InZOI Early Access Surprises with Sims-Like Depth and Freedom

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I spent my childhood playing the initial versions of The Sims and The Sims 2, creating lots of cherished memories through leveling up my characters, fostering connections among them, forming families, and designing enormous homes. My longing for The Sims led me to notice InZOI when it was first announced, yet I’ve always harbored doubts about the game. To be honest, it seemed like one of those games that overpromises. However, InZOI has left me utterly amazed, even in its early access stage. This life simulation game is a joy to play and truly gives The Sims a run for its money.

Similar to how you start by building a family in The Sims, InZOI begins with crafting your own family of characters known as “Zois”. The process of creating these Zois is remarkably flexible and innovative. You can choose from numerous presets or fine-tune the details using adjustable sliders. But what sets it apart is the freedom to pick any part of a Zoi and move it around with your mouse, giving you an unprecedented level of customization. The only limitation is that the positioning of scars on a Zoi’s face cannot be altered. Despite this, even in its early access stage, InZOI boasts impressive character creation tools.

After players feel content with their chosen Zois, the following action involves deciding on one of the three open-world cities to establish a residence in. The possibilities are Dowon, Kucingku, and Bliss Bay, each embodying the spirit of South Korea, Indonesia, and Los Angeles respectively. In my initial set of Zois, I selected Dowon and settled them into an apartment.

InZOI Constantly Impresses

In essence, the fundamental playstyle of InZOI is remarkably similar to The Sims, yet it offers enhanced realism in graphics and an expanded range of possibilities when interacting with any item within the game world. Similar to Sims, Zois have essential needs that must be catered to for them to live contentedly and healthily. Players can either allow their Zois autonomy or manage every facet of their lives closely. This management can be done using the conventional bird’s-eye view as in The Sims, or players can opt for a more engaging over-the-shoulder perspective. Additionally, players have the choice to navigate freely with a movable camera or even directly control their Zoi, thereby enhancing immersion within the game.

I was eager to discover any restrictions on my Zoi device, but soon realized there weren’t many. Leaving the apartment building, I strolled around the city and encountered a few other Zois, which can be operated by players like myself. Upon seeing a public basketball court, I assumed it was just a decorative feature of the city. To my surprise, I learned that I could make my Zoi play basketball! However, the public display did seem to cause him some embarrassment.

While managing one Zoi, the other operated independently and oddly selected the “Overspend” option repeatedly on its computer, racking up $5,000 in expenses each time. To recoup my losses, I utilized the smartphone provided to both Zois and found them jobs starting the next day. Although they vanish when leaving for work, I’m periodically prompted to decide on their daily activities at work.

Users can enhance Zoi’s job efficiency, aspirations, and overall attributes by interacting with different items and accomplishing missions, although I found the task completion aspect to be faulty in my experience as well as across various Zoi clans. Unfortunately, the tasks weren’t being recorded or completed as intended, but hopefully this issue can be resolved promptly.

In my playthrough of InZOI, I encountered some peculiarities that are typical for this genre, particularly since it’s still in early access. For instance, there was an unusual scenario where two Zois were dancing together, yet one Zoi kept on dancing incessantly. Tragically, they seemed to be stuck dancing for eternity, with the only solution being to quit and restart the game. In another case, if a room contained a chair, the Zois would only converse if one of them was seated.

Even with occasional hiccups like random loading screens, I find InZOI impressively smooth and functional for an early access title. It’s not perfect – I’ve dealt with far more game-breaking problems in my time with The Sims. However, it’s important to note that my playtime with InZOI is relatively light compared to the countless hours I’ve invested in The Sims games. As more players delve into the early access version of InZOI, there might be uncovered issues that I haven’t encountered yet.

InZOI Lets You Play How You Want

Following some time with my Zoi duo, I manufactured a fresh Zoi and placed it on an unoccupied Bliss Bay plot to evaluate the game’s construction features. Those accustomed to building homes in The Sims should quickly grasp how InZOI‘s building functions, as players can construct walls, roofs, doors, and essentially design their house according to their preferences. There are also pre-fabricated houses that players can place on empty lots if they wish, and as an added perk, these houses even include furniture, allowing players to concentrate on their Zoi immediately.

In the virtual world of InZOI, construction functions seamlessly, making it a delight for enthusiasts of life simulation games who enjoy tinkering. However, InZOI’s building tools offer more than just residential structures. Players are granted the freedom to customize the city where the Zois reside, from eliminating existing elements to decorating streets uniquely, introducing diverse wildlife, modifying billboards, and even manipulating weather conditions at will. Despite the vast control it offers, InZOI remains user-friendly, with an intuitive interface. Should players ever encounter confusion, helpful tips, accompanied by instructional videos, are readily available to clarify all aspects of gameplay.

I ran the pre-release version of InZOI on a Windows computer equipped with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card, a 3.70 GHz AMD Ryzen 9 5900X 12-core processor, and 32 GB of RAM.

In the game InZOI, users have an almost limitless array of possibilities when it comes to designing and personalizing their game environment. Not only can players create their own items using the furniture customization tool and the 3D Printer, which lets them upload an image file that AI converts into a 3D object for use within the game, but they can also connect their iPhone for additional perks like face-scanning technology that makes Zois mimic real-life facial expressions. There’s even motion capture available for users to have more control over how their Zois move within the game. However, it should be noted that these features are currently only compatible with iPhones.

InZOI primarily emphasizes player autonomy, allowing individuals to manage every aspect of their character’s life in the game world. Players can opt for a conventional experience by finding employment, earning income, and living their character’s life, or they may choose to activate the built-in money cheat for instant wealth. This cheat is a convenient button that players can click repeatedly to amass immense wealth, effectively bypassing the need for employment if they prefer to explore other game aspects. I, for instance, utilized it to purchase a lavish, fully-furnished house in Bliss Bay for my second character.

Using the money hack from InZOI, I managed to buy a high-end car, dreaming of having direct control over it as I do with Zoi. However, I found that manual driving controls were disabled by default, so I had to go the extra mile to enable them. Regrettably, the manual driving feature in InZOI isn’t particularly impressive; cars seem to crash into tiny objects as if they were hitting a brick wall, and the game environment doesn’t react much to reckless driving. I even tried running over a pedestrian to see if it would be like Grand Theft Auto, but instead, my car screeched to a halt, sparks flying from the hood, leaving Zoi completely unscathed. While the precise control over the vehicle is cool, with options to choose which window to roll down or which turning signal to use, the impact of collisions was disappointing.

In due course, I found myself at an engaging amusement park on the pier where guests could freely enjoy various rides, including rollercoasters. To test the AI, Zoi, I cranked up its speed and allowed it to navigate independently to see if it repeated past errors. This particular Zoi was quite efficient during work hours, but had a habit of forgetting to use the bathroom before bedtime. A quicker speed setting would be beneficial, as even 10 times faster felt sluggish when I needed to accelerate events to certain points in time. The time-altering capabilities are reminiscent of the popular game, The Sims.

The initial launch of InZOI is currently exclusive to PC platforms, however, it will be made available on consoles at a later date as well.

In its preliminary release, InZOI stands as a formidable contender against The Sims. Showing remarkable potential, it could eventually surpass Electronic Arts’ established life simulation series, boasting intricately detailed environments and numerous thoughtful features that create an impressive “wow” effect, something that The Sims has been lacking for some time. While there is still plenty of room for enhancement, InZOI largely meets expectations and, based on its development roadmap, the game is poised to continue improving significantly.

Starting March 20, I get to dive into the thrilling world of InZOI through its early access launch on PC! Game Rant was lucky enough to receive a Steam code for this review.

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2025-03-20 03:05