It’s not often The Sims gets competition; however, this time around, it appears many of The Sims players have been won over by inZOI. Hence, something interesting is currently happening within EA’s walls because it appears The Sims Labs playtesters keep getting email surveys from EA asking about inZOI, with some surveys going as long as 80 questions.
For those who are unaware, EA (Electronic Arts, owner of The Sims) has launched a playtest registration for The Sims Labs in 2024. It’s supposedly its next big innovation for the franchise (though not necessarily a full sequel). Since inZOI‘s release, however, some of The Sims Labs playtesters have been allegedly bombarded with surveys from EA asking about specifics from inZOI, including how many hours the playtesters have spent playing The Sims‘ biggest competition or what they like about it.
The information came from an anonymous Reddit post that claims to know someone who received around 10 surveys from EA’s The Sims team asking about inZOI. “They said this feels like the 10th survey they’ve received from EA since InZoi’s early access release. They think The Sims Team is genuinely scared,” according to the post.
Some of the inZOI Redditors were in disbelief and needed clarification, because this is, reportedly, EA and The Sims snooping around and possibly asking what they could copy from the competition. In the aforementioned thread, plenty of others have also claimed to have received the same or a similar survey from EA, with one inZOI fan even sharing that they were “brutally honest” about what they liked and hoped that EA would listen.
The Sims was Friendly With inZOI Prior
Some of the weirder incidents surrounding the story are how even those who playtest an unrelated EA game, such as Skate, also received the inZOI survey. Regardless, the consensus in the thread is that EA is now feeling the pressure from the competition, especially since The Sims franchise practically went unchallenged for decades, up until The Sims 4.
The funny thing is that back in inZOI‘s early access release on March 28th, the official The Sims X account even welcomed the competition with a digital fruit cake and open arms. The online gesture practically quelled the animosity within the overlapping player communities, though we now know what’s really going on within The Sims team.
Those who have been playing inZOI, however, will likely note the lack of content and how the game is still a little too bare to be copied by its bigger competition. In fact, the player count for inZOI has already dropped significantly– around 85 percent since its release. It appears inZOI hasn’t exactly shown its full hand yet.
So maybe expect more surveys from The Sims Labs or EA about what else they can copy from inZOI, because there’s bound to be more groundbreaking features in the months ahead. Perhaps they might have asked too early.
