The Last Day of The Sims Online

On 7:35AM US Eastern Time on August 1st 2008, The Sims Online was closed by EA. This video documents the interface and some minor gameplay elements, for nostalgia/archiving purpose.

The story:
The Sims Online was released in 2002, an online version of The Sims. The cost to play was $10 per month, although there was a 30-day free trial. You might remember seeing it in various electronic outlets.

In May 2007, after noticing the subscriber population had diminished drastically, what was left of the programming team started to rewrite the game engine to have better features and less bugs. The team was headed by Luc Barthelet, who re-joined the team, after having left it since the game's launch.

On February 2008, this code became rebranded as EA-Land, which hosted a server which anybody could connect to for free, without a monthly subscription, called Test Center 3 (the other server, The Sims Online, still required a paid subscription). They continued to push out some updates to the game, such as the ability to display custom image files on an easel for your visitors.

And on late April, they announced that they gave up, as they failed to generate a crowd which they could make enough money off of to satisfy them for their efforts. They announced that the game would be shut down on August 1st, the same year.

RIP TSO as we knew it
The last version:
2.1667.5.0

Luc and his team left EA to form Tirnua Inc, an online game company which he subsequently left again. http://www.tirnua.com/

The next game in the online The Sims series is The Sims Social for Facebook. http://apps.facebook.com/thesimssocial

Engine reimplementation projects:
http://niotso.org/
http://tsorestoration.tumblr.com/

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• the sims online
• ea-land
• tso
• last day
• sims online
• tribute
• august 1st
• end
• shut down

[jmflynny077]

they need to put sims 3 online

[Expl0rati0n]

So much virtual throat clearing!

[maximum411]

@jmflynny077

They need to put The Sims 4 online- I heard they're thinking about it.

There's actually a petition to get this to happen. Google the sims 4 online petition.

[Bigsnake0579]

just about brought a tear to my and my wifes eyes seeing the old town and game again ty love the memers we all shaired there

[Bigsnake0579]

I wish That EA would Bring Sims online back :( :( :(

[BrickThunder101]

This was great to see. EA turned it off because some players were scamming objects in game, and money out.

[Zigkiss]

I miss this so much. I didn't play it near the end but I wish it was still around I would play it now :(

[ACluelessKid]

This game looks way better than The Sims Social, and less glitchy too. 'Tis a shame all the cool noughties social sites are closing down.

[Awesomewolfpic]

@13ettyful can sell it but servers will not work due to it is closed people probably just selling it to get money and scam people who are selling it

[Awesomewolfpic]

@xTheCommodore i know and it had the sims 1 graphics too X3 what lot people sorta liked X3

[Awesomewolfpic]

@jmflynny077 i think they would but lot people seem to not like that stuff plus ea would make you pay to play online since now a days they just out for the money

[mexicansilentpanther]

I WAS BENTHEBEAR! i miss these days :\