EA Shelves Mysterious Sims Project, Raising Hopes for Players

It has been another difficult year for video games, marked by a wave of studio closures, staff layoffs, and projects that barely managed to launch before being abruptly cancelled. The mood has felt especially bleak since EA paraded out two beloved franchises—Mass Effect and Dragon Age—for what amounted to a public execution via the announcement that BioWare was being shut down.

This hit especially hard for Mass Effect players, who had been looking forward to the upcoming Mass Effect 5, which we now know was tentatively titled Mass Effect: Universe. But it is not just BioWare fans who are upset at the moment. Fans of EA’s other properties are growing increasingly concerned about the future of those franchises, if any future is planned for them at all. My colleague Levi Winslow recently wrote about those concerns for the Skate franchise in the wake of layoffs at its development studio. Meanwhile, I am quite worried about the fate of The Sims.

In the same breath as announcing the end of BioWare, EA also reaffirmed its commitment to the Apex Legends, Skate, and The Sims franchises. But everyone knows that when it comes to profits, EA’s sports titles leave its other IPs far behind. If EA is willing to pull the plug on legacy franchises like Mass Effect and Dragon Age, where does that leave its other franchises, like The Sims 4?

EA is pivoting its focus from Project Rene to Project Evergreen.

According to EA, Sims fans need not worry, as the company is committed to “focusing on the long-term potential of The Sims.” Apparently, focusing on that long-term potential involves shelving a project The Sims team has been working on for years: Project Rene, AKA Project Lotus, AKA the nebulous next entry in The Sims franchise, which appears to be some kind of weird Sims MMO mobile game thing. Instead, EA will be focusing on Project Evergreen, which is rumored to be a sort of remaster of The Sims 4, with all (or most) DLC packs included, and recurring bugs squashed.

“We’re supporting this franchise by pausing work on one of the next titles in this franchise” doesn’t exactly inspire confidence, especially after the nonchalance with which EA just killed two other beloved game franchises. But I think this actually might be the right move.

It’s been a bumpy couple of years for The Sims, and many players aren’t particularly enthused about Project Rene/Lotus, as it seems to be once again trying to recreate The Sims Online, something EA has tried to rebuild over and over. In fact, much of the reason The Sims 4 launched in such awful shape was due to the fact that it was initially meant to be an MMO-style game that could run on mobile devices. Less than a year before launch, EA pivoted to a more traditional Sims game–but by then, so much of the game had been built with online play and mobile devices in mind that it was too late to turn back. Despite releasing over 100 DLC packs and embarking on a concentrated campaign to squash the game’s many, many, many bugs, longtime Sims players are still frustrated with the state of The Sims 4, often pointing out the numerous ways it pales in comparison to its predecessor, The Sims 3.

The Sims 4 is officially “done” in that there are no plans to release any more expansion packs for the game. When it comes to the future of the franchise, most players don’t want the next Sims title to be yet another attempt at shoehorning online and/or mobile gameplay into a game that is, at its core, all about building and playing with digital dolls in their digital dollhouses. So EA’s decision to hit pause on Project Rene/Lotus’s development isn’t something I find especially heartbreaking. In fact, I think it’s the first truly wise decision EA’s made regarding the franchise in a long time, provided EA actually plans to support Project Evergreen long-term (which the name Evergreen would suggest).

Sims 4 players don’t want Project Rene, but they do want either The Sims 5 or a complete, playable version of The Sims 4—ideally one that doesn’t require the purchase of $1,600 in DLC packs to feel “finished.” Hitting pause on its weird, experimental Sims projects in favor of attempting to preserve The Sims 4 in a stable, playable, “evergreen” state is arguably the best decision EA could make, given the current state of both EA and The Sims franchise. Pouring resources into a concept that has failed before (online MMO-style Sims gameplay) rather than a tried-and-true formula (a digital dollhouse) would only harm the franchise at this point.

Whatever Project Rene is supposed to be, it’s officially on ice for now.

Of course, there’s no telling what kind of shape Project Evergreen will launch in, assuming it does successfully make it to launch. It sounds like the Evergreen devs have a deadline to hit—hence the reshuffling of resources away from Rene/Lotus—but even with the increase in development resources, there’s no guarantee Evergreen will be a massive hit with players.

Provided the rest of development does go smoothly and Evergreen is indeed well-received by players, it may still fall short of EA’s goals when it comes to profits. EA has spent the last decade doing everything possible to monetize the living hell out of The Sims 4, a game that—unlike EA’s lucrative sports catalog—is largely intended to be a solitary gaming experience that doesn’t require online play. Back in the olden days of The Sims 1, 2, and 3, players would purchase the base game, a few expansion packs, and maybe a couple of “stuff packs” for extra decor options, but that was all one really needed to enjoy the game.

The Sims 4, however, ushered in an era of seemingly endless DLC: expansion packs, game packs, stuff packs, kits—there are over 100 of them, ranging in cost from $40 down to $5, and totaling around $1,600 if purchased individually outside of sales and bundles. In addition to the constant stream of DLC releases, EA has in recent years implemented daily login rewards, various events and challenges, and even a paid mod store nobody asked for—all in the hopes of getting players to spend more time and money on The Sims 4. For a while there, I half-expected EA to implement a Sims 4 battle pass.

EA trimming down its Sims projects is fine with me, as long as the series isn’t uprooted entirely.

There’s no telling what sort of irritating monetization tactics we’ll see in Project Evergreen, but at the very least, Evergreen sounds like an attempt to try and maintain the series’ roots, rather than continue chasing the mobile MMO Roblox-like direction Project Lotus seemed to be taking. Even better, Evergreen may turn out to be the game Sims players have been aching for since The Sims 4 launched to middling reviews back in 2014: a game that isn’t fundamentally broken and lacking in content.

The real question is whether Evergreen will be successful enough to keep The Sims franchise alive. Given that EA’s new owners were happy to kill off what was shaping up to be a potentially great Mass Effect game, it’s not hard to imagine a world where the Grim Reaper inevitably comes for The Sims, regardless of whether players love or hate Project Evergreen. After all, feelings don’t generate dollar signs, and EA’s new owners have made one thing abundantly clear: killing off an iconic franchise is “worth it” if it saves EA a few Simoleons.