If something new is shown at EA Play regarding The Sims Franchise, what do you think it will be?

"Loanet;c-16393798" wrote:
Who's gonna buy any more Sims 4 packs if there's a whole new game coming out in 18 months? I know I wouldn't.

They haven't even released Seasons yet.

I think there are three things to be discussed - Sims Mobile release, and whatever game pack is out this quarter, while also fielding questions about this year's EP.

You see, while some people clamour for Sims 5, EA knows that it can appeal to many more new customers than Sims 5 would get for their money, by employing porting teams. You see, the younger audience IS on the phone apps.

There's a good reason the Devs would want Sims 4 to last. You see, Triple-A Devs are in a pretty lousy position when it comes to job stability. As soon as a game is complete, their jobs are pretty much over. Bye-bye, don't let the door hit your plum on the way out. A sequel with an identical engine is their only chance, and not much of a chance at that. When Sims 4 was made, a whole new team was brought in for a whole new engine, and then the Sims 3 staff got laid off.

No way is it just EA who treats devs that way. So Devs are not going to turn to their employers and say "We're out of ideas, I guess you've got to pay us to make Sims 5 now" cuz for sure they won't be on the team making it. And I'm not knocking at the Devs for it either. That's what happens when you don't have a union.

I think standard game developer rules don't really apply to the Sims. Look at how many of the SimGurus have been around since Sims 2 and even the original Sims game. Much of the current functions remain the same, even if the game engines change; you still have the programming for interactions between Sims, or between Sims and objects, character design and such. And it costs a lot of money to dismiss employees and bring in new ones; depending on the company, you'll have vacation/sick time to cash out, 401(k)s that have to be transferred which could mean stock options being held in an 401(k) have to be converted, etc. It's like the old song "Cheaper to keep her" -- if you've got a good employee it's cheaper to hang onto that person rather than replace with someone who might turn out to be a lousy worker who spends most of his/her time surfing the Web.

As for who will continue to buy Sims 4 packs? I will, and probably many others, in case Sims 5 is beyond our current computer specs and we're not sure if we can afford an upgrade right away when Sims 5 is released. I bought Into the Future even though I knew Sims 4 was coming in a few months. And I might even wait to get a Sims 5 base game anyway if it's missing key features like toddlers.

"Erpe;c-16394548" wrote:

"Zeldaboy180;c-16394198" wrote:

"Erpe;c-16391802" wrote:

"ebuchala;c-16391208" wrote:

"MissNightOwl;c-16358866" wrote:
I'm a little confused with the whole TS5 idea. Didn't Graham said that now when the big Pets expansion pack is done, they can work on new exciting packs, or something like that? I don't now, I got impression that there's a lot to do with TS4 (and I think so myself), but everybody suddenly talks about TS5... Anyway, it'd be rather odd if they annouce now the game to come in few years, the Sims Mobile is not interesting to me at all, so I hope it's about a new expansion.

I wouldn't worry about it being TS5 yet. I think some people who really dislike this version have their wishful-thinking caps on, is all. Maxis has been pretty clear that they're following a different release schedule/pattern for dlc with TS4 and, even more recently, that they'll be offering plenty more content for this game. I really do think they plan on continuing with this version for awhile yet to come.

There is no doubt that TS4 will get another EP, a GP and at least 4 more SPs which is quite a lot. But this doesn’t prevent EA from announcing TS5 in a couple of months and then release it about 15 months later in the second half of 2019. So I think that the wishful thinking is mostly done by the dreamers who want TS4 to continue to 2022 or even later ;)

Graham said the they follow a different schedule with the packs for TS4. But we already know that because we have seen that at least half of the usual EPs now are replaced by both the new GPs and by many more SPs. Again the wishful dreamers instead overinterpretate the statement to mean a guarantee that TS4 will continue forever until TS4 even has more EPs than TS3 got ;)

But, this is the speculation section so, like everyone else, I'm just speculating. Either way, I'm interested to see what they're planning next for the Sims.

I have followed this debate closely and I am not especially interested in TS5 even though I don’t play TS4 anymore. The reason is that I don’t think that the release of TS5 will stop the changed schedule with many smaller packs instead of a lot of big EPs. Actually I fear that TS5 won’t get even a single EP but only GPs and even more SPs than TS4 got.

It's not wishful thinking. It was already stated they will keep making packs for sims 4 until it no longer makes sense. What that means exactly is speculation, but I believe it means either until the game gets too clogged up, it stops making money, or they have a new idea they can only add with a new sims because the engine limits them.

I actually think that I read that statement a long time ago. But I only read it as one of those meaningless statements that people often say when they don’t have a real answer. Also I didn’t put more meaning into it because I know that it isn’t the devs but instead EA’s top who make such decisions and it is unlikely that EA’s top already had made a more accurate statement to the devs at the time. So “until it no longer makes sense” likely just meant “until EA has told us to release TS5 instead” or “until TS5 is so close to be released that more packs for TS4 won’t make sense anymore”

Even Grant on the First page says Sims 4 isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

Wasn’t that a long time ago? But anyway: That is obviously true because they still will release packs for TS4 at least a year more. Most likely until late in the spring of 2019. And besides even TS3 hasn’t gone anywhere yet and its packs are still sold by EA for high prices ;)

The Graham quote you are mentioning and this quote are TWO different quotes. Nobody is confusing them for each other.

Maybe not. But I think that many simmers overinterpretate those statements because they forget that the developers only are making the games. They aren’t the top managers in EA who decide which games to make and when they are released. So statements from the devs about such thing are usually vague and based on their own private guesses which they avoid to state too explicitly though.

I think the teams have a bit more input in what gets made than is implied. Basically, they get the budget for a pack (EP, GP or SP) from upstairs then they discuss ideas and choose a theme, working within budget limits to produce content. The Community SP project really gave a great look at the process of producing a pack, just a bit more stretched out because of the need to get community input instead of yelling at each other over a white board. B)