The Apocalypse Challenge

📖 The story

Twenty years ago the reactor melted down, and your corner of the world has been clawing back from the ashes ever since. Life is buried under a mountain of restrictions — and the only way to lift them is to send your family, one Sim and one career at a time, to the very top of their profession, slowly rebuilding civilisation skill by hard-won skill.

💝 The goal

**Lift every apocalypse restriction.** Each restriction is tied to a career; you lift it by getting a Sim to the **top (level 10) of that career**. The run ends when all restrictions are gone.

🎀 Packs required

Packs recommended

🏡 Setup

🚀 Getting started

• Create or import a single founder (any age, even pre-skilled — unlike the Legacy Challenge). Move them onto an empty lot and quit any job; their past doesn't count.
• Quit any career; begin under the full restriction list. (Tip: start the save on a Sunday for the "swap-meet" buy restriction.)

⌨️ Cheats to type

📋 General rules

• You start under **all** restrictions at once; life is brutal by design.
• A restriction is lifted only when a Sim maxes the career it's tied to — then that freedom applies to the whole household.
• **Each Sim may lift only one restriction in their lifetime** — so this is a generational marathon; you need heirs to lift them all.
• Only bloodline Sims and the spouses of heirs may lift restrictions; the family may never move lots.

✨ Specific rules

• **Culinary → Chef:** no ovens or appliances except the cheapest grill, until a Sim maxes Culinary.
• **Tech Guru:** only the Tech Guru Sim may use a computer, and only the cheapest one, until maxed.
• **Retail (teen):** you may only buy or replace objects on **Sundays** (the weekly swap meet).
• **Athlete:** no smoke detectors or sprinklers; non-athletic children, teens and elders can't even leave the lot.
• Many careers cross-gate each other (some can't be taken until another is unlocked first).

✅ What you can do

• Survive off wild/foraged plants and fishing from day one; cook grilled fish on the cheapest grill.
• Use the MoveObjects cheat — but only after you've lifted the career restriction that gates building.
• Buy only the cheapest version of any object you're allowed to purchase; move in one spouse per generation (without keeping their funds).

⛔ What you can't do

• No cheats beyond setup and the gated MoveObjects, and no advantage-giving mods/CC.
• No ageing Sims up early, and no moving to a different lot — ever.
• A Sim may lift only ONE career's restrictions (the first career they top); until lifted: no TV/internet/radio, computer only for job tasks, phone only to get/quit a job, shopping only on Sundays, one stack of food until Athlete is lifted, and building confined to a small footprint.

🎯 Objectives — complete the checklist

0 of 6 done · 0%

🎮 If you don't own the packs

Pinstar's original is base-game only — about 25 careers, fully playable with no DLC. Owning more packs simply ADDS careers and restrictions, making the run longer, never blocking it.

💡 Strategy tips

• Lift the restriction that annoys *you* most first — usually Culinary (to cook) — but note some careers need a pre-skilled founder to even start (e.g. Chef needs gourmet cooking the grill can't build).
• Plan your bloodline: with one restriction per Sim, you need a steady supply of heirs, so don't neglect having children.
• Map the unlock order in advance — career cross-gating means a wrong early pick can stall you for a generation.

💕 Milestones — track your progress

0 of 5 done · 0%

🔥 Want it harder?

• Add the Eco Lifestyle **off-grid** layer: stay off the grid until a Sim maxes the Civic Planner career.
• Forbid pre-skilled founders — start from a blank Sim.

🏆 Scoring

**Fewer in-game days to lift all restrictions = a better score.** The original base-game target is roughly 25 careers; with every pack it can exceed 50.

🎭 Variations

Use the base-game-only ruleset for a defined finish line, or the all-packs version for an open-ended epic. ---