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Transcript

Project Rene is Mobile-Only: What This Means for The Sims 4's Future · The Plumbob Report

• 0:00
  SO, SO, Plumbobs, Welcome to The Plumbob Report. Imm Becca Hartwell And Imm joined by...
• 0:06
  Danny Reyes, here For The autonomy fails And Community Chaos, And Oh boy, Becca, do We
• 0:12
  have Chaos today. My meme account's been getting tagged non-stop since The announcement dropped.
• 0:19
  Um, Yeah, SO... Project Renee? NOT The Sims 5. Itss Mobile First And The Community Is...
• 0:28
  Okay, Theyree completely UNHINGED Right Now. Itss Absolutely on fire.
• 0:34
  The autonomy said, burn It all down. Like Twitter Is Absolutely UNHINGED Right Now.
• 0:41
  Imm getting notifications every second. Itss beautiful And Absolutely chaotic.
• 0:47
  I mean, I GET It Though. We waited years For news And EAss Like, Surprise, Itss NOT What You thought.
• 0:54
  Right, Right, Right. SO Weree diving deep into What THIS Actually Means For The franchise,
• 0:59
  Because The Community Is spiraling And I Need to break down The business logic behind The madness.
• 1:05
  Exactly. Weree Decoding EAss Roadmap. What Next Evolution For Sims 4 Actually Means,
• 1:13
  Whether our saves Are safe, And Honestly, Whether We should even be worried.
• 1:18
  Spoiler, Some of us Are Very worried. But Weree ALSO going to tour The absolute
• 1:25
  wildest Community reactions, Because Sul Sul And What Is happening.
• 1:30
  The memes Are hitting different levels of UNHINGED.
• 1:33
  The memes Are peak Sims, Honestly.
• 1:36
  Plus, Weree predicting what's Next For Sims 4, Because Honestly,
• 1:40
  THIS game isn't going anywhere. The modders will make sure of It If EA won't.
• 1:44
  And We want to Hear from You. But First...
• 1:47
  Letss break down THIS bombshell Right Now. Becca, walk us through Exactly What EA announced,
• 1:54
  Because My timeline needs ACTUAL facts before The speculation spiral takes over completely.
• 2:01
  We want to Hear from You. Submit questions via The web form in The description,
• 2:06
  Or give us A call at 747-677-1037 And leave your question.
• 2:13
  Dontt be shy. Our AI assistant makes It super easy.
• 2:18
  Sul Sul, everyone! Welcome to The Plumbob Report,
• 2:22
  your weekly dose of Sims news, Community Chaos, And build mode breakdowns. Imm Becca Hartwell,
• 2:28
  And after years covering THIS franchise, I couldn't be more excited to finally be doing THIS.
• 2:35
  And Imm Danny Reyes, here to provide The UNHINGED commentary And autonomy fail analysis,
• 2:41
  Sul Sul, And ALSO, What A week to launch THIS thing.
• 2:46
  Right! Like, we've been planning THIS podcast For weeks,
• 2:50
  And then EA just drops A BOMB on The Community three days ago.
• 2:54
  Okay, But before We spiral into That, Because We Absolutely will,
• 2:58
  Letss Tell People What THIS show Actually Is.
• 3:02
  Yes. SO every week, Danny And I Are breaking down The latest Sims news,
• 3:07
  pack releases, Community drama, mods, builds, Basically everything happening in The Sims
• 3:13
  universe. Imm The Chaos gremlin who literally lives on Sims Reddit And TikTok, SO If The
• 3:19
  Community Is screaming About something, And They ALWAYS Are screaming, Imm bringing It here.
• 3:25
  And Imm The build mode nerd who's been playing since The original Sims launched in 2000,
• 3:31
  literally The day It came out. I will Absolutely go on tangents About swatches,
• 3:36
  BB move objects, debug items, Youvee been warned.
• 3:40
  Imm NOT exaggerating. She's got color-coded spreadsheets About swatches.
• 3:45
  The organization Is GENUINELY UNHINGED.
• 3:48
  Theyree ORGANIZED, Danny!
• 3:50
  Anyway, Weree here to celebrate THIS beautiful, broken, deeply UNHINGED game We all love.
• 3:57
  Exactly. And speaking of UNHINGED, We Need to Talk About Project Rene.
• 4:02
  Oh, here We go.
• 4:04
  SO For anyone who hasn't seen The news, And Honestly, Weree
• 5:00
  Where have You been? EA officially confirmed That Project Rene, Which everyone thought
• 5:05
  was The Sims 5, Is Actually A mobile-first game.
• 5:09
  Mobile-first?
• 5:11
  NOT The Sims 5, NOT A PC successor, A Mobile game that'll eventually come to other platforms.
• 5:17
  And Like, Ivee been doom-scrolling My replies all morning And The vibes Are GENUINELY bad
• 5:23
  Because The Community Is Absolutely NOT Okay About THIS.
• 5:27
  No, Theyree really NOT. And I GET It. As someone who's been playing since day One
• 5:33
  And covered THIS industry For years, we've been WAITING A long time For news About The
• 5:38
  franchise's future. The Sims 4 Is almost 11 years old.
• 5:42
  11 years!
• 5:44
  And performance issues, lack of features, broken AI, People wanted to Hear That A next-gen
• 5:50
  game was coming.
• 5:51
  Instead, We got, Hey, SO Weree making A Mobile game. Enjoy!
• 5:55
  Okay, But to be Fair, EA ALSO said Theyree committed to The Sims 4ss Next Evolution
• 6:01
  For PC And console.
• 6:03
  Ooh, Next Evolution. Very corporate. Very vague.
• 6:08
  It Is vague, But I think Theress more to unpack there than People realize.
• 6:13
  Wait, Are You defending EA Right Now?
• 6:16
  No, No, No, Imm NOT defending The communication, Which was terrible, But I think The ACTUAL
• 6:22
  strategy might make more sense than It looks.
• 6:24
  Okay, Okay, Imm listening. But Youvee got maybe five minutes to convince me THIS
• 6:29
  isn't just corporate speak before I go draft an ACTUAL riot post.
• 6:34
  SO here's The thing, And Weree gonna dive deep into THIS in The Next SEGMENT, But EA
• 6:39
  Is Basically splitting The franchise into Two tracks. Mobile For new audiences And accessibility,
• 6:45
  And continued support For Sims 4 on PC And console.
• 6:48
  Right, But Like, will That Actually work? Or Is THIS just them abandoning The idea of
• 6:54
  The Sims 5 entirely?
• 6:55
  Thatss The billion-dollar question. And I mean That literally. I covered The industry
• 7:00
  long enough to know how much money THIS franchise makes EA.
• 7:04
  Motherlode energy, Truly.
• 7:06
  The thing Thatss frustrating to me, And Ivee interviewed multiple devs who GENUINELY
• 7:11
  care About THIS Community, Is That The Community has been BEGGING For transparency, And THIS
• 7:16
  announcement created more questions than answers.
• 7:19
  Yeah, Like, Are We ever Actually getting The Sims 5? Is Sims 4 just gonna keep getting
• 7:25
  half-baked updates forever? And can We PLEASE Fix The autonomy Chaos? Imm tired of My
• 7:31
  Sims mopping during fires.
• 7:33
  Exactly. And I have thoughts. Many thoughts.
• 7:37
  Shocking. Truly Shocking.
• 7:41
  Shush. But Seriously, Theress Actually A business logic here That I think makes sense
• 7:46
  once You break It down.
• 7:47
  Okay, But ALSO, Ivee literally watched My Community split in real time over THIS. Like,
• 7:53
  TikTok And Reddit Are in SHAMBLES. Half The People Are Like, Fine, keep Sims 4, And The
• 7:59
  other Half Are ready to organize A full riot.
• 8:02
  Which Is why We Need to Talk About What Next Evolution Actually Means, What EAss Roadmap
• 8:09
  looks Like, And Whether THIS franchise split Is genius Or A disaster WAITING to happen.
• 8:16
  Okay, Imm ready For The deep dive.
• 8:19
  Good, Because Weree About to break down EAss entire franchise strategy, decode The
• 8:25
  corporate speak, And figure out What THIS Means For The Community moving forward.
• 8:30
  And Whether We should be excited, terrified, Or both.
• 8:34
  Honestly, Probably both. Thatss peak Sims energy Right there.
• 8:38
  Alright, Letss GET into It.
• 8:40
  Okay, SO Danny, We Need to break down THIS Roadmap Because The Community Is, Um, Confused.
• 8:47
  And Honestly, I GET It.
• 8:49
  Confused Is generous. Ivee been doom-scrolling Reddit all morning And The threads Are Absolutely ABLAZE.
• 8:57
  Right, Right. SO here's What EA Actually said in their official blog post.
• 9:02
  Theyree doing A split strategy.
• 9:04
  Project Renee Is mobile-first.
• 10:00
  First, Which We covered, But For PC And console players, Theyree calling It The Sims 4 Next
• 10:05
  Evolution.
• 10:06
  Okay, But What Does That even mean?
• 10:09
  Like Thatss such corporate speak.
• 10:11
  I know, I know.
• 10:13
  But let me translate.
• 10:14
  Basically, Sims 4 isn't going anywhere.
• 10:17
  Theyree committing to continued updates, new content packs, And, THIS Is The important
• 10:22
  part, potential engine improvements.
• 10:25
  Wait, Wait, Wait.
• 10:26
  Engine improvements?
• 10:28
  Are We talking ACTUAL performance fixes?
• 10:31
  Because My game legitimately takes 10 minutes to load, And Ivee just accepted It As part
• 10:36
  of My ritual at THIS point.
• 10:38
  Thatss What Theyree implying.
• 10:39
  I mean, The engine Is almost 11 years old Now.
• 10:42
  If Theyree serious About long-term support, And I really hope They Are, They have to address
• 10:47
  The lag, The memory issues, all of It.
• 10:50
  Okay, But Becca, Are They Actually going to Fix It?
• 10:54
  Or Is THIS just another corporate promise Weree going to watch them fumble?
• 10:59
  Thatss The million-dollar question.
• 11:00
  I will say, When I was at EA Play A few years back, The dev team was GENUINELY passionate
• 11:06
  About The game.
• 11:07
  They know The problems exist.
• 11:10
  But knowing And fixing Are Two different things.
• 11:13
  Absolutely.
• 11:14
  And I think Thatss why People Are upset.
• 11:17
  The Community wanted Sims 5.
• 11:19
  A fresh start, A new engine, all The features we've been asking For.
• 11:23
  Instead, We got Next Evolution, Which sounds Like A gym membership plan trying to sell
• 11:29
  me on leg day.
• 11:30
  Oh My god, It Does.
• 11:32
  But here's The thing.
• 11:33
  From A business perspective, THIS makes sense.
• 11:36
  Does It, Though?
• 11:37
  Hear me out.
• 11:38
  Sims 4 has Like 70-plus packs.
• 11:41
  Thatss A massive library built over years of development.
• 11:45
  Starting over with Sims 5 Means rebuilding everything from scratch.
• 11:49
  Right, Right.
• 11:50
  Which Is What happened with The Sims 3 to Sims 4 transition.
• 11:54
  People lost SO much.
• 11:55
  Toddlers, pools, functional careers.
• 11:59
  And Honestly, The Community still hasn't recovered from That.
• 12:02
  Exactly.
• 12:03
  And People Are still mad About losing toddlers, pools, And careers at launch.
• 12:08
  EA doesn't want to repeat That disaster.
• 12:10
  Okay, Imm on both sides A little bit.
• 12:13
  I GET The business logic.
• 12:15
  But ALSO, with frustration, My game takes 10 minutes to load.
• 12:20
  And My Sims autonomously eat spoiled food Like The autonomy said, No thoughts, head
• 12:26
  empty.
• 12:27
  Yeah, Yeah.
• 12:28
  The autonomy Is NOT Okay.
• 12:31
  Soul soul.
• 12:32
  And ALSO, What The heck.
• 12:34
  You know?
• 12:35
  Exactly.
• 12:36
  SO The big Community concern Right Now Is, Is Sims 4 being abandoned in favor of Mobile?
• 12:42
  Because Thatss peak Sims energy, Honestly.
• 12:44
  Which to be Fair, Is A valid fear.
• 12:47
  EAss Mobile game track record Is, Letss call It chaotic in The wrong way.
• 12:52
  True.
• 12:53
  But They specifically said, Next Evolution Is For PC And console.
• 12:58
  That suggests parallel development, NOT abandonment.
• 13:01
  Hmm.
• 13:02
  But What About Sims 5?
• 13:04
  Like, Is It ever happening?
• 13:06
  With A sigh, Probably NOT anytime soon.
• 13:09
  And I think Thatss What hurts most.
• 13:11
  Ivee been with THIS franchise since 2000, And The Wait has just been long.
• 13:16
  The memes Are BRUTAL Right Now.
• 13:19
  My 200k followers Are going Absolutely feral.
• 13:23
  My timeline Is flooded with skeleton WAITING memes tagged Sims 5 players, And Theyree
• 13:29
  all Chefss kiss levels of BRUTAL.
• 13:31
  I saw That.
• 13:32
  The Sims Community Is UNHINGED, And I love us.
• 13:36
  Same.
• 13:37
  But Seriously, what's The realistic expectation here?
• 13:40
  Okay, SO If I had to guess, And I spent years covering The industry, EAss betting on Two
• 13:46
  things.
• 13:47
  One, Mobile gaming Is Absolutely massive, especially internationally.
• 13:52
  Two, Sims 4ss existing player base Is stable.
• 13:55
  SO Theyree playing It safe.
• 13:57
  Exactly.
• 13:58
  Innovation on Mobile, stability on PC.
• 14:01
  Itss risk management.
• 14:02
  I mean, I GET It.
• 15:00
  But Itss just NOT giving The Innovation We Need, You know?
• 15:04
  Itss Very corporate risk management energy, And NOT Very chaotic neutral Sims energy.
• 15:10
  No, Itss NOT exciting. And Thatss totally valid.
• 15:14
  But here's Where I GENUINELY think The opportunity Is.
• 15:17
  If They Actually deliver on engine improvements…
• 15:20
  Then Next Evolution could be Good.
• 15:23
  Right. Like, imagine If They fixed performance,
• 15:26
  added features The community's been asking For,
• 15:29
  maybe even brought back Some Sims 3 open world elements.
• 15:32
  Okay, Okay. Now Youree getting My hopes up, And Thatss DANGEROUS territory.
• 15:39
  Imm just saying, The potential Is there.
• 15:42
  Whether EA follows through, Thatss What Welll be Watching.
• 15:45
  SO Basically, Weree in A wait-and-see mode.
• 15:48
  Unfortunately, Yeah. The Roadmap gives us direction, But The execution Is everything.
• 15:55
  And The Community Is Absolutely NOT patient.
• 15:59
  Like, Ice Speed run The 100 Baby Challenge.
• 16:02
  Weree talking days, NOT months.
• 16:05
  SO Watching us Wait For information Is hilarious And painful at The Same time.
• 16:11
  No, We Are NOT. Which brings us to…
• 16:14
  With excitement. Oh, Danny, You Need to Hear The reactions.
• 16:19
  The memes, The TikToks, The Reddit Chaos.
• 16:22
  Itss been wild. Like, Absolutely UNHINGED.
• 16:26
  Letss dive into That Next, Because Honestly, Some of these takes Are… something.
• 16:33
  Okay, Becca, We gotta Talk About The Chaos. The Community Chaos.
• 16:39
  Oh No, What happened?
• 16:41
  SO, Like, within minutes of The announcement dropping,
• 16:44
  The Sims subreddit Absolutely exploded. My timeline was flooded.
• 16:50
  There was THIS One meme That went viral of A Sim autonomously setting A kitchen on fire
• 16:56
  with The caption, EAss Roadmap explained in One image. Motherlode energy, Honestly.
• 17:03
  Thatss peak Sims, Honestly.
• 17:05
  Right? And TikTok was Absolutely UNHINGED.
• 17:09
  Theress THIS trend Where People Are doing dramatic readings of The EA blog post
• 17:14
  Like Itss A breakup letter, And Honestly, My For You Page Is still recovering.
• 17:20
  Dear Simmers, Itss NOT You. Itss our Mobile First strategy. Chefss kiss of Chaos.
• 17:29
  Stop It. Thatss SO accurate, Though.
• 17:31
  I know. But here's The thing. NOT everyone's mad.
• 17:35
  My community's Actually split down The middle Right Now.
• 17:39
  Theress THIS whole side Thatss cautiously optimistic About Sims 4 getting more love.
• 17:44
  And then Theress The burn It all down crowd.
• 17:47
  Yeah, Ivee been seeing That too.
• 17:49
  Like, The Gallery creators, especially being One myself,
• 17:53
  Were hopeful That Next Evolution Actually Means better build tools And maybe Some UI improvements.
• 18:00
  But then Youvee got The performance rage threads.
• 18:04
  Twitter was an absolute war zone.
• 18:06
  Screenshots of loading times That look Like slow motion videos with captions Like
• 18:12
  Fix THIS before You make anything new. People Are NOT Okay, Becca.
• 18:17
  I mean, to be Fair, Theyree NOT wrong.
• 18:20
  We talked About That last SEGMENT. The performance issues Are real.
• 18:23
  Exactly. And You know what's wild? The modding Community Is already making jokes About how
• 18:29
  they'll Probably patch whatever EA announces before EA even ships It.
• 18:34
  Ivee reviewed enough mods to know Theyree NOT exaggerating.
• 18:39
  The team really understood The assignment there. The modders, I mean. NOT EA.
• 18:43
  Yeah, Yeah, Yeah. But Okay, wild pivot here,
• 18:46
  And Imm GENUINELY asking, What Are We Actually expecting in 2026?
• 18:52
  Okay, SO realistically, For Sims 4, I think Weree looking at smaller content drops.
• 18:58
  NOT huge expansion packs, But more Stuff packs And kits focused on refreshing existing…
• 20:00
  SO Basically What we've been getting? Stuff packs And kids That feel more Like
• 20:06
  content stretches than ACTUAL expansions? Well, kind of, But I think they'll lean harder
• 20:12
  into Community requests. Like, We might finally GET That farming refresh everyone's been BEGGING
• 20:18
  For. Thatss been A top request For years. Skeptically? You really think Theyree
• 20:23
  listening? Because The community's been screaming About autonomy fails And performance issues For
• 20:29
  years. Imm optimistic. When I met The dev team at EA Play, They GENUINELY cared About THIS game.
• 20:36
  And If Theyree NOT splitting resources For A Sims 5 launch, That budget has to go somewhere.
• 20:41
  Wait, Thatss Actually A Good point, Huh? Right? SO My prediction, And Imm putting THIS on The
• 20:47
  record, Is Welll see at least three expansion-level updates to existing packs.
• 20:53
  Okay, But What About Project Renee? Like, what's The ACTUAL timeline there?
• 20:58
  Because The community's been theorizing About THIS For years.
• 21:02
  I think late 2026 For Mobile beta, maybe early 2027 For full release, But Thatss pure speculation.
• 21:11
  SO Weree Basically locked in Sims 4 land For another Two years minimum? Which Is Fine, I guess,
• 21:19
  But ALSO, oof. Pretty much. Which brings us to something Ivee been WAITING to Talk About,
• 21:26
  What Weree Watching For. Oh, Now Imm listening.
• 21:29
  Okay, SO Imm keeping My eyes on three things. One, any major base game updates,
• 21:35
  especially to Create-A-Sam, Because The swatches matter, Danny. Two, how They handle inevitable
• 21:42
  bugs from refreshing old content, And three… And Whether They finally Fix autonomy. Like,
• 21:50
  Actually Fix It, NOT just patch It. Danny, You And autonomy, I swear. Though,
• 21:55
  Honestly, My First Sim literally set herself on fire making Mac And cheese back in 2000,
• 22:02
  SO The Chaos Is kind of on brand. Listen, My Sims keep autonomously
• 22:07
  mopping The floor during house fires. Theyree literally choosing cleaning over survival.
• 22:13
  THIS Is A crisis, And Weree just supposed to accept It?
• 22:17
  Okay, Okay, Fair. That Is Actually concerning. Thank You. SO What should listeners be Watching
• 22:23
  For? Honestly, The Community. As someone who covered THIS industry, I can Tell You,
• 22:29
  fan feedback GENUINELY shapes roadmaps. If People Are vocal About wanting life states refreshed,
• 22:35
  better elder gameplay, ACTUAL consequences For actions…
• 22:39
  Thatss what's going to drive The content calendar.
• 22:42
  Exactly. Which Is why We want to Hear from You all.
• 22:46
  Yes, SoulSoul listeners. Jump into our comments, Tag us on Twitter, Tag us on TikTok. My meme
• 22:53
  account's literally ALWAYS Watching. Send us your wildest predictions For what's coming.
• 22:59
  And your memes. Danny Absolutely lives For The memes. And Same, Honestly.
• 23:04
  The Community creativity Is What keeps THIS franchise alive.
• 23:08
  I do. I really do. ALSO, hot take time, send us your most controversial Sims opinions,
• 23:16
  And Imm talking Actually UNHINGED. Like, Sims 3 was better UNHINGED.
• 23:21
  Ooh, DANGEROUS. I GENUINELY love It, Though.
• 23:24
  Right? Like, Actually, pool ladders Were never That funny. Or, Sims 4 build mode Is
• 23:31
  better than Sims 3. Or, My personal favorite, Ivee never let A Sim drown,
• 23:36
  Which Is Basically admitting Youvee never played The game correctly.
• 23:40
  Danny, You Absolutely cannot just say That on The record.
• 23:45
  Imm NOT even sorry. And Honestly, Itss working,
• 23:48
  Because Thatss The energy The Community runs on. Chaos And accountability.
• 23:53
  Okay, SO Next week, Weree diving into something special. Weree breaking down The top 10
• 23:59
  community-made mods That Basically became must-haves.
• 25:00
  The Unsung Heroes of THIS Franchise Oh, THIS Is going to be Absolutely spicy.
• 25:05
  The mod Community literally runs THIS franchise.
• 25:08
  I review these things constantly, And Honestly, We should Probably be paying them A salary
• 25:13
  at THIS point.
• 25:14
  They really do.
• 25:15
  Weree celebrating them properly, And we've got Some exclusive creator interviews That
• 25:20
  Are going to be SO Good.
• 25:22
  SO keep your notifications on, back up your saves, And I mean Seriously back them up.
• 25:28
  I learned THIS The hard way during My 100 Baby Challenge speedrun When My entire legacy
• 25:34
  got corrupted.
• 25:35
  Yes, Seriously, ALWAYS back up your saves.
• 25:38
  Trust me, I learned THIS The hard way with My Sims 3 legacy.
• 25:42
  And Welll see You Next week on The Plumbob Report, Where We celebrate The People Actually
• 25:47
  keeping THIS game alive And functional.
• 25:50
  Until then, happy Simming!
• 25:52
  And Hey, quick build tip of The week?
• 25:55
  Use D-bag objects to create custom wall decor.
• 25:58
  Youree Welcome.
• 25:59
  And may your autonomy be ever in your favor.
• 26:02
  Or at least make sense occasionally.
• 26:04
  Thatss terrible.
• 26:06
  I know.
• 26:07
  Bye, everyone.
• 26:08
  Okay, SO Project Rene Is Mobile First, NOT Sims 5.
• 26:14
  We covered That Chaos Pretty thoroughly.
• 26:18
  And The Community?
• 26:20
  Absolutely UNHINGED.
• 26:21
  I live For It.
• 26:22
  My timeline Is thriving.
• 26:24
  The takeaway?
• 26:26
  Sims 4 isn't going anywhere.
• 26:28
  And Thatss Honestly kind of Okay.
• 26:30
  Imm choosing optimism.
• 26:32
  Yeah.
• 26:33
  Yeah.
• 26:34
  I mean, Welll see What EA Actually delivers versus What They promise, You know?
• 26:39
  Sool sool, Simmers.
• 26:40
  Subscribe And leave A review to help other fans find us.
• 26:44
  Tell us your wildest Sim stories on at Plumbob Report.
• 26:48
  I love hearing them.
• 26:49
  Seriously.
• 26:50
  We want The Chaos.
• 26:52
  Tag us on Twitter, TikTok, Reddit, wherever Youree posting your UNHINGED takes.
• 26:57
  Thanks SO much For listening to The Plumbob Report, building dreams One tile at A time.
• 27:03
  Welll be back Next week with more Sims news And deep dives.
• 27:07
  Until then, keep those autonomy fails coming.
• 27:10
  And If You GET creative with pool drownings, Weree all ears.
• 27:14
  Bye, everyone.
• 27:15
  And back up your saves.
• 27:17
  Dag Dag.