Sims 2 developer says Simlish is 'gibberish', goes on to explain why they don't have threesomes

(Image credit: Maxis)

Turns out Simlish, the gobbledygook language of The Sims series, has absolutely zero linguistic background, according to a developer who worked on The Sims 2.

Jake Simpson, who was the game's lead simulation and tools engineer, shared some of the details behind The Sims 2's development in a lengthy tweet thread over the weekend. "Note, there is NO linguistic background for Simlish," Simpson wrote. "All those websites that claim there is are absolutely wrong. It was entirely made up, of gibberish sounds, that was made up on the spot by the voice actors."

Simpson said the team was "constantly amazed at people who felt they could see patterns where there were none," and that they'd pass around links to sites that thought they'd cracked the Simlish code.

Note, there is NO linguistic background for Simlish. All those websites that claim there is are absolutely wrong. It was entirely made up, of gibberish sounds, that was made up on the spot by the voice actors.March 26, 2021

Interestingly, Simpson also claimed that the team would get bug reports from non-English players who couldn't change the voice language because they assumed that Sims were speaking English instead of random gibberish.

There were a whole host of other interesting tidbits, like the fact that EA tried to can the bladder function because Sims peeing themselves was "pretty revolting." Series creator Will Wright initially caved, but after his random toilet data values were proven correct by a New York Times study, he promptly faxed a copy back to the higher-ups with the words "BATHROOM NEEDS STAY!"

This bug went all the way up the chain to the executive producer, Lucy Bradshaw, who marked it "Will not fix", with the comment "Not enough time for animations" :)Maxis didn't say no to threesomes, just, they didn't have time to make the animations and scripts:)March 27, 2021

Apparently, EA wasn't exactly against the ideas of threesomes in the game either. Simpson wrapped up his tweet thread by saying he had jokingly sent a bug report about how Sims couldn't initiate a threesome, to which the executive producer marked it "will not fix" with the comment "not enough time for animations." Classic.

I highly recommend checking out the entire tweet thread to see all of Simpsons' great anecdotes, which really highlights why The Sims 2 is such an evergreen, fun and oddly human experience.

Mollie spent her early childhood deeply invested in games like Killer Instinct, Toontown and Audition Online, which continue to form the pillars of her personality today. She joined PC Gamer in 2020 as a news writer and now lends her expertise to write a wealth of features, guides and reviews with a dash of chaos. She can often be found causing mischief in Final Fantasy 14, using those experiences to write neat things about her favourite MMO. When she's not staring at her bunny girl she can be found sweating out rhythm games, pretending to be good at fighting games or spending far too much money at her local arcade.