The Sims 5 be damned, we’re getting the next best thing this year

Move over The Sims, because there’s a brand-new life sim on the block - and they’re moving in on your territory.

Vivaland is an upcoming life sim that’s being developed by Hive5 Interactive and produced by HypeTrain Digital.

Just one look at the trailer on the Steam page for Vivaland should paint its influences pretty clearly, because this is as close as you could get to a new The Sims game without it actually being published by EA.

However, there is one thing that Vivaland has that no other The Sims game does - online co-op.

As stated on the Steam page, Vivaland will allow you to “invite your friends Vivas to be neighbours in your town or housemates on your lot and you can even start a family together”.

Don’t worry if you don’t have any pals you want to play with though, as they also state that the game has a complete single-player experience outside of the online co-op.

As for now, there isn’t actually a solid release date for Vivaland. It was scheduled to drop in 2024, but it’s since been delayed along the way and is now planned to release sometime in 2025.

Tales of the Shire should appeal to life sim fans.

There was a closed demo for the game titled Vivaland: Dream House back in 2024, but unfortunately, you can’t actually access it anymore.

The reviews for the Vivaland: Dream House demo aren’t particularly great, although it seems like the majority of the negative reviews come from people who were unable to launch the game.

Those who did manage to get it working seemed to leave pretty positive comments, so hopefully the technical issues will have been dealt with once it is released fully (whenever that is).

It also seems to be a PC-exclusive title at the moment, although the FAQ page on the Vivaland site does state that “the game engine supports consoles as well, so there is a possibility to expand on other platforms”.

We’ll make sure to keep you updated whenever a release date is announced.