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As someone who is slowly burning out on The Sims 4 and bounced off the uncanny sameness of Inzoi's world, Paralives was my last hope for a new direction in life sims. No pressure to the small indie team at Paralives Studio, but I was feeling very "this hits, or I'm over the genre for a while," so thank goodness Paralives feels like it's got the makings of a winner.
It's got the early access jank, sure, but even those day-one bones outline something I'm finally excited for—a life sim that isn't a bland attempt at recreating the success of The Sims. Instead, it's real admiration for the original Maxis formula, which includes a few features outlined in the Paralives roadmap that have me hopeful the team will go back to expand on more features its cousin abandoned years ago.
My mom would tell me not to count my chickens before they've hatched, but the Paralives roadmap reads like my life sim dreams come true. The only problem is that it's a little hard to follow between a sparse infographic and a detailed Notion outline, but that's easy enough for me to solve and present here.
When is the first major Paralives update?
The Paralives roadmap notes its first major update is planned for Q4 2026, so that's a tentative October to December window. We don't know what the update entails just yet, but we do know it's my favorite price: Free.
Until then, the rest of the roadmap outlines a period of hotfixes, bug smashing, and existing feature improvements from June to September 2026. Then there's a broader "within ~2 years of early access" note for more major updates, including a system for weather and seasons, pools, pets, and more.
The Paralives roadmap
What's coming to Paralives while it's in early access
The Paralives team estimates they've got about two years of early access development ahead of them before it's 1.0 ready, but some of the updates include features that The Sims 4 would package as a new expansion. There are also things the Maxis series abandoned in its older games, like cars, working garages, and houseboats.
I've highlighted and consolidated the most interesting details found in the Paralives Notion roadmap, but as the team explains in their Patreon blog, it's by no means exhaustive, and plans may change as development continues.
Paramaker features
- Voice pitch sliders
- Search and filter options for Paramaker clothes and accessories
- Improved skin tone color wheel
- Create dogs, cats, and horses in the Paramaker
- More clothing, items, hairstyles, and accessories
Build mode features
- More objects, furniture, and decorations
- Door and window support on curved walls
- Pools and related customization tools
- Basements and improvements to stairs
- Better terrain tools for creating lakes and ponds
- Improved tools for creating new towns
- Create cars, bikes, and boat houses
- Create roads, garages, and parking spaces
- Pick up and move entire rooms or place them from catalogs
Live mode features
- Weather and seasons
- Gardening system
- Objects that have effects on paras
- Sexual orientation and preference system
- New characters that move into town
- Story progression for other paras in town
- Additional story cards unique to each storyteller
- New gameplay and difficulty options for storytellers
- Additions to shops and town activities
- Call or message other paras
- Calendar menu for para's schedules and social events
- Own and use cars and bikes
Paralives early access features
What can you do in Paralives early access now?
General features
- Photo mode with options for moving paras, changing their pose, or adjusting time
- Mods available via the Steam Workshop
- In-game mod management tools for keeping downloads tidy
- Cheats for money, editing paras, items, and more
Build mode features
- Create your own town or start with the premade option
- Build with curved walls and color wheels
- Freely move objects around or toggle on grid snapping
- Stack, resize, and recolor objects
- Tools for stairs, fences, and roofing
- Basic terrain tools
Paramaker features
- Adjustable heights
- Body and face sliders
- Heterochromia and detailed hair color wheels
- Layer clothing, mismatch socks, and save outfits for later
- Tattoos with recolor and placement tools for multiple body parts
- Combine and create new paras through the genetics system
Live mode features
- Customize difficulty settings through storytellers
- Explore the town by visiting houses or going shopping
- Start a job, pay bills, and progress careers
- Tend to emotions, wants, needs, and skills
- Form friendships, find love, and go on social outings
- Start a family with systems for pregnancy and children
- Experience life stages through aging and death
- Learn recipes, cook, and maybe start a fire
- Donate collectibles to the museum
