CPS Overhaul & Foster Home – a Sims 4 Mod

In which Sims can try to fix their lives and get back children taken away by CPS, report neglectful parenting, foster children, and more.

This is a MOD (nonofficial content) for the Sims 4 game, and while it tackles serious subjects, it does not try to recreate the foster systems or CPS systems of any existing countries, or to imitate reality completely. It is rather built to expand on what the game already has in a manner that fits it.

Post and mod now in Beta

Little Summary

There are three ways Sim social services can take away a Sim’s children:

via the game itself triggering neglect (when hunger is death-low)
via Sims reporting each other
via a random visit (can happen once per sim)

A sim can also:

voluntarily surrender a child to the Foster Home

There are two ways a Sim can foster children:

via applying to foster a child in the Foster Home
via being selected as foster household by another household losing their children

— Basic Mod Info —

MENU:

If you use mods from the RPO Collection, the CPS menu puts itself under the main RPO menu
If you don’t, the CPS menu is not in any submenu

— Losing and Recovering Children —

LOSING CHILDREN TO CPS

— Losing children Due to NEGLECT —: Details

Setting: Death Or Intervention

First thing to note is you have a setting in the mod to decide if children Sims should be able to die from hunger, or if they should be picked up by Social Services upon reaching critical hunger.

If the Death setting is on, CPS does not visit and the child dies. Later, authorities learn what happened.

Otherwise:

CPS INTERVENTION

When the game triggers neglect rescue (hunger failure), if you did not turn on death from child hunger, instead of the child Sim being taken away somewhere unknown, agents come to address the situation.

Eventually, the player gets to choose:

Foster in another household (choose which family they go to).
send to Foster Home (sim is not in sent to a household yet – they can be selected to be fostered when playing other households)
send far far away (Sim disappears and will never return)

Relationship statuses are added, and the parents can later apply to get their child back.

— Losing children Due to OTHER SIM MAKING A REPORT –: Details

If a Sim is reported to CPS, they will receive an investigative visit.

Reports can happen:

When player uses the interaction to “report a sim to cps”
(still in development) autonomously if a sim witnesses something that’s cause for alarm, if you enable that in settings.

THE CPS INVESTIGATION

The agent goes to observe and talk to the children. Then, he goes to check out the furniture and how well the house is equipped.

During this process, your Sim mostly follows the agent around.

NOTE: if the agent notices violence against children during their visit, they will automatically conclude that the household is unsuitable.

CONCLUSION OF THE VISIT

When the agent is done visiting, the following notification appears and the agent comes to talk with your sim.

Entirely based on what the agent observed during the visit, he will either:

dismiss concerns
give a warning
Validate the report & Relocate the children for fostering into another household

REACTIONS TO CPS INTERVENTION

Sims’ reactions depend in part on their relationships with each other (parent to child, etc).

Depending on relationship with parents, children sims taken away can react more sad or more hopeful to both being taken away and being returned to their parents.

Depending on the relationship between a child and their returning sibling, they can be happy to see them return or angry.

Parents can share blame or sadness, the response depending on relationship, general context mood and traits.

— Losing children Due to a RANDOM VISIT –: Details

This is almost identical to when being reported (CPS comes to visit the Sim’s household) – the difference being the text of the intro and conclusion notification:

RECOVERING CHILDREN

While Sims have a child fostered away, for the first few days, they can get occasional moodlets about it. So can the child fostered away.

Note: a warning that “Evil” and “Hates Children” Sims have a chance to get a rather horrible (insensitive) moodlet in which they don’t really mind that their child is gone; the rest of Sims don’t risk getting this moodlet.

Sims who want to do their best to get their children back can do so.

Before a Sim is able to apply to get their children back:

at least three days must have passed since CPS intervened
the Sim must have attended a Parenting Workshop
the Sim must have attended a Parent Counseling Session

Additionally, if the Sim is hoping for a positive outcome for the second visit that will determine if they can get their children back, they need to have fixed the problems noted at the first visit.

For example, if the problem was lack of money, the Sim must now have more money
if the problem was bad relationships with the child, the relationship must have improved
etc.

Otherwise, children won’t be returned.

The return of the child can be a happy event, but some resentment and doubts can remain if the relationship between child and parent is bad, and moodlet reactions for child and parent depend on that.

Letting go of Parental Rights

A Sim can declare their child adoptable if it’s been taken away by Child Social Services. This lets the foster household, if any, adopt the child if they so choose.

— The Foster Home —

VOLUNTARILY SURRENDERING A CHILD TO THE FOSTER HOME

Sims can decide to surrender a child to the Foster Home if they feel they aren’t fit to take care of them at the moment. This impacts the relationship with the child negatively, so be careful!

To do so, a Sim must have their partner’s agreement.

Sims willingly hosted in the Foster Home can be retrieved anytime.

APPLYING TO FOSTER A CHILD FROM FOSTER HOME

There are two ways for Sims to end up fostering a child:

they’re selected as foster household when a Sim is taken away from another household, if the player has opted for immediate transfer to another household
OR they apply to foster a child sent to the Foster Home (to do this, they need their partner’s approval if their partner lives with them)

APPLYING TO FOSTER

Once a Sim is ready to foster a child, they can go apply. Sims with a criminal record (from “Law & Disorder”) or with a CPS record cannot do this. It also requires having 30 000 simoleons at least.

Then, you choose who to foster. Choices are all the Sims in the Foster Home (played sims taken away from other families, and generated NPCs).

Your Sim comes home with the selected foster child.

FINANCIAL COMPENSATION

Every few days, your Sim gets a payment to help take care of foster children. The payment is proportional to how many foster children the sim has.

SENDING BACK OR ADOPTING FOSTER CHILDREN

Adopting

For a Foster Child to qualify for adoption:

If the foster child ended up in foster care because played Sims had a CPS visit, these played Sims must declare the sim adoptable for the foster parents to adopt.

If the foster child came from the Foster Home without having been in a played household (= a generated NPC), CPS might call some day to say the child is now adoptable (you can use a cheat for it to happen, too).

Once a Foster Child qualifies for adoption, the Foster Parent has an interaction on the child “Talk about Adopting“.

If the child agrees, the adoption is complete!

Sending Back (willingly or not)

If the foster child ended up in foster care because played Sims had a CPS visit, sending them back will send them to the Foster Home, not to their original household (since presumably those Sims haven’t taken the steps for that yet)

If the foster child came from the Foster Home without having been in a played household (= a generated NPC):
- The fostering sim can send back the child to the Foster Home,
- CPS might call some day to say the child MUST be returned because their original parents have fixed the problems of their household (you can use a cheat for it to happen, too).
  - NOTE: this vanishes the foster child Sim forever, so don’t send them back if you don’t want to (even when you receive the call, you can ignore it if you want).

If Foster Child ages up tHimo Young Adult

At young adult age, Sims are old enough to not need a legal guardian anymore, so the foster system ends for them.

A few choices are possible to a Foster Child, and are offered to the player when the sim ages up:

If you want the Sim to move back in with their original parents, or to move into their own household alone, use the last option.

Foster Home Cheats

There are cheats for you to manipulate the setup of the Foster Home.

Interactions between Foster Family and Foster Children

Foster children and foster families have a chance of getting certain moodlets when having interactions with a foster child.

Depending on relationship, foster parents are more supportive in their replies, or less, in the interaction “Share Sadness about Being Taken From Home”:

— Relationships and sentiments —

Examples