The Sims 4 February 3 patch notes and custom stair updates

(Image credit: Electronic Arts)

The next expansion for The Sims 4 is all about royal dynasties, family secrets, and scandals. While I love that for everyone who was dying for some new family tree features, that's all squarely in the realm of Live Mode and I am a staunch Build Mode woman. I almost don't feel tempted by Royalty & Legacy at all because The Sims 4 dropped something that was made just for me in a new base game update: more staircase customization.

The Sims 4's pre-expansion base game update happened today and yes, there's some family tree stuff in there too but I don't care because, I am quite serious, look at these stairs:

Those are flared stairs—how grand! Of course the new feature is supposed to pair well with all the big ballrooms EA wants you to build to host dramatic waltzes in the expansion, but as someone who rarely hits the play button I will just be here tweaking the railings for about five hours.

As briefly described in the patch notes, you can add a flare to the top or bottom of a staircase, either symmetrically or asymmetrically, which is an admirable amount of forethought for how us Build Mode freaks are going to want to use it. I jumped in quickly to test it out and it basically works how asymmetric roof gables do: a new pair of arrows at the bottom and top of the steps that you can use to widen the end (with certain width intervals) and holding shift to drag just one side at a time.

We can also now apply stair rails to just one side or the other of a staircase and change the length of the rail so that it stops partway down. Great for ballrooms, sure, but suburban McMansions with forked staircases are going to get a little glitter from this update too. Interestingly you can also have a railing stop before the top of stairs, not just the bottom.

This isn't quite as revolutionary a change as when configurable stair bends were added but still, this is going to keep me busy for a bit.

Here's what else got added in today's February 3 base game update:

Family tree relationship labels for in-laws, half siblings, great grandparents, step parents and step children, and more
Autonomous flirting between in-laws and step-relatives now prohibited by being close relatives
Flared stairs
Customized stair railings
"Africana" style filter in Create-A-Sim
Jewel-tone metallic nail swatches
"Lost Legacies" four-week gameplay event begins

The Sims 4 Royalty & Legacy launches next week on February 12 and yes, it will have a bunch of new Build Mode items in it as expansions always do. Seriously though, I'm just happy with new stair tool toys.

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Lauren has been writing for PC Gamer since she went hunting for the cryptid Dark Souls fashion police in 2017. She joined the PCG staff in 2021, now serving as self-appointed chief cozy games and farmlife sim enjoyer. Her career originally began in game development and she remains fascinated by how games tick in the modding and speedrunning scenes. She likes long fantasy books, longer RPGs, can't stop playing co-op survival crafting games, and has spent a number of hours she refuses to count building houses in The Sims games for over 20 years.

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