WEBVTT 00:01.000 --> 00:07.000 We are at Summer Game Fest Play Days and we missed The Sims happy hours. 00:07.000 --> 00:12.000 I'm sorry about that, but we are happy that we got to do this interview and we are here with you. 00:12.000 --> 00:20.000 So, after so many years, how would you define the current status of The Sims and its community? 00:20.000 --> 00:26.000 Yeah, the community is thriving, we have 70 million players that have played our game now 00:26.000 --> 00:32.000 and they're just looking and asking for more and more from the team and we're just providing. 00:32.000 --> 00:34.000 Yeah, we're very excited about the community. 00:34.000 --> 00:38.000 What are you providing us of late and in the near future? 00:38.000 --> 00:41.000 So, we've been doing lots of updates and we've got many, many more planned as well. 00:41.000 --> 00:44.000 Most recently, we've actually just released two new kits. 00:44.000 --> 00:48.000 One's Grunge Revival, so if you're kind of like looking at kind of modern trends now, 00:48.000 --> 00:51.000 but also like myself, if you kind of grew up in the grunge era, 00:51.000 --> 00:55.000 it gives you a great opportunity to kind of tell stories using those kind of elements. 00:55.000 --> 01:00.000 And then the other one was Book Nook, which is another kit, which is for our build by players. 01:00.000 --> 01:03.000 So, being able to build these Book Nook kind of builds, 01:03.000 --> 01:05.000 I've just seen some incredible builds from the community. 01:05.000 --> 01:07.000 It's absolutely so inspiring. 01:07.000 --> 01:10.000 So, there's some of the most recent updates we have and also, like I say, 01:10.000 --> 01:13.000 there's many, many more plans for The Sims 4 in the future. 01:13.000 --> 01:20.000 Could you give us a couple of examples of what players are doing to express themselves with the new content, 01:20.000 --> 01:24.000 the stories they're telling and how they are expressing it into the game? 01:24.000 --> 01:29.000 Yeah. So, with a lot of our content, players are really discovering kind of who they are. 01:29.000 --> 01:35.000 We have such a wonderful player base that gets to figure out who do they love, 01:35.000 --> 01:37.000 who are their friends, what are their family dynamics. 01:37.000 --> 01:40.000 And so, we just, we came out with Growing Together earlier this year 01:40.000 --> 01:44.000 and they get to explore also what happens when you raise a child 01:44.000 --> 01:49.000 and it's not, you know, it's not all wonderful rainbows and easy, right? 01:49.000 --> 01:51.000 They get to kind of see and understand the challenge, 01:51.000 --> 01:57.000 what happens when you nurture a baby and how does the baby grow and become an adult one day 01:57.000 --> 02:04.000 and how do the decisions that they make in the game help change what's happening to their Sim? 02:04.000 --> 02:05.000 Yeah. 02:05.000 --> 02:08.000 That's for what the game is right now. 02:08.000 --> 02:13.000 So, how would you guys picture The Sims going forward? 02:13.000 --> 02:19.000 I don't know if still The Sims 4 or future entries into the series that you kind of talk about probably, 02:19.000 --> 02:21.000 but how do you picture the experience? 02:21.000 --> 02:26.000 How do you think it can evolve further with a game that has evolved so much, 02:26.000 --> 02:31.000 even in its business model, the way it's distributed, the way it's multi-platform? 02:31.000 --> 02:34.000 So, what can you tell us about that, both of you? 02:34.000 --> 02:38.000 Yeah. So, we still have a lot of stories to tell. 02:38.000 --> 02:41.000 I really personally want to dig deeper into relationship building 02:41.000 --> 02:44.000 and seeing how that can evolve in the game. 02:44.000 --> 02:49.000 Also, with our audience, they are always exploring something different in their lives 02:49.000 --> 02:54.000 and so we try to look at how do we tackle that in The Sims and help them express and tell that story. 02:54.000 --> 02:56.000 How about you? 02:56.000 --> 03:01.000 So, for me personally, I always think that The Sims kind of draws inspiration from what the community is creating, 03:01.000 --> 03:03.000 but also just from the world around us. 03:03.000 --> 03:06.000 And so, the world's constantly evolving. It's constantly changing. 03:06.000 --> 03:10.000 And so, looking at seeing, okay, how can we give players the ability to tell stories 03:10.000 --> 03:13.000 that are personal to them today? Like, what does that mean? 03:13.000 --> 03:17.000 And so, I'm really excited about all the potential that we have for The Sims 4, 03:17.000 --> 03:19.000 about kind of looking at what the community is really excited by, 03:19.000 --> 03:24.000 what they're using today, and then what more we can do to build upon that. 03:24.000 --> 03:28.000 But also, understanding the world around us and saying like, you know, how are trends evolving? 03:28.000 --> 03:30.000 You know, what's expectations? 03:30.000 --> 03:33.000 And that goes right the way through from, you know, the clothes that people are wearing 03:33.000 --> 03:36.000 to the food that people are eating to the types of relationships 03:36.000 --> 03:39.000 and their own personal identity as well. 03:39.000 --> 03:43.000 So, I'm just like incredibly excited about kind of all the potential to continue evolving in that space. 03:43.000 --> 03:47.000 Is there something that you just mentioned that you cannot do right now? 03:47.000 --> 03:52.000 Or you feel like you guys have the platform to keep adding that sort of content 03:52.000 --> 03:54.000 for them to tell those stories? 03:54.000 --> 03:58.000 No, very much feel that we've kind of got this kind of platform and this kind of foundation 03:58.000 --> 04:00.000 and we just want to keep building on top of it. 04:00.000 --> 04:05.000 So, earlier this year, we did some kind of updates to improve representation, 04:05.000 --> 04:07.000 such as adding things like hearing aids. 04:07.000 --> 04:10.000 And that was so incredibly important because we saw players then say, 04:10.000 --> 04:13.000 I can finally see myself and I can see myself represented. 04:13.000 --> 04:17.000 And then also when we looked at things like when we recently just gone free entry, 04:17.000 --> 04:19.000 so it's actually free to play the base game. 04:19.000 --> 04:23.000 So, more players from around the world are now playing The Sims 4 for the very first time. 04:23.000 --> 04:27.000 And that's inspiring us to go, okay, what can we do for more people around the world 04:27.000 --> 04:31.000 so that they can tell those personal stories about what their life can be like, 04:31.000 --> 04:34.000 but also giving them that opportunity to then go into the fantasy world as well. 04:34.000 --> 04:37.000 So, they might say start by telling the story of their family 04:37.000 --> 04:39.000 and then end up telling stories about vampires and werewolves 04:39.000 --> 04:42.000 and bringing that together and how they interact in those dynamics. 04:43.000 --> 04:46.000 Fantastic, that sounds incredible. So, thank you so much for your time. 04:46.000 --> 04:47.000 Much appreciated. 04:47.000 --> 04:48.000 Yeah, thank you. 04:50.000 --> 04:51.000 Thank you so much. 05:04.000 --> 05:05.000 Thank you.