The game also courted controversy, with its open-ended approach to social interaction leading to organised player harassment and simulated cybersex.

The Sims Online has retrospectively been viewed as a failed experiment, with its failure attributed to its limited features, repetitive gameplay and subscription fee.

Players with properties also can set several items that allow others to pay them an income, including tip jars, fees for vending machines and pay-to-enter doors.

[13][14][15] Wright also attributed conversations with author Neal Stephenson and his 1992 novel Snow Crash as inspiration for the game, with its notion of a metaverse also emerging as a comparison point for publishers and reviewers.

[18] To realise Wright's concept, the development team aimed to create an online game with The Sims engine that encouraged interaction between players,[19] and provide a broader business and economic simulation built from this premise.

[26] Prior to release, The Sims Online received significant pre-release coverage and high expectations as a potential commercial and cultural phenomenon,[27] following the showcase of the game at E3 in May 2002.

[16] Lev Grossman of Time described the upcoming title as a "daring collective social experiment" to simulate a "vast virtual society" and "sandbox where we can play out our fantasies and confront our fears about what America might become".

The Sims Online was subject to controversy due to the behaviors of some of its user base,[37][38] prompting commentary on whether these behaviours consisted of virtual crime.

[42][43] Public attention was further brought to these issues by Peter Ludlow, a University of Michigan philosophy professor, who operated an online blog titled The Alphaville Herald that frequently canvassed the activities of the inhabitants on the server of the same name.

[44] Under the pseudonym Urizenus, Ludlow observed, wrote about, and interviewed users engaging in practices including scams,[45] sadomasochism,[46][47] prostitution,[48] and organised crime.

[49] Of particular concern was a reported griefer, Evangeline, who claimed to be a seventeen-year-old male who operated a brothel offering virtual sex services in the game.

[50][51] Ludlow, among other academics, noted the ethical grey area of these activities, although the potential of "real money" being exchanged for simoleons opened up issues around the "exploitation" of users.

Initial features added by the development team included clothing racks to customise outfits, a player trading feature,[53] non-player characters that provide services, and pets from The Sims Unleashed;[54] however, the introduction of the clothing rack also introduced an exploit into the game that allowed players to generate large amounts of money.

[67][70][71] The Sims Online was a commercial disappointment, peaking in sixth place in United States PC sales charts in December 2002.

[54][85] The subscription base, which remained under 100,000 for most of 2003,[87][88] underperformed industry expectations,[89] and fell short of EA goals of reaching 200,000 by March and 400,000 subscribers by the end of the year.

[25][27][90] Analyst Bruce Woodcock estimated active player subscriptions for The Sims Online peaked near 105,000 in 2003, sharply declining in the years after.

[73][75][79] Describing the game as a "chat room come to life', Michael Lafferty of GameZone considered the interactive social gameplay to be a highlight of The Sims Online due to the diversity of the player base.

Steve Butts of IGN noted the gameplay was open to "confusion" and "abuse", observing easy ways to exploit the property manager system.

[39] Dana Jongewaard of Computer Gaming World found players were generally unwilling to interact in gameplay and were primarily focused on making money.

Steve Butts of IGN noted that the lack of a "player-run market of commodities and items" limited the incentive of focusing on the money-making aspects of the game.

[39] GameSpot similarly cited the functionality of the economy as a problem for the game, finding skill building and money making activities to be limited and repetitive.

The size of their publishers may be a factor but is no guarantee of success ... as with the Sims Online, it would seem that an MMOG based on a top-selling single-player franchise should have been a sure hit.

[99] Dan Whitehead of Eurogamer wrote that the mixture of pre-broadband performance issues and lack of infrastructure failed to "support the infinitely malleable persistent virtual world The Sims required".

[102] Graham Smith of Rock Paper Shotgun described the game as a "mess", citing the vulnerability of its player-driven economy to bugs and the unscrupulous nature of players.

[55] Leah Williams of Kotaku noted the game was a "bold experiment" with a sound concept, but "faded quickly" due to the newness of the internet, the lack of players and available features, and constant development changes.

Will Wright believes that the game's lack of success was due to the online subscription model not fitting with The Sims' core audience.

[34] Although later added in EA-Land, The Sims developer Don Hopkins considered the initial lack of support for player-created content was also a major factor in the game's failure.

[108][109] Associate producer Jessica Lewis speculated the game's higher price and subscription fee at launch deterred some consumers, who could purchase expansion packs for The Sims for cheaper.

[111][116] FreeSO, a free fan-made recreation of The Sims Online created by developer Rhys Simpson in C# and MonoGame, was launched in open beta on 6 January 2017.

[120] Initially featuring a shared area named Sunrise Crater that accommodated 200 users, demand for the beta was so high that the servers crashed under a load of 1,000 accounts.