Maybe it’s a gender issue: do we see The Sims as being ‘for girls’? I certainly remember the first Sims as being one of the first games that I heard female friends effusing about as well as male. We are talking about a series that literally got a piece of paid content called ‘Laundry Day Stuff’ recently, so I can understand that perception.Or perhaps it’s that the whole idea of a doll’s house simulator simply isn’t for ‘gamers’, but exists for a different audience – either younger or way less hardcore than the sort of person who whiles away their evenings laying very still near a rock in PUBG. Perhaps what excludes latter day incarnation The Sims 4 and its entourage of post-release content from grabbing the column inches in 2018 is the perception that it’s a flimsy vessel with which to sell DLC to kids. There’s somethingabout the Sims that means we don’t talk about it in the game industry as much as a game this size would normally warrant.The series has sold over 175 million copies to date, after all, so it is not like The Sims doesn’t have an audience already.
