With The Sims 4: Lovestruck out for players, love is in the air. There are new interactions, new CAS and Buy Mode objects, a dating app you can use in-game, and plenty more to get your Sims ready for some good romance. Along with these come the new romantic boundaries.

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If you’ve wanted more control over your Sim’s romantic relationships for a while, you’re in luck. You’ll get tons more customization with romantic boundaries, and they’re easy to apply and change whenever you want. If you need to know all the details, look no further.

What Are Romantic Boundaries?

Romantic Boundaries are settings you can find in Create-A-Sim, much like the Gender and Sexual Orientation settings, that affect how your Sims react to their romantic partner engaging in romance with others. They are primarily to allow your Sims to be in polyamorous relationships.

There are four different settings you can alter that affect romantic partnerships:

  • Whether a Sim becomes jealous if their partner participates in non-physical romantic interactions.
  • Whether a Sim becomes jealous if their partner participates in physical romantic interactions except for WooHooing.
  • Whether a Sim becomes jealous if their partner has WooHoo with other Sims.
  • Whether their jealousy triggers can be changed by talking about them to other Sims.
These settings are not permanent and can altered at any time during gameplay. This allows for fluid gameplay that allows you to create a story specific to your own Sims. If your Sim has a relationship they don’t want to be open, then later one they do want to open, this can be done in a variety of ways.

These settings are consistent whether you have the Lovestruck expansionpack or not. If you’re playing the base game, you can still access and change your Sim’s romantic boundaries.

How To Choose Romantic Boundaries

The main way you can alter your Sim’s romantic boundaries is through Create-A-Sim. Under the gender selection, you can tab over to the Romantic Boundaries options and adjust them from there. You can simply choose either Yes or No for each preference. Yes will have your Sim become jealous under the circumstance listed, and No will turn off jealousy for your Sim for the scenario.

To be fully polyamorous, you can choose to set the first three romantic boundaries to No. This will turn off your Sim’s jealous reactions entirely, and be free to pursue a romance with as many Sims as they wish.

All Sims have a default of jealous reactions when their partner engages in romance with others. However, changing your Sim's romantic boundaries will affect their relationships immediately after confirming the changes. These can be switched at any time, so you're not stuck with boundaries after changing them once.

You can also change a Sim’s romantic boundaries during Live Mode. Click on your Sim’s romantic partner and choose Relationship, then Change Relationship. You can then click on Ask To Reconsider Romantic Boundaries, and ask your Sim’s partner to change their boundaries by accepting the different options.

Be aware that if you ask your Sim’s partner to change their boundaries instead of altering them through CAS, there is a chance that they will be rejected for the change. This is dependent on how close the Sims are.

How Romantic Boundaries Affect Sims

Sims are able to participate in polyamorous relationships with the addition of romantic boundaries. They can have multiple romantic relationships and pursue more partners, without their existing romances becoming jealous or upset. Each of the boundaries corresponds to different types of romantic actions.

When a Sim does not get jealous when their partner engages in non-physical romance, they are comfortable with their partner flirting with others. If a Sim is comfortable with their partner engaging in physical romance except for WooHoo, their partner can kiss and cuddle with others and they won’t get jealous. This is the same for Sims who are comfortable if their partner WooHoos with others.

With your Sim engaging in open relationships and having different romantic boundaries, your Sim is less likely to develop the Jealous trait, as well. They won’t get angry with their partner for romancing others, just like real polyamorous relationships.

Sims with the Jealous trait can still have open relationships by setting their boundaries, however they can still feel lingering jealousy. This can give them a tense moodlet if they witness their romantic partner being with someone else.

Even though open relationships and polyamorous relationships are now possible in the game, your Sim can still only be married to one Sim. If they are married and want to marry someone else, they will need to divorce their current spouse to do this. There is no way to marry more than one Sim without mods.

Romantic boundaries are available in the base game, so even if you don’t have the Lovestruck expansion pack, your Sims can still engage in polyamory. There are no differences in romantic boundaries if you don’t have the expansion, so your Sims can still enjoy the full experience of open relationships.

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