The Sims 4 Vampires explained, from how to become a vampire and back again with a vampire cure

What are vampires in The Sims 4 and how do they work?

Vampires - like ghosts, aliens, mermaids, spellcasters, and servos - are a unique creature type that stand apart from ordinary Sims.

Similar to aliens and mermaids, vampires have a 'Dark Form': their true supernatural appearance which they take on when feeding from humans, but which can be hidden under the guise of an ordinary Sim to help them escape detection in everyday life.

A vampire's ordinary and Dark Form appearances can be edited separately, although the player can choose which details are shared between the two.

You can also choose whether your vampire Sim defaults to their ordinary or Dark Form appearances by clicking on the active Sim and selecting the option to 'Show/Hide Dark Form' from the 'Vampire' menu.

While vampires can start biological families with other types of Sims (both ordinary and occult), their offspring will inherit the powers of either one parent or the other, hybrid creature types being impossible in The Sims 4.

There is one minor exception: a deceased vampire will return as a vampire-ghost; but it's a one-way street, and a ghost cannot be turned into a vampire.

The Sims 4 Vampire aspirations, skills, benefits and drawbacks

The Sims 4: Vampires introduces three new aspirations to help your Sims make the most of their undeath:

• Vampire Family (under the Family Aspirations category)
• Master Vampire (under the Knowledge Aspirations category)
• Good Vampire (under the Popularity Aspirations category)

You don't have to commit your Sims to any of these aspirations in order for them to become vampires. However, in order to get anywhere with any of these new aspirations, your Sim will need to become a vampire before they can do much else towards fulfilling their goals.

If you want to set an existing Sim on the path to the life vampiric using these structures, you can change their aspiration in-game at any time by clicking the 'Select New Aspiration' button (found on the Aspirations tab of the Simology panel).

Alternatively, if you're starting your game with a new household, you can select one of these aspirations during character creation (see the Create-A-Sim section, below).

The Vampires game pack also introduces the Vampire Lore skill. Reading books and researching on the computer helps vampire Sims to understand and manage their condition.

Sims with the 'Master Vampire' and 'Good Vampire' aspirations will need to achieve certain levels of the skill in order to progress, but all vampire Sims (as well as any staunchly anti-occult Sims who wish to keep the vampires from their door) will benefit from the lessons they learn.

Note: Uniquely among all skills in The Sims franchise to date, Vampire Lore goes up to Level 15 instead of being capped at Level 10. Those last five levels grant access to some very powerful books and recipes, so be sure to keep working on it!

What are the benefits and drawbacks of vampirism in The Sims 4?

Vampires in The Sims 4 enjoy a number of significant lifestyle perks. A Young Adult, Adult, or Elder who becomes a vampire will immediately and permanently cease to age, meaning that death from old age is no longer something they need to fear.

A Teen or younger vampire will age normally until they enter the Young Adult life stage, at which point the benefit kicks in.

Vampires have fewer needs: the Bladder need is gone for good, while the Hunger and Energy needs are replaced by Thirst and Vampire Energy, respectively.

Thirst decays normally if a vampire Sim doesn't drink Plasma (the Sims-verse euphemism for blood) regularly but, crucially, there is no vampire equivalent to death from starvation: dangerously low Thirst renders a vampire Sim dangerous to others, not to themselves. Vampire Energy, meanwhile, only depletes when the vampire uses their special powers.

There are a total of twenty-five vampire powers in the game, most with multiple levels. New powers are unlocked every time a vampire increases their rank, which they can do by drinking Plasma, increasing their Vampire Lore skill, and using the lower-rank powers they already have.

If you're familiar with vampire fiction you'll probably have a good idea what to expect from these powers: they include the ability to take on other forms; influence the minds of mortals; and generally become stronger, faster, and better than ordinary Sims.

However, if it sounds like becoming a vampire is all fun and games, think again: vampires are subject to some fairly severe limitations, too. By default, they'll be unable to go outside during the day without burning, which causes their Vampire Energy need to rapidly deplete.

This can make holding down a day job tricky, as well as potentially leading to death by sunlight: a unique death type that occurs when the Vampire Energy need hits zero while the vampire is in the sun.

Furthermore, vampires can't regain the Thirst need by consuming ordinary food: it has to be Plasma, and getting hold of some isn't necessarily as easy as going to the fridge.

Vampires with higher levels of the Vampire Lore skill can seek out alternative means of nourishment, but new vampires will be reliant on their ability to feed on other Sims, at least at first.

Those Vampire Powers don't exist in isolation, either: they are accompanied by eleven Vampire Weaknesses.

Like Powers, Weaknesses include many classic vampire tropes, such as increased vulnerability to sunlight; overwhelming guilt about their preference of beverage; and other restrictions that impact on a vampire's ability to live an ordinary and fulfilling life.

When a vampire Sim increases their rank, they will sometimes need to take on a weakness in order to gain access to their new powers. The player gets to choose what Weaknesses their vampire Sim takes on.

Weaknesses are limiting by design, and you need to weigh the costs of those limitations against what you want your vampire to be able to gain from their Powers. Some Powers and Weaknesses even conflict with each other, and you can't simply change them once you've made your selection; so choose wisely.

Where to find vampires in The Sims 4: Forgotten Hollow, Vladislaus Straud, and the Vatore siblings

In The Sims 4, you can embark upon a vampiric life no matter where you live. However, if you're looking to really indulge in the vampire aesthetic, you might want to consider checking out Forgotten Hollow, the new world that ships with the game pack.

The whole place is, needless to say, very spooky: with rolling fog and ominous ravens, as well as rumours of a cave full of bats nearby, Forgotten Hollow really sets the mood for the gothic hijinks to ensue.

Forgotten Hollow consists of a single neighbourhood, made up of five residential lots. Four of the five lots have pre-made houses built on them, and two of these houses are occupied when you install the game pack.

This is actually fairly significant: in the Straud and Vatore households, you will find the only pre-made, playable occult creatures in all of The Sims 4.

Even if you don't jump over to Forgotten Hollow immediately after installing Vampires, you'll likely become familiar with Vladislaus Straud quite quickly.

He's picked up a bit of a reputation among players because of his tendency to make creepy phone calls to your active Sim praising the loveliness of their neck, before possibly turning up at their house later that night to compel them to give him a drink of their delicious plasma.

He's quite persistent too: willing to travel literally anywhere in the game world in order to chow down on his chosen victim.

Caleb and Lilith Vatore are a much less offputting pair. Though far from being recluses, they won't go telephone stalking complete strangers or breaking into other Sims' houses in the middle of the night.

If you choose to move into one of the unoccupied lots in Forgotten Hollow, at least one of the Vatore siblings will turn up as part of the Welcome Wagon.

They're both rather sweet, actually, and getting to know them is probably the best way to make a start on turning your Sim into a playable vampire.

Of course, Vladislaus Straud and the Vatore siblings are already playable, so if you want to quickly jump in and see what vampires in The Sims 4 can do, you can just load up either household and start playing with them straight away.

How to become a Vampire in The Sims 4

Assuming that you didn't purchase the Vampires game pack just to play with those three pre-made characters forever, you're eventually going to want to make some vampires of your own. There are a few ways to go about this, but there's only one method incorporated into ordinary gameplay.

There's a pretty strong consensus out there that, to turn into a vampire, you need to be bitten by a vampire. The Sims 4 is not out to rewrite the rulebook on this one. This is why Vladislaus and the Vatores are so important: you need a vampire in order to make more vampires.

It will come as a relief to many players to learn that not every Sim who gets bitten by a vampire for feeding purposes gets turned into a vampire themselves - otherwise Vlad's out-of-control hunting habits would rapidly go from an occasional annoyance to a nightmare of overpopulation.

On the other hand, it's equally good to know that becoming a vampire isn't especially hard: all you need is a vampire as an acquaintance. If Vlad doesn't come calling of his own volition, you can visit either of the pre-existing vampire households in Forgotten Hollow and introduce yourself.

After that, initiating the bite is as easy as making chit-chat. Seriously: the vampires of The Sims 4 are curiously eager to share their blessing/curse with the world, and all you need is to be Acquaintances and have a moderate Friendly relationship value with them to unlock the 'Ask to Turn' interaction.

Not all vampires are able to turn other Sims: in order for your request to be successful, the vampire needs to have invested some of their Power Points into unlocking the 'Vampire Creation' power (which becomes available once they attain the rank of Minor Vampire). Fortuitously, all three pre-made vampires come with this power already available to them.

Note: In a rare departure from many portrayals of vampires in popular culture, The Sims 4 does not consider the vampiric embrace to be in any sense romantic. Thus, vampire Sims can turn their own mortal relatives (e.g. parents, siblings, and offspring); and Young Adult/Adult/Elder vampires can turn Teens, and vice versa.

Younger Sims must wait until they are Teens to become vampires. This applies to using the 'Ask to Turn' interaction, but also to the more traditionally conceived offspring of vampire parents, whose powers (if they inherit them) will lie dormant until that time.

In the likely event that your request is accepted, your Sim's vampiric sponsor will take a drink from their neck, before offering their own wrist in reciprocation. This little ritual begins the process of turning your Sim into a vampire, but the effects aren't immediate.

After exchanging plasma with the vampire, your soon-to-be undead Sim will gain the 'Strangely Hungry' moodlet boosting the Uncomfortable emotion, and which has a hidden duration. Their hunger need will decay at an increased rate, but ordinary Sim food will have a decreased effect.

As additional reminders, the Sim sports two discreet puncture holes in their neck, and will occasionally groan and clutch at their stomach as an eerie supernatural light emits from their body.

Around 12 in-game hours later the moodlet will expire and be replaced by a stronger Uncomfortable moodlet, 'Disgusted by Food'.

A Sim in this condition can still consume ordinary food, but the increased decay and decreased gains will be even more pronounced, and they might take longer to eat as they struggle against the suddenly unpleasant sensation.

Another 12 hours or so in-game and 'Disgusted by Food' will give way to 'Appetite Lost'. Once again, the negative effects are stronger, but now the Sim will be lucky if they can keep that human food down at all: eating anything will make them nauseated, which carries a risk of vomiting.

One final 12-hour hour stretch later, during which your Sim is somewhat unavoidably miserable, and you'll receive a pop-up notification informing you that your Sim is transforming into a vampire.

That weird purple glow that's been hanging around them on and off will intensify, actually lifting them up in the air, before turning into spinning strands of black smoke that surround them. A moment later, your Sim lands back on the floor a fully-fledged vampire - complete with the new 'Strange Thirst' moodlet. You can probably guess what it is they're thirsting after.

You'll also get your first peek at their randomly generated Dark Form - which, if you're familiar with the infamous randomised fashion choices of The Sims 4's NPCs, probably isn't the suave look you were hoping for.

Luckily, you can edit your vampire Sim's appearance (including both their clothing and a bunch of vampire-exclusive cosmetics like supernatural eye and skin colours, vampire teeth, and skin details) by using the 'Change Sim' interaction on a dresser or mirror.

After that, you should probably think about spending the modest handful of Vampire Power Points your Sim gained when they turned, as well as finding them their first drink. From then on, it's up to your vampire Sim to seize the night in whatever way best pleases them.

How to get a Vampire cure in The Sims 4

Being a vampire may give your Sim a shot at immortality, but they don't call it a curse for nothing.

After a while, your vampire Sim may wish to renounce their nocturnal existence in favour of good old-fashioned humanity, even if it means eventually growing old and dying. It's not easy, by any means, but they do have a shot at redemption.

In order to reverse their vampirism, your Sim (or someone they know) will need to become the best Vampire Lore expert around.

Once a Sim has gained Level 15 in the Vampire Lore skill, they unlock the ability to make the Ultimate Vampire Cure, which can be mixed like a cocktail at any bar. (Fortunately, there is no accompanying Mixology skill requirement.)

They'll need the right ingredients, of course - 10 garlic, 10 wolfsbane, 10 plasma fruit, and two-and-a-half grand in cash - but if they're lacking a green thumb, the plants can be purchased from a computer by a Sim with Vampire Lore at Level 8 or higher. You'll need to come up with the cash on your own.

Note: The Ultimate Vampire Cure can be mixed by anyone with the requisite skills and ingredients. The Sim making the Cure doesn't need to be the one who's going to drink it, or even a vampire at all.

Drink this appealing-sounding mixture and in a glow of light your character will be a vampire no longer. They'll lose access to their powers and weaknesses, but be free to enjoy life as an ordinary mortal Sim once again.

If, somewhere down the line, they start to regret their choice, they can always seek out a new or former vampire buddy and start the whole process again by asking to be turned.

Other ways to get Vampires in The Sims 4

If you don't want to spend time introducing yourself around Forgotten Hollow and then still have to wait 36 in-game hours for your Sim to transform into a vampire, there are a couple of options to quick-start your game with a playable vampire Sim.

Create a vampire using Create-A-Sim

Like most other occult creature types in The Sims 4, vampires can be made in Create-A-Sim. You can enter CAS by starting a new game, or by creating a new household in an existing save file.

Your randomly generated starting Sim will almost certainly be an ordinary human. (There is a chance of getting an occult creature type from the Story Mode quiz, but it's hardly reliable.) Unfortunately, there's no way to edit a Sim's creature type in CAS, so you'll need to start again from scratch.

Do this by clicking the 'Add Character' button in the lower left hand corner of the screen, then selecting 'Add Occult Sim' > 'Add Vampire' from the branching pop-up menus.

After your vampire is added to the family, you'll notice an additional prompt on their character portrait to add a Dark Form for them. Once this is done, you can edit the two forms separately, or choose to link some or all aspects of them together.

It all depends on how creepy you want your vampire Sim's true appearance to be... or how badly you want them to pass among mortal society.

From here on in it's very much like a regular CAS experience, with a few added extras. In addition to the usual preset faces, vampires have access to a tab called 'Vampire Archetypes': i.e. preset faces but for vampires in Dark Form, utilising many of the occult cosmetics added with the game pack.

There are also separate tabs for a few different vampiric facial features, such as brows, mouths, and eye sockets, allowing you to create a truly inhuman looking creature to feed on their fellow Simkind. Vampires (in both their human and Dark Forms) can also choose from a wider range of eye colours than ordinary Sims, including some spooky supernatural ones.

Regrettably, since you can't edit a Sim's creature type in CAS, you can't take a favourite Sim from your library or the Gallery and turn them into a vampire if they aren't one already. But this is The Sims 4, so don't worry: there's a cheat for that.

Using vampire cheats in The Sims 4

There are, in fact, two cheats you can use to turn an existing Sim into a vampire.

Which one you should choose depends on whether you want your Sim to experience the authentic transformation - including the day-and-a-half of increasingly desperate discomfort as their humanity slips away - or whether instant gratification is more what you're after.

As always when using debug cheats, save your game before you begin, just in case you run into any glitches. Turn on testing cheats by opening up the cheat console and typing in testingcheats on, followed by one of the following commands:

stats.set_stat commodity_BecomingVampire 2160: Triggers the start of the vampiric transformation as if the active Sim had just been turned by another vampire. This will trigger the 'Strangely Hungry' moodlet, and the process will take the usual amount of in-game time to complete.

traits.equip_trait trait_OccultVampire: Immediately turns the active Sim into a vampire. Success is signalled by a silver bar appearing around the Plumbob, as well as a purple bat icon with a plus sign near their head (signalling that they have gained their starting Power Points).

As a bonus, if you want to turn a vampire into a regular Sim but crafting the Ultimate Vampire Cure seems like too much hard work, you can adapt the latter cheat a bit to quickly restore a vampire Sim's humanity.

Simply substitute the word 'remove' for 'equip' (i.e. traits.remove_trait trait_OccultVampire) to have your active Sim immediately resume their mortality, for better or for worse.

Have a baby with a Vampire Sim

Sometimes playing the long game is appealing, and that's the case for players who want to start their vampire family off in a way that'll definitely get the neighbours talking: by having Woohoo with a Vampire Sim, and giving birth to a Vampire baby.

Of course, your little Vampire baby doesn't come out of the womb hungry for blood and willing to chomp down on an artery to get it. So there's very little indication if your baby is a Vampire until they hit the Teen stage. It's here that you'll be able to shape what your Teen vampire looks like in their Dark Form.

For more information on how The Sims 4 handles vampire pregnancy, check out our Woohoo/Pregnancy guide.

Unique Vampire Interactions with Werewolves and other Non-Occult Sims

Being a powerful and hot Vampire is the dream for anyone who finds these nocturnal creatures compelling, but that doesn't necessarily mean that everyone around you will feel the same way. In fact, you could find yourself on the wrong side of a goold old-fashioned beatdown if you come across a Werewolf Sim.

If you have The Sims 4: Werewolves installed, coming across a Werewolf as a Vampire will lead to immediate distrust and dislike of one another, with your relationship bar immediately turning red. This goes doubly for the unique vampire Sim, Vlad, who is notably hated by all of the werewolves that reside at Moonwood Mill.

Because of the long history of aggression and violence between Vampires and Werewolves, it's going to be very difficult to gain friendship with one another, which leads to a variety of unique interactions - both through dialogue and through physical actions.

One example is the unique interaction 'Find Common Ground'. This has a good chance of trying to find some sort of level playing field with both the Vampire and Werewolf Sim, and lead to a significant hit against the whole 'disliking your mortal enemy' thing they've got going on. Alternatively, if it goes wrong, it can lead to the two Sims arguing even more... Or it can turn physical, and we do not mean in the pleasant way!

The unique interaction of the Supernatural Smackdown occurs between Vampires and Werewolves only, and is triggered simply by a Vampire and a Werewolf (who has a bad relationship) being in the same viscinity of one another. It is near impossible to stop it outside of resetting your Sim through cheats, and goes to show just how much hatred is shared between the two occult races.

Other than Werewolves, Vampire Sims will find that any other Sim that finds out their a plasma-drinker will not feel all that glad to be in their presence. Other Sims may run away, or the relationship between your Vampire Sim and others will decrease.

Hiding your vampirism isn't exactly an option either, depending on what powers you choose. If you're constantly hissing or vomiting after eating human food, other Sims may get suspicious. And you thought you had it bad with Werewolf Sims...