The Sims 4 Wedding Stories pack won’t release in Russia
A few days ago Maxis revealed The Sims 4 Wedding Stories game pack – featuring a mindblowing LGBTQ trailer that highlighted all the amazing new things coming Simmers way. However, in a letter shared yesterday, it has been revealed that The Sims 4 game pack will not be making its way to Russia. Why? Because of the country’s homophobic law against gay marriage.
The letter from The Sims Team reads: “[Y]esterday we introduced you to The Sims 4 ‘My Wedding Stories’ Game Pack and along with it, to Dominique and Camille, a couple whose love knows no boundaries. Today we want to explain the decision we’ve made to not release this pack in Russia.
Over the years, you’ve delighted us with the ways your Sims have found love and celebrated that love through weddings in our base game. You’ve also shared with us your eagerness to walk down the aisle, have your Sims take their seats and shed a tear of joy as you made a lifelong commitment.
When we set out to create “My Wedding Stories” this was the vision we had for our global community: the joy of finding love, celebrating that love and telling stories that have meaning on a personal level.
Imagining the stories our players will tell with our packs is at the heart of everything we create. For “My Wedding Stories,” we were excited to introduce you to Dom and Cam. Their love story reflects the lived experiences of so many members of our community and team.
As we moved through our development and brand storytelling process, we became aware that the way we wanted to tell Cam and Dom’s story would not be something we could freely share around the world.”
The letter from The Sims team goes on to explain that the ability to tell stories is what makes The Sims as special as it is. More importantly, the team does not want to compromise their values by holding the beautiful, queer story of Cam and Dom back. So, as an answer to that, The Sims 4 pack featuring these two characters, as well as all of the features Simmers are looking forward to, will not be available in Russia.
“We are committed to the freedom to be who you are, to love who you love, and tell the stories you want to tell,” continues the letter. “We are steadfast in upholding that commitment by shining a light on and celebrating stories like Dom and Cam’s, so we have made the decision to forgo the release of “My Wedding Stories” where our storytelling would be subject to changes because of federal laws.”
The law in question most likely references to a law passed in 2013 that criminalised public expressions and positive representation of LGBTQ+ relationships – doing so would be seen as promoting “gay propaganda.” The homophobic law is said to exist due to Russia being concerned with protecting minors under 18. Pfft, yeah, sure.
Barring Russia, The Sims 4 Wedding Stories game pack will release on all platforms on February 17.
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