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(Below: Akary complains about The Sims for 2 minutes)
I love The Sims 4. I love how it has a core loop—build a Sim, give them a personality, watch them/guide them to live their life—that has been essentially unchanged since forever. That loop is tight. It works. It generates emergent stories and genuine emotional investment.
But what I looooove even more is how EA has perfected Cook’s content treadmill. You see, The Sims 4 launched in 2014 missing basic features that The Sims 2 had a decade earlier. Toddlers? Gone. Pools? Gone. Ghosts? Believe it or not, also gone. But don’t worry! They came back later—as free patches, sure, but also as part of a DLC strategy so aggressive it makes a used car salesman blush.
There are now over 90 packs. NINETY. Expansions Packs (21), Game Packs (12), Stuff Packs (20), and Kits (45). Each one is some form of arc—a payload of content you consume once, maybe items you build a few houses with/unique interactions with, and then wait for the next one. The game’s architecture is almost entirely arcs stacked on arcs stacked on arcs. The core loop? Still building Sims and removing pool ladders. That hasn’t changed but if you want a new flavour of arc, parenthood to feel more grounded like it did in the Sims 2…pack time!
Cook warns that “if you stop producing content, the business fails.” EA has taken this as a challenge. They have never stopped producing content. They will keep selling you “seasons” and “pets” and “university” and “cottage living” and “horse ranch” (yes, horses were a separate $40 pack) until the heat death of the universe.
So thank you, EA, for teaching me that a game’s architecture can be whatever you want it to be—including a $1,500+ investment in the illusion of choice. I love that for you. Free base game now buuuut with all the cool features behind pay walls—walls don’t exist in the sea 🏴☠️—but don’t you just love and appreciate EA’s commitment to shareholder value. Really warms the heart.
