EA, WE ARE TIRED OF TESTING YOUR GAMES!! ONLY 6 QA TESTERS ON HIGH SCHOOL YEARS? UNACCEPTABLE! 😬

[@Pixelade]

SOURCES/LINKS FROM NEWS & COMMENTARY VIDEO: pixelade.org/2022/07/30/ea-we-are-tired-of-testing-your-games-only-6-qa-testers-on-high-school-years-unacceptable/

[@StrayCradle]

I must say, the players don't play-test for free. They PAY the company to do it. Why would EA spend money on testers when they have testers paying them for the privilege?

[@MatsuyoRific]

I'm honestly wondering if they're even testing the packs with other packs installed, or if they're testing it with base game only. That could be why Game Changers weren't seeing these bugs during their early release gameplay, since they didn't have access to the other packs. If it's something with another pack that's causing the issues, then it makes sense that they aren't catching it. They need to start giving the packs to Game Changers for their actual games, so they can play it with all the other packs installed. Yeah, it still sucks that they would be using the Game Changers as QA testers, but if they're not going to hire people to do this, they might as well let the Game Changers do it.

[@Pavlinka__]

They're def not testing it with the other packs (they'd also have to try combination?? esp. if they were lenient on that before too) as that would take way more work and if they're understaffed? yikes, y'know. Well it's yikes anyway in the end

[@danoott_]

Even James Turner mentioned in his let's play that compared to the Game Changers version of the game, the released version with all his packs and his own save games is a lot more buggy. He even went as far as turning ageing off so his sims wouldn't age up randomly.

[@PinkFox983]

Exactly! I see a lot of people accusing the Game Changers of lying to sell the pack or of manipulating their viewers, but they had an entirely different version of the game! In fact, I think its a bit shady the way EA intentionally misrepresents the content for the Game Changers, and then the GC are always blamed when the content is actually released. Remember when GC were given only six hours to play with Island Living for early access? That was clearly so they wouldn't realize how shallow the game play was so they would hype it up before realizing it had no content beside looking pretty. People accused the GC of lying and only being honest when people already spent their money, but they literally couldn't possibly have known.

[@Marissa71490]

@@danoott_ I turned auto age off on mine too but now I'm wondering if graduation shows up after you reach a certain point in age. My sim has gone to school for like 5 weeks with prom every week and no graduation on the calendar. Idk though.

[@Arteefact]

@@Marissa71490 graduation happends when (after) you age up to young adult :)

[@gregorysimileer]

I’m a UX designer for a wayyy smaller tech company, and we have 8 QA. This news of EA and their qa team is actually shocking to me because even with that amount, we ship products that perform very well. It’s actually a process that takes months for QAs, rinse and repeat. The fact that these packs are shipped in droves just pisses me off.

[@jackskydragon_JW]

From what you said I guess that they have almost no time to test the packs. That being aside from the QA having "only" 6 people when EA could have more people, I guess that they must have almost no time to test the packs. It's only a guess, of course.

[@lj2265]

The other problem is they outsourced the entire QA team to India so what they do have for a QA team they didn't pick because they do a good job, they picked them because they're cheap.

[@jackskydragon_JW]

@@twistedstitch It surely feels like it.

[@lance9249]

@@lj2265 Fact. It was hilarious the mod on the Sims forum went completely woke nuts because someone mentioned this

[@controlledcourtney]

Same. I'm a software developer for a Fintech company and we take literally months to test even the smallest features

[@Jhud69]

QA testers are massively underpaid (sometimes not paid at all), are overloaded working overtime and sometimes are told to do their job like a WEEK or so before release. This isn't just EA either. This is why I really don't like when people call the Sims team lazy, they are definitely not lazy, they probably are just in horrible working conditions given not much time and too much work on a relatively small team size. This is not okay and shoud be changed.

[@kristinbeuscher8059]

Yea I was thinking about the same thing

[@Life_Universe_Everything]

EA stopped standing for “Electronic Arts” and started standing “Evil Assholes”

[@brasiworld8835]

Yeah it's not the Sims team fault it's literally the company even outside of the Sims EA is always worried about money

[@freedomofspeech2420]

Yes this is what I think too. They are strained by the company . EA is a terrible company that has a terrible work environment. It’s not a hidden thing. Anyone could research this stuff.

[@makaylaboyko1292]

@@freedomofspeech2420 EA basically admitted to it apparently in their State of Play back in 2015. Only they took it as a joke, not as serious backlash.

[@malignantgoldfish7224]

Really can't blame people for pirating. Who wants to pay $40 to break your game?

[@alexjulien984]

But to be fair though High school years didn’t break anything it’s the base game that’s broken. Sure there are bugs for HS years as there is in any new pack but it’s not breaking the game at least not for me. It’s just sad that the base game itself is so broken.

[@OhShitReactions]

We’ve been saying for years that EA has been cutting corners and releasing broken and bare minimum packs. This only confirms what we’ve thought for the past few years. Very disappointing to see this beloved video game series fall so low.

[@Miochh]

I'm quite scared to see how this franchise is going downhill so much.

[@jackskydragon_JW]

I totally agree with you wifcy1012

[@jackskydragon_JW]

@@Miochh true

[@mxlo8713]

100%, just went on my game two days ago to find that two of my recent saves were wiped, hoping they fix this soon

[@sleepysartorialist]

It isn't just Sims. It's ALL of their IP. Dragon Age and Mass Effect had this same problem. EA is trash

[@LifeOfTheAngels]

With the way these bugs are so frequent you would’ve thought they had nobody on QA, either they need more ppl or somebody’s not doing their job, and I’m inclined to believe both at this point

[@XvXHaruhiSuzumiyaXvX]

it's more likely they're ignoring or mistreating the QA testers from what i've heard

[@nigerianprincess101]

Nah I’m not going to blame the QA testers, there are an infinite combination of ways bugs work. Sometimes bugs are due to specific pack interactions. With 40+ different packs, that means there are just too many combination of packs to play. And it’s also not their job to fix the bugs.

[@casseysteph797]

It’s clearly an issue of EA as a company and not the individual employees who happen to work there. I feel like the simguru rotation is constantly cycling and for good reason

[@Yorbelize]

I remember reading awhile back that they hire freelance QAs and once the contract is up, they don't pay them so that explains a lot

[@claudiabcarvalho]

Or those people don't actually exist and their names are there just for show. Because they could totally lie about them, who knows?

[@yasminni485]

There is something about multi-billion dollar companies which don't pay their staff proper wages, cut corners and end up selling crappy/broken products that just makes my blood boil. People are putting in so much money towards this game and EA are being greedy bastards. Shame... shame on you. Keep treating your customers this way and your days are numbered.

[@kaz1819]

Yes! With their budget they could be creating the most incredible life simulator game and still have billions of profit to spare but they just don't give a damn to do that. Absolutely no excuse for it

[@AnnaYV]

I think they’re already numbered…which is so sad because some of the players have been around since the very beginning of The Sims franchise :( like me. To see a whole franchise of video game you know and love fall so low and become so immoral and greedy is honestly sickening and heartbreaking :( I never thought the Sims would end up like this…

[@nowhereman748]

@@AnnaYV Tell me about it.. I'm also a Silent Hill fan. :(

[@AnnaYV]

@@nowhereman748 :(

[@yasminni485]

@@AnnaYV I know what you mean, I've also been playing this franchise since the very beginning and it would be so sad to see it fall. When will these giant companies realize that the way to succeed is to take care of your customers and employees? Especially in this internet age when everyone talks to everyone, your mistakes and crappy attitude cannot be hidden. We see the truth and we don't like to be manipulated and lied to. Companies that have no compassion have no future on this planet!

[@yeahno51]

I'm a QA Tester at a much smaller company (different industry) and I'm on a team of 9 with 3 more open positions. And even then, I'm sometimes overworked. For something of this scale, this is crazy!

[@laguna4life]

Yes…it takes some serious stress tests from QA before things can even get to beta, since you have to be well knowledgeable about the software and the typical users, then do everything in your power to break it with our company because somewhere and sometime a user not knowing enough about the software will do some really odd things. You have to try being those users. Our company is much smaller than EA.

[@lvly5357]

What frustrates me is how you’re forced to update your game - so even if you don’t buy into the hype of new packs/etc, you’re still affected. Mods broken every few weeks/months is draining .

[@naeshelle]

You can keep your game in offline mode if you don’t want to update! That’s what I do. I still haven’t gotten this disaster of an update & I’m not going to until they release the fix. (You can still access the gallery in-game even if your game is offline in Origin, if that’s a concern for anyone.)

[@Kat-593]

@@naeshelle you can play it offline ?

[@tulekahju]

@@Kat-593 Yes, you just need to set Origin to offline mode. I also disable auto-updates for Sims 4 too just to be extra cautious.

[@beingclaire_.]

@@tulekahju do you happen to know how to stop origin from being on even after closing it out? When I shutdown my laptop it will say it’s still running.

[@tulekahju]

@@beingclaire_. Aside from Quitting the app or Ending Task via Task Manager, no.

[@RevasFen]

I've pre-ordered only Cottage Living and Werewolves because this was packs that was the most interesting for me. I feel very bad for people who pre-ordered Wedding Stories or High School Years. What EA doing is unacceptable! They only want money but they don't care in what state the game is! I actually play The Sims 3 and sometimes The Sims 2 UC and this games are so much better when you compare gameplay and content. PS. Sorry if I made some errors, English is my second language :)

[@minranelf3810]

Very true, even tho cottage living and werewolves have their own bugs and glitches, i still had so much fun with both of the packs and still is having fun with them right now (werewolves living in the countryside 🤌🤌🤌). My wedding stories have very nice CAS items but i was so annoyed with the gameplay itself

[@chrisstandfast6112]

If they didn't care about the game they wouldn't be doing patches

[@RevasFen]

@@chrisstandfast6112 But if they DID care, the game would need a lot less patches

[@itsbrooklynbabyyy]

I regret buying anything that came out after strangerville tbh since that everything went downhill.

[@chrisstandfast6112]

@@RevasFen do I think they're perfect no but but the fact they're acknowledging the glitches show they care if they didn't care at all they'd leave it as is and believe me I've seen some game companies do this

[@bloodiebat085]

I'm having many bugs even without the update or pack itself. You can't use many things because it's just broken. Get Famous is bugged. Dine out is just unplayable, Bowling night stuff too. Everything takes way too long. You can't fully operate your sims because they will just stand there for 5 second or do something different. Nothing works like it should. There are those little things that when you experience it often its really frustrating. The game is shallow AF I wouldn't complain if it at least worked properly. For the price we're paying this is so horrible and embarrassing.

[@mlem6951]

Same, i stopped buying packs and other stuff a long time ago. So, my game is not that overfilled, but i have the same buggs as mentioned for the pack. And a lot of other buggs which are associated with packs i don't have- It's so frustrating that i didn't touched my games in month's and now after this mess, i will again probaly not touch it for month ...

[@alittlemoresonic42]

@@mlem6951 I dont think the pack is the issue its the update that came out for the pack before it was released. so everyone has it.

[@bloodiebat085]

@@mlem6951 I feel you, worst part of it is that the packs content is amazing but unfortunately unplayable or broken. Most of the time I'm so done with it that I just build houses and stuff.

[@mlem6951]

@@alittlemoresonic42 Yeah, thats what i was thinking to.

[@mlem6951]

@@bloodiebat085 Yeaaah~. Sure, there could be things made better. But all in all, i find the packs for sims 4 not that bad. I played Sims 2 and Sims 3 and many people compare Sims 4 to sims 3 und, unpopular opinion, i like sims 4 more. The packs are not that big, but more in detail. Althoug as i said, there is a lot air to fill out for this pricetag. This and the buggs are the reason why i stopped buying. I would love Wervoles or an Japan-Vacation, ect. but ... there are games out who you can get for 40-60€ which have way more content and have not half of the bugs sims 4 has :/. I wish we could get a Sims with the style and detail of sims 4, but with the pack-densiti of Sims 2(and the open world of Sims 3). I loved Sims 2 SO MUCH, you could build youre own appartments and the gameplay was so fun.

[@MadisonSpearslol]

I honestly feel bad for the QA testers they’re being overloaded with work

[@Stellalun_a]

Yeah my thought exactly ! I sure hope they're not being blamed by EA for this mess. Testing a buggy, glitchy game with so many DLCs already with only a small team sounds nightmarish.

[@curlycrazy3513]

@@Stellalun_a LMAOAO YALL DONT know how processing and making games work YALL are so lost and dumb and y’all just say what y’all think like y’all need to just stfu y’all are so goofy and annoying my ps5 is working so smooth and playable YALL are just saying stuff y’all be the main ones asking for updates but when it breaks a game YALL are mad 🤣 pick a struggle atp

[@valenciawalker6498]

Same here haven't played in over a month or longer.

[@timw5k]

You are kidding, right? The QA testers arent overloaded with work, the developers are.... The QA team has probably already found and filed 99% of the bugs that are known now. It's the developers that have an absolute catastrophic pile of work to do....

[@hannemanpng]

@@timw5k it isn't a competition lol both groups are obviously overworked. the sims team needs significantly more than what they're being given rn

[@Jetblackbird]

Hey as a QA tester I guarantee even though there were only 6- they caught all of those major bugs. Though more testers would ease their burden.... The problem lies in management and the prioritization of bugs and what is deemed "known shippable"- and being unwilling to shift release dates because they know they can get away with shipping a buggy product. That is not on the QA testers

[@melbeleng]

THIS. They always blame QA but nobody actually knows the whole truth behind it. I'm sure those 6 QAs did their best and reported bugs like crazy. I'm a QA Lead in a mobile gaming company and the Production team asks ME if I'm okay with releasing with blockers or if we prefer a new build, even if that means pushing the release date a few more days...

[@Kardinaalilintu]

EA has had a horrible management for over a decade, but they just managed to buy some incredibly popular games to their comppany. And no, they did not originally develop those games, just bought the idea, team and formula, even a whole studio, like with Maxis, and then ran it to the ground in order to get the best short term monetary value. No regard for the actual potential that the games might hold in terms of art, ground braking concepts or evolution of entertainment. The whole industry is suffering from the incredibly brutal bashing from our capitalistic economical system; since exponentially growing profits are the number one target, passion for creating something cool, new or enjoyable is being strangled to death in favor of low costs and agressive marketing. It's the same issue that the animation and movies have been strugling with for decades. Just for a disclaimer: Yes, our economic system is outdated and flawed, but it's also the best we got for the moment.

[@Ahjusshi_Brown]

The players aren’t testing these packs for free. They’re PAYING ea to test them. Anywhere from $10-$40 at that.

[@LynnStoleYourBin]

Actually, I have to pay 60 DOLLARS for the expansion packs in my country. It's out right ridiculous to pay that much for something that doesn't even function as it should.

[@candeezymarie9827]

Yep.

[@fozzytheflyingmuppet]

Those 6 surnames highly suggest the testing was outsourced. Outsourced work is not always bad but it's possible EA just e-mailed the code abroad for some light testing by a very small team and this is the result. I'm not blaming these 6 people, I feel sorry for them. They had to do the work of 30 people with probably very little input from EA. It's obvious that the number of testers is important here. The werewolves pack is viewed relatively positive, City Living too. So testing matters. Why can't EA at least keep the testing consistent?

[@sp4c3yb4by3]

Yep, as soon as i saw the names i realized it was definitely outsourced. Foreign names are ofc normal, but not to the point its every name, and every name is Indian.

[@victorvale1015]

Whose to even say they’d played the sims before. If I hadn’t I might not even notice the sim aging up and I might not understand that a pink bar under a green one on a sims parent means something very bad. And in a week I might not have learned enough about the game to say for sure

[@jadorejoe]

I thought the same thing, I don't think I saw any of those names under the Werewolves QA credits either, but they could've been on a different page. It definitely strikes me as them outsourcing to cut costs.

[@demijacked]

Yeah outsourced totally and they probably never played Sims and didn't understand Sim stuff

[@camieki3419]

I paid 40 DOLLARS & 300+ DOLLARS for DLC for nothing to work, why do they do this every time do they not care?! This game is expensive as it already is, and the game been out since 2014, shouldn’t it not be doing this anymore ?

[@kiera2850]

Their QA team is obviously outsourced and I’m sure that causes some communication and logistics errors if theyre not operating together

[@UtamagUta]

yeah, all names are indian (as in, from India)

[@merchantfan]

Which honestly makes the number of QA testers even worse. QA testers are some of the lowest paid positions AND they are outsourced probably to India and they still majorly cut corners on how many they could hire??

[@dear_totheheart]

No excuse

[@kewpified]

My BIG worry is that after buying all these digital downloads (where they don't provide a keycode) they will stop supporting service for 4. My laptop can't even access my Sims 3 game (which was mostly digital downloads) After investing A LOT of money into the game, I do not want to start again with a Sims 5.

[@GodiNaga]

Omg yes THIS.

[@PeukinsPoint]

Loving these videos. Yes. Hold them accountable and don’t stop. The fans have been shelling way too much money for way too many years.

[@lirpa2300]

You hold businesses accountable with your wallet, not your mouth. These corporations could care less about these videos, especially If these SAME people complaining/ranting/making videos turn around and buy the game anyway. This game didn't have to look like this at almost 8 years but it has MAINLY due to consumers STILL buying the game knowing it wasn't the best quality. This game was in trouble since 2014 with the shallow gameplay and the basegame coding but consumers threw their money at EA anyway and have made excuses for the Sims team the last 8 years. Despite knowing the conditions of workers, shortstaffing, downsizing teams and outsourcing, people will STILL buy this game. At this point, for the last 8 years, the consumers got EXACTLY what they paid for.

[@yugen8195]

@@lirpa2300 right , I agree 100% , ive been saying this for years. people are complaining , but it’s not hard to not buy a game or pack if you see it’s broken. make their pockets hurt and they’ll get their shit together.

[@camillehinchley1379]

I literally purchased new laptop worth £1,700 just so I could play sims high school without any lags as I been waiting 15 years for this moment. Don’t even play sims as much due to work but since the pack was announced I knew I had to get new laptop. I never been so angry in life..

[@seanstults1271]

Anyone who spent money on these last couple packs are complicit in enabling EA’s poor behavior. Admittedly I’ve spent hundreds on Sims for these packs. EA doesn’t just do this with Sims, y’all shouldn’t forget. FIFA, Madden, have been declining for years for many of the same reasons. They don’t deserve your money.

[@goated3285]

Exactly, they just gave up on NBA live completely

[@simsbrosia]

I feel so bad for those QA testers, being so understaffed and stressed.... EA are cutting corners and it's disgusting and the amount of racism I've seen just because the QAs names "look indian" is absolutely vile and unacceptable

[@princedakkar2251]

It looks like EA have completely scaled back on the number of quality testers to save money; and then outsourced the work to an office in India to reduce the quality bill even further as wages are notoriously low there.

[@AubreyWatt]

This is why I always play my game offline now and don’t update until I hear how the update went for others! I don’t trust their updates… especially the big ones

[@bluesclues4371]

Same! I’ve been offline since this update and I might keep it that way lol

[@SaraMcNutz]

what does playing offline do? does it stop something specific

[@PestilentSabreS]

@@SaraMcNutz its so it doesn't update automatically, the only downside is that you cannot access the gallery

[@SaraMcNutz]

@@PestilentSabreS oh ok ty

[@zach99998]

Keep buying the games and they'll keep getting away with it

[@tywilbert4437]

I agree with you, Matt. I'm going to start waiting until content is out for awhile before jumping up to buy it, or even preorder. I've been in love with this game since the Sims 1, it's a huge part of the creativity in me, I live to make new Sims. But if we as gamers don't start holding them accountable for such sloppy, buggy content that is not fully tested, this kind of thing is only going to get worse by the time we do get the Sims 5. Thank you, Matt, for always being honest and decent with your comments and opinions.

[@sircharlesmormont9300]

I wonder if they're outsourcing. Did you notice that the named listed on the larger QA rolls seemed to represent people of a diverse array of backgrounds, while the small QA team seemed to be limited to folks of only one background? To me, this smacks of outsourcing to one small, outside team instead of doing QA in-house, where they can be fully integrated into the project development and release schedules. Hiring a foreign contractor, thus putting those team members on a customer-to-provider footing instead of on a more equal, teammate footing is a bad move. It incentivizes contractors to tell customers what they want to hear and to agree to meet impossible deadlines (thus cutting corners) at a lower cost than competitors. It also introduces scheduling and communication issues like conflicting holidays, completely different business hours, and cultural misunderstandings into the mix. The result is, as we see, a worse product. Now, I'm not saying that EA shouldn't employ an international cadre of QA testers. Especially when it comes to testing translations, it makes sense to employ people internationally. That's why that first list, with a list of names that seemed indicative of a team from a diverse array of backgrounds, made more sense to me. That's a very different situation, however, from hiring one small team that is cut off (geographically and within the company structure) from project development as a whole. Ideally, the team would consist of both in-house and international testers, with in-house representation at all project meetings. Is what I propose more expensive? Sure. If anyone can afford to put money into QA, though, it is EA and the Sims franchise! This is a flagship product! I know I'm just speculating, here, but... I don't think I'm that far off base. EA needs to put more funding into QA immediately.

[@Abiwg1910]

I feel like the game changers are almost their QAs as with when they pushed back the wedding stories pack because it was broken for them, but as the update is the thing that broke the game rather than the pack then they didn’t have that secondary QA

[@Abiwg1910]

Also if the players are the QAs then they’re paying to do that 😂 they’re a joke

[@Laurajlithgow25]

@@Abiwg1910 exactly, we’re paying them to do a job that QAs should be getting paid for

[@itsbrooklynbabyyy]

But what’s they’re payback ? Views and free products ? It’s not even worth it tbh what’s the point of having all dlc of a broken game if you can’t even properly play it.

[@bubznsunny143]

@@itsbrooklynbabyyy not to mention people yelling at them when they find bugs in the game

[@QueenMakeda1]

I totally agree and I'm not giving them any more money until they do the necessary fixes!!! I'm sorry but we need to boycott EA and The Sims until they honor their customers. This game has been buggy since day one. And we need to put our feet down and say they need to fix the entire interface. It's not fair to us that we spent our hard earned money on a lackluster product. Some of us have been with them since day one of the franchise (like myself) and we all know they can do it because it was done before. This is totally unacceptable. It's like a big FU to all of us. It's a freaking video game like get it right before you release it. It's as cut and dry as that. So over it, when's Paralives coming out again 🤦🏽‍♀️🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣💯

[@QueenMakeda1]

@@inactivechannel-km1vf I know I'm mad at myself for spending so much money with them up to this point. But I'm excited for Paralives tooo ❤️❤️❤️🙌🏽💯 they'll probably light a good fire underneath EA's & Sims team butt 😁

[@PizzaMadeMeFat]

@Black Star but why would you wanna play a broken game at all? Being able to find it for free means nothing if it's still broken

[@jai07070]

I had mentioned a long time ago I felt many times EAs motto is, "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with BS". In the past I would rush to purchase new content because I was 'dazzled' by expectations, a huge fan and because I had some money to do so. 40 US dollars is a lot of money for this. 20.00 should be the highest even if the content lived up to its promises. You wouldn't buy any product such as a car if there could be bugs not tested. EA produces other games I have never played and it makes me curious if there are glitches in them also. I sadly lost all interest in this pack.

[@SailorRoza]

I believe the reason we have all these problems is because we have so many packs. When they play test its just base game and the pack. When the pack releases it conflicts soo much with the other packs and things start to go haywire. They need to play test it with all the packs installed to see how it will interact

[@HF-tj8db]

Thanks for the video! I bought high school years yesterday and I’ve only played it for a couple of hours. I’ve encountered glitchy objects and CAS items, game crashes and a couple of annoying bugs (if my sim tries on an outfit from the thrift store, even after selling it and switching all her outfits back, she will change into it on every occasion). It’s very disappointing, considering these are minor things. I mean, fixing CAS assets is the easiest thing ever!! And very easy to spot. This is the first and last time I buy a pack before it goes on sale.

[@shelbseroo]

Same here 😫

[@tocacreepy4748]

prom didn’t work. I played for 2 saturdays and still prom wasn’t even in the calendar

[@recycleyourcar]

my sim changes into the thrift outfits instead of nude for bathing

[@rushergames9]

I got the pack the day of release and only played for a couple of hours. The only thing I encountered is that my teen sim was acting like a werewolf and I didn't make them a werewolf nor were they bitten by one.

[@HF-tj8db]

@@recycleyourcar yep, I told my sim to use a treadmill and she changed into her thrift outfit. I then changed her back, got rid of the thrift outfit and made her go on the treadmill again, and she changed back to the thrift one. it's such a ridiculous bug, and I'm shocked that it wasn't fixed before release.

[@chelseamcintyre6473]

This has been this way for AWHILE. My guess is that they are outsourcing their QA to another company who isn't actually doing anything. I think another issue is the possibility that they are not testing the entire game when they come out with a patch or pack. Notice the game changers only ever have access to the new pack and new patch. I think that they aren't testing the new packs with other packs at all.

[@angelicslayer10]

We don't learn, we keep throwing our money at EA even though we know what's going to happen. It'll only hurt them if a huge amount of us stop helping them. I for one really hope that Paralives will replace sims. I cannot wait for it to be released. It's also true that us as players are now bug testers because most companies release games with bugs and we just test them for free

[@xazulex442]

Can’t we sue for this? They taking our money n giving us broken games

[@chelsisims6399]

Just have to find a lawyer willing to take the case.

[@Miluielle]

I'm not sure what other countries have but I wonder if a refund would be more likely under 'not fit for purpose' consumer laws.

[@MrsO1983]

I couldn't agree more! 👍🏾 💯 I was shamed by an admin in a Sims 4 FB forum when I said I'm too nervous to pre-order. Her response was saying that the problem is usually mods and CC. Obviously I know that and would remove mods and CC. We should be paid for the stress of testing the games, not the other way around!

[@marcgarrett4401]

I find it odd that those I watch, deligracy, James Turner and lilsimsie, said nothing about the bugs. True, they talked about the curved walls had dead space, but other bugs such as the ageing up... crickets.

[@Emi-ro5ew]

I haven’t watched all of their videos, but if the ageing bug only appears on long lifespans, I wouldn’t be surprised if they had lifespans on normal and never saw it. Probably the most important part is that they only had base game and the new pack, because the more packs there are, the more it seems break the game.

[@Kam-jm9eo]

Unfortunately they have already stained their relationship with consumers. They shouldn’t even think about a Sims 5 let alone a expansion pack. We deserve and should ask for better especially with our base game. This issue just make me see how the sims is not evolving well…

[@GodiNaga]

The moment they abandoned optimisation for the sims 3 and just left that game a drift while still selling it . They don't care to sell finished goods to paying costumers.

[@jomontanee]

But there are a lot of EA pet customers out there who defend EA no matter what. They are the ATM machine for EA. Willing to pay for uncared, unloved and unworthy packs.

[@Ahjusshi_Brown]

I’ve been telling y’all to stop giving EA your money. Continuing to buy their trash just reinforces their atrocious behavior. Bc they’re not gonna change their quality if they’re not losing money. And it’s always all abt the money.

[@lirpa2300]

Unfortunately, they're not going to listen. The consumers could have stopped this nonsense YEARS ago when the basegame didn't have pools and it took TWO YEARS to get toddlers in the game. That's when they should have STOPPED buying the game. But they let EA and the Sims team get away with it for 8 years. Look what just happened a couple of months ago with MWS fiasco, even after that, they STILL bought whatever the Sims 4 released next. The consumers brought this on themselves.

[@Ahjusshi_Brown]

@@lirpa2300 couldn’t agree with you more. Consumers have already shown EA that there will be no real consequences to their pockets for terrible output quality. Bc when the sims 4 came out?? That should’ve been enough but (understandably, imo) they remained optimistic and EA milked that optimism for all it was worth (and continues to be worth) capitalistically.

[@iluvcorbin123]

i just dont know why they would plan another game when they cant even handle this one

[@mulberrywolf]

I just want to say thank you for giving a voice to the rest of us. EA is much more likely to notice you than most of the rest of us. You have done much more than provide news, you have also voiced the complaints many of us have been having, and I personally appreciate that a lot. I’d also be fine with being a “tester” if they made it known and didn’t act like we were getting a final product. I’ve played quite a few early access games, and I’ve known to expect bugs and to report them. And I’m fine with it, because I am told that I don’t have final software and to expect potentially game breaking bugs. But that is not what is happening here, and that is the issue with them using players as testers. We’re not even testing for free, we are paying them to test games, believing we are getting final software. Shady.

[@heatherjones1777]

Same here everything is broken I couldn’t even place a door and my screen would just log out in and out so I closed my laptop I couldn’t survive 2 minutes

[@lissaoe3131]

Nevermind preordering, these days you won’t catch me ordering any Sims 4 pack

[@itsbrooklynbabyyy]

I don’t understand when I was younger so many of my friends were QA testers even if they weren’t even paid for it alot of people started like this to get a foot in the industry and I’m sure a lot of kids now a day would love to do that for a living why not just hire them to do so, they are so greedy smh.

[@icuddlecats1]

I truly wish every time I say I told you so, that I wasn't saying it at all. This is beyond profit making, getting money and sending unusable product over and over again is THEFT!!!!

[@sleepysartorialist]

My game is completely unplayable. I went OFF on Twitter last night about this. I'm filing a complaint with the State of California and the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). I'd also like to see legislators do something about this. If you are a player in Australia or Ireland, you have consumer protection rights and can demand a refund by invoking them (I worked tech support at a megacorp this was an issue I dealt with directly). I always turn mods off for new packs and my sims can't be aged up. I was checking how it was for my friends and family and this is the worst one yet. Fed UP. As for the whole "oh QA isn't gonna fix it" bit? The person who said that needs to get a reality check. EA has a PATTERN of doing this with ALL of their popular properties. Edit: I can't even load new saves now.

[@sleepysartorialist]

*still aged up anyway; i just woke up lol

[@MissTissVR]

And the players, us, the ones testing it, we're not doing it for free, we're PAYING to test the game for them! Unacceptable.

[@SilverTheTrinity]

It very much looks like they outsourced their QA to a single company and I'm going to start off by saying it's not the people doing the QA's fault. They probably found a lot of bugs and issues themselves and reported them to the Sims team but six QA testers is just not enough for such a large expansion AND update of a giant game like the Sims 4. It's not the Guru's either, they probably received the QA feedback and fixed the bugs found and now they're sadly under fire to fix all these bugs people are finding when EA have already got them working on new kits and packs. The problems here land firmly in the lap of EA who are stubborn in some places and cut corners in others with a general drive to do live service speedy content drops that are slowly tearing their games apart. I'm happy to see more content coming out which clarifies exactly who is to blame here!

[@RhensShorts]

I love that you are always honest and that is why I have been subscribed for so long because I count on your thoughts before I make financial decisions about the sims.

[@JesusisliterallyHim]

The version the game changers had had about 10 max bugs. With all packs combined this is when all the glitches and problems start to arise. EA should Def change the way of testing

[@Crazyismygame]

I've been trying to figure out how to say what I've been feeling. The Sims 4 has been out for years now, and it still feels undone, unpolished, and unfinished. I wish EA was better to their teams, and actually gave a shit about what they are creating. What happened to pride in their games? The early iterations of Sims show some heart, and it feels like creators cared about the quality of their work. If EA wasn't so money hungry, I would be so desperately happy if they went back to base game, and then worked their way forward, adding one pack at a time as they test for bugs and quality, and then fix what is so fundamentally broken. My game has been so laggy when panning around, my sims will just stand around despite having things queued up, and I have to reset the sim to get it to work again. I've had the inappropriate family romance issue, and the game makes my gaming PC run warm. My boyfriend said that some if these issues with the lag are lack of optimization. I just wish...they cared more about this game that provides so many of us an escape.

[@m_m1331]

I myself and many others can't play HSY atm. Prom and Graduation aren't showing up in our calendar 🙄

[@pieflower6419]

for me, prom is randomly appearing on Mondays and Fridays, and they don't even happen! my sim had no classes on Friday...

[@m_m1331]

@@pieflower6419 absolutely unacceptable. I really am tired of their bs. I mean think about it. My Sim couldn't graduate or go to Prom...

[@NawiTheCore]

Why pay professional testers when Game Changers first and then all Simmers can test their games for them? The problem is that we have allowed this to happen. If we had made more noise and held EA's feet to the fire, and refuse to buy packs until they hire more QA testers, we wouldn't be in this situation. "My Wedding Bugs" should have been the point of inflection. It should have been the moment when we said "enough is enough" and made so much noise online that EA would be forced to pay more QA testers. But we are always worried about not offending anyone and being "nice" so this what happens when you're more concerned about being nice than about defending your rights as a consumer.

[@PMoney_onthepage]

I’m so sad I have to wait an entire week before I can play my game :(((( I literally stop the download for the update everyday it’s so annoying. EA is ridiculous for having us wait a whole week to fix a game we already paid for…

[@mellonlord4616]

It doesn't matter if you don't preorder the pack or not, they break your game with the patches.

[@lesliemascarel6897]

You know I have been a big sims player for YEARS. Since "the Sims 2", I've NEVER missed a pack release. I have been buying on the release days. But ever since the creation of KITS, I haven't been doing so. And for the first time in my simmer life I DO NOT OWN all the packs/kits. Now I wait before deciding to buy, mainly I wait for KZbinrs reviews and sometimes I even wait for SALES. Not because I do not have the money but per principle I refuse to buy unfinished / laggy / broken packs. I am probably not the only one, and I can't see the game making money on the long run.

[@mmmmmduffbeer]

I don't know why anyone is surprised or upset about this. Whatever release date EA gives is just the open beta. The real release, when they release the patch, is like a week later. It's like that friend we all have who is always late so you tell them to show at 7 so they will show up at 8, the actual start time. EA's like that, if your friend was also always mooching, borrowing money, and constantly disappointing you in every way possible.

[@nigerianprincess101]

EA is insulting. The game full price is around $1000 dollars. Imagine buying an iPhone and it just doesn’t work. Or every new iOS update breaks your phone. This game isn’t free so what am I paying for?

[@Verydeadbarbie]

My favorite thing is the thrift store always gets trashed, thr store owner gives up cleaning halfway there everytime so it always makes it that your Sim has to clean

[@trinityrobins4957]

Tearfully uninstalled the sims 4 from my console. It hurt more than I expected but I started playing at 8 years old with the sims 2 and was so excited for sims 3 and eventually 4. Its crushing that there's been such a massive downfall at this point. I'll miss the game for sure, but I think it's for the best.

[@Laurajlithgow25]

Yeaaa, this is why I haven’t bought any of the recent packs. If they are shifting to Sims 5 & giving us broken content for profit, it’s going to backfire becsuse Sims players are not happy right now. Why would we want to spend on a whole new game when you can’t even make the current one work? They’re already showing us what to expect for Sims 5. I’ve decided that any Sims 4 pack I buy will be at least 50% off because it’s not worth full price & even at 50% off, if it’s completely going to break my game, I won’t even pay that. I’m very disappointed because I was really looking forward to this pack but I knew there would be issues when the Game Changers only had Base Game & the new pack. As many others have said, that makes absolutely no sense. At this point, they know the majority of players have most of the packs, if not all, & it needs to be tested for compatibility with all. This is ridiculous.

[@BooDotBoo]

People are still talking about buying packs even knowing the game is the way it is, knowing the company is the way it is. They will definitely buy Sims 5 and, if it's bad, do the same thing they do here. Complain, but still buy every single pack.

[@leo6278]

EA doesn't care if a Sims pack is broken, as long as it is released on time and sells. :)

[@venus-demilo]

It’s cute that some of y’all still be expecting them to care after all these years.. they clearly don’t…. 💁🏻‍♀️$$$

[@Elwaves2925]

It's not expectation, it's hope that they have. Although the end result is still the same.

[@Cloud-10]

I saw a reddit post from a old tester that said they had four categories of bugs A being game breaking, B being frustrating like no toilets, C you could live with it,D being they won’t notic they only fixed A bugs

[@hotcrunchycheeto]

This is exactly why we don't see them go live with all the packs in the game at once. Even if if they just show off the pack with the base game first and do integration later. They know that the game is on thin ice and not tested with everything in it. Which is really deceiving to me. Especially because all we really have to go off before official pack release is that live stream and the early access posts. I personally always wait to release day to see how it plays for people who have all the packs and also mods and so far I have yet to see anyone successfully play this pack with the patch. Yesterday I was watching someone's two hour live stream and in the middle of it the game just crashed and she gave up and said she was going to go take a nap. Just over it lol.

[@AlM22]

But if they had tons on Werewolves, why would it be a budgeting issue since that was released only a month prior? weird that they used more for a game pack than an expansion pack..

[@casimit2469]

It fascinates me how they do not realize that nobody wants a broken game.

[@lirpa2300]

Obviously, people DID want a broken game because people have been buying it BROKEN, buggy, full of glitches, shallow gameplay for the last EIGHT YEARS...SMH!!!

[@ashleyfortag7695]

I won't be giving EA or Maxis anymore of my money. If I wanted a job to play test game systems I could get paid for this. I refuse to pay to do a job for someone else.

[@overwhelmed_cactus6820]

I have never installed a single piece of CC in my game ever. Have had the same issues as everyone else, and the fact that the sims team almost try to put the blame on the players feel a Lil dirty..

[@Nikki-hype.]

The Sims four is now just getting on my last nerve it’s getting ridiculous for how much money we’re putting in the game this game shouldn’t be having problems like this

[@Cxurtney]

I don’t want to buy anything from them anymore as this is unacceptable

[@kathrynmarie6580]

So far I haven’t had any issues with aging. (I did make a new save with normal settings) but I’ve noticed that when I want my sims to do something they either take a really REALLY long time to start doing the task or they just exit out of it….when my sims goes to high school, it’s hard to doing anything or talk to other sims because it takes so long for them to do anything!

[@lumindoesvideos]

The only bug I've encountered so far is the aging bug, but someone put a room in the gallery with a bunch of potions of youth so I have a work around for that. (My fridge in the household has 18 potions of youth in it so I shouldbe ok for now)

[@papayapapaya4024]

I honestly think they created kits as a way to "get rid of inventory." Just like a store gathers and sells all of its leftover products as fast as possible so they can put out their new and improved items. They put out kits back to back to back and definitely at the start it was just stuff that should have been in other packs. Now it's clothes and build/buy stuff that they probably designed a while ago and are trying to sell out so they can be cleared of Sims 4 stuff so it doesn't go to waste. Then they'll announce Sims 5 in a few years.

[@asmalltalk]

They don’t even test the base game updates properly, that’s why it ends up broken before the pack release 😒 each new feature has to be tested if it’s compatible with everything else. I deal with bugs at my job daily and yes, things do break sometimes as the system is complicated but what EA is doing is unacceptable for a huge and rich corporate. They are not some indie studio with two people creating the game!

[@Elwaves2925]

I don't think they test any of the patches. If they're only putting 6 outsourced people on big expansion packs, they aren't going to bother with patches. It's likely just the people who coded the fixes and they would only test it on their particular dev build of the game...which may not have all the packs installed.

[@Knazy]

They don't care anymore. They do false advertising for all the new packs and release it broken but still get all the cash if they promise to fix it eventually.

[@Satan_Herself666]

Thank you for being a true mvp for info, keep up the good work!

[@lutilda]

It's SO disappointing how QA is underestimated and unappreciated. 😫.I work in tech and our company has so few QA testers (and they're all offshore). They're seen as either "not being needed" if everything was fine, or "getting in the way" if they find issues because then the team has to fix the issues and it takes more time.. 😫

[@nikkigin3093]

The cafeteria lady at my sim's school won't even go in the cafeteria. I be making them lunch before they go to school and putting it in the brown bag.🤦🏾‍♀️

[@Iluvpie6]

Yo thats a clever workaround. Never would have thought of that.

[@nikkigin3093]

@@Iluvpie6 thanks and it's perfect since it helps my sims with their cooking skill anyway

[@AilaK_]

If they don't fix ALL the glitches in the base game and pack like they did with Wedding Stories I will never play this game again. I've officially had it!

[@OnlyHopeRemainsTTV]

Please don't paint this like QA isn't doing their job. They don't fix bugs. They bring them to the attention of the development team to fix. They're not to blame.

[@Iluvpie6]

And also when there aren’t enough testers, they won’t be able to find all the bugs.

[@anikawright5879]

He points that out in the video

[@Laurajlithgow25]

We’re not blaming them. We’re acknowledging that 6 people is not enough for QA on an EP & that EA needs to do better. None of this is on the actual workers. Clearly the work system EA has set up for the Sims is not benefiting anyone but EA

[@jasonhammitt8660]

It was recently reported that Sims5 is nearly through its preproduction stage. Teams are being expanded and built as the game moves into full production. I would not be at all surprised if this is where most of Sim's resources are going.

[@strangeworldsunlimited712]

EA apparently just put out a FIFA soccer/football game, and those players are finding bugs galore in THAT game too. So, it's system wide throughout the company across all of their titles.

[@paytinii4833]

I’ve spent the past two days making the perfect family, house, highschool, and auditorium. Last night I was finally ready to start playing…. my sims all immediately started aging up and it was so frustrating i haven’t even gotten to play.

[@dieantler]

The only things that make this game bearable are the modders and communities.. if its not for the mods I would’ve ditched this game.. honestly sometime I wish I didn’t care about this game.. such a sad thing too.. I’ve been a Sims fan since the sims 1 came out….

[@gordonramslay9955]

i just wanna play the sims but i gotta wait a week because if i even enter into live mode my sims will age up and die because of the bugs.

[@therenaway1115]

Switched to the sims 3 after this mess. Never been happier with my siming experience. Highly recommend

[@Teknikah]

They've made it harder to just say "don't pre-order" now since the last 2 EPs have had bonus early order content... That's how they get ya. I've always liked to have all the packs so I have all the stuff (I'm not a great builder but I have fun). I haven't been purchasing the CAS kits though.

[@intergalacticalcommiteeofp9807]

At this point I'm questioning if they have a QA at all. Just slapped some random names to have something, because what company, especially one as big as EA, doesn't have QA? Or they have QA, they turned on the game, it loaded? Great, off to the customer! On more serious note, while yes, the size of QA team is beyond questionable, I wonder... does EA listen even to the ones they have? How much time they have to test these things out? Because there's always bugs that slip through, but they usually so hidden and specific, it's hard to see how QA would have caught it. Sims isn't like that, it's unplayable, my "it loaded so it's ready" theory still stands. Edit: I would like to see the names on the QA team in other latest updates of EA games. I have a sneaking suspicion we'll find the same ones, if those people are actually real

[@CosyJaney]

We are basically EA’s testers and are paying THEM to test their fkn game!

[@kewpified]

the problem too is that QA jobs are shipped oversees. They don't want to pay fair wages to people at 'home' because they want to maximize their profits. Most of the names sound like their from India

[@tamaradavis2276]

I play a long life save (backed-up and copied to desktop), which I haven't touched since the update . However, I started a new save in normal lifespan, all sims set to age, to test a couple game play theories. I haven't bought the new pack, just the update, and while my active household is aging, the NPCs are experiencing a daily reset. My teenage sim's boyfriend had 10 days until age up at the time my teenage sim aged up. Took a wee vacation, checked in with the boyfriend a couple days later (planning age him up) and now he had 11 days until age up. So even normal saves are not working right. Aging is screwed up.

[@CrescentiaLuvsU]

Do they have a list of how many people work to fix the bugs? That’d be interesting to see as well.

[@briellejade._]

that makes sense. I haven’t had any issues yet with the patch or pack so it’s possible that the 6 testers had no issues, because not everyone has an issue. This new pack is honestly my favorite pack (and i have almost all of them.) I’m very thankful to have a functioning game right now

[@hezekiahduckworthy8867]

For me the update was more buggy than the High School expansion pack itself. My only complaint as far as High School is that it’s not cross pack with Get Together and Get Famous.

[@mayaha200]

People need to stop pay/buy EA stuff, just stop!

[@TatolMochi]

I’m furious!! I went to save a household on the gallery and it deleted my whole library, builds and households I’ve save for years of playing!!! Gone. I can’t believe this I want to cry. This is ridiculous. And I just spent $40 on the new game expansion pack.

[@KaleyWells]

Ope never been this early🤪 I’m holding off on buying the pack or even playing the game until the patch update. This is ridiculous

[@adalynpowell4778]

It’s stood out to me that I haven’t seen any of the EA game changers mention the bugs. I may have missed them but I haven’t seen anyone mention the bugs. It seems weird considering they get money for sales

[@LovelyYungi]

How many QA's where on Wedding Stories I wonder 🤔 also aside from QA I would like to see the list of game developers/editors too. I might be wrong but I believe there is a group of editors who have to work with the developers to decide what issues should be tended to and fixed before the product is released. It just goes to show that many people dropped ball here not just one department. The editors and EA either decided it was good enough and they'll fix it later or they ran out of resources/time to thoroughly check the product for problems.