The creator of 'The Sims' reveals first game in a decade and it sounds amazing and terrifying

Well, good news: Will Wright, the brains behind all that senseless murder, has finally announced his follow-up game – and it sounds exciting and horrifying in equal measure. 

Proxi is described by the Daily Dot as “a mobile simulation game with a twist”, and it certainly sounds interesting. 

The game creates an “artificial intelligence version of you” – a ‘proxi’ in other words.

“This is a game of self-discovery,” Wright says in a trailer for the game. “It’s a game where we actually uncover the hidden you, the subconscious, your inner id, and bring it to life so that you can interact with it, play with it, learn from it, and it can learn about you”. 

Much like Minecraft, players start with an entirely blank universe, where they then develop memories. 

Those memories then become the “building blocks” for activities including family adventures, connecting to form “islands of connected memories”. 

If you’re into art or design, you can also enter the Proxi Art Challenge, where artists have the chance to have their designs placed directly into the game. 

Spore, Wright’s last game, was released ten years ago. The game followed the entire lifespan of a species: starting as a microscopic blob, players could develop their species into intelligent social creatures or rocket-riding space explorers, befriending aliens.

It received critical support – IGN Australia gave the game 9.2 out of 10, for example – but never hit the heights of The Sims or SimCity.

Those games, on the other hand, received both critical and public support, with The Sims franchise selling nearly 200 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling video games of all time and the best-selling PC game ever.  It’s also spawned a number of spin-offs: The Sims Medieval; Pet Stories; University Life and many more.  

Wright has stated that inspiration for the game came after he lost his home in a firestorm and had to rebuild his life, replacing his possessions and home. 

And in Charlie Brooker’s How Videogames Changed the World, Wright said that The Sims could also be read as a critique of American consumerist culture. 

No word yet on whether or not you can commit Sims-like acts of mass murder in Proxi – but we’re still excited either way.

(Image: EA)