I feel like it's been ages since my latest game review, but... I missed saying this - Hello, hello! What are you playing lately? 🎮
Even if in 2024 I still posted some of my walkthroughs playing games, sooner or later, I decided to stop making them because of the lack of free time. I was not playing daily, but when I was doing it, I was making sure to have enough content for both my YouTube channel and my gaming posts on here that took place every Wednesday.
However, it's been even more than 2 years since my latest game review which I really enjoyed making in 2022, but they were part of a personal challenge were I was posting daily, each day coming with its own theme (gaming, travel, food recipes, movies, photography, etc) until I ended up with a burnout.
It wasn't my first burnout, nor the last, but again, the lack of free time made me slowly give up on posts until I reduced everything to what my name suggests and focused on the travel content.
Did I make the right choice? Possibly not.
Do I regret it? Definitely.
Anyway, as nobody enjoys a long introduction, I think it's time to begin my game review on inZOI, a game that was released on 28th March but which I've been waiting for almost a year since it was first announced.
**inZOI is a life simulation game developed by inZOI Studio and published by Krafton which features many of the mechanics that are present in other life simulators like character creation, building tools, needs, social interactions, careers, education, relationships, families, skills, aging, and death but an easier definition would be that it is an improved version of The Sims that perhaps most of you heard about and played at least once.
Both I and my cousin were addicted to playing The Sims as kids, until they turned the game into an ongoing investment to be made from the players with all the DLCs that were released at more or less affordable prices, the total price reaching a bit over 1,400 EUR just for the DLCs.
Personally, I am a game collector and my Steam account is worth a little fortune without owning the DLCs of The Sims, so investing in games is not really a problem here, but what I don't enjoy is the constant greedyness from the developers of gaining more and more money, even if they knew they had no real competitor for a long time. So people had to buy their game anyway, and hence, I believe this action of constantly releasing DLCs was not needed.
So, after giving up on playing The Sims, I started focusing more on Simulator games in all their forms (construction, driving, fishing, cooking, selling at a market, etc) but I never stopped dreaming on the day when I'll be able to play something similar, but obviously with better graphics since the last The Sims game was released on September 2, 2014.
Happily, it's been only a bit over a week since this game was released, and I started playing it, so I can now share my personal review of this experience.
Along with the constant situation of having the game compared with The Sims because of obvious reasons, I am happy to say that the improved quality of the graphics is not the single major thing but also some new features that make the experience even more authentic.
You can control your zoi not only just by point and click but also by direct control and see where it goes, enter random buildings, start spontaneous conversations with the NPCs met on the street or even die because of not paying enough attention to your zoi's needs. For example, if you are not getting enough rest or forget to feed your zoi, it will die.
Anyway, the thing I am most excited about is the AI tracker, which allows you to reproduce yourself perfectly in the game by simply using a webcam, which will track your traits, behaviour, but also what you are dressed with. Hence, even if the options of clothing items and possibly hair are way fewer than what you normally find in The Sims, the new AI feature surely represents a smart move that will take everything to the next level, almost effortlessly.
I did not take advantage of this feature at the time I created my character (which I am not very proud of), but I did try some AI features of generating hairstyles and accessories, which I can say are not working the best at the time I'm writing this article.
However, after creating both myself and my boyfriend, getting a house in the game and playing for a bit, I realized that I am a lot more curious to play around with creating characters, which is what I'm lately doing.
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Some of the characters I have created so far are Michael Jackson, Johnny Depp, Ozzy Osbourne, The Weeknd and Marilyn Manson, but as I am still discovering new things with each character creation, I'm planning to have this activity ongoing for at least a while.
However, the lack of hair options is the biggest struggle as it determines pretty much what can be created and what not. So while the advanced details for the face are almost flawless, I can't say the same about the hair, which is obviously playing one of the main roles when recognizing a character imitation.
Here, you can check a playlist I created on YouTube where I will post the fast forward process of creating each celebrity I will try to imite, so if you are curious to see more than pictures, don't forget to check it out!
An important mention that I almost forgot about is that the game is in Early Access, which means this is not the final version of the game and its current price (39,99€) is not going to be the same forever.
Basically, the developers decided to put this game on a discounted price rather than what the original one is going to be for those who dare to buy it in its current state, try it, and report possible glitches or things that should be fixed along the time.
They also mentioned that the game is going to stay in Early Access for at least a year and that it will suffer constant adjustments, trying to take note of all people's feedback, but I doubt it will really happen like this.
Conclusions 🤔
Anyway, even if the game already comes with a lot of interesting features, I believe that the price of 39,99€ is not really worth it right now. I can see this price and even a bigger one when the game is fully released, but I didn't expect it to cost more than 25-30€ for what it currently offers.
However, being a fairly small difference from what I expected this to cost and owning a gaming channel where I want to bring as many new games as possible, I made this compromise, and I think that if you are a gamer creator, you could make it too. But as I said, the game is still far from its real potential, and I think we need to wait at least 2 years before it reaches that level the developers promised.
Did you play it? 😁
I know we have a fairly big community of gamers on here, so if you have already given this game a shot, let me know what you think about it so far!
NOTE:
- all the pictures attached are in-game screenshots taken by me (unless if other stated). 📸
- this article is trying to stay away from revealing spoilers. ⚠️
- this is a personal review and should not be taken as a real advice of either playing the game or not because the opinion might be subjective. 🗯
- this article was written exclusively for the Hive community and its members. ❤️
Here is a list of some other games I wrote reviews about and you might like:
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20.Forza Horizon 5 🚓 - 5/5
21.Watch Dogs: Legion 💻 - 4/5
22.Far Cry 6 💣 - 5/5
23.inZOI 👧 - 4/5
| Game | inZOI |
|---|---|
| Release Date | 27 Mar, 2025 |
| Played On | Steam |
| Price | 39,99€ |
| Genre | Early Access, Life Sim, Character Customization |
| Completed | Main |
| My Rating | ★★★★☆ |
| Hours Played | 8.5 hrs |
Gabriela Travels is the FOUNDER of "Festival Mania" who started this community from the passion of attending various festivals and with the purpose of encouraging more people to explore festivals all around the world and share their experiences.
At the same time, Gabriela is an independent Graphic Design Freelancer since 2019 completing over 600+ orders in this time and collaborating with various businesses and people from all over the globe.
Additionally, Gabriela has her own corner on the internet since 2017 where she writes various articles for her blog, the most popular being the travel ones (300+ articles written on this field), but also approaching other topics as well, like game reviews, lets plays, movie and series reviews, photography posts, cooking recipes and more, boosting the total number of articles written to 750+ blog posts.
Gabriela is also a gamer since she was 11 years old and gaming remains one of her biggest passions along with traveling, owning a YouTube channel for each of the two.