hair coloration choices, and have even fewer choices for clothes colours. In order for you pastel pink hair, too bad–the solely possibility is magenta. In order for you neon purple hair, your solely possibility is lavender. In order for you an all-black outfit, good luck–even swatches that should be the identical coloration typically find yourself being noticeably totally different when utilized to totally different items of clothes. EA has repeatedly stated that implementing a coloration wheel for Sim hair (not to mention eyes, garments, furnishings, and decor) is just not possible.
That is a bit odd, on condition that EA simply carried out not solely a coloration wheel however a customized portray mechanic for pet-Sims like cats, canine, and horses (which the sport’s code treats like common, human Sims). If you wish to create a literal rainbow unicorn within the Sims 4, you possibly can simply achieve this. However if you wish to tweak your Sim’s dye job barely? Nicely, you will want a mod for that–or you will must pay for a Maker Marketplace content material pack of coloration swatches, assuming they add any. I handpainted this Lisa Frank-inspired cat in about 20 minutes utilizing no customized content material in anyway, however in response to EA, making my Sim’s hair the best shade of purple is a technical impossibility.
As I stated earlier than, the creator-made content material within the Marketplace is not overly costly. However until you are a console participant, there’s completely no cause to buy it, as a result of you possibly can simply discover equal CC gadgets without cost on websites like CurseForge, The Sims Resource, and even Tumblr. Many creators present free CC and make their earnings through supporters on Patreon, which solely takes a 5% to 12% minimize of the cash given to creators–a much better deal than the 70% EA’s taking from its Marketplace Makers. Previously, EA has even tried to regulate what Sims modders can do on Patreon, altering The Sims 4 TOS in 2022 to seemingly stop modders from offering early entry to mods through Patreon, a coverage they later walked again. On reflection, it seems like EA was trying to pre-emptively make it troublesome for modders to revenue from their work on Patreon, which would go away the Maker Marketplace–which has been in growth for some time now, primarily based on feedback from former members–as the one choice to earn an earnings from their mods.
Although the Maker Marketplace might sound attractive with its promise of higher publicity for creators, it is clear that this system rips off creators simply as a lot as gamers, and continues to provide EA an excuse to keep away from implementing a function it beforehand supplied whereas it fees gamers for that performance.
Colour swatches are simply the largest promoting level within the Maker Marketplace. Look, this assortment of European-style electrical retailers solely prices 200 Moola ($2) and has 10 coloration swatches! Nevermind the truth that a virtually similar set of retailers is available for free through The Sims Useful resource.
Why would I–or every other player–waste much more real-life money on an already overpriced sport that seems to see its largely feminine playerbase as nothing greater than an infinite provide of money? The Maker Marketplace is an insult to gamers and creators alike. The solely demographic who would possibly profit from the Maker Marketplace is the console playerbase, as console gamers can’t set up mods or CC from the web. However that does not change the truth that EA is as soon as once more utilizing predatory monetization techniques to try to wring more money out of gamers who may need already shelled out for a sport with over 100 DLCs, as a substitute of implementing the one function gamers have been begging for since day one: a coloration wheel that may enable for coloration customization in a sport that has traditionally been all about participant freedom and creativity.
On one degree, the Maker Marketplace’s choices are each underwhelming and overpriced–one Maker-made “Elevated Necessities” pack prices $5 and solely contains “improved” variations of pre-existing clothes gadgets initially created by EA. Paid mods have by no means and will never elicit a positive response from gamers (one thing each EA and Bethesda have not appeared to determine but). Yow will discover higher CC without cost all around the web, and you may assist the creators of that CC instantly through Patreon as a substitute of handing EA a large 70% minimize of the earnings for content material it was too lazy and grasping to make in-house. If we dig in deeper, nevertheless, the best way EA makes use of {the marketplace} to push content material creators so as to add lacking components or options to the sport, fees for them, and takes a giant slice of the cash, is finally predatory. Creators, gamers, and even The Sims 4 itself do not feel like priorities for EA anymore; it is clear their eyes are on one thing an entire lot greener.