Sims shift to free2play has been fruitful

A good fit, it appears. However it's Electronic Arts so, generally don't want to wish them well. Or give them ideas. Which they will be getting, bad ones.

The Sims 4 gained more than 15m new players in the past year, despite being over a decade old

Wabadebadoo!

The Sims 4 might be getting on a bit, what with having launched over a decade ago now, but that doesn't seem to have dulled interest in the long-running life sim series; EA just announced The Sims 4 has managed to gain over 15m new players this year alone.

To put that into perspective, it took The Sims 4 six years to amass 20m players after its launch back in 2014 - a figure that then skyrocketed following EA's decision to transition the formerly premium title into a free-to-play game in October 2022. That business model shift more than quadrupled The Sims 4's audience, with EA touting 85m players back in May this year, and we now know the past 12 months have brought a total of 15m new players.

That most recent figure was revealed as part of EA's second-quarter 2025 financial earnings report ("Increased engagement led to higher-than-expected net bookings for the franchise in Q2", the publisher noted), and helps provide additional context for its announcement earlier this year that, despite its age, The Sims 4 will remain "a foundational Sims experience" as the series moves "beyond linear, sequential Sims releases".

The Sims 4's surge in popularity also explains EA renewed focus on the ten-year-old game, with the publisher having pledgedmore bug fixes more oftenthis May as it looks to address years of 'frustrating' technical issues. That's on top of a range of new in-game initiatives, such as the new live-service style Reaper's Rewards Event, and a continuing avalanche of new DLC.

Next on the expansion list is The Sims 4's extremely promising and wonderfully macabreLife & Death expansion, which releases this Thursday, 31st October. Its launch follows a free base game update last week considerably expanding Sims' ghost-form gameplay (and making itpossible to bonk Death), and comes ahead of a new series of creator-designed DLC packs.

Fucking casuals and their easily exploited minds.

I don't see a problem with people enjoying the sims.

It can be a gateway for people to enter the pc gaming sphere, and probably, alongside World Of Warcraft, Starcraft, Championship Manager etc.. contributed the most in that respect to drawing in people who otherwise did not care.

More the EA part, them being a cancerous tumor looking for ways to grow perpetually.

@BassMan: Evil casuals! *Shakes fist*

Seriously dude. I never understand why casuals are enemies to the hardcore? Did they poison your water supply? Burn your crops? Deliver a plague into your house?

PC gamers don't like to hear it but a big part of what kept the platform going was these people, because the hardcore ones were too busy stealing their games.

I just wish they would release a next gen update for consoles to fully take advantage of the SSD

The ps4 version is un-playable, but playing it on PS5 makes the load times bearable, but there still isn't a next gen version to make load times better

Only The Sims game I ever played was the first one on PC. Got the Double Deluxe bundle that came with the Living Large and House Party expansions. Still have it. Quite enjoyed it. Would sometimes think about checking out the newer games to see what they’re like now but never got around to it.

That's what makes them hardcore, they live on the edge of the law.

I don't think the Sims 4 is a bad game really, I'm sure I got it free on Origin along with some DLC.

But yeah when I first heard about the developers of Sim City making the sims, I was genuinly excited.

Had a blast playing that first game, but never returned for any sequel.

@BassMan The Sims fans arent the ones spending 1000s of dollars every other year for slightly better shaders, that wont impact the gameplay in any way.

I think I bought it for about 3-4 euro.

For that price it was a pretty solid game, more laid back experience that gives you a lot of freedom. Even if Sims 2 and 3 were/are better (Sims 2 has SERIOUS compatability issues with modern hardware).

The sims as a concept and a game was groundbreaking. Not really getting the hate either. EA being EA, over-monetization, barring it with DLC and live service shit, I get. But again, that's EA.

The sims helped pc gaming grow signicantly. I don't think that's something to be disputed.

@uninspiredcup: I was talking to my brother the other day. Making a game costs a lot of money and the return on investment isn't always clear.

Making a skin barely costs any effort and you can sell that stuff for 10-20 dollars these days and people will accept it. Just sit back and count your (admittedly short term) gains

Really there is no point anymore in making games, which is what Valve has realised too and they are just fine with selling skins in CS2 and TF2. The rules of the game have shifted.

But yeah just like RTS and city builders or even economy games or FPS... I think The Sims as a style of game and genre helped PC gaming grow tremendously.

It kinda hurts that EA no longer wants to make city builders (Simcity) or RTS (C&C)

Oh yes, let's thank casuals for micro transactions, free to play trash, season passes, live service garbage, predatory monetization, shit like Wii, dumbed down game design, etc..

Hate to break it to you, but "hardcores" started as casual at one point. Hell, I'm casual in a lot of genres of gaming, only because I play too much (Fighting games for instance. Ain't good enough for tourneys, but I still love them for my love of Martial Arts fiction, ala JC films, Power Rangers, and Dragon Ball, etc).

And way to act like the Wii didn't bring anything good to this industry, nevermind had solid games (even NOT by Nintendo) despite it's library's reputation.

And far as corps are concerned? Casuals still bring in...

Casuals aren't going away. And don't act like hardcores aren't toxic as hell.

Even if EA made them they'd probably **** them up.

Let us not forgot Syndicate, that had fuckall to do with Syndicate.

@uninspiredcup: it's true but I still miss that Xcom very stylish Bioshock-esque FPS that had **** all to do with Xcom. I was digging the 50s vibe with stylised characters ala Dishonored. I still watch that e3 2010 trailer from time to time.

I actually played that Syndicate game for the first time a few years back. Ripping all of the hideous post processing out and forgetting its lineage for a second it was not bad. Not bad at all.

@R4gn4r0k: Syndicate is what America will be in if Trump wins. All the pink haired people will be send off to death camps.

Be crazy, and very sad.

I wish they'd rerelease classic Sims on Steam or something. Not a big fan of new Sims.

I remember reading somewhere it's a lot of older women, the "I don't like video games, but I like The Sims" crowd. I think the emergent story you could weave appeals to them, as does the fantasy aspect.

Imagine if they'd just go one step further and play, idunno...Rimworld? We'd have a whole world of diehard gamer MILF's.

That stats speak for itself.

The delusion that it was primarily a hardcore platform defied cold hard reality.

1. low spec, laptop

2. A casual relaxing experience

The platform is obviously flexible, facilitating practically any experience, and helped forged them on console handouts. But the revenue of the platform, people actually buying and investing in the games, comes from this demographic.