They sacrificed the game by introducing “distance culling” (Zoilers and cars no longer appear far away) purely for performance reasons.ı m so sorry for that
@Starwing @GDfromRivendell @LennyOgg
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Well, is there a response to this same issue? So it’s better to loosen the grip for now. Same as with Apocalyptic/Run-Down, Vehicle Parking, and with CatEye. Right now, specifically regarding @Starwing’s remark, if we’re going to write something. I’ll be this way for now.
Oh goodness… I hope they don’t release the game next year. Not even at the end of 2026. This game has special written all over its ideas, but it needs and deserves more time. I honestly came into this Early Access phase expecting it to last a minimum of two years. Three to four years is more reasonable—especially with the practice of stuffing random half finished big ideas and big features in to lure more players to buy the game. That strategy actually only makes sense if you’re looking at a release a few years down the line.
If they give the game the time it rightfully deserves, then it’ll need fresh support to help fund that. So they need more players to buy the game.
But they’re still wasting time not opening a merch store for fans of the game to actively support its development by purchasing adorable merchandise with a typical 40 to 60% mark-up of the price over the cost of the produced item.
We’ve been asking for that.
Like…
What?
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Promises broken a couple months ago are worth nothing at all when repeated now.
I will only believe what Kjun says if the proof is in the product. Until then, I don’t trust a thing said any more. I wish it wasn’t that way.
Watching interviews of Kjun… he seems so warm and smart and passionate—the perfect spirit needed to make a truly great game that will live for years and years in players’ hearts. But seeing the interview talking about how fast a big and complex game can be made these days came across like this, “Hi, I am a genuine person with a great idea, and this publisher is going to let me make the kind of game I want to make for all of you. Except they’re basically Electronic Arts in a Korean way, and you’re going to get something even worse than the Sims because of our publisher that we need but which is killing what we’re trying to make. But the really good and exciting news is we can do that very, very fast these days.”
Oh my… I’m really feeling bad bout some things with the game, yet I love it dearly. I just don’t have a good feeling of where this is going anymore.
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If they copy and paste it into a chatbot, you mean? They won’t read what we write. We waste our time with any details. But we can say “Add such and such quick Sims ripoff idea” sand it shall be done… kind of… sort of… no, not really…
EDIT: I copied my post and added some more to it in the active Brainstorming thread. I hope the chatbot will adequately translate and summarize my post that I put thought and time into writing.
Following is from an interview with Kjun
I think if Krafton and the investors get pushy, Kjun has to follow.
And I also think this already shows.
With all the half-bakd features and all the bugs that happen in the wake of this rushing through development.
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I don’t trust Krafton, that’s for sure. Publishers have killed some of my favourite games and franchises. Most recently, Cities: Skylines. They pushed the devs to release the game about two years too soon, then when they suffered from player backlash, the devs got fired. That studio was making one game. They might be out of business now and that’s a company in my city.
I wish inZOI was an indie game. That would give me hope. Krafton is a big money monster that will demand to be fed whether the game and inZOI Studio can handle it or not.
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Well then, what’s the way out if the money flow dries up so quickly? Even with giveaways of PCs and prizes at the DLC release, they couldn’t bring the player base back. The original player base wasn’t strong enough to hold on to, either. Many complained about Karma, the UI, flat characters, and so on (booooring), and now only a few people still complain about major changes, while instead they cater to simmers, action/MMORPG players and so on. Overall the mood is way more positive, and Reddit hate Discord for its toxicity, since the game direction is fine for them, but with us they can’t change the tide anymore. It’s more of a conflict of interests.
Meanwhile, in light of the recent news with the President and prestigious awards, inZOI feels secure as a tool of influence. Many options are tied to South Korea’s and Krafton’s global strategy. In the West they wouldn’t bother with this and would’ve shut the game down. Life by You is a game by the same Paradox, and it got shut down.
Yeah, Paradox… the _____s. I was interested in Life by You a bit, but still really turned off of the life sim genre by Sims 4 and the entire Electronic Arts strategy over the decades. So, I was happy my sister was so excited about it and telling me about it. The idea that it would tie in with Cities: Skylines 2 was exciting to me and made me tell myself, “Well, I’ll try their life sim, then.”
I know the team needs funding but selling the game to people who don’t know about it is is one very important way. But they are completely overlooking providing a way for current fans to support the game. I would happily buy inZOI merch at prices that are profitable to the company. It not only satisfies the collecting joy for fans, but would act as a bit of free marketing.
“Where’d you get that adorable t-shirt?”
“I bought it from the inZOI merchandise store. It’s a life sim game that I play all the time. You think this shirt is adorable? Wait till you see two toddlers hugging! Here, let me show you the Steam page or some video reviews so you can check it out…”
EDIT: I have to add that even though I wish inZOI was a fully indie game so they wouldn’t get mistreated by the publisher who would happily see players suffer for their own profit margins, I have no interest in Paralives. There’s nothing that game has shown me outside of its building tools that makes me excited. inZOI will give us resizable windows like Paralives has, and that means I won’t even be tempted to buy that game for its building tool.
I had planned to buy the game to signal to the industry that life sim games are worth making, but they’re charging twice what I think it would be worth to me as a game I might fiddle with a bit, but don’t really want to play. I’d pay €20 for sure as a hand in the air saying, “Yeah, more of these games!” but waiting for a sale for that game won’t give the signal anyway.
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Don’t forget that inZOI has quite a few loud opponents, and any careless move in the form of another distraction from the dev process (which early access is supposed to be), whether it’s another giveaway or, even more so, a store, would stir up an even bigger wave. Yes, I’m aware that such promotions existed for some early access games, like BG3, but their initial reputation was much higher.
I don’t think Krafton is currently concerned in crowdfunding for the game’s development. They’ve already spent freely on marketing, if they needed exclusively money, they’d have found a more reasonable use for it. Meanwhile, development funds are in influencers’ homes in the form of PCs with 5090s… do you seriously think that won’t hurt their reputation and, accordingly, the reach? And isn’t reputation and global reach what Krafton values most right now? Yes, yes, those 85% recent positive reviews on Steam, the open arms of the Korean government, Kjun in the spotlight, billboards, Korean flagship – it all looks rather cloudless. But do you think what the Ministry of Culture might allocate and what players might spend on merch are comparable sums?
Paralives – let’s be realistic. The game is on 1M wishlists. They can sell… maybe 50-100k copies, ok. With regional pricing and Steam’s commission, that’s about $2.5M. Monthly Patreon support is around $50–100k, which covers 2–3 years of dev if they expand the team, since they’re moving at a snail’s pace and are unlikely to implement everything for release within 2-3 years. And then free DLCs, developed either from release revenue or somehow else…
Too complex a genre, too little experience and groundwork, too many risks, too few who have tried and survived. As we can see, so far only the Korean style of business management has managed to provide at least some chance of avoiding collapse, we have no other positive or neutral examples. Neither a store, nor the European way of management, nor indie.
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When a company mentions, increases, or cuts the budget for a game, or expands it, this isn’t necessarily related to the game’s profit, but rather to the company’s market capitalization and stock value, which are influenced by positive news, portfolio, reputation, strategic and national political significance, government support and grants, and more. This is often mistakenly reduced purely to monetization.
The main problem for Krafton is the lack of appeal in new IPs, the low reach, meaning a stable player base (which multiplayer could potentially address better than simply adding content for the same players who already purchased the game), and secondly, the lawsuits and the delay of Subnautica. In this context, the only effective step is to try to make these IPs more appealing, through the government, through global MMO expansion, through accelerating the Subnautica and inZOI releases, and so on.
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I always say this: people gave a game as bad as Sims 4 11 years of playing time. But when it comes to inZOI, people are very rude and complain about why this isn’t there, why that isn’t there, and make various demands like “it should be like this, it should be like that.” First of all, inZOI is an early access game and will remain in early access for another year. The game is developing rapidly. It will continue to develop. We should give the game a chance and support it. Otherwise, we will be forced to rely on the money-hungry Electronic Arts and MAXIS companies. Please be understanding and sensible.
(Also, I’m a player who has played Sims 2, Sims 3, and Sims 4 for many years, and I watched all my dreams crumble with Sims 4. So let inZOI develop because its potential is very high…)
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“Above all, don’t let the investigation lead back to us.” – the USSR’s Prosecutor General 
Of course, all of this is partially off topic, so I hope others won’t mind.
As always, you’re so right about many things you just wrote! Some confuse me, and that’s on me because you’re always very coherent.
The reason I mentioned a merch store is it’s a great way for active players to show and share their love of the game. I don’t know if it would hurt their reputation. I’m an idiot most of the time.
I think the freebie PCs in influencer’s homes hurt their reputation, but I also agree with you that it helps get the word out to more people who will be more likely to buy the game if they see gameplay and hear information about the game from a creator they already know and like their content. I’ve seen a lot more video recommendations from these influencers with positive thumbnails and titles. That’s very encouraging.
I really have no idea about anything else. I want the game to succeed and you’re right, it needs more players rather than more money. I was merely daydreaming outload about a world where the inZOI team wasn’t beholden to a publisher that could easily harm the game by pushing its official release too soon.
A merch store is a wish of an existing fan, that’s all. Hardly any games do it. They save merchandise for contests and influencer campaigns, and occasional surprises. I got some exclusive gifts and signed stuff from Sims 3 and Sims Medieval that I still keep even though I don’t play the games anymore. There are memories attached to the items. Sentimental gaming feels and memories.
What I do know is that whenever someone like myself would get even a t-shirt or poster, many other fans felt disappointment. They would pay to have a t-shirt or whatever, but they had no opportunity.
But yeah, I really don’t know if the existence of a store would help or harm. I know nothing at all about these things. I’m just a gamer and a storyteller.
agree, right now its like in sims where the burglar is just a oopsie lets be friends kind of thing , i want realism and immersion
the sims 4 community is very toxic, i don’t wanna say too much but i think we all know why, when we think about it and connect the dots. i hate that community. i hope inzoi will attract a more reflective, low-drama audience from other gaming communities who could be into this kind of genre. imo sims 4 players can stay where they are.
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