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Keeping track of the planned features for upcoming life sim Inzoi is nearly a full-time job—for me and probably for several project managers at Krafton—because its game director just won’t stop promising more player-requested additions. Every week I nervously look at the calendar as Hyungjun “Kjun” Kim makes new lists of features coming in time for the early access launch date in March. And he just did it again last week with only two months to go.
For a few months, Inzoi’s game director has been running a routine “Kjun’s Concerns” thread on the official Discord server, sharing thoughts, announcements, and feature plans with fans. The server also maintains a “wishlist” channel for players to lodge requests like more careers for Zois, platform and language support, and a whole lot more.
A few weeks ago Kjun’s Concerns covered the Smart Zoi AI tech that Krafton is partnering with Nvidia to bring to the game. The week after that there was a breakdown on the cooking system, four days after which Kjun responded to player feedback with a list of new requests that Inzoi would implement for early access (and some for after). Last week was a broader look at the ongoing player wishlist with, again, more commitment to early access features.
Kjun knows that the launch date is March 28, right? Here’s some of what Inzoi has committed to getting into the game in time for its early access launch just from the past month:
- Effects like “food coma” given based on foods your Zoi eats
- Ordering food delivery
- Higher quality cooking animations
- New animations for fights between Zois
- Determining the “winner” of a fight based on Zoi stats
- A more comprehensive tutorial for new players
That’s not even counting the other features like pets, gas stations, culinary careers, and other features that Kjun’s snagged from player comments and added to the post-launch to-do list.
I’m as antsy as any Sims player to finally see some legitimate competition for the long-reigning series arrive this year. There are plenty of ways to contrast what Inzoi is offering with The Sims 4, and the level of communication that Kim and the Inzoi Studio have had with fans is close to the top of the list.
It has meant that keeping up with the actual list of Inzoi gameplay features planned for launch has been a bit challenging—how many of those planned life stages for Zois are actually going to be in the game on March 28?
Compared with EA’s chronically constipated communication that leads to a fanbase eager to latch onto leaks and rumors every couple months, it’s nice to have overcommunication for once. Krafton may find out the hard way at launch that making lots of promises can occasionally backfire, but the community hunger for Sims alternatives means it’s got a pretty hefty stash of goodwill to burn through.
Inzoi’s team has been out of office for a South Korean national holiday, so at least the studio (and me) get this week off from tracking the moving bullseye that is the early access feature list. Beware though, Kjun’s Concerns may be back in force next week with even more commitments.
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Kurt Indovina
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