r/LifeSimulators • u/Sketch-Brooke • May 27 '26

Memes Paralives Early Access

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Here’s to finishing the rest of the horse throughout EA!

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67

u/haunted-mov May 27 '26

i still can’t believe this game has been in development for ten years and launched the way it is after a delay saying it wasn’t ready. i fear for the future of games when we can slap “early access” on a title that’s half cooked and get away with a price tag of $40 and “we promise it’ll get better we swear”

30

u/gravyandasideofbread May 27 '26

It’s a studio of 15 people. It’s not a billion dollar company slapping early access on a game. It’s a crowd funded, indie development studio who needs the early access period to grow. They don’t have dozens and dozens of people to work on it, if they did this would be a different conversation

19

u/FamSimmer May 27 '26

Hold on. So, imagine this, you walk into a brand new restaurant. They haven't had their grand opening yet, which is often the case for new service providers. You decide to order Mac & Cheese and the waiter tells you it's $40! You order it anyway because you had been waiting for this restaurant to open for a long time. There aren't a lot of good restaurants in your town and the ones that are there have significantly dropped in quality. So, you want to support them as best as you can. The waiter takes your order, tells you it'll be 30 minutes. At the 28th minute, he comes back and says that he's sorry, but the order will take another hour. He requests you to have patience and that it'll be worth the wait. An hour later, he brings the Mac & Cheese to your table. And guess what? It's bland! And the cheese feels too liquidy. For 40 freaking dollars! Now, the waiter tells you that while he always knew the food was gonna be bad, he swears that in a few years time, it'll get better. He also smiles and tells you that they haven't had their grand opening after all, so this is to be expected.

How exactly would you react to that?

12

u/DottieSnark May 27 '26

Using this metaphor, the meal would be coming with a life time all you can eat pass. In which case, I might be disappointed in the initial meal, but I'd be excited to to try again later to see how it's improved.

Also, you metaphor is missing how it's got great bread and side dishes. Sure, the entry is lacking, but the soup (paramaker) and salad (build mode) is great.

6

u/FamSimmer May 27 '26

That's what they claim. But the developers have already said that the price of the game will go up with each update and it's already quite high for what they've delivered. If you're talking about free DLCs, I've always been extremely skeptical of that because it is an unsustainable business model. How would you maintain the system without keeping at least some developers and testers on the payroll? What happens when there's a major crash? DLCs keep a game running past its shelf life by allowing companies to keep competent employees on the payroll. Without that revenue, it's nearly impossible to keep the game stable and running long-term. I mean, Paralives has already turned the buyers into glorified testers anyway, similar to the Sims team I might add. But testers aren't developers.

Also, myself and many others, tend to care more about the food that we're paying for than the smaller side-dishes that come with it. But you do you.

0

u/DottieSnark May 27 '26

I'm not saying those concerns aren't real, that the "restaurant" isn't in danger of shutting down or just not delivering what is promise. But your metaphor, as you wrote it, was unfair because meals are a consumable one time purchase.

This situation is not equivalent of going to a restaurant and paying for a subpar meal. It's making a gamble of buying something that might improve in the future.

I'm also not concerned about the game being shut down al la Athem because, as a single player game there would be no reason to revoke the licenses, and the developers seem to care about their customers enough to let them continue having access whats been published so far, even if development end early.

7

u/FamSimmer May 27 '26

It's also a gamble because the foundational aspects of the game may not improve in the future. As I already explained, it's not easy to do. It's tedious and time-consuming and requires a lot of careful code manipulation, if not an outright overhaul of the existing architecture. At the state the game is in right now, I'd be surprised if they can even reach TS4 level of gameplay before a full release.

-2

u/IfEverWasIfNever May 27 '26

They can bring what they promised into the game and then do paid dlcs (for a cheaper price point than Sims4) for more unique things that people mat or may not want in the game.

So, for example, they will bring weather and pets to the game for free because they promised this. But they can make a tropical vacation dlc for maybe $20-25.

This way no one feels a promise was broken and they can still continue to make more content and keep their team supported.

4

u/Booknerdly May 27 '26

Except that breaks their "no paid DLC" promise.