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At long last, there are a whole three full-scale, Sims-style life sims available now that Paralives has launched into early access. It feels like there may finally be something in this genre for all of us to chew on. With a handful of real options to consider, is Paralives worth getting in early access?
I've played Paralives (and accidentally stayed up late doing so) quite a lot already so I'll lay out the big features life simmers expect, what the early access state feels like right now, and whether it might be worth trying for you depending on what kind of player you are.
I grew up on The Sims and The Sims 2, sinking thousands of hours of my childhood into the series, and yet the past five or so years I've felt a little burnt out and bored with The Sims 4. I've been waiting on a life sim to bring back the delight I felt when I was first experiencing simulation games and Paralives may be the one that does it for me.
Paralives features
What kind of life sim is Paralives?
Paralives is a stylized, Sims-like life sim with Build/Buy/Live modes and character creation that also borrows ideas like a community center and townie quests from the other side of Life Sims: Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing. One of its big claims is that it "will never have paid DLCs, only free expansions," setting it apart from The Sims series.
Feature | Included? | How it works |
|---|---|---|
Live Mode | ✅ | Manage the needs, wants, and progression of a household in real time and swap to any other household in your town save file at will |
Build/Buy Mode | ✅ | Build walls and clutter rooms with tons of freedom, tyranny of snapping be gone! You can freebuild on a "basic empty terrain" but otherwise need to move a household into a lot to build in town. |
Character creation | ✅ | Create households of up to 8 Paras with detailed face and body editing, color pickers, and up to 12 outfits in four styles (casual, formal, workout, sleep) |
Open world | ✅ | Walk anywhere in town any time, but stores and other houses get loaded on demand (by clicking "visit") while you play |
Customization | ✅ | Swatches, color picker, and pattern picker for customizing clothes and items, along with resize objects like beds and tables to fit your spaces |
Careers | ⚠️ | All rabbit hole style, currently, but upgradeable with perks |
Life stages | ✅ | Eight stages: baby, toddler, child, pre-teen, teen, young adult, adult, elder |
Paranormal "occult" characters | ❌ | Not currently planned |
Pets | ⚠️ | In development during early access |
Seasons | ⚠️ | In development during early access |
Cars | ⚠️ | In development during early access |
Multiplayer | ❌ | Not included and not planned |
Mods and CC | ✅ | Via Steam Workshop |
Player creation gallery | ✅ | Via Steam Workshop |
My favorite feature so far is the conversation meter that prevents spamming the same interactions over and over. You have to wait for the meter to fill over time and then pick from a hand of interaction cards available based on your Para's mood and the current direction of the interaction. I might have two flirty options and a friendly one, or an interaction based on my Para's low Charisma stat, or one that lets me comment on another Para earnestly or sarcastically. It's totally changed my relationship to Live Mode in the best way, because time and interactions are both limited. I have to actually consider the strategy of each conversation rather than spamming the exact choice from three clicks deep in a conversation menu.
What Paralives lacks right now is a whole lot of bug fixes (more on that below) and a lot of staple life sim features, just like Inzoi did at launch. The amount of furniture, clothing items, and swatches isn't huge—though truthfully I'd compare it to something like base game Sims 3 which I still enjoy the challenge of over Sims 4's total asset glut. It's also got a long list of features life simmers will be clambering for still on its to-do list during early access: pets, seasons, pools, basements, family trees, a calendar, and social event organizing (more on that below too).
Paralives early access state
How 'early' access is it?
After her first 10 hours, my fellow simmer Mollie said that Paralives is very, very early access, in a lot of ways. It's buggy, which we expect from every life sim, for better or worse. Even I—normally the one having a fine time in games where others see tons of bugs—have been hit with bugged menus, buttons that don't work, camera glitches, and a grilled sandwich permanently attached to my stove. There's no denying that Paralives is a bumpy experience right now, particularly in Live Mode.
Load times when booting the game up are long, but I've otherwise found performance to be just fine on my desktop PC. I saw a lot of community speculation about simulation lag based on videos by content creators playing ahead of launch, but didn't experience that myself.
What's on the roadmap?
The Paralives roadmap is pretty stacked with things that are planned as game updates over the next two years. I won't cover all of them here exhaustively, but it looks like Live Mode and Build/Buy Mode have the biggest laundry lists. In Live Mode it will be things like seasons, weather, swimming, pets, cars, and so on. For Build Mode it's pools, basements, better roof and stair tools, and a whole lot more furniture objects.
Should you get Paralives in early access?
Is Paralives worth it?
Short answer: yes. Long answer: consider waiting to play based on what you value.
👨👩👧👦 If you're a major life sim fan: Paralives is totally worth it. You'll just need to factor in your own tolerance for jank to decide if you play right now or wait for a couple months of bug-stabilizing updates. Paralives is doing so many neat things with strategic gameplay and customization that remind me of everything I missed in the Sims 2 and Sims 3 era. Along with lots of little quality-of-life touches clearly inspired by a deep, lifelong love for the genre this really does feel like a simmer's life sim.
💻 If you're a casual gamer: Paralives isn't worth it until later in early access. There are settings to help tune the experience as difficult, or laid back, as you'd like which is great for casual players. The current state of the game is very buggy though, lacking features that life simmers feel attached to, and may really put your PC to the test if you're one of those folks getting by gaming on a low spec laptop that's meant for schoolwork and slide decks. The $40 price tag feels like a big ask if you aren't accustomed to early access games, so let us guinea pig this one and come back when it's more polished.
🎬 If you're a Live Mode-only player: Paralives is worth trying and coming back to. I truly think it's doing some awesome things with Live Mode like its gamified conversation system and its storyteller difficulty settings and town quests. Frankly, I'm pretty smitten. I acknowledge that I'm really a Build Mode lady, though, and the true Live Mode lovers may find the current state of Paralives runs out of possibilities for them. There's not a ton of infant gameplay, animation variety, pets, seasons, activities, you name it.
