March 2002 News Archive

Interested in the progress in the developments in Maxis' upcoming title, "The Sims: Online"? Maxis has introduced a new newsletter you can subscribe to that will give you information and possible release dates in the future months. To stay tuned with this newsletter, sign up here.

It's official: The Sims: Vacation will be at your American local software store in mere days! The expansion pack will let your sims go to different vacation spots; from camping, to skiing, to surfing. The official press release posted by Maxis/Ea can be found here.

A paragraph from the release is below:

“Everyone needs to get away from it all sometimes, and The Sims aren’t any different,” said Tim LeTourneau, Senior Producer at EA’s Maxis™ studio. “With The Sims Vacation, the whole Sims household can get some fun and sun on a fabulous island get-away.”

The suggested retail price of the new expansion pack is $29.95. (That's in US dollars) There is no word yet when the pack will be shipped to Canada or overseas.

Will Wright of great Maxis fame was recently named the fourth most influential man in gaming by Gamespy, trailing only behind such greats as John Carmack (Quake series), Sid Meier (Civilization series) and Shigeru Miyamoto (Nintendo). Below you'll find a tidbit by a fellow designer on Will's distinctively addictive games:

"Rantz Hoseley, Quicksilver Software: "Forget the Sims, Sim City turned a geek hobby into a mainstream pastime. I remember working at a daily newspaper and coming in to find four or five editors playing the original SimCity, totally addicted, and missing deadlines because of it. Always the sign of a good game."

Congrats to Will! You can read the the full entry on Will here or start at the beginning of the list here.