Project Rene: What is the Difference in FTP and FTE?

It is a very suspicious quote, if you ask me. I don't know what it means, but I imagine "Entering" the game will require an internet connection. I also imagine that a lot of stuff will cost money once you "Enter," though this is just suspicions from years of playing EA. They are a company, not a non-profit, and are not interested in putting hours in to create a game then releasing it for free, without a way to make money worked in there. Expansion packs come out some time after the Base Game, unless they're working EA employees twice as hard. So, I'd say it can't be typical dlc. They might be stripping the game down to the most basic bare-bones, then releasing a pack with more stuff. But I think what most are afraid of is that they'll put a store with the individual items in it. And you'll use real money to buy a special fancy named Sim dollars. And each item will have a sim-dollar amount. It's a sneaky way to get you to spend more, because you're not spending real cash on the item.

Of course, the original posted Job listing that had this on it was taken down, but sorry EA, you guys can't unring a bell. Getting us to stop talking about this will take more than that.

I have not heard "free to enter" before, if I had to guess, they mean that the entry barrier is very low, because you are supposedly going to be able to play the game on your phone and they assume everyone has a phone so the game is free to enter as in you don't require a computer or a tv with a console to play.

From what we have seen it looks like Rene will probably be free to play with different ways of monetizing the game.

I'm not a fan of them making the game for a phone as well because I think that will just limit them in what they can make.

I've never heard of "free to enter" in the context of gaming. It's well understood at F2P or FtP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-to-play)

I think it's possible that they chose those words for SEO/web crawling reasons as they don't want to be associated with F2P or the HR person who helped draft the job description wrote it that way and it was never changed

But maybe they specifically say Free to Enter in order to differentiate from games like Fornite, which are really free to play but rely on microtransactions for revenue. Free to Enter could suggest a very minimal base game with large DLC EPs being almost required to do anything.

My guess is that only the base game will be free.

"simmerorigin;c-18289274" wrote:
I've never heard of "free to enter" in the context of gaming. It's well understood at F2P or FtP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-to-play)

I think it's possible that they chose those words for SEO/web crawling reasons as they don't want to be associated with F2P or the HR person who helped draft the job description wrote it that way and it was never changed

But maybe they specifically say Free to Enter in order to differentiate from games like Fornite, which are really free to play but rely on microtransactions for revenue. Free to Enter could suggest a very minimal base game with large DLC EPs being almost required to do anything.

It's a bit scary in terms of microtransactions. Maybe they meant F2P but like you say didn't want people to think it's really like that where we are nickeled and dimed to death. But then it is a specific term, and maybe it could mean your Sim needs transportation to get to that job, pay real money to ride a trolly or buy a car sort of game. I hope they explain that term soon.

"simmerorigin;c-18289274" wrote:
I've never heard of "free to enter" in the context of gaming. It's well understood at F2P or FtP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-to-play)

I think it's possible that they chose those words for SEO/web crawling reasons as they don't want to be associated with F2P or the HR person who helped draft the job description wrote it that way and it was never changed

But maybe they specifically say Free to Enter in order to differentiate from games like Fornite, which are really free to play but rely on microtransactions for revenue. Free to Enter could suggest a very minimal base game with large DLC EPs being almost required to do anything.

Of course, I hadn't thought of that. It's possible that they didn't want to use the term "Free to Play," because they didn't want us to hear about it yet. Well, too bad.

"Sarah26Cat;c-18289523" wrote:

"simmerorigin;c-18289274" wrote:
I've never heard of "free to enter" in the context of gaming. It's well understood at F2P or FtP (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-to-play)

I think it's possible that they chose those words for SEO/web crawling reasons as they don't want to be associated with F2P or the HR person who helped draft the job description wrote it that way and it was never changed

But maybe they specifically say Free to Enter in order to differentiate from games like Fornite, which are really free to play but rely on microtransactions for revenue. Free to Enter could suggest a very minimal base game with large DLC EPs being almost required to do anything.

Of course, I hadn't thought of that. It's possible that they didn't want to use the term "Free to Play," because they didn't want us to hear about it yet. Well, too bad.

It seems like the sims team doesn’t want the attention. Major publications like IGN wrote about job posting, but EA does not seem to responded to any of the requests for comment https://www.ign.com/articles/the-sims-5-will-seemingly-adopt-a-fortnite-monetisation-model

From the following information in the posting (job posting) does this mean the person who gets that job will determine creators' content pricing? And advise what they should share and when and what? It sort of reads that way to me. And like I thought cliques of teams to create this content for them?

The candidate will "own pricing of all content in this free-to-enter game, ensuring we have an optimal pricing and content architecture provide guidance to content teams on in-game content needs to meet player demand.

ETA: Thanks for the answers. I don't play any F2P games, nor do I understand how MMOs work all that much with players selling their creations to other players. That doesn't sound like something that would be in the spirit of The Sims since most of us who played for years have always believed that custom content is shared (free) from a generosity of heart to fellow players and EA was the one who always went after those charging for their content creations. My how times have changed.


I wouldn't even want to deal with the divisiveness this will eventually cause in the Simming Community. Maybe good for EA (money, money, money) but bad for the spirit of sharing and no one above anyone else sort of type community we have always tried to keep alive in the community.

It almost sounds like EA/Maxis will be telling custom content creator teams what they should create and sell so that Maxis doesn't have to do it. And in my opinion, just like gamechangers/influencers, once they start depending on that income, they own their souls. I wonder if they will be told they have a deadline to create and upload some predetermined content..

Pretty sure the content teams they are referring to are just Maxis employees, not CC creators.

"g01denswan;c-18289892" wrote:
Pretty sure the content teams they are referring to are just Maxis employees, not CC creators.

Yeah that's how I interpreted it too. I'm pretty sure they outsource stuff so maybe it's referring to those teams that aren't "officially" employed by EA or Maxis but are more like contractors that get paid for to do a job and that's it until something else is needed.