Over half of The Sims development team is working on The Sims 4 and 'the next evolution' so I guess it's time to start speculating again

I feel like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day because the year was 2022 when I first watched EA tease the "next generation Sims game" with the codename Project Rene. Two years later it said "actually that's not the Sims 5 though" and spent another year being weird and silent before finally admitting today that yeah, Project Rene is now a mobile game. Simultaneously though, it made sure to mention that a huge portion of the team is working on "the next evolution." Here we go again.

In its start of year blog post today, EA says it is "committed to singleplayer life simulation experiences," and reiterated that it is continuing to work on updates and improvements to The Sims 4. After that, it coyly adds:

"Singleplayer PC and console experiences will always be a part of our future, with more than half of our global development team dedicated to The Sims 4 and the next evolution. More news in the coming months!"

The Sims 4 and "the next evolution," apparently two different things.

The recent rumors point to anything from a Sims 4 code base rewrite to a full remake, though the grist for that mill was mostly unsubstantial vague-posting from unconfirmed sources. After all the hubbub about it, well-known Sims 4 modder SimMattically stepped in to put a damper on things by posting, "there’s no Sims 4 remaster."

So it's likely not working on a remaster and likely not working on The Sims 5, but is working on a "next evolution," and crucially one that's singleplayer, not another attempt at taking The Sims online.

The only other hint we have is EA's investor presentation from 2024, during which it announced (and has still never really explained) a platform called The Sims Hub to unify The Sims 4 with Project Rene and other Sims games. During the same presentation, EA entertainment & technology president Laura Miele said that the team would be "updating the core technology foundation" of The Sims 4. The direction for Project Rene seems to have shifted in that time though, so I'd hesitate to put too much stock in any other plans EA announced over a year ago.

This tiny acknowledgement of something else in the Sims team pipeline feels like a bone thrown to keep all us life sim dogs from snarling over the confirmation that Project Rene really is just the mobile game we don't want. At this point though, this tired old Sims hound will take it.