Start at the beginning, right? When faced with a self-imposed task as massive and daunting as writing a retrospective on The Sims franchise, going back to the very first game was the obvious launchpad. The original The Sims — now sometimes called The Sims 1 for the sake of clarity — was released in February 2000, and received regular updates via expansion packs through to October 2003. The game was the brainchild of Will Wright, the designer behind the SimCity series, who had decided to approach the world of his popular city-building franchise from a new angle. Switching from macro- to micro-management, Wright's new spin-off project aimed to focus on the architectural design of individual houses. As time went on, his creative interests would shift again, to also take in the lives of the people inside the buildings.