Players Have Noticed That the Quality of The Sims 4 Seasons Has Been Lacking in Newer Worlds
So, has EA been lowering the quality of Sims 4 Seasons over the past few years? Recently, a tweet from @lunar-britney highlighted a simple yet frustrating observation: Seasons, one of the most impactful Expansion Packs for The Sims 4, is causing some glaring visual issues in the new world of Innisgreen from The Sims 4 Enchanted by Nature.
The rivers don’t freeze, and much of the new foliage around both Sprucederry Grove and the Coast of Adhmor neighbourhoods doesn’t shed its leaves and die in the Winter.
seasons looks dreadful in the newest worlds. i hateeeeeeeeeee it
— Lunar 🇵🇸 (@lunar_britney) July 10, 2025
water doesn't freeze, half the new foliage stays green and full. MESSS pic.twitter.com/ovJ7oxGUEO
So what is going on? Some players have noticed that seasonal effects in more recent worlds have been lacking, with the community being split over a “design decision” with Ravenwood that came with The Sims 4 Life & Death. Are they really getting worse? Let’s take a look
Table of Contents
The Issue
The Sims 4 Seasons Expansion Pack was released on June 22nd 2018, being the fifth Expansion Pack for The Sims 4. Until that point, we had 10 worlds total in-game, 8 residential, and two as vacation-only destinations. The team had to go back and optimise each world for the new seasonal changes based on the weather in the locations that inspired each world. As of June 2025, we have 28 total worlds, 3 being vacation only. That is a lot of worlds; however, more recently, the quality seems to suffer. Both images below were taken during Winter after a blizzard.
How Seasonal Objects Work
So it seems the quality has suffered, but Seasons offers so much more than visual effects to the game. World files in The Sims 4 contain something called “Conditional Layers”, these tell the game what non-permenants gameplay objects to spawn and when. For example, the Spice District in San Myshuno has conditional layers for both the Spice Festival and the Flea Market, as well as other days of the week when different food stands spawn in. Seasons also introduced conditional layers to worlds that didn’t have them previously. For example, the Crawdad Quarter has conditional layers telling the game to spawn a roller rink in the summer, seasonal drink stands, and a variety of other seasonal objects. Worlds such as San Myshuno and Nordhaven don’t, as they have daily festivals/meetups spawn in.
Innisgreen seems to have done a pretty good job at this; however, they seemed to have stopped short of having any form of seasonal drink stands, yet there is the opportunity to ice skate in the Winter.
Sunrise & Sunset Times
Something you may never have noticed in The Sims 4 is that the sun rises and sets at different times depending on the season. For example, in Winter, Windenburg has shorter days than it does during the Summer. Take a look below at each worlds sunrise and sunset time.
And which one remains unchanged? Innisgreen. Both Copperdale and Chestnut Ridge suffer from teh same lack of attention, both of which were developed by the same team as Enchanted by Nature. This further adds to concerns of recent worlds not being updated for Seasons.
Old Worlds vs New
Take a look at some comparison screenshots of older worlds during Winter versus newer worlds.
The images on the right of the newer worlds of Innisgreen and Nordhaven both have foliage unaffected by seasonal changes, despite the option being available in Sims4Studio to change these.
Improvements Via Modding
LunarBritney has helpfully shared a mod via ModTheSims that fixes seasons for almost all worlds. Check it out below!
Final Thoughts
Seasons used to be what I would consider a crowning achievement for The Sims 4. But as new worlds such as Innisgreen roll out, it’s becoming clear that support for the Expansion Pack is slipping. Whether it’s due to development trade-offs or overlooked asset tagging, players are noticing it.
As @lunar_britney put it best: it’s a MESS. And for a game that sells itself on interconnected systems and legacy improvements, this kind of mess matters.
What are your thoughts on this? Let us know in the comments below, and stay tuned to Sims Community for all the latest on The Sims 4.
they’re in a rush to constantly put out mediocre worlds (especially american suburbia ones) so i wouldnt be surprised if they’re sacrificing functionality from one of the better sims 4 packs for it.
Innisgreen has a different sunrise and sunset than other worlds, though, because it’s the brightest there the longest. You guys can make a problem out of anything, lol
Hate this is the topic. Seasons are least of the games worries, emotional buffs, and aliments are of huge concern bc half the time it stops the sims from doing anything, the negative moodlets need to become a setting to disable. While others may enjoy “realism” I on the other hand play the game to bring positive vibes and this makes it unplayable. Burnout, aliments and grief are a huge problem. And so many items can kill sims it’s getting crazy. And everyone pushed for burglars like there isn’t issues as it is. I don’t understand how anyone with a platform for this game can sit here and not advocate these issues. It’s become unplayable
Each world in the game has its own unique weather patterns. This means that the seasons can feel very different depending on the world. For example, winter in Arizona or Alabama is not the same as winter in Virginia or Colorado because each place has its own climate and foliage.
The seasons were a failure from the start regarding snow. The level of snow on the ground is ridiculously low. At the time, they explained that they couldn’t do better. Wait, it’s the same mechanic as The Sims 2 and we can’t have the same level of snow? When I’m in The Sims 3 and I see how every detail is studied, every architecture, these are supposed to be worlds, but to me, they’re neighborhoods from The Sims 4.
The last two worlds are disconcertingly simple: budgets seem to be getting smaller and smaller, they’re constantly releasing expansions, which messes everything up.
There’s even worse, in my opinion. Sims have to manage their emotions, and it’s gotten out of hand. They’re constantly unsatisfied in love, often want to break up, and suffer from repeated burnouts. Add to that grief over anything, and now syndromes, lost lifestyles, how can you manage all this and still enjoy the game?
The Sims 4 began to decline because the game was already suffering from incomplete expansions, but instead of improving this by adding content, they preferred to sacrifice the entire emotional system.
Why do I always get bored and feel like I’m doing the same things over and over again, while on the sims 2 and 3, which have a shorter lifespan, I never have this feeling, because it’s rich in gameplay and fun, the worlds of the sims 3 are very well worked and look like real worlds, the sims 2 have an incredible charm and fun, how long do you think the sims 4 engine will last with all these botched expansions that follow one another, and all these bugs that accumulate without end, we are in the last cycle of the sims 4, I don’t know how long it will last, but I know that it has become worse and worse and I think that all this will end with a feeling of waste over a duration that is far too long for an opus that started badly and that I think will end badly too, maybe much sooner than expected, but the future of the sims 4 is not good at all.
I feel like they gave up at this point, creating basic, sloppy worlds with minimalist gameplay, thinking that’s enough. It feels like the game is in its death throes, waiting for the endgame.
I don’t understand this problem… In real life not all foliage dies off in the winter and that varies by local climates. Ravenwood, Nordhaven and Innisgreen are all inspired by European places which have a lot of evergreen foliage (green all year round) so it would make sense that not everything would die off in these worlds. Innisgreen even more so because it is a magical land so surely anything goes?! The screen grabs that you are pointing out as problems look better than the ones that you are saying aren’t the problem. This is such a non-problem.
Yeah, I agree. I couldn’t see anything wrong w the before pics and I actually prefer seasons and weather in general in my game to vary based off of location. Where I live irl, we rarely get snow so I like that the newer worlds don’t have frozen lakes or dead foliage.