I looked forward to events with brand new objects created by the most talented people I know. I hung out on lot servers hosted by friends between developing new features before we even launched, messing around on a half-broken game. While I never got to experience the “core gameplay” with FreeSO, I got something a lot better. Thanks to The Sims Online, I’ve had the opportunity to learn how my favourite game series works behind the scenes, and I love every piece of it. Its lasting impression was strong enough to drive me to dedicate years to the project, which I don’t think any other piece of media could have managed. My only experience with The Sims Online was downloading the trial when I was too young to play, then eventually rediscovering and binging it weeks before the announcement of its shutdown. Maybe one day, there should be a decompilation project to ensure that the true original is preserved too.įor me, FreeSO was an opportunity to fully explore a game that I never had the opportunity to play during its heyday. While adding new things lets us envision a future TSO never had, it’s limited by our own interpretation of the original formula.

FreeSO is our attempt at doing that, though it has its limits as a reimplementation.

It’s a product of its time, a piece of history that deserves to be preserved for as long as possible. Habbo Hotel never had the sense of reality. Second Life never had the depth of interaction. I don’t think the experience and feeling that this game provides has ever been replicated by another game, and I’m starting to think that it won’t ever be. Now, it’s scary to think that FreeSO’s servers have now been running for more days than it. After almost a decade of spinoff games trying to recapture the feeling, and many failed restoration projects, we finally emerged with something resebling the original game. I remember personally checking the blog religiously for months.

That kind of following is hard to come by. Despite this, years of communities devoted to the game kept interest alive for almost a decade. It was hard enough to understand why The Sims worked so well in the first place.Īfter just under 6 years, and an incredibly awkward attempt at a reboot, all cities were closed for good. The same base simulation, but a completely different game, it simply couldn’t capture the same audience. What the world expected was another smash hit success – video gaming taken by storm by the most ambitious entry in the series yet… but The Sims Online was not The Sims. The deep simulation and interactions of the original, combined with the creativity of millions of players around the world.

On release, The Sims Online was pitched with the potential to become the biggest MMO in the world, right off of the massive success of The Sims. Today marks 20 years since The Sims Online was officially released.

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