Life By You early access launch delayed until March 2024

rockpapershotgun.com:

The Sims has gone unchallenged in the life simulation genre for a quarter century and the wait for a challenger is about to get a few months longer. Developers Paradox Tectonic have pushed back the early access launch for their human dollhouse rival Life By You to March 5th 2024. Rod Humble, the studio’s general manager and former Sims boss, said the game will be “a more robust experience out the gate” thanks to the six-month delay.

Since the game’s announcement in March, the developers have been stockpiling feedback from fans online and from modding partners who have been playing early builds. “We want to take some extra time to integrate [that feedback] before launching early access,” explained Humble in a video update.

Some of that feedback was geared towards Life By You’s visuals, which ironically look a little lifeless compared to fellow budding rival Paralives, and indeed The Sims itself. To address that, Humble says that visual improvements are on the list of changes, as the team is “enhancing animations, lighting, character models, assets, and some more.”

Humble also laid out everything else that’s being tweaked before the early access launch, which includes smoother modding tools made in collaboration with modding partners, additional language options, and a major UI overhaul that will be shown off in the next week.

Modding tools are clearly an important part of future-proofing Life By You. Rod Humble previously told RPS that there wouldn’t be an always-online requirement in the game, meaning future updates can’t break existing mods. "We want this game to last for as long as we can, because we want players to be able to lean on this game and know that what they make is going to last."

We’ll see whether the