inZOI Early Access Review: solid life sim, with potential to be the best

By now I spend decades in one particular series, with occasional simcapade to other titles. Saying I was excited for inZOI was… understatement. I had the opportunity to test it for some time at gamescom, and even if it was far from ideal then (who needs floors in their buildings or working sleeves), it was impressive. The character creator was just Chef’s kiss… okay let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Before I even begin, I must admit, I was kinda surprised by this Early Access. To be honest, without pointing fingers, there are game developers who have released games in far worse conditions. inZOI is a fully running game that has its issues, but I would still pay for it and just expect to be patched. It’s so full of possibilities I can’t even imagine what else the final version will have to offer (but I hope pets).

Krafton knows how to advertise. Because even if you are not a cat lady like me, who could resist that adorable fluffy perfection. That big cat hanging from gamescon ceiling and drawing everyone's attention. That's your in-game boss. I enjoyed that narrative of it. After all, from a ludology point of view, sims hardly pass as a game without having a clear winner. So now, when you are tasked with keeping that part of the universe nice and thriving (or not), you have some kind of goal not to get fired. I find it rather funny to get the concept of cats being gods that control human lives. I’m sure they do think so in real life, too.

They told me I can be anyone, so I’ve become a Zoi

First, the creme de la creme of this game is Character Studio. I don’t even know where to begin. The insane amount of customization: the points you can pull, mold, drag, and scale, let your imagination go wild. You can do anything, especially you can turn off the symmetry feature. Hooded lid? Checked. Crooked lips? Sure. The differences between age groups are very distinct. Wrinkles can be enhanced with shadows, there are even freckles, scars, and birthmarks. Finally, there is the possibility of having that actor you were crushing on to marry ‘you,’ and if you don’t know how to create them, there will be someone in the community in Canvas who will do that for you.

You can adjust almost everything from tiny details on the face to a wide range of body parts. No matter if you want to play a top model, a gym bro, or a chubby cutie, it will be possible and it will look as you imagined it.

The only thing that would make creating your perfect silhouettes better would be height adjustment. Although I understand the difficulties that come with animations of different heights, the girl can dream, no? But hey, at least you can adjust the size of pupils and irises and how the colors will blend on the eye! And hair length. A lot of the hairstyles, besides changing colors (in some hairstyles even multiple sections), have adjustable length, which blew my mind with how good it actually worked. My only dream would be the possibility to add or remove fringes from a certain hairstyle, and I hope it will be added at some point.

And speaking about colors. The color wheel is something I will be gushing over and over in this review. You can adjust basically anything - skin, eyes, makeup, hair, even the colors of the clothes. In some cases, you can adjust intensity, transparency, or how the colors will blend.

You can dress your ZOI for different occasions. And it would not be very exciting if not for the fact that, except for colors, you can add patterns to your outfits and even create them! Patterns can be AI-generated, which is both a bit controversial and working with mixed rates of success. But what is super cool you can upload your own textures. You can even scale the pattern, but unfortunately, for now, it is only available as a tiled option.

Crafting the clothes and accessories is not very complex, but it lets you design your own basic shirt, pants, skirt, necklaces, and watch by customizing a few options like sleeves, length, or watch face. There is also a ‘3d Printer’ AI tool to change 2D photos into 3D accessories that works… to some extent. You can only upload one photo, so it won’t work with complex designs, but if you really want that Louis Vuitton bag, then maybe. If they allow uploading 3D objects, that will be heaven both for CC creators and players, who won’t have to mess with their game files to get that dream Jimmy Choo.

And of course, not everything is butterflies and rainbows. I can’t say that there is something that clearly doesn’t work in the creator, but there is room to improve. I know that to release the game, they had to draw a line at some point. It’s clear that the Krafton team spent a lot of time and effort to create Character Studio, so I’m nitpicking. Minding the number of details, except for things I’ve already mentioned, I’m missing the option of making complete or sectoral heterochromia in the eyes. And if we can add snake eyes and make irises 85% of the eye, why not add black/colored whites? If I can create an almost perfect image of myself, I feel I should be able to place the scars to my liking, yet here I can’t even flip them to the other side of the face, nor can I use more than one. The same goes for the face paint and moles. And honestly, if we have the color wheel on almost everything, I would really love to see it working on freckles too.

For now, asset library with objects and clothes is very limited. I hope to see more options in the future, because there is a sexy/sweet K-POP star or your typical K-Drama ajumma/ajeossi, and almost nothing in between.

Sampling the colors doesn’t exist; you can type the hex color code, but sometimes it would be easier just to pick a color with a tool and roll with it (which is something that will also be an issue for me in build mode).

There is one more innovative feature in both Character Studio and later in the inZOI world. It’s a face capture. You can download the app and your ZOI will mimic your facial expressions! Which works great in Photo Mode and probably will be a very fun thing for streamers. Photo Mode is also well designed, perfect for all those people who want to share their creations.

Home is where the Zois are

I usually spend hours meticulously designing a house. So for me, the build mode was the one I was most excited about. And to be honest, it was so far the worst part of the game. Not bad in general, but crude to start. As someone who has over 1000 hours in one particular series, mostly building, I have some habits that are not easy to ignore. So moving a camera in build mode was annoying, but probably won’t be to someone who will just get into this genre and start fresh.

Starting with what I liked. The panel with furniture and built elements is very comfortable to use, you can easily look through it. You can use different filters to speed the process, but they are categorized by rooms, instead of having a full list by item types.

There is a Create Custom Furniture feature, which is similar to the outfit one, there are some options, not too many, and a 3D Printer that also works questionably, but may be a good way to introduce some clutter. The elements are really nicely done, look like something most people would consider buying, in normal colors (which, of course, in most cases are adjustable). Gen AI and uploading your own patterns work for some furniture and most floors and walls. There is an option to turn off the grid and snap to it.

I tackled the parcel in Bliss Bay between two tall buildings. Unfortunately, viewing from a wider perspective wasn’t possible. Zooming the camera out a bit further resulted in getting stuck inside a neighboring building. And it was just the beginning of my struggle. From UI battles, through disappearing objects, to dealing with subtle differences in heights, just to close some walls. I don’t really get why floors are just premade squares instead of a tool like walls. And why can't I drag the tiles and wallpapers, instead of fighting with selecting the whole wall/floor and then deselecting parts I don’t want to color, because the only way to get into the coloring UI is by selecting it whole (or the whole room). There were times I was doing something on the ground floor to find out that the roof decided to disappear at some point. Once I had to redo half of the floor to fit back stairs that I decided to perish, because things can’t overlap in this game, and alt cheat doesn’t work in quite a lot of cases. Speaking of stairs, there are almost no matching handrails, which drives me nuts, because I just wanted a nice mezzanine. Deleted platforms could not be brought back by simple CTRL Z. And the bane of my existence - I could not clutter flat surfaces other than the floor, because everything has snapping points and you can’t just easily move it, even with alt and snap off. A few times, I also had bugs that needed restarting the game, like rotation or alt to move freely not working.

Let’s play God. Or, at the very least, a slightly irresponsible landlord

I’m a builder (RIP my unfulfilled dream of being an architect) and someone who can spend hours searching for that one perfect hair. In this kind of game, I quickly lose interest in actually leading a life. inZOI was not an exception. However, this mode in this game left me speechless. Of course, there were bugs, that’s early access after all, but I was not expecting this level of game to be served. This title even needs a little bit of a “tactician” approach, because we are not only responsible for the families we choose to play with. We are the architects of the whole neighbourhood.

We can manage its appearance, decide if it will be a shadow of its past—litter piles up, buildings crumble, and caution is a necessity, not an option. Or maybe a spotless, pristine district known for its wealth and sophistication. You can decide what animals will wander around, plants, decorations, and edit billboards (even put your own images and videos from YouTube!).

The base game already has four seasons and different weather, which makes ZOIs respond to changing clothes and behaviors. Your role will also be managing the city status, where you can control what kind of interactions will be happening in the neighborhood. You will decide if the city should be safe or if there will be chaos and fire everywhere.

All ZOIs will be reported to you by their Karma Status, which reflects how they act. If they are on a bad path, you can scold them and hopefully help the whole neighborhood. But maybe you shouldn’t? Play by your heart's desire, but who knows if the HQ will like where it goes.

City itself it’s amazing - very lived-in, very authentic. ZOIs have interactions with each other and the environment made my jaw drop. They wait at a red light. They chat with each other. They use public transportation if they need to get to the other part of the city.

If you end up homeless, the city will help you, and if you lack cash, there are banks (if you want a more authentic experience than money cheat). I hope in the future they will also add interactions with city animals.

ZOIs speak in gibberish very similar to well-known simlish, just on speed with more cutesy Korean vibe. But often you get to know little inscriptions of their talks, so it’s not that cryptic.

There is also a “Smart Zoi” feature that is still in development, which you can turn on for your family and all other ZOIs. It’s an AI function that helps ZOI make more authentic decisions. It also gives you their inner thoughts and why they decided to make such choices. I didn’t notice much of a difference, though, but maybe it will change with further development.

Mom, dad, this is Zoi

inZOI isn't really reinventing the wheel when it comes to family management. I need to admit it has a very nice, clean UI that you can move around to your liking (but it restarts with the game). Although it is so minimalistic that finding the needs was a bit of a challenge. I realized they exist when my ZOI got hungry. And the cluster of text bubbles when interacting between ZOIs was too overwhelming, but it’s getting better with time. Although the thing I loved was having a “free will” switch available from UI, which helped sometimes with coordinating more than one ZOI at a time.

What is nice, needs have a completely different pace of dropping, which is more natural. And even if they drop very low, ZOIs can survive but have difficulties with their activities. Your ZOIs will have their moods, desires, ambitions, likes, and personality traits that will determine their behavior.

If you ever left your NPC unattended for too long in the Sims, you know exactly what would happen. Spoiler: chaos. But not in inZoi. I am not even surprised that ZOIs wait for the green light, clean after themselves, and don’t have existential crisis over a plate left on the floor. Unfortunately, for now, if left with free will, they don’t do much, often just wander around. It took me a moment to find where they can apply for a job, and when I did, I kinda regretted sending them there. Default day lasts 96 real-time minutes, but that can be changed to a minimum of 48 minutes and to even 24 hours (but why…)! Minding that, 8 hours at work makes it quite a long wait. Even with fast-forwarding set to 10 times. Everything seems a bit long, but also your ZOI doesn’t spend half of their work hours just to get to the doors. In some cases, like a part-time job, you can join your ZOI at work and help them achieve a good work score (or not), but most of the time, you have time to get yourself a tea or three.

ZOI’s relations are moving on three axes – romance, friendship, and business, which unlock new interesting possibilities that often influence Karma points. The more progress on the Karma track, the more options you unlock. But remember, all choices have consequences, some may lead to actual in-game jail.

There is also a way to organize events. They are, in general, nicely done and customizable – from dress code, through guests to activities for ZOIs, you can plan a perfect date or dream wedding with ease.

What I disliked in the life mode was that actions can’t be done simultaneously (for example, talking during the family dinner), although at least you can change the order of the queue by dragging and dropping. Also, the lights are not fully automated. Either you have them all on or off, or one by one (and of course, you need for the ZOI to complete their queue to do it). Lights go on automatically when ZOI enters the room, but do not go off when they leave.

Each light and electronic device must be turned off by the ZOI (it is not done automatically by choosing that option like in other series). And as ZOIs obviously don’t care about their electricity bills, they need to vacuum their home a few times a day because even with high City Sanitation, everything gets dirty very fast. That is the part of life that not many of us want to revisit in the chill game.

A thing that was a game changer for me was the fact that not only can you change camera perspective, but you can also move your ZOIs by using WSAD. Maybe it’s not much, but the level of comfort is A+ now. The same goes for the car, because yes, now we have GTA at home. You can drive around the neighborhood, breaking the law and causing traffic accidents (especially when you forget to turn on the lights at night).

New game ahead, be wary of bugs

A few things don’t really work smoothly yet. If you ask your ZOI to prepare a meal and they are hungry, they will cook, put it on the table, and then grab something quick to bite from the fridge. If your other ZOI asks them to prepare a meal for two (because the one that is cooking cannot decide that on their own), they will cook one meal anyway. Sometimes they have the weirdest ways of finding paths, which include walking around and sitting before they get to their destination. If they are late to work, even if you ask them to go in their car, they will take a taxi. And if they go to work, they will have no trouble with leaving a newborn or toddler alone (at least the game sends the babysitter after an hour or so). Toddlers have a lot of furniture that should be usable, but 90% of the time, my toddler was on the floor, which included feeding and cleaning. Some objects will be permanently on, like paintings or diapers, even if you are on the other floor, you will see them float in the air. And it looks like you can’t move in with your loved one until you are married (or at least I didn’t find that option).

Of course, I also encounter more obvious bugs. Like ZOIs phasing through the objects or moonwalking on the street. Almost every time close to my parcel, a crowd of hungry or sick ZOIs was gathering, and I couldn’t even walk through the middle of the pavement, because it was for some reason blocked.

Ah, life. One minute you’re thriving, and the next, you’ve accidentally locked yourself in a bathroom with no way out. This game captures that energy perfectly. There is an option to lock and unlock the door for some groups, and usually when I did that, my ZOIs would be stuck inside, even if they were part of “Family only.”

And if you remember how I was whining about time being slow, the game also randomly stuck on 10x pace. In build mode few times I couldn’t rotate objects, alt was not working for anything, and in Character Studio, I couldn’t use any of the points to mold, but usually restarting helped. Nothing serious, and making the experience of this game bad.

I guess all the guides are easily accessible, but there is none of them in the form of popups that could help you out when you struggle without searching for it.

Life sim with potential

Overall, inZOI is a really good life sim. With potential to be one of the best. It's not there yet, but that's a matter of time. And Krafton actually listens to the community, so I have no doubts this game will be a gem in its final form.

As I enjoy more cartoonish, clay aesthetics, I thought the level of ZOIs' realism would creep me out. But it doesn't. They have a tiny bit of that uncanny valley vibes, but still don't pass as too real, and the game is looking great. Developers put a lot of effort into creating a convincing and coherent world. I must admit this is a really good game already. It’s packed with content as a base game, and who knows what the full launch will bring. I hope for pets and more outfits, and furniture. Or support for actual 3D mods.

If you’ve ever dreamed of micromanaging the lives of tiny digital people while ignoring your own responsibilities, then inZOI might be just what you need. This game is a perfect simulation of real life, except here, you can actually afford a house, and bad decisions are fun.