I can remember these weird little egg things attached to everyone’s rucksack at school. They were bloody everywhere, and I think I had one. It probably died quite soon after I got it, and then bitched about me in the afterlife along with my decapitated Barbies and burnt teddy bears. There seems to be a strange anticipation towards the return of Tamagotchis - I must have missed the memo about the national wake for these little liabilities, because I can’t quite compute the hype. The thing I remember most about Tamagotchis is parents looking after them. Once the reality of responsibility took over, to the parents they went. Naturally once a Tamagotchi reached its inevitable death children would scream bloody murder, and I honestly don’t think parents really gave a shit, just more relieved if anything. Until the thing came back to life. To celebrate 20 years of wasted childhood Tamagotchi are releasing their latest design, which is basically the same as the original from 1997 just swankier. The same concept still applies: feed it, clean up after it, and try not to let it die. You will have 3 buttons to do this. The very same 3 buttons which even today I cannot recall the official function of. Apparently said functions are meant to be simple to allow some sort of Tamagotchi-life balance. Eventually this then leads to forgetting about the bugger completely. I’m predicting that this era of children are going to create some sort of super Tamagotchi, and actually see what this pet was meant to evolve into. 90s kids had a tendancy to instantaneously malnurish them. Then again, kids today have something our generation didn’t have: complete access to the internet. Yes, like most fun things the mystery is killed by Googling the cheats. To be fair I probably enjoyed playing the Sims purely because mine were always minted. It’s weird to think that a toy without any connection to the internet, or app that engages with social media platforms, could possibly be totally unique to kids today. But you could just give a child a plant, or gerbil to look after- in theory the life expectancy should be longer. To be honest I just don’t think people have the patience for Tamagotchis, and the novelty will probably wear off soon enough - kind of like Pokémon Go. If anything it’s just another digital device to check on for updates, in the form of a really high maintenance virtual pet. Maybe my outlook is too pesimistic, as Tamagotchis are still a big deal in Japan and we’re just about ready for our next fad.
