EA Announces The Sims 2 Holiday Edition for PC; ''Deck the Halls'' of Your Virtual Homes in a Holiday-Themed Special Edition From One of the Most Popular PC Game Brands in History

Business Wire, Oct 11, 2005

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. -- Get into the holiday spirit with The Sims(TM) 2 Holiday Edition! Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:ERTS) today announced The Sims 2 Holiday Edition, a special-edition holiday-themed version of the world's best-selling PC game of 2004, The Sims 2. Look for The Sims 2 Holiday Edition, rated "T" for Teen by the ESRB, to hit store shelves across North America on November 17 -- just in time for holiday shopping!

Available for a limited time only and listed at the same manufacturers suggested retail price as the original version, The Sims 2 Holiday Edition contains the original game, The Sims 2, in its entirety, plus 40 new holiday-themed items that allow your Sims to celebrate their holidays in style. With this bonus content, your Sims can decorate their house, serve a festive holiday dinner, engineer a visit from Santa himself, even host a rollicking New Year's party!

A Stocking Stuffer with Wide Appeal

The Sims games are known for being among the few games to achieve popularity across all ages and genders, making The Sims 2 Holiday Edition a great gift for anyone from your nephew, to your grandfather to your favorite aunt, best friend, or kid sister. "The appeal of playing The Sims 2 is that the game is what you make it," explained Senior Producer Tim LeTourneau. The gameplay experience follows the day-to-day life of the Sims characters that you create and control, over an entire lifetime. According to LeTourneau, "Players enjoy participating in all the ups and downs of their Sims' lives, from the big things like falling in love or building and decorating their house to the memorable things like putting up their family's first Christmas tree and hosting a holiday dinner -- even mundane details like ordering a pizza or fixing the toilet are humorous and fun. The Sims 2 is designed to make even the ordinary extraordinarily entertaining!"

The Create-a-Sim feature allows you to combine your choices from a vast selection of facial features, hairstyles and outfits, to create the Sims you most want to play, make your own family and friends or invent someone on the fly -- you can even create your own celebrity look-alikes! Help your Sims fulfill their lifelong aspirations; they can seek popularity, fortune, romance, family, or knowledge -- their choices are in your hands. Mix their genes, fulfill their dreams, and push them to extremes. Your Sims aren't the only thing you can create and customize! You won't need a degree in architecture to build dream homes and design neighborhoods with the easy-to-use building, design, and home furnishing options. And now, with holiday-themed bonus content from The Sims 2 Holiday Edition, you can even hang a stocking over the fireplace!

For Owners of The Sims 2 (PC)

The Sims(TM) fans who already own The Sims 2 for PC won't be left out in the cold! The Sims(TM) 2 Holiday Party Pack offers only the bonus content -- from merry to scary -- and not the full game. For information on how to purchase The Sims 2 Holiday Party Pack, Sims fans who already own The Sims 2 for PC can visit http://www.thesims2.com.

For more information on The Sims 2 and The Sims 2 Holiday Edition, as well as expansion packs such as The Sims(TM) 2 University and The Sims(TM) 2 Nightlife, which provide additional experiences for the original game, please visit http://www.thesims2.com.

About The Sims(TM)

The Sims franchise celebrated its fifth anniversary in February. The game skyrocketed to the top of the charts when it began shipping to stores in February 2000 and quickly become a universal gaming and cultural phenomenon. The Sims PC based product and expansion packs were the best selling PC games of 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2003. Translated into 17 different languages, The Sims has inspired seven top selling expansion packs. They include: The Sims(TM) Livin' Large, The Sims(TM) House Party, The Sims(TM) Hot Date, The Sims(TM) Vacation, The Sims(TM) Unleashed, The Sims(TM) Superstar, and The Sims(TM) Makin' Magic. The Sims 2 shipped in September 2004 with sales already topping 5M units worldwide, it was the best selling PC game of 2004. The Sims(TM) 2 University shipped in March 2005 and The Sims 2 Nightlife shipped in September 2005. Combined sales for the franchise have topped 50M units life-to-date. For more information on The Sims 2, visit http://www.thesims2.com and for more information on The Sims franchise titles, visit http://www.thesims.com.

About Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts (EA), headquartered in Redwood City, California, is the world's leading interactive entertainment software company. Founded in 1982, the company develops, publishes and distributes interactive software worldwide for videogame systems, personal computers and the Internet. Electronic Arts markets its products under four brand names: EA SPORTS(TM), EA (TM), EA SPORTS BIG(TM) and POGO(TM). In fiscal 2005, EA posted revenues of $3.1 billion and had 31 titles that sold more than one million copies. EA's homepage and online game site is www.ea.com. More information about EA's products and full text of press releases can be found on the Internet at http://info.ea.com.