“If somebody feels like there’s some aspect of this that doesn’t quite fully capture who you are, let us know,” she says. She wants to hear from those players in the weeks and months ahead.
“Still, it felt like the right thing to do.”Ĭroft notes that while many players will come away from the update feeling they are finally represented by the game, others may not be fully satisfied. “Trying to retrofit something in is always complicated, but what really matters is that we felt the work was important,” Croft says. A sore point in the community is the lack of nonbinary gender options for Sims, which means updates like the Sexual Orientation feature still have to operate within a rigid gender binary that doesn’t represent the entire player base. The Sims 4 is an eight-year-old game, and Croft explains that the game’s systems weren’t made for updates like this. “80 percent of the work is pretty straightforward then 20 percent is throwing out all the things you broke because the game wasn’t meant to handle this particular thing,” Croft explains. Implementing this feature had unforeseen consequences, though. We can tell the story of somebody who knows who they are and somebody who’s still figuring it out,” Croft says.Īny of these parameters can be changed at any time, which the team saw as a way to give players the ability to tell evolving stories. “It came from a desire to want to tell authentic stories. “What really matters is that we felt the work was important.” However, there is a third option to determine if a Sim is experimenting. By separating physical and romantic attraction, the team can better reflect asexual and aromantic identities in the game. This includes what gender they are interested in romantically and what gender they want to engage in Woohoo with. The feature itself sounds simple enough, a new menu will appear in Create a Sim where players can set the parameters of attraction for each Sim. “We try not to seem evil whenever possible” laughs Croft.
Players will not be required to purchase the High School Years expansion to receive the Sexual Orientation feature -it will be a free base game update available to everyone. So it was important to implement this feature here”.Ī new section in Create a Sim allows players to determine physical and romantic attraction. “When you start talking about finding your identity, touching on orientation was just a no-brainer. “A lot of people discover themselves or start asking who they are in their teenage years,” Croft explains. As the title suggests, it will focus on stereotypical teenage experiences like going to prom. “It’s in our DNA to really want to be an inclusive franchise.”īut why did this update take so long? Why now? The Sexual Orientation feature will launch on July 28, alongside The Sims 4’s newest expansion, High School Years.
Media gives people blueprints for how to lead their life, and Maxis sees The Sims as a way to give players more blueprints to see how life could play out. “This is something players have been asking for for a very long time, and rightly so.”
“It’s in our DNA to really want to be an inclusive franchise and this seemed like an important next step,” Croft says. Numerous members of the development team, including Croft, identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ community.
The Sims player base is heavily queer, and Croft has heard countless stories from players who saw themselves represented in media for the first time through The Sims. The new High School Years expansion focuses on the teenage experience.