A fresh life sim was getting ready to finally give The Sims some real competition starting on June 4, but early access for Life By You has now been delayed indefinitely.
The update was shared in a blog by Paradox Interactive on May 20. The team believes “additional development time is needed” before Life By You goes up for early access.
This update is pretty surprising considering Paradox Interactive doubled down on the early access start date only a couple of weeks ago on April 30. The devs originally announced the June 4 launch date on Feb. 2 and seemed on track to meet that date with the most recent update they gave on their progress before today’s announcement.
It’s the third time the life sim has been hit with a delay since it was originally scheduled to launch in an early access state back on Sept. 13, 2023. Since then, the release date has been moved to March 5, delayed again to June 4, and is now postponed indefinitely.
Although the devs said in the blog that they “would have preferred to commit to a new release window” following the latest delay, they have instead decided to “hold off” on doing so to ensure they don’t commit to another date they can’t meet.
Even though they don’t want to promise a date just yet, the devs do promise in the blog that additional information regarding the release status of Life By You will be shared as soon as possible. Considering all of the delays so far and the lack of an official early access start date or window, there’s a good chance The Sims competitor likely won’t be ready for early access for at least a couple more months.
There’s also no current timeline or estimation as to when the game will be ready for an official launch. The devs previously said they expect Life By You to stay in early access for at least 12 months after it launches, though, so the official launch date of the full game is likely well over a year away.