Introduction
The Sims 4 History Challenge is a Legacy-style challenge that takes you and your Sims on a journey through history. You’ll start in the Stone Age, and progress all the way to Modern Day. Each Era is designed to be unique and provide a different experience from the Era before it, while still maintaining historic accuracy. You’ll be restricted on what objects, careers, and aspirations you can have, but will unlock more options as you play. While these restrictions will force you to adhere to the struggles of that Era, there are also unique goals that will encourage you to experience life in that time period.

This challenge was originally created by Cloudseeker, and inspired by the Through History Legacy Challenge for the Sims 3, as well as the Legacy challenge. Credit and thanks to Cassalina, Pinstar, and ImaginingMystic for the inspiration behind the challenge, and a huge thanks to Cloudseeker for creating the original History Challenge for the Sims 4. While the challenge may have changed with time from what he originally created, it wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t laid the foundation for such a unique and intriguing challenge.

Credit also goes to Cloudseeker for the images used in this section. Enjoy!


Well, now that that's out of the way... Hi! I'm Snowie, the lead maintainer for this challenge. Yes, you read that correctly, I'm not the original creator of the History Challenge. The original creator, Cloudseeker, has given me his blessing to keep this challenge alive--you can check out his notes on the subject in the original History Challenge thread here. I've been updating this challenge from his original template for the last two years now, and decided it was time to take a second look at everything and rebuild it from the ground up--which is exactly what I've done!

The reason this challenge is still flagged as Beta is because there hasn't been enough feedback on the long-term goals of the challenge, as it is a rather long one. The length of the challenge is also why I won't be posting all the rules, goals, etc. on this thread. Please check out the Google Document here to read through everything about the challenge. I do apologize for any inconvenience that not posting the entirety of that document's contents on the forums may cause, but the challenge is much clearer and easier to understand in the format that I designed it for.

There are some challenge-wide goals that you'll be shooting for in this challenge, as well as a smaller set of goals for each generation. There are two difficulties; Casual and Historian, as well as an Enduring Eras mode that will make the challenge longer and slower paced. Check out the "Eras" and "Challenge-Wide Goals" sections for an explanation on how those work. Since there's a lot to track, I've made a scoresheet that will allow you to keep track of your progress on all the goals, as well as a family tree to record your Sims through the generations! Please follow the instructions on how to make a copy of this scoresheet for yourself, as the link will take you to the read-only master copy.

This post is long enough already, so I'll leave it at that! Links to the challenge and scoresheet are below, as well as the change log. Happy Simming!

History Challenge Google Doc
History Challenge Scoresheets
Discussion of this challenge on the Sims Forums

Oh, and there's now a Discord server for this challenge! If you want, you can come hang out. We have channels for suggestions, questions, CC and more!
Discord Link

Change Log: 6/16/22
I've added support for the Werewolves pack, as well as cleaned up some general things in the challenge rules.

This looks like a lot of fun, but I can see it will take some time to set up (probably the entire weekend for me... likely will have to remove more mods than I need to install lol). Really appreciate the alternative mod links in the google doc for those of us who don't have Outdoor Retreat (at first I thought I was just going to have to wait til I could buy the pack). And thanks for sharing!

The first time I played this challenge, it was super tedious going through and deleting everything in the world I picked (Willow Creek). In the mods section, there's a link to an "Empty Worlds" mod, which is just a save file with the worlds already emptied out. I installed that and never looked back, lol. As far as setting up lots to visit goes, there's actually quite a few lots on the gallery that you can place that just have plants, etc, as well as some with outhouses (if you don't have Get Together). Sifting through all the CC created for the challenge may take a while, though.

Edit: Also, I just updated the fridge and grill CC links with some that look a bit more prehistoric (tree fridge, rock grill). The site that has the rock grill actually has quite a lot of good prehistoric CC, if you don't mind translating the site every time you go back to it.

this sounds really fun i might try it

The next update for this challenge will likely be when Cats & Dogs is released. I'm considering changing the Middle Ages goal: "Have the same Sim be father/mother to 8 children" to something to do with raising children, not just the sheer amount of them. Something like reaching the max level on all toddler/child skills with babies born in the household. My reasoning for changing this is that we already have a (very) similar goal for the Prehistoric Era, and the original descriptions for this Era reference watching your children grow up--which having a lot of different kids doesn't really feel like the perfect fit to me. I also find it rather un-fun to try to micro-manage that many Sims at once.

Let me know your thoughts on this, and of any other suggestions you've thought of! Thanks to everyone for their continued support, I hope you're all enjoying your challenges!

Does it *have* to be a 50x50 lot? I don´t like seeing normal sims walk by, and the 64x64 lot on Windenburg is almost ideal since it has no roads or anything

It doesn't technically matter what size lot you start on, since you use cheats to set your starting funds anyway. Personally, I use the 64x64 Windenburg lot as it's definitely more immersive (and makes for great screenshots). The idea is just to pick a big lot, since you can't move after you've started and will probably want a big lot to build on by the end of the challenge.

Thank you for replying so quickly! I am having mad fun with this challenge - and it is pretty hard!

I'm glad you're enjoying the challenge! The Prehistoric Era has had a lot of changes from when it was first released, mostly because that's the era that everyone who tries the challenge plays. Still, be sure to let me know if you have any suggestions for the challenge.

Could you expand on the Era´s rules a little bit more? For example when my sims should/could start going to school, etc.

Cloudseeker had always left that up to the player. Personally, I start sending my kids/teens to school once the Middle Ages start.

It would be interesting to restrict it to perhaps, child boys could attend school starting in the middle ages, teen boys and child girls could attend school starting in the Old West, and everyone can go to school starting in the Roaring 20's--or something along those lines. Part of the issue is that without using a mod for it, you have to cancel the "go to school" action nearly every Sim day, and I wouldn't want to force people to do something so tedious for such a long time in their challenges unless a majority of people thought it was worth it.

What would be some of your suggestions for this?

What I'm doing right now is:
-Boys go to school during the Early Civilization (thinking more of an Ancient Greek setting) while Girls learn creativity/writing/etc
-No one goes to school during the Middle Ages but are home schooled (Probably making them to projects and homework for Immersion). I honestly don't know if there were schools in the Middle Ages, but I know writing was reserved for Priests and Religion was important so I thought "homeschooling" could fit nicely.
-I have no clue what the Old West was about so I might improvise since that's foreign culture to me hahaha

Also: I'm using a Mod that adds a Miscarriage chance just to add some difficulty. It's by LittleMsSam on her tumblr. I've added it in High chance and I plan on lower it until reaching Modern Day. This is just to add realism to my game and up the difficulty.

That mod sounds interesting! I'm always up for the game being more challenging and realistic (though I wouldn't want my Sims having miscarriages all that frequently).

For the sake of the challenge, it's usually best not to add some sort of gameplay in one era only to take it away in the next--it becomes too complicated for people and can restrict the way they play (many people pointed out that the progression of the relationship restrictions wasn't realistic due to divorces, etc, but I agree with Cloudseeker that it's best to keep things as simple as possible). I have been considering adding an "optional rules" or suggestions section to the challenge, with added rules and considerations that people can choose to play by if they wish.

A note for mod/CC users: We'll be getting a substantial game patch sometime in the next week, which will likely break a lot of mods and CC. If you don't want to play without these until they get fixed, be sure to set Sims 4 to run in offline mode and turn auto-updates for it off.

I've been playing this challenge for a little while and I like it a lot. Maybe a roll for different random events per era would kind of break up the legacy challenge monotony?

I've been wanting random events in the Sims 4 since I started playing RimWorld. I've thought about it a fair bit, but can't seem to come up with more interesting things than the usual "add 1,000 Simoleons" and so on, which doesn't really feel like an adaptive addition to any gameplay since there's nothing you can do to manipulate the outcome. I know they got a lot of hate sometimes, but the opportunity popups that were in TS3 were actually a good way to add some randomosity to the game. If a modder could implement some system like that (or EA would just add it in themselves), I think that would be the best way to break the Sims 4 monotony in general.

Edit: That being said, what would be some of the random events you can think of for this challenge?

On another note... RimWorld is amazing

Hmm.. Discovering gems (using the cheat to show hidden collectibles in buy mode), getting attacked by an animal (confine the sim on "bed rest" for 24 sim hours), picking a random sim to get smallpox/black plague/dysentery and die, famine (No adult sim is allowed to eat more than once per day for x sim days), sim gets a social class raise (add x amount of money). Just off the top of my head. I'm a big fan of random events as well.

! A NEW IMPORTANT NOTE ! As of the latest game patch, EA has added more options to control culling. However, this will NOT protect the ghosts who died in your household from culling, so in other words nothing has changed. I still recommend using MCCC to control culling (please be sure to download the newest version once it's updated for this patch). That is all, carry on.

Change Log (11/14/17)
Updated for Cats & Dogs!
This update is largely experimental, as I haven’t had time to fully test it. As always, your feedback is greatly appreciated!

• You may now start the challenge with one pet to accompany your Ancestors, added in the Getting Started section. There are no restrictions on the pet, other than it can only be one.
• Sims may breed and adopt strays throughout the challenge (starting in the Prehistoric Era), but may not use the Adopt option on the computer until Modern Day--since that’s when you’re allowed to use computers. You can’t give up pets until Modern Day for the same reason. This is subject to change if we can find a suitable workaround.
• Vet clinics and their various items aren’t allowed until the Roaring 20’s. This also, by extension, means you won’t be able to take your pets to the vet to get cured of an illness until this era. I considered allowing the pet medicine table earlier, since it allows you to make treats that will heal your pets, but it’s still rather technologically advanced. If people are having issues with the consequences of their pets being sick all the time, let me know, and I’ll consider where best to move the medicine table.

Item restrictions have been updated:

• Most “conventional” pet furniture is allowed in the Prehistoric Era (food bowls, pet beds, scratching posts, and pet toys).
• Litter boxes, however, are not allowed until the Old West. The idea behind this being that the cats can see themselves outside to do their business, though in practice I don’t know how well this will work. As always, please give me your feedback on this as you’re playing through!

Other non-pets related changes:

• Removed the painting type restrictions in the Prehistoric Era. Your Cave-Sims may now paint weird pop art references to their heart’s content, who am I to restrict the creative mind?
• Clarified the world/lot selection in the Getting Started section for future expansions and use.

I'm gonna play a modified version of this where the only relationships are between two women, to spite whichever one of the creators thinks lesbians and bisexual women were somehow invented in 1860s. That's ridiculous.

A quick update for laundry day:

Change Log (1/20/18)
Updated for Laundry Day!

• Wash basins, hampers, and clotheslines are allowed starting in the Prehistoric Era and onward.
• Washing machines and dryers aren't allowed until Modern Day.
• Litterboxes are now allowed in the Prehistoric Era and onward.

This challenge looks really interesting! I'll be adding this to the list of challenges I'm interested in playing once I'm finished with my decades challenge! I've also never heard of the empty worlds mod, so I will be giving that a looksie as well!

Okay, I've finally decided on the updates for Jungle Adventures (and My First Pet Stuff) for this challenge! Change log is as follows:

Change Log (3/14/18)

Update for Jungle Adventures and My First Pet Stuff!

• My first pet stuff animal cages aren’t allowed until Modern Day.
  - Hamsters with rocket ships? Modern day, moving on.
• You aren’t allowed to visit or adventure in Selvadorada until the Old West.
  - I liked the idea of allowing adventuring throughout the entire challenge, but the respective adventuring objects and relics/treasures would just be out of place or unbalanced in earlier eras.
  - This is noted both in the Old West Era restrictions as well as the challenge-wide rules section.
• Archaeology Tables aren’t allowed until the Old West.
  - This pack comes with some great build objects for Early Civilization, though, so feel free to use all other build/buy objects as they’re unlocked!
• Both Jungle Adventure aspirations (Archaeology Scholar and Jungle Adventurer) are allowed in the Old West and onward.
  - Whoops. Almost forgot about those. (Edit)

That's all, as always feel free to post here or on the official forums page with any questions or suggestions! Happy Simming

It's update day! This one's a long one, with a few challenge-wide rule changes so be sure to read through it all.

Change Log (6/25/18)
Update for Seasons and game version 1.44

• Challenge-wide rule: You may only use the Re-Traiting Potion once per Era. This means you can use this potion a maximum of seven times. You must randomize all three traits when you use it, but may reroll five times instead of three.
  - This is kinda-sorta a placeholder rule at the moment; it isn’t set in stone. I’m going to test this challenge without the rule about randomizing all traits and see how I like it. If it still feels challenging and entertaining with hand-picked traits, I may change the rules accordingly to allow players to choose their own traits throughout the challenge.
• You may purchase seed packets at any time.
  - This includes seeds now able to be purchased directly via buy mode (added in the Seasons patch), and purchasing seeds from plant pots (the original way you could do this).
  - While not technically a rule, I wanted to point this out here in case anyone was wondering. I won’t be adding it to any sections in the main rules outline (unless you think it will be confusing otherwise).
• Glass Roofs cannot be used until the Old West.
  - I originally wasn’t going to restrict these, but it wouldn’t be realistic to allow your Prehistoric Sims to construct fancy glass roofs with the added benefit of any plants under the roof growing year-round.
• The Bee Box may be purchased in the Prehistoric Era and onward.
  - I did a bit of research to see when beekeeping historically started, and was surprised to find it’s been around since before what this challenge classifies as “Early Civilization”. The wax our Early Civ Sims use for their candles have to come from somewhere, after all.
• Male Sims may join the Botanist branch of the Gardener career in the Middle Ages. They cannot do the Floral Designer branch until the Industrial Age. Female Sims may join the Botanist or Floral Designer branch starting in the Industrial Age.
• Ice Skating/Roller Skating rinks can be used starting in Early Civilization.
  - These spawn at random locations in the worlds, so one may be in your local neighborhood. While I’m sure Prehistoric Sims wouldn’t have anything against using these, historically people only began to make skating a passtime in Early Civilization Eras.
• Sims may purchase and use the Flower Arranging table in Early Civilization and onward.
  - People didn’t really start using potted plants/flowers to decorate their homes until this time period. Besides, I didn’t want to start up the debate again on whether gardening should count towards the 20k goal in the Prehistoric Era or not.
• The Weather Machine can’t be used until Modern Day.
  - If you’re playing with seasons with this challenge, you don’t get to cheat mother nature! We’ll all just have to suffer together.
• The Thermostat is allowed in the Industrial Age and onward.
  - If your Sims are getting cold, try using fireplaces to warm up your house!
• Umbrellas may be used in Early Civilization and onward.
• Water Balloon Buckets may be used in the Old West and onward.
  - You might want to take advantage of that pool lot from the Prehistoric Era to keep you cool in the summer.
• Challenge-Wide Rule: Holidays may be created/deleted at any time during the challenge.
  - Use this feature to make fun Holidays for each Era!
  - You can also use the holidays to keep your kids/teens out of school by making a holiday every weekday that gives your Sims the day off. Keep in mind this will give your adults the day off from work too, though.
• Toddler Pools (Kiddie pools) are allowed in the Prehistoric Era and onward.
  - In fact, if you have Seasons installed, you won’t be allowed to use bathtubs in this Era. You’ll have to use toddler pools to clean up your toddlers, and either a pool or Deodorizing Cream (Herbalism Skill Level 2) to keep your kids-elders clean. This is noted in the change below.
• You may no longer use crafted items if they aren’t allowed for the current Era.
  - This means that players with Jungle Adventures and/or Get Together can’t use toilets until Early Civilization, and (as noted above) players with Seasons can’t use bathtubs until Early Civilization. You must instead use the toilet bushes or the toddler pools, respectively.
  - This rule mostly only applies to the Prehistoric Era, since everything crafted on the woodworking bench is allowed after that Era.
  - You can still sell anything crafted at the woodworking bench, and can store crafted items in the family inventory to be used in a later Era.
• Bathtubs are allowed in the Prehistoric Era Part Two, but only for toddler use.
  - Allowed bathtubs here to support the above rule change.
  - These aren’t allowed if you have Seasons.
• And finally, a note for Seasons players.
  - Enjoying your lovely new rain/snowfall? Well, you probably won’t be in this challenge. Seasons adds a whole new layer of difficulty to this challenge, but since it’s an optional pack you can change the in-game seasons settings as you see fit. The ones I’m talking about are found in Options>Seasons. If you want a hardcore experience, though, you’ll leave those death settings on.
  - If you’re starting a new challenge with Seasons installed, you’ll probably want to set the season to Spring. This will give you time to reach the second part of the Prehistoric Era and at least give your Sims a hut to retreat to when it gets too cold. That, and a warm bed.

I'm in the middle of the prehistoric era and had a couple questions:

-What are the rules in each era for children being born out of wedlock? I know there are some rules about pregnancy during affairs, but what if a totally unmarried sim gets pregnant?
-If you move a sim out of your lot, how do you get their urn to display when they eventually die? Or do you only need to display the urns of certain sims?

Thanks so much for reviving this challenge, I'm loving it so far!