What is Simlish? Plus Phrases You Should Know

When you’re playing games created by EA like The Sims or SimCity you may hear a weird language coming out of the character’s mouths. What exactly is that language they’re speaking? It can’t be english, not spanish, not french, it’s Simlish! This is a language that was created by Will Wright, the creator of The Sims and SimCity to make sure that the language was accessible and not repetitive.

What is Simlish?

Simlish is an entirely fictional language created by Maxis in 1996, yup, it’s probably older than many of you reading this. It was originally created by Will Wright and Maxis for use in SimCopter but has also been featured in MySims, SimCity and, of course, all of The Sims Franchise.

The reason for Will Wright creating Simlish was a smart one. Will Wright believed that having real life languages in his games the dialogue would get repetitive and extremely expensive. If they used english in their games, they would have to get new translations and voice actors for every country they sold it in.

In addition to the cost of voicing over each country’s game, the use of real life language would get repetitive. How many times can you listen to a character say the same sentences before you’re sick of the audio and turn it off?

For these reasons Will Wright decided to go with a language made up of pretty much random sounds and gibberish language that would sound like a real language but could not be directly translated.

@krizia_bajos Answer to @afdssssgghh good question 💚 #simlish #simlishchallenge #simtok #fypシ #voiceover #ROMWEGetGraphic #simfluencer #simlishchallenge #sims4 ♬ original sound – Krizia Bajos

Simlish Dictionary

Since there have been so many games created using this made up language, players from across the world have come together to try to find consistencies in the language to create some kind of simlish dictionary. This can be used to truly understand some of the things your characters are saying, but to be honest, you’ll never fully get to understand the language as random words after often thrown in.

There are a few things that most players have learned over time like Sul Sul meaning hello and Dag Dag meaning goodbye, but below you’ll find more of the simlish dictionary to learn how to understand what your characters are saying.

Artists Performing in Simlish

One of my favourite parts about Simlish is when EA gets real life artists to perform their songs in Simlish to be added to the game. There are dozens of songs in simlish in the game, and it’s just so much fun to listen to songs you love with gibberish lyrics. For example, in The Sims 3 with the addition of Katy Perry Sweet Treats, Katy Perry sang many of their songs to be added to the game in Simlish.

You’ll also find awesome songs like Lily Allen’s Smile in the game and EA even went so far as to create an entire music video for the Simlish version of this song using The Sims 3: Seasons.

Simlish Voice Actors

Something fun is that a lot of players are getting to know a few of the voice actors for The Sims who have worked on the game for a number of years. For example, there is a voice actor named Krizia Bajos who has a pretty active tiktok presence and often does funny videos in Simlish.

For example, they did an entire meditation tiktok while speaking simlish the entire time. It actually is super nice to listen to someone speak simlish while trying to zone out because you can’t actually think about what they may be saying.

@krizia_bajos What everyone wants for Christmas. A guided meditation… in #simlish 💚 thank you @cosmopolitan for the collab! #sims4 #voiceover #simtok #simfluencer ♬ original sound – Krizia Bajos

In addition to silly videos like the one above, you can also find videos with more of the behind the scenes of creating this language and voicing over for the game.

@krizia_bajos Answer to @sunsiis I’m sorry…❇️ #simtok #simlish #simfluencer #fyp #thesims #sims4 #kriziabajos #gamer #simlishchallenge #ChipsGotTalent ♬ original sound – Krizia Bajos

Final Thoughts

Listening to characters like Bella Goth and Agnes Crumplebottom speak this gorgeous made up language has been so fun for the last 20+ years. It’s helped to make the game more accessible and much better to listen to for years on end and is a huge reason why players aren’t getting bored easily in the game. What is your favourite word in Simlish? Happy playing!