The Sims 4 Wedding Stories will come to Russia after all
It was only last week that it was announced that the latest game pack from The Sims 4, featuring a same-sex couple getting married on the front cover, would not be released in Russia. This came as a shock for Russian Simmers, especially LGBTQ+ players who just like the rest of the world, wanted to play a game pack that celebrated the love of two queer women.
In retaliation, the hashtag #weddingsforrussia started to trend on the social media platform, Twitter. There were numerous threads explaining why the decision to not release the game pack in Russia didn’t make sense, even with the country’s anti-LGBTQ+ laws.
“We have already had released covers of add-ons or sets from Sims, where LGBT couples were shown, and no one has raised this issue.” Twitter user nekocarlsenpai told Gayming Magazine. “It is no longer in the understanding of the EA studio itself with our Russian laws. We have all their games released with the mark +18. In Russia, adulthood begins at 18.”
However, what makes this story even weirder is that The Sims 4 team have now decided that they will be releasing The Sims 4 – My Wedding Stories in Russia after all. The question then is, what was the problem in the first place?
The full post from The Sims website states the following:
Last week, we shared the below update about our upcoming game pack “My Wedding Stories.” At the time, we believed that our team could not freely share the storytelling of same-sex couple Cam and Dom in Russia and decided the best way to uphold our commitment to sharing their story was to not release this pack there.
Since then, we’ve been listening to the outpouring of feelings from our community including both support for our decision and concern for their fellow community members. It’s equally important for us to stand by our values, including standing against homophobia, and to share stories like this with those who want and need it most.
With this in mind, we’ve reassessed our options and realized we can do more than we initially believed and we will now release The Sims 4 “My Wedding Stories” Game Pack to our community in Russia, unaltered and unchanged, featuring Dom and Cam.
We want the entire Sims community to be able to celebrate together, so we’re pushing the global release of “My Wedding Stories” to February 23 – including in Russia.
Love is love, and The Sims community will continue to be a safe space for those who want to see a world where that is true for everyone. We are thankful for the support of our team and our values even when it is hard. Thank you for being a part of The Sims.“
– The Sims team
The original release of The Sims 4 – My Wedding Stories has now been moved from February 17th to February 23rd to incorporate the new development. The reason for why Russia was excluded in the first place is still unknown.
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