Livestream Alert: Special Livestream tomorrow (Friday, Sept. 27) at 12:30pm ET, look for some surprise Addicts. We’re going to talk about the game ending, our feelings, read your thoughts and comments, and more. Hope you can join us tomorrow! I’ll put up a post in the morning with a link to the Livestream, or you can subscribe to our YouTube to be alerted when we go live!
Note: Safi and I are going to try and go live shortly (will post video link when we do, if I can get it to work). We want to hear from you. So share your thoughts here and on the YouTube chat when it goes live. More details soon…
Hey Howdy Hey Tappers!
It is with an insanely heavy heart, and a mind still in utter shock and disbelief, that I tell you all (as some of you have already seen) the game we all have loved and built the amazing community around for the last 12 years is coming to an end.
Many of you have seen the post on their Facebook page, or are seeing the following in your games now…
Here’s a little more information we’ve been provided from EA:
To our beloved fans,
We have made the difficult decision to sunset Tapped Out. In-app purchases have been disabled, and the game will be removed from the app stores October 31, 2024. You may continue playing until January 24th, 2025, at which point servers will be turned off and TSTO will not be accessible.
The decision to end our twelve-year journey is an emotional one. Together with our partners at The Simpsons™ and The Walt Disney company, we have delighted in bringing this game to you, the fans, and seeing how you’ve each built your own beloved versions of Springfield. It has been a remarkable journey, and we are grateful that we’ve been able to deliver 308 updates, 831 characters and including today’s final farewell 1,463 questlines.
As our journey comes to a close, we offer our sincerest thanks to you, the players, who have made this all possible.
– Electronic Arts
They have provided some additional FAQs which I will share at the bottom of this post. However, I wanted to take a minute to share this news with all of you and to let you know the Addicts Team (new and old), are currently trying to figure out a way to make these next couple of months of TSTO very special for all of us…and YOU the amazing community of TSTO Addicts.
While we still process the shock of it, know that we will be back in the coming days with an Addicts Live (or several) and more information about what’s ahead.
Thank you for being an amazing part of this community. We love all of you who have joined us over the last 11 years of TSTO Addicts, as we came together to play a silly lil’ game. I’ve always said, we supply the music and margaritas it is you, the members of this community, that make this place come alive. And for that I am eternally grateful.
-Alissa
FAQs From EA:
Q: MTX purchases are no longer available. Are there still ways to receive donuts in game? (THERE’S AN ISSUE WITH THIS EA IS WORKING TO RESOLVE…pulling info down for now)
Q: Is there a way to be able to obtain items from days long gone, now that events are over?
A: Yes! Throughout the coming weeks, we will be returning as much content from the past twelve years
as possible, in waves of a few years of releases at a time. Look for these in the store! This includes both
Premium and Prize items. Waves of items will be released on a weekly cadence for the next five weeks.
Q: What about land and item limits?
A: As part of the previous event, A Bart Future, we phased in increased land tile availability, along with
ramped up item placement limits. While we are not adding any additional increases with Taps, there will
be a reference to it within the final questline, as we did not formally announce this enhancement
previously.
Taps Start & End Time: 2024-09-26 15:01 UTC to 2025-01-24 23:00 UTC
Prize Track Items:
● Lard Lad Donut Factory (Building)
● Donut Mech (Character)
● CostMo (Building)
● Jewish Walk of Fame + Yahweh / Golden Goose Realty (Two Buildings)
● Lard Land Shop / Ten Commandments + God (Building + Decoration)
Players who own any of the items on the prize track will receive donuts instead of that particular item.
New Items:
There are new items coming to the store as part of the final wave of Taps store items – a building and a
bunch of decorations, that were not previously released. All of these items will be available for in-game
money.
- Lenny’s House (Building)
- Pink Bouncy Horse (Decoration)
- Brown Bouncy Horse (Decoration)
- Purple Bouncy Horse (Decoration)
- Tan Bouncy Horse (Decoration)
- BBQ Grill (Decoration)
- Picnic Table (Decoration)
- ATM (Decoration)
- Residential Mailbox (Decoration)
- Blue Postal Box (Decoration)
- Red Trashcan (Decoration)
- Holiday Person Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Creature Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Dog Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Dragon Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Bear Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Horse Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Gator Sculpture (Façade)
- Holiday Chimp Sculpture (Façade)
(From Alissa: I will note there is NO WORLD’S LARGEST TOILET! WTH EA? Couldn’t give me that one thing?)
P.S. Took 11 years, but thank you for the shoutout EA….
Wondering if there’s a total count of the items that were available in all 5 stages of the TAPS event? How does this number compare to the total number of items available in all of Tapped Out over its entire run?
That’d be hard to figure out.
There’s things you could never buy but got anyway like the Debris to clean or the Consumables like event currency.
Then there’s bundles, stuff in the permanent store and the vault as well as what’s in those Taps panels.
They also gave stuff numbers, but by update, so that won’t help. For example Lenny’s House was ID 284500 then jump to decorations and the Pink Bouncy Horse was ID 284500 up to the Red Trashcan with ID 284509. 11 items only in those 2 sections though.
Just rough numbers? I didn’t mean it had to be exact
Lots 🤪👿
I would pay monthly just to keep a few servers running, just so I could edit and continue finishing my Springfield. I don’t care about the store, quests, events, new characters, etc. I simply want to be able to continue building my town and visit the neighbours I’ve kept in touch with over the years. It’s been like 2 months since I’ve logged in and played because I’m still pretty pissed about EA shutting this down after the gobs of money I’ve dumped into this game. I suppose it’s too late now to do anything but I’ve always been someone to hold out hope for things I believe in, and love. What a mess this has become…
No
WORLDS LARGEST TOILET
Isn’t that the “biological solids”
😂😂😂
(Keeping the language PG)
I started playing this game 10 1/2 years ago when I was told on a Friday that next Friday is your last day, you must retire.
60 miles per hour to zero in the blink of an eye.
This game and jigsaw puzzles kept me busy and sane.
And I keep hoping a White Knight will swoop in and take over the game.
Hope everyone had a good Halloween and are doing well.
Any chance of staying around after 25-Jan-25 and get ‘isekai’-ed as Homer Donut Overlord in new Springfield?
12 years… wow…
Did anyone ever make it to the Beloved Billionaires Club?
I’ve been playing this game way before my kids were born 11 years ago, Please all I want them to do is for them to enable us take hi res photos of the entire town, the 4mb file is not even detailed enough when you zoom it in. It’s still locked to the iPhone 5 resolutions of phones of the era!
Wow, that is an end of an era. Not just with the game but all those involved outside too. Dipped in and out of the game (and the site) over the past few years but always appreciated the work Alissa and the team did to keep everyone up to date and keep the game alive. Thanks all.
It would be GREAT if EA could make TSTO a stand alone game that was not dependent on their servers. No purchases, just the hourly tasks for in game Simpson$ and the ability (like they’re doing now) to purchase donuts with Simpson$. My favorite part of the game is continually refining the city layout and decorations. If there isn’t anything beyond January 24th, my last act will be to nuke it.
Silver lining is that the ‘moving in hex filled circles pt 3’ task finally got fixed. I never realised I had two other tasks that the game had denied me previously (Costington’s and a The Collider). I put game down between 2013 and late 2020 but have been an addict since resuming it. To be here next, I was thinking of calling it a day after this coming Black Friday. Being able to bag my missing characters in the next few weeks (still about 150) will make it a satisfying end. Will definitely be nuking my town at the end. Have done it once before to make the layout better. If there was more incentive, I probably.would have nukes again anyway after.the extra land tipped up, but doesn’t seem much point any more. The game has been a joy to play. Have loved the events, particularly raiding the boxes in November!
Can’t be bothered to play any more, just not the same knowing it’s coming to an end
Haven’t played in quite a few years, but this game and this blog brought me a lot of good memories. Thanks for everything to the team that made it happen. Truly the end of an era.
I’ve been playing The Simpsons Tapped Out since it first came out in 2012, it’s really such a shame that after almost 13 years, it’s finally getting the plug pulled. Has anyone started to collect all the Characters and Outfits to complete every Character Collection?
11+ years of tsto. Oh dear, they finally released the Lady Duff skin! It truly is the end of days. Tyring not to be bummed out over a video game, but damn , I am.
This is truly heartbreaking! I don’t want to lose my progress and I don’t want this community to die off! I’m in shock. Easily one of the best mobile games ever. Certainly a better city-builder than EA’s botched mobile version of SimCity. I can’t accept this fate. I’m a professional Urban Planner who uses this game both as a city-building thought exercise and as an escape from reality… if you’d like to add me as a friend and see my Springfield for the little remaining time there is, my EA ID is Lluck002. RIP 🙁
Okay, you piqued my interest! Sent you a friend request.
Thank you TSTO Addicts for adding to the fun of this game! My wife and I have played for over 10 years and relied on this site for so much information. We’ll miss it all for sure.
I don’t see any point in playing the game anymore now that I’ve completed the last “event.” There’s nothing to do. I suppose I can hold onto the game until the end. I might check into the game every once in a while to see if anything changes between now and January 24. I’m reluctant to nuke the town just yet or delete from my devices, because they might come up with something else (however unlikely).
https://chng.it/rCsWxN4XSS
Signed. Almost 14, 0000 signatures now.
Hey guys there is a petition to save the game from being shutdown has almost 10,000 signatures on it I will post a link to it
Gutted! Been playing this game for longer than my son has been alive so to see the shock announcement has left me feeling like a big part of my life is going.
I still think EA are missing out on an opportunity to either make it a subscription and keep it in its current format or make it a one off purchase to keep on our local devices as I can’t imagine life without my daily Springfield
I’ve played this game since I was around 7 so it’s sad to see it go, but it was going to happen eventually. I hope the fan-made private servers work out.
As a player of 11+ years, the news that TSTO is coming to an end is heartbreaking. I’ve been an avid fan and faithful player for all that time. To me, it’s more than just a game, it’s a memory palace. There are sections of my town that were built by my grandchildren throughout their early years, there are buildings and characters from storylines played late at night or the early hours of the morning when I couldn’t sleep after my father’s passing. There are lines of dialogue that linger from tapping away in front of the fireplace of my old home and from stolen moments loading the van on moving day. When the leaves change and the wind blows, or the snow is lying on the ground in Springfield I am immediately transported back to Hallowe’ens and Christmases of the past 11 years, each one conjured up by a particular character or building. Even when Christmas was gray and wet here, there was always snow in Springfield. It’s more than just nostalgia, it’s a way of anchoring to the past, like a photo album of memories and emotions. Through 11 years of change (some good, some not so good) TSTO has been a constant companion and time for tapping has always been scheduled into my daily routine. I will screen-shot my Springfield and screen-record as much gameplay as I can over the coming months but, needless to say, I will miss just taking a daily stroll through Springfield. A huge thank you to Alissa, Safi, and all the Addicts community. I’ve never really interacted that much on this site but I was a frequent visitor over the years and deeply appreciated all the content and support provided here. It made my days playing TSTO all the more special.
I share your sentiment, so many memories, good times and bad times, over 11 years playing and will be 10 years in February next year being part of the tsto addicts community
I’m in the same boat. My son suggested printing and framing a photo of my town. That’s what I plan to do. So the next few months I will get all everything they release and build my final Springfield to be framed forever.
I think this situation is totally unacceptable. Over the years players have paid a lot of money to play tapped out and to not to be able to “use”, after Jan 2025, what you have purchased is just wrong !!!. EA should think about their customers and allow talked out to be played offline.
Didn’t read the terms and conditions you agreed to when you started playing? Like the part about how they can shut the game down at any time with 90 days notice?
I think it would be cool if we all nuked our towns at the exact same time. It might blow up some of EA’s servers too. That would teach them a lesson. Ha ha.
I have had same idea we should all nuke at same and see what happens to EA servers..💣
Great to see you my neighbour Alunited. Be sure to check out my post that’s scheduled for tomorrow at 6:30am Eastern.
Hi Safi been a while ….I will read your post I am hoping for some Fighting Canadian talk..
Thanks to all on this site for making the last 11 years of game play more fun and interesting for me. I’ve loved all the helpful information you are tirelessly provided. So long to my fellow tappers! *wipes a tear away*
I’m not sure what to do with the game now. Nuke it? Wait until January 24 and just let it disappear? Seems kind of silly to do anything at this point. The game is over.
What if we all nuked the towns at same time?