Since its initial announcement in March 2023, Life by You captivated the interest of fans of the life simulation genre. Promising an eventual end to the seemingly endless reign of The Sims franchise, the game was an ambitious undertaking that made plenty of promises that had the gaming community waiting with bated breath.

 

Unfortunately, following the game’s official cancellation on June 17, 2024, fans looking forward to playing God have been left with more questions than answers. However, the abrupt end of the game seems unsurprising when viewed in the context of its progress since its announcement.

 

Life by You Announcement

Paired with a video showcasing a glimpse of what the game would look like, the announcement of Life by You (LBY) in March 2023 quickly garnered the attention of casual and hardcore gamers alike. Considering it was to be published by Paradox Interactive, a company known for popular games like Cities: Skylines, Crusader Kings 3, and Prison Architect, many were excited to see what the game would become.

 

The hype surrounding LBY grew with the announcement that a new studio, Paradox Tectonic, would develop the game. The studio’s head, Rod Humble, was one of the original heads of development on The Sims and the CEO of Second Life studio Linden Lab.

 

As news and excitement spread, new details about the game began emerging, leading many to call the upcoming title “the death of The Sims” due to the incredible feature list that made the current genre king, The Sims 4, look outdated.

 

Life by You Features

Many of the features listed for LBY are familiar to anyone who has played a life sim game before. However, some features had fans of the genre eagerly awaiting the release.

 

Character Creation

Like in any life simulation game, the ability to create and customize your character is one of the foundational building blocks. Expanding on The Sims’s Create A Sim, LBY planned to release a character creator that allowed greater customization than ever.

 

Every part of the in-game characters was designed to be edited—from their physical appearance to their personality traits. The game was set to allow players to add their own custom traits and define how these would change the way their character interacted and lived, something never before offered by any game in the genre.

 

Open World

One of the most significant hype points surrounding the game was the open-world map in which characters lived. Not seen in AAA titles since The Sims 3, many were excited to explore the in-game world without the need for any loading screens.

 

Paradox also announced that the open world could be customized as each player wished via new roads, changing terrain, houses, commercial spaces, and community hangouts.

 

Real Language Conversation

Unlike any other life sim, LBY was set to feature conversations between characters in English. These were to be driven by AI to ensure that talks among virtual residents made sense, but they also allowed user input in some circumstances.

 

The move from gibberish (or Simlish) into understandable interactions was highly anticipated among players eager to craft a unique story alongside others. While this was limited to text conversations without the accompanying sound, the feature was still something revolutionary for the genre.

 

Mods

Paradox is well known for encouraging players to create mods (modifications) for its games that help bring new aspects of gameplay to life. Life by You was no different, with the game planned to ship with an in-built mod creator tool similar to that used by Tectonic when developing the game.

 

These mods went beyond simple gameplay changes and allowed players to create almost anything. From custom furniture to new career paths, the game was planned from the onset to be highly moddable, with Paradox planning to create an in-game portal where players could effortlessly share their mods and character stories with each other.

 

Release Delays

With Paradox constantly releasing new insights into the game’s development, anticipation was at a fever pitch in September 2023, when the game was supposed to launch into early access. Citing the need for more development time, the developer pushed the release to May 2024.

 

As the May 2024 release date loomed, online communities reached a new level of fervor. With videos, searches, reviews, and news that shifted from telling website visitors to “check out our review of Lukki from casinos.com” to “read about the upcoming Life by You,” the game was set for an incredible launch.

 

However, Paradox once again published a statement delaying the game until June to try and refine the title more and work on known bugs. The delay, which should have dampened the excitement of the gaming community, only added fuel to the fire as the game became even more popular.

 

Cancellation

Although Google doesn’t release specific figures, it is estimated that searches for the game peaked as June neared. At the time, blogs and forums were buzzing with users awaiting the chance to play the new title via early access. This was for naught, as days before its release date, Paradox announced an indefinite delay.

 

Then, on June 17, the publisher’s website announced that the game had been cancelled. Mattias Lilja, the company’s deputy CEO, said, “The road leading to a release that we [Paradox] felt confident about was far too long and uncertain.”

 

The title’s cancellation was followed shortly after by an announcement that Paradox Tectonic, the development studio responsible for LBY, was being axed, and all 24 employees were being let go. This was because LBY was the only title being worked on by the group, and without it, the studio was no longer viable.

 

Tumultuous Times

The news, which has outraged players looking forward to the title and called for its current code to be published online, is not surprising when looking at Paradox’s recent history. Cities: Skylines 2 was meant to be one of the most significant releases for the publisher but was plagued by bugs, glitches, and crashes, leading to a sharp decline in sales just after launch.

 

Other upcoming titles, like Prison Architect 2, have also suffered release delays. Initially expected in May 2024, the release has been moved to September, citing the need to refine memory usage and excessive crashing.

 

With issues seemingly constant across Paradox titles, many hope the studio will learn from these failures. Whether this will occur remains to be seen; in the meantime, we wouldn’t be surprised if some gamers head back to DVDs for some much-needed entertainment.