As the eighth anniversary of The Sims 4 approaches, rumors about The Sims 5 are in full swing, raising many questions. When can we expect to play it? What will the sims of the future look like? What about multiplayer? Rest assured, we should be able to provide you with some answers!

No, you haven’t missed anything: the next installment of the popular license from Maxis and Electronic Arts has not yet been announced , and according to the information at our disposal and the few rumors circulating, it will not be. before a while. The game that we will call The Sims 5 for now has been in pre-production for some time, and it looks like development has only just begun – according to job postings published by Maxis. But there is nothing to be discouraged, because a long production cycle could be beneficial, and would give developers time to explore new avenues in terms of gameplay and design, but above all to avoid the crunch.. Generally, Sims games take between four and five years to renew, but the gap between The Sims 4 and The Sims 5 is already much greater. This summer, The Sims 4 will celebrate its 8th anniversary, and it looks like there’s still a lot of content to come out for this fourth installment, especially given recent announcements from the Vice President of Maxis. While waiting for more news from the successor to The Sims 4, here’s what we have to get our teeth into:

Codename: Project Lotus

Rumors have been swirling about an upcoming installment for almost four years now, and it looks like things are starting to materialize. Since the start of 2021, top-secret AAA game development jobs keep popping up on the Maxis site, and more studios have opened in the US and Europe. . If these offers are to be believed, this mysterious AAA project would go by the name “Project Lotus” , which, as you probably already know, is actually a code name to hide the true nature of the game. Sims 4 had used the same subterfuge, calling the game ” Project Olympus” at the very beginning of production, when the title was still intended to be multiplayer.

Referring to symbolism, the lotus flower is considered a sign of purity and regeneration in many cultures. It’s an interesting analogy for The Sims, firstly because it’s a life simulation game, but also because this next installment could well be a turning point for the fetish license of Maxis , for reasons that we will reveal to you in this article.

Release date and platforms

As explained previously, the development of The Sims 5 is not yet very advanced , and unlike the other opuses which were released between four and five years after their predecessor, this next installment risks doubling this average – or even more. The Sims 4 was released almost eight years ago, and given how advanced development has been and how little news we’ve had of The Sims 5 since pre-production began, we’re not likely to see the game until the tenth anniversary of the fourth opus , or even after. It is however possible that more information will emerge as early as the second half of 2022 or next year depending on the progress of the team.

As for the platforms affected by this release, The Sims 5 should be released on PC and Mac as usual, but it could be that a release on consoles is to be expected . After all, The Sims 4 has been playable on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One since 2017, and also on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series since their releases thanks to backwards compatibility. Especially since The Sims 5 was featured in a PlayStation Magazine article from May 2020 (pages 28-29) showcasing future games available on the PlayStation 5.

Game engine

Thanks to more job postings on the Maxis site, we know that the prototyping phase of Project Lotus will be done on the Unreal Engine . Since this information is from January 2021, it’s most likely Unreal Engine 4, but with Unreal Engine 5 releasing earlier this month, it’s possible the final game may benefit . With such a game engine, the creation of characters and the customization of the environment could amaze us.

Multiplayer aspect

The first rumors about multiplayer features appeared at the beginning of 2020 when Andrew Wilson, CEO of EA, confirmed that he wanted to explore the notion of social gaming and in particular multiplayer for an upcoming Sims game in an interview with CNN . It says it draws inspiration from the social side of Maxis’ MMO The Sims Online – renamed EA-land shortly before it closed in 2008 – which unfortunately wasn’t a hit. He mentions in particular a world on the cloud , the possibility of playing cross-platform , and above all, a competitive aspect . It seems to be based on the fact that for a few years, players have enjoyed participating in challenges(official or not) in terms of sim creation, house building, storytelling, and staging.

As Maxis continues to think about The Sims for a new generation – cross-platforms and a cloud of a neighborhood world , you should imagine while we will always stay true to our inspiration, escape, creation, self-improvement, motivations – that this notion of social interactions and competition like the kind of things that were actually present in The Sims Online many many years ago – that they will start to become a part of The Sims experience in the years to come.

We are very excited. This is a game that really doesn’t have any competition in its category for delivering and fulfilling these motivations for players and we think of the tremendous growth opportunities for us for many many years to come.

In addition to Andrew Wilson’s statements, job postings on the Maxis site seem to confirm the development of a competitive multiplayer aspect: the studio is looking for a Back-end Developer to secure data and prevent cheating in a competitive environment . As you may know, cheating is a scourge that plagues most multiplayer games these days, and developers are actively looking for safe ways to prevent this kind of behavior . The development of such tools therefore seems to further confirm multiplayer in the upcoming Sims game, as does another job posting – this time for a Game Designer position –which mentions subscription services, which is likely to divide the community .

Although a section of fans have been clamoring for multiplayer functionality for some time, the idea of ​​a subscription service similar to World of Warcraft seems to terrify gamers – especially if the issue of typical license extensions is still on the table. table. With all this, The Sims 5 could quickly become a money pit, which reinforces the desire of most of the community to continue playing solo , with only a few social tools like The Sims 4 Gallery , social networks , and challenges offered by community managers or SimGurus .

Advanced authoring tools

In January 2021, Maxis published a job offer that appealed to players: that of a senior CAS artist . In case you didn’t know, in the Sims world, CAS is an acronym for Create A Sim . This position would therefore aim to define the appearance of the sims of the next opus, to produce intuitive customization tools, and to create clothes and accessories to dress these characters. But the creative side of the development doesn’t stop there, as in December 2021, patents filed by EA in April 2020 were published, and these highlight revolutionary creative tools.

Among them, we find a tool allowing to scan faces from images to import the features directly on a 3D model . This technology was invented by a team of AI developers and scientists, led by Igor Borovikov, a developer who worked on The Sims 3, The Sims Medieval, and The Sims 4 . Moreover, the models used to illustrate this tool come from the Sims 4, and serve to show which elements could be transferred from an image to a 3D model , such as the general shape of the body and the face, but also more precise features like the nose, the mouth, the eyes, and even the ears.

It’s a tool that’s reminiscent of The Sims’ Face Photo Wizard , which allowed its users to upload images to paste directly onto their sims’ faces . The results were quite approximate at the time, in particular because of the lack of detail in terms of the geometry of the face. But with the creative tools that already exist in The Sims 4, this new technology could work wonders. Especially since this is not the only ambition of the team: in addition to using images, another patent proposes to also draw from video files . This technology would make it possible to transcribe the body, the clothes,and not only in the form of meshes (3D objects made of polygons), since the textures would be imported as well.

According to the developers, this tool would proceed in stages, starting with creating a generic 3D model based on the subject of the video . Behavior and appearance would be considered second, and finally, clothing and accessories would be generated based on those worn by the subject of the video. The player would then have the option to reject the model if he does not like it, or to import it into the game if it corresponds to his expectations . This technology would also make it possible to create new animations to match those scanned from the video file, but also to name them, classify them, and use them in game.But the progress does not stop there, because a third patent, older this time, could allow players to do the same with… their animals:

As with human subjects, this tool could copy the appearance and behavior of the animal in question , and in addition to detecting the species, it would even be able to determine the breed of a particular animal. With this technology, you could therefore recreate your own pets and play with their exact copy in The Sims!

Complex storytelling

In addition to the multiplayer aspect and advanced creation tools, the next installment of The Sims may well place more emphasis on storytelling . Since the release of The Sims in 2000, the lore around the license has continued to grow, but it is true that its influence is much less palpable in The Sims 4 . Veterans of the Maxis license probably remember the mystery around the disappearance of Sonia Gothik in The Sims 2, the intense rivalry between the Capps and the Montys or the strange Pipette family and their roommate, Hector Cobaye . Although characters like Sonia Gothik, Noémie and Geoffrey Plènozas, and the indomitable Don Lothario still persist in The Sims 4,the stories around these sims seem more superfluous than in the old games.

The Sims 5: release date, creation system, multiplayer… everything we know about this very mysterious game

This is actually one of the things the Sims 4 developers are currently working on, as they recently added Story Progression features through free updates. As for The Sims 5, other job postings suggest the lore will be back, as Maxis was looking for a Senior Narrative Designer last year. In the job description, we learn that the project would have a guideline to follow in terms of narration , and that it would be strewn with specific events such as objectives, conflicts, interactions between the characters, but above all decisions .experience with interactivity, and even with machinima and mods from the Sims community , which is a good sign considering the extent of player creativity.

In January of this year, another offer this time asked for a Storyboard Artist to bring specific storylines and personalities to life . We then found things like the influence of the emotions of the characters on their interactions with others, that of a particular type of personality on the behavior of the character, and even instances where the characters must carry on a conversation while carrying out another action at the same time, similar to how The Sims 4 currently works . All these notions lead us to believe that the events of everyday life and the elements resulting from the narration will have a specific effect on the characters, whether positive or negative.

Additional content

At this time, no information is known regarding additional content. We can still establish some theories based on the model of previous games. Since The Sims, each major game of the license has been entitled to its share of extensions, the number of which has multiplied over the years. The first part benefited from 7 extensions bringing interesting elements such as romantic outings and new professions. This continued with The Sims 2, which in addition to releasing 8 expansion packs to bring gameplay, also offered 9 stuff packs for building and dressing up sims. But this practice has become widely democratized with The Sims 3 and its 11 expansions, 9 kits, and of course the Sims 3 Store. The latter offered many customization items and items in exchange for real money, and even 11 additional worlds and the gameplay associated with them, such as Dragon Valley , a medieval-inspired world with pet dragons. The popularity of The Sims 3 also spawned its spin-off, The Sims Medieval.

The Sims 5: release date, creation system, multiplayer… everything we know about this very mysterious game
The Sims 5: release date, creation system, multiplayer… everything we know about this very mysterious game

After nearly 8 years of gameplay, The Sims 4 continues to deliver additional content to players through expansion packs, game packs, stuff packs, and a recent invention: Stuff Packs. Today, The Sims 4 has 11 expansion packs, 11 game packs, 18 stuff packs, and 11 kits, but the additional content doesn’t stop there . The developers regularly add haircuts, clothes, items, and even cooking recipes at key times of the year to celebrate different holidays and diversify the game’s core content . We think in particular of the update of skin and hair colors, the addition of makeup customization tools, and of course theunlocked clothes so they can be worn by all sims, regardless of gender . Based on this diagram, it is therefore very likely that The Sims 5 will offer additional content packs, especially if it has a multiplayer mode, but it is always possible that the financial model will experience some changes.

The Future of The Sims 4

After all that, do not imagine that the Sims 4 will stop there. According to Catharina Mallet, the vice president of Maxis, The Sims 4 could even survive until its 15th anniversary, that is until 2029! That’s an ambitious statement, but given the pace at which developers are releasing additional packs, and the pace of base game updates, it’s a pretty plausible guess. In addition, The Sims 5 and The Sims 4 are developed by individual teams , so the developers of The Sims 4 do not risk abandoning the game in favor of the next installment of the license.

And you, do you think The Sims 4 will last as long? When do you think EA will announce the next game? Tell us everything in the comments!

The Sims 5: release date, creation system, multiplayer… everything we know about this very mysterious game
The Sims 5: release date, creation system, multiplayer… everything we know about this very mysterious game
The Sims 5: release date, creation system, multiplayer… everything we know about this very mysterious game

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