Fame Is Quietly Rewriting Your Sim's Personality
You built your Sim's personality carefully back in Create-A-Sim. Then they get famous in Get Famous, and a few star-levels later, they've developed a fear of being touched by strangers, refuse to eat anything less than a gourmet meal, and check their phone every few minutes like it's a compulsion. You never picked any of that. Your Sim did — or rather, fame did it to them, and there was never a menu where you got to say no.
That's Fame Quirks, and unlike almost every other personality-shaping system in The Sims 4, this one isn't optional and isn't chosen. It's the game quietly layering new behavioral traits onto a Sim as a side effect of celebrity, whether you wanted them or not.
Quirks Aren't The Same System As Perks
Get Famous actually runs two separate reward tracks side by side, and it's easy to conflate them. Fame Perks are the part you'd expect from an expansion pack progression system — you earn perk points as your Sim climbs star levels, and you spend them deliberately on things like better royalties, career shortcuts, or influence over the public. That's a normal, player-controlled system.
Fame Quirks are the opposite of that on purpose. There's no point pool, no menu of options to browse, and no purchase decision. Quirks are assigned automatically as a side effect of the fame journey itself, triggered by the specific things your Sim actually does while famous — not by anything you consciously spend or select.
How Many, And When They Show Up
Every celebrity Sim can develop up to four quirks total, and they don't arrive all at once. The first can appear as early as one-star fame, with a second becoming possible around three stars, and the remaining slots filling in as stardom climbs further. Because they're triggered by behavior rather than handed out on a schedule, two Sims who reach five-star fame through completely different playstyles can end up with a completely different set of quirks — one shaped by how each Sim actually spent their famous life, not a fixed unlock list everyone gets in the same order.
A Few Examples Of What "Behavioral Side Effect" Actually Means
The quirks range from mildly amusing to genuinely disruptive, and all of them are triggered by specific, identifiable patterns:
No Touching develops when a Sim is repeatedly touched by strangers with less fame than them — after enough of it, the Sim starts dreading physical contact even from people they know, unless that person is family or an established romantic partner.
Phone Fanatic shows up in Sims who lean on their phone constantly during downtime, and once it sets in, the Sim will compulsively check it whenever they're idle, growing Tense if too much time passes without a phone fix.
Refined Palette rewards Sims who eat consistently high-quality meals by locking in a strong Happy moodlet whenever they eat something well-made — but the flip side is that lower-quality food stops satisfying them the way it used to.
Public Number happens when a Sim's contact information effectively "leaks," and afterward they field a steady stream of texts from strangers — some starstruck, some openly hostile about celebrities in general.
None of these are chosen from a list. They emerge from what the Sim was actually doing while their fame grew, which means the system is less "reward track" and more "your Sim's habits are quietly calcifying into permanent quirks."
The One Thing You Do Get To Control: Removal
Here's where players get some agency back, even though they never had input on which quirks appeared. Two separate methods exist to undo them, and they work at different scales:
A Quirk-B-Gone potion, bought from the aspiration rewards store, removes exactly one quirk at a time — useful if only one specific quirk is actually causing problems.
A full Celebrity Cleanse, booked through the Sim's phone for a flat fee, wipes fame progress entirely, taking every perk and every quirk down with it — the reset-everything option rather than a scalpel.
Quitting the spotlight outright is also available directly from the fame info tab, but only if the Sim hasn't spent any perk points yet — once perks are purchased, a Celebrity Cleanse becomes the only way back to a clean slate.
Why This Matters Beyond "Interesting Trivia"
If you're playing a legacy or a long-term save where a Sim's personality is meant to feel consistent, Fame Quirks are a genuine risk most players don't see coming: pursue stardom long enough, and your carefully-built character can end up behaving in ways that contradict the traits you actually chose for them in Create-A-Sim. Knowing the quirks exist — and that specific behaviors trigger specific outcomes — is the difference between being blindsided by a Sim who suddenly can't stand being touched, and steering their fame-era habits toward quirks you're actually willing to live with.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I choose which Fame Quirks my Sim gets?
No. Quirks are assigned automatically based on the Sim's actual behavior while famous, not selected from a menu — you can influence them indirectly by shaping what the Sim does, but there's no direct pick list.
How many quirks can one Sim have?
A celebrity Sim can develop up to four quirks total, unlocking gradually as their fame level rises rather than all appearing at once.
How do I remove a Fame Quirk?
A Quirk-B-Gone potion from the aspiration rewards store removes a single quirk, while a Celebrity Cleanse booked through the phone removes all fame progress, perks, and quirks at once.
Are Fame Quirks the same as Fame Perks?
No. Perks are deliberately chosen using earned perk points, while Quirks are automatic behavioral side effects triggered by what the Sim actually does during their rise to fame.
Sources
Quirk names and trigger conditions reflect community documentation gathered since the Get Famous expansion's release; exact behavior thresholds can vary slightly between play sessions.