Tomodachi Life

About

Tomodachi Life is a life simulation video game for the Nintendo 3DS handheld console which takes place on the virtual Chin island inhabited by Nintendo Mii^[1] digital avatars. The game gained interest on the English-speaking web after Nintendo announced a North American release in April 2014.

History

On June 18th, 2009, the Nintendo DS life simulation game Tomodachi Collection was released in Japan, in which the player performs everyday tasks to take care of the basic needs of their digital character (shown below, left). On April 18th, 2013, the sequel Tomodachi Life was released for the Nintendo 3DS in Japan (shown below, right). The game is slated for a release in North America and Europe on June 6th, 2014.

Gameplay

Players in Tomodachi Life control a digital avatar known as a “Mii,” which can be imported from other devices, created from scratch or made using a photo taken with the 3DS camera. The player can feed, dress and instruct the character to perform a variety of activities and have it interact with other Miis living on Chin island.

Fandom

All Hail the Virtual Boy

On April 10th, 2014, Nintendo released a promotional video for the upcoming North American release of Tomodachi Life, which featured a montage of sequences from the game including a group of Mii avatars dancing around the 1995 Virtual Boy table-top video game console (shown below).

On the same day, the /r/allhailthevirtualboy^[4] subreddit was launched for discussions regarding Tomodachi Life and the Virtual Boy console. On April 11th, a photograph of Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime hunched over a Virtual Boy console with a speech bubble reading “All hail the Virtual Boy” was posted on the official Nintendo Facebook^[3] and Twitter^[2] pages (shown below). In the first week, the posts received upwards of 57,700 likes and 720 retweets.

Also on April 11th, Redditor ajs880 submitted an animated GIF of the Miis dancing around the Virtual Boy console to the /r/gaming^[5] subreddit, where it gathered over 1,000 up votes and 60 comments within the same time frame.

Search Interest

External References