officialsimsecret | Secrets Post #915

Secrets Post #915

WARNINGS
-> NSFW Sims image
-> Fairies
-> Enchanted by Nature
-> Tragic Clown
-> Paralives
-> Gnomes

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“I am only contributing to the conversation with meme references”

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There were two unposted secrets this week, one was not Sims related, and the other was a gross porn gif.

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Take it with a grain of salt, because this could 100% be a "My uncle works at Nintendo" thing

"News I have heard from a friend who’s partner works at Maxis:

Next Expansion after Fairies is the most expensive Expansion pack in the history of the franchise that doesn’t add a new Pet or Life Stage because of how long it was in development for.

But I have been told this is largely due to inflation, as for the last few years it costs Maxis more money now to develop a single Expansion than it did to develop The Sims Medieval (which was an entire spin off).

It’s a Vacation pack with a twist, that will allow you to customise and create Vacations beyond what Outdoor Retreat and Jungle Adventure can do. You will be able to create custom venues that your Sims will engage with on their Vacation. There will be a big focus on Family Vacations, as the existing Vacation packs are more focused on Adult gameplay.
EA are expecting the Expansion to sell over 7 – 10 million copies within the first 12 months because they know the themes within the pack are highly requested and that packs with similar focuses have achieved similar success. So the marketing team is already coming up with ideas on how to promote the game.
The majority of Sims 4’s profit from Expansions is reinvested by EA into other games development, rather than the game itself. EA set targets with Maxis to deliver a specific amount of Expansions per year.
Kits aren’t going anywhere, despite none in the latest roadmap. Maxis use the profit from Kits to invest in free base game updates as EA don’t give them much of a budget anymore since it’s now free. They’re on pause to see the community feedback of having more functionality within Kits, to see if people respond more favourably to them.
Maxis want to do more cultural worlds and have been trying for years to get a world based on Africa in the game, but higher ups at EA prefer culturally ambiguous worlds as they sell better. Maxis have come up with an idea to please both sides (but they wouldn’t tell me what that is).
Development of some Expansions will be developed in Europe instead of the US.
Project Rene is going smoothly and apparently rumours of it being in development trouble or being downgraded are false. It’s still the game it was when it was announced, a fully developed online Sims game.

This is what l’ve been told by the partner of someone who works at Maxis. I tried to ask about other stuff but they said they didn’t want to get their partner in trouble, and that everything they told me is what is already told to many creators (minus the sale projections) so it’s already semi-public.

They wouldn’t tell me anything that creators already don’t know. I don’t know if that’s all creators or just some. They didn’t know either."

It's probably a crock of shit.

https://files.catbox.moe/g3s7hi.gif

"The majority of Sims 4’s profit is reinvested by EA into other games development, rather than the game itself...

Maxis use the profit from Kits to invest in free base game updates as EA don’t give them much of a budget anymore since it’s now free."

Explains why the game sucks.

"Maxis want to do more cultural worlds and have been trying for years to get a world based on Africa in the game"

Deranged. EA is right about this.

"Development of some Expansions will be developed in Europe instead of the US"

More hints Sims 4 is not an EA priority and is being eased into a legacy game.

"Project Rene... a fully developed online Sims game"

It's obviously a mobile game. If they wanna port it to desktop ok but the recent video makes it obvious that it is a the Sims mobile replacement.

💯

"Maxis want to do more cultural worlds and have been trying for years to get a world based on Africa in the game, but higher ups at EA prefer culturally ambiguous worlds as they sell better"

but are the worlds we're getting right now culturally ambiguous? seems like maxis is pretty clear about what cultures they're based on. how is a world based on an african country/area less ambiguous than a world based on ireland or japan?

It's probably because it's too much of a risk for several reasons.
Africa is politically volatile with several regions of the continent experiencing war. EA isn't going to touch that, especially after what happened with My Wedding Stories.
Maxis is a US based developer and there's probably going to be endless debates over cultural appropriation, authenticity and some group is going to offended because one African culture had more representation than another. This has already happened with Snowy Escape and a free East Asian New Year update.
The people that are interested in diverse worlds in TS4 could be a vocal minority. There's now a huge backlash in gaming and media in general over anything perceived as "woke". I highly doubt this would happen in the sims community but it's EA that has the statistics. I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of TS4 players don't engage with the more active parts of the fan base and don't care.

"what happened with My Wedding Stories."

What happened?

"one African culture had more representation than another"

It is a very Western view, isn't it? Everytime people ask for an African world they don't even point out a country or culture they'll like to see represented. They just say Africa like it's all the same. And the cherry on top, that the African world has to have a safari. Nevermind that safari tourism is not a continent wide experience but something limited to a dozen African countries in the south. Africa has more than 50 plus countries and its political borders are messy. Within countries there are more often than not several ethnic groups, some in deep conflict and even civil war with one another.

the majority of people really are like 4 year olds or something when it comes to international geography culture and politics it's fucking sad

"The majority of Sims 4’s profit from Expansions is reinvested by EA into other games development, rather than the game itself."
This has been happening since at least the TS2 era. Remember Jake Thompson posting that the TS2 developers never got their bonuses because EA spent the money on another video game.

"Development of some Expansions will be developed in Europe instead of the US."
This is already happening. Crystal Creations and Home Chef Hustle were made by a European studio. I suspect that Businesses & Hobbies, as well as the workshop kit were made by the same studio.

don't really understand what you're trying to say about the "vacation" pack tbh

Another vacation pack? Really? Outdoor Retreat, Jungle Adventure, and Snowy Escape weren't enough? Really?

yeah if it's true that it's going to be a vacation EP then they really are just regurgitating old packs with the same content for more money and doing nothing else
fucking sad considering all the stuff that's still not in the game or hopelessly broken and unusable

I remember when lgr first posted his review of outdoor retreat. Has this corpse of a game really been dragged in the streets for this long?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Secrets Post #915

🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨

Re: 🚨 RUMOR about potential future TS4 🚨