The Sims 4 community is in turmoil. Its biggest stars are distancing themselves from the game with the support of their millions of subscribers. Then there are creators in the middle: those big enough to be known, but not big enough to be insulated. And they are struggling with a difficult choice of whether or not to keep playing the game they love and, in some cases, depend on.
Last month, The Sims’ publisher EA announced that it would be acquired for $55 billion dollars by a combination of investors including the Saudi Arabia Private Investment Fund, and Affinity Partners, an investment firm founded by President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
The news sent shockwaves throughout The Sims’ community. Players expressed concern that the company’s new owners would use their position to influence future content. The Sims and its community has long been celebrated for its inclusivity. It is a queer game played and loved by queer people. That it could soon be owned in part by an ultra-conservative, anti-LGBTQ government prompted the game’s most popular creators to act.
“Under this new ownership I feel I cannot maintain a direct association to the company.”
One of the biggest to respond was Kayla “LilSimsie” Sims who announced that she would be leaving the EA Creator program to her 2 million subscribers on YouTube. Members of the network get special perks like early and free access to content packs to show them off to their followers, along with affiliate codes that can potentially net them a cut of sales. In January, she even collaborated with EA to release her own content pack, allowing players to buy items she created to use in their own game. But now, she said she will be slowly shifting her content to other games. “Under this new ownership I feel I cannot maintain a direct association to the company,” she said in her announcement.
She wasn’t alone. Seemingly all at once, the life simulation game’s biggest content creators — including James Turner and Jesse “Plumbella” McNamara — all announced that they would be leaving EA’s creator program and distancing themselves from the game that made them famous.
A creator’s choice to abandon a beloved game is never simple, especially when money and their career’s future viability are at stake. But the game’s biggest creators have acknowledged that their choice to step away is easier for them than most. “I think taking this stand is the right choice for me,” McNamara wrote in her statement. “I’m in a privileged position to be able to say I’m leaving so easily.”
For others, it’s much harder, as making the choice to step away means potentially damaging a content creation career that’s just getting started. “[The Sims] has taken me places I didn’t think it would,” said one creator who requested anonymity as their current affiliation with the EA Creator program doesn’t permit them to speak negatively about the company. “I have quite a diverse community, lots of BIPOC people, LGBTQ people in my community,” they said.
It was concern for those members that ultimately led them to make the decision to leave the network and slowly transition away from The Sims. “[The Sims] is a game where a lot of marginalized people have the freedom of representation,” they said. They spoke of how the conservative, anti-LGBTQ values and policies of EA’s buyers were at odds with the spirit of the game. “I just haven’t felt comfortable outwardly promoting content from a game that is potentially going to be owned by those entities.” While the creator doesn’t fully support themselves with their streaming career, they acknowledged that the choice to step away could damage their upward trajectory. “Most of my viewership comes to my platform to watch me play The Sims,” they said. “I imagine that I may lose some of that viewership.”
Image: EA
On Twitch and elsewhere, viewership is the key to growth and success. Creators with larger audiences are better insulated from viewer attrition. But for mid-tier creators, any disruption, whether it be a change in streaming schedule or content, can massively impact how many people show up to watch. It’s for that reason, a lot of Sims creators — even those who have issues with the buyout — are coming up with creative ways to express their discontent without potentially imperiling their channel.
Some creators aren’t leaving the program, but have decided to abstain from its benefits. “They’re not promoting any content from EA for the foreseeable future. They won’t be reviewing any packs or having any early access. They won’t be hosting giveaways,” said the Twitch streamer leaving the program.
Renee is a Sims content creator who’s been playing the game for over 20 years and has been a part-time creator on TikTok and YouTube for the last five. “The Sims has just always kind of been my happy place,” she said. When news of the buyout hit, she said she was concerned, and was pleased to see the bigger creators make their decision to leave. “These are the biggest names in The Sims community, and these are the people that have the biggest leverage when it comes to the actual game,” she said.
But she’s not personally ready to take that kind of stand, choosing to stay with the creator program and adopt a wait and see approach. “My thought process was, ‘This deal has not gone through yet,’” Renee said. She’s holding out hope that external pressure from the Sims community and two US Senators who have requested an investigation into the deal, might get it to fall through. “If I do leave the EA creator network, and this does not go through […] I am not at the point in my Sims career to be able to regain access to something like this,” Renee said. “I know that there are a lot of people that are going to disagree with that, and that’s fine. I completely understand that point of view.”
But if the deal does go through, she says she’s out.
Streamers choosing to leave or stay with the EA Creator program has fractured the Sims community. After the exodus of high-profile creators, EA has since put out two statements in an attempt to calm fears and speculation. “Our mission, values, and commitment remain the same,” EA said in a post on X made immediately after the exodus. “The Sims will always be a space where you can express your authentic self.” It also updated an employee FAQ where it said, “EA will maintain creative control and our track record of creative freedom and player-first values will remain intact.”
These reassurances are of little comfort to some, and all the creators I spoke to expressed a deep pain for what’s happening and fear for the future of the game they love. The streamer in the process of leaving the EA creator network knows that once the separation is complete, they’ll likely never be let back in. They’ve made their peace with that.
“I always want to do my best to uphold my integrity and my morals, and I feel that this buyout and what could potentially come for not just the game, but for the company as a whole goes against that,” they said. “And that outweighs any opportunities that I could potentially miss out on.”
