The Sims 5 Is Cancelled! And More Big EA News

The Sims 5 is cancelled, but that doesn’t mean big things still aren’t coming for the franchise. But, will simmers accept everything that’s coming?

You read the title correctly—as of now, The Sims 5 is cancelled.

This was inferred by a recent post made by EA regarding the future of The Sims franchise which shared lots of news, although not all players will be happy about it. Here’s what has been announced.

The Sims 5 Is Cancelled—Or It Never Existed

The news site Variety reported today that the anticipated sequel for the long running franchise isn’t happening. Instead, EA has decided to keep its focus on further developing The Sims 4—which is already the longest-running installment of the franchise having just turned 10 years old on September 2—along with revamping other games such as the MySims series.

Project Renee Was Never The Sims 5

Fans have been making predictions about Project Renee since it was first announced, and EA let us believe that it was intended to be The Sims 5 by never confirming or denying these predictions. Through multiple developer livestreams we saw state-of-the-art mechanics and concepts and it really looked like this would be the next generation of the series.

Instead it appears that Project Renee will be its own standalone game, still part of the franchise but not one of the mainline titles. With the project being a multiplayer, multi-platform game lots of simmers were hesitant about the idea of this being The Sims 5 so there’s some relief in knowing the basic formula of the main series isn’t changing. The question is, what will Project Renee be? Is it the next version of The Sims Online? Will it be called The Sims Multiplayer or The Sims: Explore The Neighborhood or something like that? We’ll have to wait and see.

Extending The Life Of The Sims 4

As part of EA’s post, they shared plans on how they want to keep The Sims 4 going well into the future. We’ve already seen a little bit of this as the level of content being released for the game recently has increased along with the quality of said content, and supposedly they’re still working on better optimizing older aspects of the game.

One of the newer ways EA has been trying to pump up engagement is through Daily Rewards Events. There has been one so far with another coming next week. While the content from the Event(s) is free, some astute players saw this as a thinly veiled way to introduce microtransactions and their suspicion doesn’t appear to have been far off…

Creator Kits

Kits have been a thing for a while now, small DLC packs that cost roughly $5 USD and usually contain just CAS content or just Buy/Build content with about 25-30 pieces per Kit. While there has been some collaboration in the past such as Plumbella’s contribution to the Pastel Pop Kit, EA is planning on making creator collabs a regular thing now. In our recent post about the upcoming Kits we remarked that the Storybook Nursery Kit looked very similar to a CC pack released by creator SIXAM…as it turns out, they collaborated with EA to make the Kit in question.

Moving forward these pieces of DLC will be released under the title of The Sims 4 Creator Kits. Per EA:

These Creator Kits will mark the first time that a full collection of in-game assets have been crafted by a creator and officially published by The Sims development team, making them available for all players. 

For The Sims 4 players who crave more variety in customization and design, look for The Sims 4 Creator Kits to start rolling out in November 2024 across our Sims channels and available alongside our current collections of Kits.

This upcoming Kit variant was not announced in the Autumn 2024 Roadmap unless it falls under the “free updates” category, but we doubt that these Kits will be releasing for free. Part of the intention behind these Kits is to make Simmer-created content that’s accessible to console players, which leaves the question of cost all the more uncertain.

The Sims Creator Program & The Sims Labs

Creator Kits aren’t the only way EA is getting simmers further into the development side of the franchise. Many well-known creators have previously been recruited to the EA Creator Network where they were allowed to preview upcoming DLC, given free game codes to give away, and more. A new branch is being added to this area through The Sims Creator Program which seeks to tap creators of varying specialties to help shape the game moving forward. Anybody who is part of the Creator Network is automatically enrolled in the new program, but they’re also accepting applications for more.

Another area where applications are being accepted is through The Sims Labs Playtesting Program. They are looking for players over a number of different platforms and testing a wide range of features including (but not limited to) accessibility options for future content.

I myself have already applied and been accepted into this program, although no The Sims oriented content has been made available for testing yet. Project Renee will supposedly be available for playtesting on the platform at some point in the future.

The Sims’ 25th Birthday Bash

It was a bit surprising that nothing was done for the 10th birthday of The Sims 4 but it seems like EA is focused on an even bigger picture instead and preparing for the franchise’s 25th anniversary. There hasn’t been much shared so far other than that we should prepare “to party like it’s the year 2000” and that we’ll be learning more in a Behind The Sims Livestream in January 2025.

The Sims Hits The Big Screen!

EA is partnering with Amazon MGM Studios to make a movie based on The Sims franchise. It’s being written and directed by Kate Herron with Briony Redman taking on co-writing duties. Herron has previously directed for shows suck as Loki and Sex Education and Redman has written for Doctor Who. The film will be co-produced by LuckyChap (you might know them as Margot Robbie’s production house) and Vertigo Entertainment, both being production companies with many well-known films.

“The Future Is Plumbob Green”

EA’s thoughts on everything coming to The Sims is that “the future is Plumbob green,” meaning the future is bright. Do you agree?

• Are you looking forward to continued revitalization of The Sims 4? What do you want to see fixed/, updated, or introduced?
• Will you play Project Renee when it’s released?
• Are you upset that The Sims 5 is cancelled?
• Do you think Creator Kits are a good thing?
• Is the Creator Network and Sim Labs a wonderful opportunity to bring more voices into the making of the game, or a way for EA to get user input without having to pay for it?
• What do you think The Sims movie will be about?
• Where does Project Dolores fit in all of this?

Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and we’ll see you in a couple of days when the newest Kits launch!