It was already disappointing to hear that Sims competitor Life by You had been indefinitely delayed, but it seemed the behind-the-scenes situation was grimmer than we thought. Earlier this week, Paradox Interactive announced it had not only cancelled the game, but had shut down developer Paradox Tectonic too. In the wake of this, though, one member of the now defunct studio has claimed that progress on the game was going much better th??an it ?sounded.

As spotted by PC Gamer, one Willem Delventhal took to LinkedIn to say that the team at Paradox Tectonic were doing "extremely well" ahead of Life by You's planned early access launch on June 4. After having already been delayed once before, the game was suddenly put on an indefinite hiat?us, followed by the aforementioned cancellation.

"I cannot share specific numbers, but I can say that we had an internal metric we were aiming for that had been approved, and that we exceeded that number by a significant portion," wrote Delventhal. He added that they "got a thumbs up a few weeks before launch," which makes it sound like the delay was as much of a surprise to the team as it was to fans waiting to play Life by You.

By comparison, Paradox Interactive CEO Fredrik Wester, when explaining the reasons for the cancellation, had said Life by You would not be able to meet the company's expectations and that "a version that we’d be satisfied with is too far away." This doesn't match up with what Del??venthal is alleging. By his account, everything was going incredibly smoothly, especially if they were exceeding internal targets, yet Paradox pulled the plug anyway. Deventhal has also claimed he and his team were never told why their studio was closing: "Instead we spent a month in purgatory, and did everything we could to prove to them we were worth launching, including things like finding potential buyers or suggesting cutting ties and going indie. We heard virtually nothing back."

It must be stressed that Delventhal's comments do not represent the rest of Paradox Tectonic; he is only speaking for himself, and has refrained from sharing his own theories on why the project was ultimately canned. However, he did add, "This industry has become a place in which you can deliver more than expected, have AA money behind you??, and still have the rug pulled two weeks before launch."

The games industry is most certainly in a rocky state; in fact, calling it rocky is a massive understatement. After all, a distressing number of people have been laid off ??this year, and ??that number has only increased thanks to the closure of Paradox Tectonic.

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Less than a day after publisher Paradox Interactive canceled Life by You, the company announced that the game's developer Paradox Tectonic is shutting down.

The news was delivered earlier this morning ??by the publisher. Fredrik Wester, CEO of Paradox, called the m??ove, which affects 24 people, "difficult and drastic," and shutting down the studio was a "tough decision."

"This is difficult and drastic news for our colleagues at Tectonic, who’ve worked hard on Life by You’s Early Access release," Wester said. "Sadly, with cancellation of their sole project we have to take the tough decision to close down the studio. We are deeply grateful for their hard work in trying to ??ta??ke Paradox into a new genre."

Paradox Tectonic is shutting down after Life by You cancellation

Paradox announced the cancellation of Life by You yesterday. In a quote, Wester said the game would not meet expectations: "A version that we’d be satisfied with is too far away, and therefore we are taking the difficult decision to cancel the release." The decision resulted in an estimated $19.8 million write-down for the company, which has seen other trouble as of late. Last year, the company announced it would write down The Lamplighters League for approximately $23 million a week after the game launched.

It has been troubling all around. Paradox Tectonic's shuttering feels like another stone in the road for an industry that has already experienced a lot of job loss in 2024 �and we're only halfway through the year. Just yesterday, before the news of the Life by You cancellation, Embracer Group announced the closure of Alone in the Dark (2024) developer Pieces Interactive. Microsoft closed down the Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks and Arkane Austin (along with Alpha Dog Games) ahead of its big June showcase. Needless to say, the move dampened the excitement before the show.

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Paradox Interactive announced today that the upcoming The Sims competitor, Life by You, has been canceled. Originally announced back in March 2023, Life by You was to be the debut title for Paradox Tectonic, an in-house Paradox development team led by former The Sims head Rod Humble. The cancellation re??sul??ted in a MSEK 208 write-down in Q2 for Paradox which according to Google Conversion is roughly $19.8 million.

Rough times for new IPs at Paradox

Paradox Interactive has long been considered the power player when it comes to grand strategy and 4X title releases, with hit franchises like Stellaris, Hearts of Iron, Crusader Kings, and Europa Universalis. However, recently the company has expanded its scope and begun publishing and developing more titles in the strategy genre, but not necessarily grand strategy. In October 2023, Paradox published a turn-based tactical RPG titled The Lamplighters League but just one week after release also wrote it off as a loss due to poor sales.

With Paradox willing to outright cancel Life by You instead of putting in the time and resources to get it where they want to be, it seems as though the project may have been far off from where the company hoped it would be. Life by You was originally scheduled to be released into Early Access?? in September 2023 but was delayed to March 2024, then June 2024. Just a few weeks before its intended June release, Paradox revealed the life sim had been delay??ed indefinitely, and now we know why.

For a long time, we’ve held hopes for Life by You and the potential we saw in it, but it is now clear ??that the game will not be able to meet our expectations. A version that we’d be satisfied with is too far away, and therefore we are taking the difficult decision to cancel the release. Moving forward, we should perform at a much higher level, and it’s obvious that we have work ahead of us.

- Fredrik Wester, CEO of Paradox Interactive

Fans looking for a new life sim will now have to wait and see what The Sims 5, codenamed Project Rene, will turn out to be.

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Life By You has once again shifted its Early Access date, only this time without a new release window in sight. The life-sim game was set for an Early Access launch on June 4, but that has since been pulled due to the additional ??need for more development.

The Deputy CEO of Paradox Interactive, Mattias Lilja, made the announcement and indicated that this shift w??as a diffi??cult choice.

"After much consideration, we regret to announce that we have decided to retract L??ife by You’s Early Access release date, previously set for June 4th. This was not an easy decision, especially since we understand the anticipation and excitement that many players have for the game. However, we believe that additional development time is ne??eded.

While we would have preferred to commit to a new release window, we believe it is more prudent to hold off while we plan ahead, rather?? than committing to a new date that we cannot be certain to meet."

This is the third time Early Access has been delayed, and some fans are wondering when it will ever make its official debut, if the social media replies are anything to go by. Though, some are also lauding the choice to take time to work on the life-sim.

The previous delay noted some issues with its Early Access, including problems linked to bugs, performance, and character art. These errors have likely caused the delay again, especially with the mixed reviews from some of Life By You's development updates. 

Life By You isn't the only Paradox Interactive entry to be delayed, considering Prison Architect 2's May 7 release was pushed back to Sept. 3. Cities: Skylines 2 has also b??een catching some heat, where players believe it was released too early with its many broken specs. 

Considering Cities: Skylines 2's "Mostly Negative" score on Steam, Paradox Interactive may not want the same result again with Life By You. Hopefully, all this waiting will be worth it, giving us life simmers more content. Information regarding its launch may be coming shortly, but it seems like it??s launch hangs in the balance for now. 

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Publisher Paradox Interactive announced today that the debut title by Paradox Tectonic, Life by You, will hit Early Access on June 4. Revealed in March 2023, Life by You gives players the creative freedom to design their own characters then build their homes and live out their lives, similar to popular long-running Electronic Arts series The Sims.

Fans of The Sims have had their eyes on Life by You since its announcement due to its similar approach but potential freedom to do more. While The Sims 4 seems to be in a never-ending DLC-release cycle—I'm not exaggerating when I say there is over $1,000 of DLC at this point�em>Life by You inste?ad focuses on what makes?? life simulator games so fun in the first place: creative freedom.

The life simulator also features deep Creator and Editor tools such as its Character Creator, Object Designer, Language Trees, and more, allowing ease of access for players to create, customize, and even mod Life by You to fit their story. Former Electronic Arts Executive Vice President and Head of The Sims label at EA Rod Humble thinks this is what makes Life by You so special.

"At the core of Life by You is the player community. We’ve created a sandbox where players can tell whatever story they want. From deeply personal, esoteric, or fan fiction, they can live life to the fullest - or break the rules as they see fit!�/p>

- Rod Humble, General Manage of Paradox Tectonic

In development since 2019, Life by You had originally scheduled to enter Early Access earlier this year in March. However, the team opted to delay Early Access by ??about three months to put some finishing touches on the visuals and further improve the gameplay.

Life by You enters Early Access on Steam and the Epic Games Store on ??June 4.

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That's a lot of responsibility

As promised, by way of livestream, Paradox has given us all the juicy, wriggling details on their upcoming life simulator, Life by You. This includes not just how the game will play and the approa??ch it will take but also its goal of releasing in an Early Access state on September 12, 2023.

//youtu.be/ZNhV-Gnjdy8

Life by You is an open-world life simulator that looks to move in on The Sims territory. You create your families, design their houses, and dictate their lives. That’s pretty much The Sims, but Paradox Tectonic is trying to differentiate Life by You in quite a few ways. The most disturbing to me is that conversation will be held using real language r??ather than the gibberish Simlish utilized in Maxis�legendary series. Outlined is a conversation creator that allows you to choose how your person reacts in different situations.

One of the features that stuck out to me is the ability to directly control your humans in a third-person control mode. This feature hasn’t been available in any of the mainline games of its closest competitor. However, a few of the console and handheld versions have allowed this, such as The Urbz and The Sims 2. I like?? the option. I have two modes of playing life simulators, and those are direct im??mersion and storytelling.

Customization seems to be the central design philosophy. You can build the town of your humans to your liking, including homes and businesses. There’s a variety of different creators built in to allow you to tweak things to your liking. They’re also touting the integration of mods, which has been something EA has always been a bit cagey on with The Sims.

Life by Me would just be a trainwreck

It’s absolutely bizarre to me what a creative monopoly The Sims has had on the life simulator genre. Some of the ways that Life by You is breaking from the formula initially strike me as sacrilege, but upon reflection, I can’t see why. I even had difficulty not referring to the “humans�in this game as “sims.�/p>

[caption id="attachment_369497" align="alignnone" width="640"] Image via Paradox Interactive[/caption]

Rob Humble is involved, bringing with him some life simulator clout. He was producer during much of The Sims 2’s and ?was a big player at EA Games during that time.

There isn’t much reason why I shouldn’t love Life by You, but so many of my expectations are hung up in The Sims. I’m definitely going to try and get over that and give Life by You a try when it drops.

So far, Life by You ha??s been announced for PC. It will be arriving in Early Access on September 12, 2023. You can pre-order it for $39.99 on the Epic Game Store, but it will also be launching on Steam.

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Not seeing any plumbobs

As part of the Paradox Announcement Show, Paradox Tectonic has announced Life By You, which at first glance is looking like a take on The Sims. A teaser trailer has been dropped, with the promise that?? we’ll get a deeper look ?on March 20.

[embed]//youtu.be/ZNhV-Gnjdy8[/embed]

While it doesn’t seem like Cities: Skylines developer Colossal Order is involved, I felt that this would be a natural progression for the publisher as a whole. Some of the footage seems to imply a wider environment than just the household. That said, I can’t fathom how a smaller developer could compete with the incredible monolith that The Sims 4 has become. Still, I ha??ve hopes, but we’re going to have to wait to find out more.

More news about Life By You will be coming on March 20th.

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