Recently, I found myself having a string of very similar conversations, and they focus around the same argument: “You really like X, so why won’t you play Y? It’s like X but newer with so many more features and better graphics.” I understand the point, but, see, the arguments are about games like Animal Crossing. Now I like Animal Crossing, but not because I like its genre (cozy life simulators). Animal Crossing, for me, is what I call a “legacy game,” and I don’t play legacy games for the gameplay. Rather, I play them because they’re nostalgic; they remind me of the days when I first played them. I don’t care if there’s better stuff out there, “better” is just not what I’m interested in.

Nostalgia is a powerful thing, and it seems to only get more powerful as the years pass. These days it’s practically an industry in and of itself with participants catering to every callback one can imagine. Disney keeps trying to cash in on it with its live action remakes of its animated movies. Universal and HBO are doing it with the likes of Harry Potter, The Mummy and Jurassic Park, but nobody trades on nostalgia like video game companies.

Nintendo’s entire business model is founded upon nostalgia at this point, and the deluge of remakes, remasters, reimaginings, returns and revivals have made everyone, from large AAA corporations to single-person indie developers, boatloads of money. I point all this out to say that I’m very much aware of the effect it has on me (the same as almost everyone else). I guard against it in most cases, but there are just times when you want to take a step back every now and then.

That’s what Animal Crossing games are to me. As much as I enjoyed all the new things in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, the main appeal for me was that, for a brief moment, I was able to enjoy Animal Crossing together with my friends again just like we did during the GameCube and Nintendo DS days. Even when I was playing it alone, in the back of my mind I was always thinking about times past. It’s a rose-tinted glasses, stars-in-your-eyes kind of game for me now, and that’s what I play it for. I don’t care that Pokemon Pokopia and Hello Kitty Island Adventure are technically better in every way; they’re not Animal Crossing, so I couldn’t care less about them.

The feeling is even stronger for series like The Legend of Zelda and Donkey Kong. There was a time when I was a big fan of both and eagerly awaited any new releases. Now though, I don’t think I can call myself a fan anymore since I longer care about their new entries. Rather, I’m only really interested in the games that I grew up with. Playing them now isn’t like playing them back when they were new. Back then, they were just fun games, but now it’s more like they’re representations of the eras they belong to. I play them, and I remember my friends, school, childhood homes, all that stuff.

There are even some games that I simply cannot bring myself to ever start up again due to the memories bound up in them. Mass Effect is one. I was a die hard fan for the original trilogy and absolutely loved everything about them to death, especially the characters. But, I could never play it again now. I don’t want to see the changes made in the remasters or the blemishes of the originals. Mass Effect was a huge part of my late high school and early college self, and I feel like playing it again would dredge up more than I’d like.

Transistor is like that too. I still love that game, but its era was my first couple of years after college. It was a rough transition, and lots of unpleasantness was going on then too. So, again, it’s a game that I think I’m happy to leave in the past despite still very much loving everything about it. Destiny too, is similar in a way, but that’s more a case of the friends I played it with not being around anymore. I could get involved with groups that are still active, but it wouldn’t be the same. If I can’t play Destiny with my old clan, then I don’t wanna play it at all.

I guess the point here was that nostalgia can have a very powerful impact upon games and gaming habits. It elevates some, preserves others and can even remove all appeal from even beloved titles. It’s just such an odd thing, isn’t it?

---

How does nostalgia affect your gaming experience? Would you say it’s largely for the better or for the worse?

Image from Nintendo official website