InZoi, the upcoming Sims-like from developer Krafton, is absolutely gorgeous – to the point a lot of life sim fans are very excited indeed. So the good news is it now has a release date; the bad news is it’s been delayed into next year to give it a “stronger foundation”.
InZoi, which promises a “complete community simulation” where “every character [acts] on their free will”, was initially announced last year, when it was expected to launch for PC sometime in “Q4” this year. Now, however, Krafton has revised that release, confirming Inzoi will be launching into Steam early access on 28th March next year.
In a message announcing the news, InZoi director Hyungjun “Kjun” Kim explained the decision to delay the game had been made after reviewing feedback and “analyzing a wealth of data from our various play tests”. He added the revised release will give the studio time to “improve areas that need attention” and “create a game that truly captures the essence of life simulation”.
“It is said that among primates, raising a human child to adulthood takes the longest time because humans must be prepared to endure and adapt to their ever-changing surroundings,” Kim continued. “The extra love and care that is required to properly nurture a child is how I see our journey with inZoi — a game that we will be nurturing together from its Early Access birth. This change in our release date represents our dedication to giving inZoi a stronger foundation, so we can embark on this journey together in the best way possible.”
Players did, of course, get a bit of a look at InZoi back in August, when Krafton briefly released its impressively flexible character creator on Steam. During its five days of availability, the demo saw a peak of over 18K players, one of them being Eurogamer’s own Jessica Orr, who shared a little of her character creating adventures right here.
“Visually, [the demo is] stunning,” she wrote. “It’s a little unbelievable how good it looks, actually, even on lower graphical settings. The customisation goes deep too. It’s got all the usual bells and whistles, and even a few chimes to boot, as we’re treated to entire categories for things like fake nails… Personality customisation doesn’t go as deep, from what I can tell in the demo, but it’s nice to see inclusive gender and sexuality options there already.”
InZoi is just one of several Sims-like that have surfaced in recent years. Paradox Interactive’s Life by You has now been cancelled, but that still leaves the highly anticipated Paralives, also scheduled to launch into early access sometime next year, and if you fancy something a little more lo-fi, you can also play the adorably retro – but still surprisingly robust – Tiny Life on Steam.