You can now add top-surgery scars, binders and hearing aids to your ‘Sims’ characters

Beyond choosing a Sim character’s body size, fat ratio or hair color, players — known as Simmers — can now give their teenage or adult Sims top-surgery scars or make them wear a chest binder or shapewear.

Top surgery is performed on some transgender men and nonbinary people to remove breast tissue or augment the breast, enabling them to feel more physically aligned with their gender identity. Binders are used to minimize the outward appearance of breast tissue.

“The Sims” — one of the best-selling PC games since its debut in 2000 — has also introduced medical wearables, including hearing aids and glucose monitors, the makers announced on publisher EA’s website on Tuesday.

While these new assets are purely visual, without any gameplay functionalities — the binder, for example, does not change the Sim’s body shape — many have praised the game’s endeavor to become more inclusive.

For many neurodiverse people, ‘The Sims’ has been a lifelong comfort

One person tweeted that the update made her cry, adding: “I’m non-binary and this made my heart happy. It’s not perfect and the binder not binding is disappointing but they’re taking steps to make trans and non-binary people feel more representation in game and that’s a huge start.”