Creature comfort

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This article was published 20/04/2020 (2152 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The latest instalment of Nintendo’s Animal Crossing, a cute series with a cult following, has fast become the unofficial video game of the pandemic.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons, which was released for the Nintendo Switch on March 20, was already much anticipated since it had been seven years since Nintendo had released a main Animal Crossing title. But a social simulation game arriving to the market when much of the world is in isolation? You can’t buy that kind of timing.

If you’re not hip to the world of Animal Crossing, which first debuted back in 2001, the gist is this: you play a customizable human who lives among anthropomorphic animals with huge personalities, this time on a deserted island. You plant trees and flowers, pull weeds, run errands, catch fish and bugs. There’s currency in Animal Crossing, called bells, and also, debt. Your deserted island, purchased from Tom Nook — a much-memed, sleepy-eyed raccoon who has been called everything from a “greedy businessman” to a “capitalist overlord” — must be paid off.

“You’re just aggressively in debt to a raccoon, and then as soon as you’re out of debt to the raccoon, you’re immediately in debt again for a larger amount,” says longtime player Chris Davis, of Winnipeg, with a laugh.

Right about now, you may be thinking to yourself, “this sounds suspiciously like doing chores” and “why is this fun?” Reader, it is so fun. Like, inexplicably fun. Davis, 25, suspects it’s the relative absurdity of the game’s premise that endears it to people. “Like, the fact that you’re the only human on an island full of strange animals that seem to have very established back stories,” he says. “Maybe it just tries to impart that it’s OK to not rush through a game. I think so many games are so focused on the grind of beating it; I don’t think you can ‘beat’ Animal Crossing.”

That’s precisely what attracted Winnipegger Brittany Foden to Animal Crossing. “I’ve always liked games you can do at your own pace,” says the 29-year-old, who has already sunk 140 hours into the game. “There’s no real end to it. You go along and you play and you unlock new things. You can literally play this for years.”

Even though the stakes are extremely low and also it is a game, Foden confesses she’s reluctant about playing the Stalk Market, Animal Crossing’s fluctuating stock market. On Sunday mornings, Daisy Mae, a little boar whose nose is always running for some reason, sells turnips, which you attempt to buy at a low price and sell for profit.

“I’m very nervous about it,” she says, laughing. “I don’t have good luck with gambling. Even though it’s fake money, I’m like, ‘It’s money I could give Tom Nook for my house loan.’ I get legitimately scared. What if the turnip market takes a turn?”

Lloyd Hannesson, 43, is a local podcaster and lifelong gamer. Last month, he added an Animal Crossing-themed show to his stable of games-related podcasts called Crossing Animals, and has heard from many people that the game is what’s getting them through the pandemic. (I can relate: dozens of Winnipeggers also wanted to be interviewed for this piece.)

“I think right now, it’s such a happy place,” he says. “It’s a happy little town, you have all these fun animal friends who are talking to you, no one has a care in the world. Even though you’re locked inside, you can escape into this other, more colourful, happy world.”

Hannesson says Animal Crossing’s demographic-spanning appeal may also account for the moment it’s having. Anyone can play it so everyone’s playing it. “Which is great, because then you get what’s happening on Twitter right now where it seems like every third post is about Animal Crossing or what their town looks like or the cool shirt they just made,” he says. “I don’t remember seeing something like this for almost any other video game.”

Still, not everyone gets it. “I tried to explain it to my mom and show her my island, and she just kind of sat there staring at me weird, like, ‘OK, that’s cool…’” Foden says with a laugh. “I was showing her villagers. ‘This is Celia, she’s an eagle, she calls me feathers.’ And my mom was like, ‘OK, what’s the point?’ That’s it. That’s the point.”

Albertine Watson, a Winnipeg-based game developer, says that Animal Crossing: New Horizons fits snugly within a broader gaming trend: cozy games.

“There will always be a market for really intense shooter-type games that have a fair bit of violence or military simulation — those games aren’t going away anytime soon,” she says. “But we really have seen a rise in these kinds of cute, comforting, wholesome games.”

Watson, 30, says there’s been lot of discussion in game academia and among developers over the past few years about what, exactly, constitutes a “cozy game.”

“A lot of it has to do with freedom of expression, so being able to experiment with your clothing or your presentation or how you wear your hair with no real downside,” she says. “And then being able to explore a space without a threat. So, in certain games you can explore a space — but zombies are coming so you better be prepared. Whereas in Animal Crossing, you’re just exploring, and you’re hoping to come across a new species of insect that you haven’t catalogued in your encyclopedia yet, or you’re trying to find fossils to donate to the local museum.” (You can, however, be stung by wasps in Animal Crossing, so be careful when shaking those trees for loot.)

For Winnipegger Shae-lyn Gordon, 24, being able to design her island, her home, and her outfits — all of which are honeybee themed, by the way — was a big draw. “It’s a good distraction,” she says.

Crucially, because friends can visit your island, the game also offers a way to distantly socialize that isn’t, say, yet another Zoom call.

“I don’t live with my step-brother, so us being able to buy him that game and then we can play hide and seek or Marco Polo — it’s a different way to connect with him, other than being upset we can’t see each other,” Gordon says. “My birthday is in 10 days, and planning a party on Animal Crossing sounds so fun.”

Winnipegger Kaitlin Bilodeau, 21, has created a big group of online and offline friends who all play Animal Crossing together. The friend group spans continents, with members from the U.S., Europe, the Philippines and Australia. “We’ve all been able to meet up with each other through the game and have become closer. It’s been a really nice thing, and I’ve been able to include my local friends. Everyone is constantly checking in and being really sweet and nice to each other.”

Bilodeau is a longtime fan of the series, but the social simulation element of the game has carried new resonance during the pandemic.

“I haven’t been able to see my girlfriend in person for a month now, but we are still able to connect and meet up and, like, I don’t know, go to the museum together in the game,” she says. “We can’t see each other right now, but it still gives that simulated sense of hanging out and being in the same room. It wasn’t until I put the game down that I realized it actually made me feel better and like we spent some time together. Like, ‘Oh, dang, this game does feel really nice.’”

It makes sense, then, that Animal Crossing would emerge as a balm for our collective, pandemic-induced anxiety.

“It’s refreshing to be able to open this game and say, ‘I’m going to water some flowers today and check in on my little neighbours,’ which I can’t do in real life,” Watson says. “I think everyone wants something comforting right now, and Animal Crossing is very prepared to provide that in abundance.”

jen.zoratti@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @JenZoratti