Let’s find out the curiosities about the highly anticipated new real-life simulator and what distinguishes it from The Sims.
As anticipated, Paralives is a life simulation game. Announced for the first time in 2019 winks at the players of the famous colossus: The Sims.
The game is developed by Paralives Studio, a fresh new independent Indie company led by veteran Alex Massé. It will be available for PC and Mac and will be present on the Steam platform.
The main objective is to offer an innovative and fresh title. All the gameplay, leave us pleasantly surprised and we can’t wait to be able to play the game in its entirety. More surprising is that the team working on this new pretender in the simulation sector counts just eleven members.
Everything we know about Paralives
On the official website of Paralives, it is presented to us as a “doll house life simulation” game. This title decides to follow the formula of Maxis, trying to completely detach itself from its aesthetics and his style. Paralives is simple and realistic, with a cartoony look but not too much and pastel colors.
Nothing wacky in sight (not yet), no cow plants, no mermaids or vampires, no secret spots dotted around the neighborhoods to woo-hoo on the sly.
In Paralives we will be able to freely build our house, our characters and manage their home life and in the open world environment. If in The Sims our avatars most commonly take the name of “Sim”, in Paralives they will be called “Parafolk“.
The game features new build mode, with simple to use yet powerful tools for experienced “builders”. Simulation Mode allows players to explore a city filled with events, people to meet, and ways to evolve their Parafolk and live a happy life!
Let’s not waste any more time and let’s discover together the various modes and innovations that Paralives brings.
The ParaMaker mode
ParaMaker is the equivalent of “Create a Sim” mode in The Sims. It is very rich in options to make your character as customizable as possible.
We can actually act on an infinite number of details: from the body, to the hair, to the eyes (we can also make them heterochromic), to particular signs such as moles or freckles to tattoos.
The level of detail makes this mode particularly intriguing for all those who like to create the perfect avatar or themselves in the game. The numerous selectors, allow us to modify the physique in a clear and very detailed way. Among everything, you can even choose whether or not to curve the back of the Parafolk. Thus giving it a more or less “hunched” appearance.
What about tattoos, with The Sims we are used to having a large number of applicable tattoos. What differentiates the two games is the possibility to move freely the tattoos. The Sims allow to position tattoos in precise points of the body, without a great possibility of move them. Paralives, allow us, to freely choose how high/low and left/right to place it and increase/decrease its size as we please.
We can even choose the height of our Parafolk!
All these details in creating our avatar make us want to discover more!
Build Mode in Paralives
The name leaves no interpretation, we are talking about the build mode. For those who like to build buildings and houses (like me), this mode will blow your mind!
Want to recreate your real life home? Use the in-game measuring tape to recreate the exact dimensions! Paralives introduces the measurement tool. In this mode can be configured in the settings menu to measure in different units, such as feet and meters.
The tool will also present “comparison units“. Which ones are they? Simple, bananas and Texas… yes who has never dreamed of using them as a unit of measurement?
If this isn’t enough, hold on tight, we’re used to have a grid to give a more or less regular shape to our houses/buildings. Well, Paralives will not be bound by anything. Players can build walls of any length and at any angle.
Does your perfect home contain curved walls? Paralives has the tools to do just that.
A third innovation in the construction world? Doors and windows, those who usually play this genre know how long it takes to carefully choose the interior of the house, the floors and the doors and windows based on the style you want to give.
Paralives introduces an extraordinary novelty. The gameplay shows the construction of a chalet, a simple “base” window/door can be resized thanks to the anchors. We’ve noticed that for now there are few elements for each type of object (doors, windows, etc …). This does not mean that new ones will not be added to the basic ones when the game is released.
The Buy mode in Paralives
What if we told you that there are some news in the “Buy” mode too?
Well, if the doors and windows are resizable so are the paintings! It will be possible to change the size of the frame and of the painting itself and of course you can choose the theme. Same method of anchors, once you click on the “base” picture you can make all the changes you want.
No need to say our eyes were already gleaming with the first features seen in the “Build Mode“. Far more with the paintings, we can only be amazed as regards the world of furnitures.
If we want a very long table with more than four chairs, just click onthe anchors, to resize the object. But if we want a nice King Size bed or a square and a half bed? Guess what…the answer is always the same: Anchors. Make them appear in the objects to be resized and they will become as you have always wanted them.
Apparently we won’t need a large number of mods as we usually use in the world of The Sims. To be clear, this does not mean that Paralives does not contemplate the “personalized material“.
Parafolks‘ father, assures the players about the presence of Modding Tools, to create mods and customized material within Paralives. The game will then rely on the “Steam Workshop” for sharing content created by users.
The “Live Mode” of Paralives
Creating the best life for Parafolk couldn’t be possible without enjoying what the city has to offer. Of course, also beyond the walls of their homes.
That’s why Paralives allows you to explore a welcoming open world neighborhood. Discover shops, parks, workplaces and other interesting places to discover and meet people.
The Team takes into consideration, to give players the possibility to create community lots. These could be managed by their own Parafolks; such as a restaurant or a bar or why not… a supermarket. It could be these kinds of commercial lots or others that have not been disclosed for now.
Other elements that the developers have certainly kept in mind, suggested by the community, are certainly the seasons. Parafolks could play snowballs or build a snowman, or tan by the pool and sip cocktails to beat the heat.
The presence of the seasons introduces another concept, the holidays. A post on the official Paralives forum shows us a Parafolk, dressed up, next to a Christmas tree.
This and much more of the “Live Mode” will be revealed to us nearer the release date of the game.
Parafolks’ language: The Parli and how it was born
Building relationships and interacting with other characters will be an important aspect of Live Mode.
Parli (pronounced par-lee) is the spoken language they created for our Parafolks. So we will hear it when our characters talk together and express themselves.
Inventing a completely new language is arduous. To start, the team decided that the language should have these characteristics:
- Incomprehensible gibberish so to give the player freedom of storytelling
- Different from the made-up languages of other franchises
- Minimalistic without long and exaggerated sentences (“less is more”)
- Distinct from English gibberish, while still sounding familiar enough
- Realistic enough as if it could exist in real life
- Not too goofy but also not too serious with a good balance that would give a cozy effect!
“At first we came up with simple ideas such as altering existing words. Progressing, we came up with more and more complex ideas. We had to study how actual linguists create made-up languages. We came up with over 20 different approaches and recorded more than 2000 instances of words and expressions. Also we got the whole team to give their own opinion on our ideas through a survey. We got a lot of good feedback which helped us decide which approach was our favorite.”-says Andrei
“One of the things that I enjoy doing to make my partner laugh is to sing any existing song in a made-up gibberish that I improvise. It always works. So I thought that it’d be nice to incorporate it as one of our approaches. I brainstormed a bunch of made-up words and created a phonetic alphabet with the recurrent material of those words.“-Andrei concludes
Paralives latest developments
Paralives Studio is working tirelessly to implement all the sectors required by a game of this magnitude.
Let’s see together the latest developments of the month:
Current Status – May 2023
- Developing the live mode core systems like interactions, needs, relationships and more
- Creating various art assets for the build mode and Paramaker
- Creating more character animations
- Working on the musical direction and soundtrack of the game
- Brainstorming and designing different aspects of the game
Everything is in the hands of the developers. They’re taking the time to work at their best, making the hype of the fans skyrocket.
We look forward to updating you again on the world of Paralives!
Stay with us to find out more!
