The Sims 5 has been in development at Maxis (an Electronic Arts studio) for several years, and every so often, we get snippets of what that game might end up looking like when it’s eventually released. It’s being created under the name ‘Project Rene’, and it’s being touted as the next generation of The Sims, both in terms of technology and gameplay.
In a recent interview, Lyndsay Pearson, the VP of Franchise Creative on The Sims at Maxis, spoke about the all-new elements being fused with the creation of The Sims 5. Namely, she touched on the multiplayer mechanics they’re eager to embed in the game ahead of its inevitable release.
‘Social Can Mean So Many Things’
In a podcast-based interview with Radio Times, Pearson spoke about the team’s desire to bring online multiplayer to The Sims 5 – which would more or less be a first for the franchise:
We definitely want to introduce multiplayer. And not multiplayer in the big, scary ‘jump in a world full of strangers’ kind of way. But literally, how do you and your friends want to do some play together? And there’s a lot of different flavours that could take, so we’re exploring a lot of different spaces there.
Pearson explained that the team at Maxis is ‘having fun exploring all those different opportunities,’ because ‘social can mean so many things.’ There are plenty of ways in which Maxis could introduce multiplayer mechanics to The Sims 5 – and Pearson took the opportunity to lean on Animal Crossing as a representative example of what could be done. In Animal Crossing, players build their own ‘island’ in whatever fashion they desire, and other players can come to visit that island.
It might not yet be known how multiplayer will work in The Sims 5, but it is safe to assume that it will be a thing in this next generation of The Sims, which is now more than two decades old as a franchise.
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