Back in 2020, Animal Crossing: New Horizons was a beacon of light for many, myself included. A cosy life sim you could pick up every day and use to boost your serotonin by helping adorable villagers build a peaceful home. It offered solace and comfort exactly when the world needed it most.
However, before New Horizons, there was MySims, a cosy spin-off which filled that exact same role for me back in 2007 and 2008, a period we simply refer to as the dark times in our house. Now, 18 years later, I’m back in that tiny chibi village trying to remember how to build walls and where to find Charlie the Chef. It’s been an emotional and unexpected journey.
Dark Times And Light Games
Without going into too much detail and depressing you all, 2007 is a year I barely remember. My husband and I had to deal with the loss of a parent, a host of mental health issues and some circumstances beyond our control that halved our income overnight, all within a few short weeks of our second child’s birth. Everything came very close together, and for the most part, all I remember is existing.
At some point I ended up with MySims on Nintendo DS.
I have no recollection of buying MySims, but it was a decision well worth making, as some of my only real memories of that time are stupid things I did in this quirky little spin-off. I created my best version of me, one with funky hair and a smile on her face. She got to live a great life. She had a cool house, she got to do things like paragliding and scuba diving, and she had friends. Socialising was easy for her, and she met some super cool characters and read all their backstories, consuming snippets of lore like it was a best-selling novel.
MySims DS has a townie called Helen, and seeing my own name in a game always makes me ridiculously happy.
The town was run down, but I helped restore it, one request at a time. It only takes a few hours to follow the core storyline through, but afterward you can still play the minigames, like fishing, entering fashion shows, and playing casino games, and of course, earn more money for decorating.
At some point, things turned around, both in my town and my life, and while I continued to play some of the other MySims titles, they eventually faded away, much like my DS, which these days sits neglected on a shelf.
Going Back To The Past
The re-release has been a strange experience. If you have a game closely linked to a traumatic time, then going back to it can be very difficult, but I knew I loved MySims despite the memories surrounding it.
I remember wanting to know everything I could about all the characters, and I fondly recall the slightly simplistic and janky controls, longing for the precision that The Sims 2 offered me as I reconstructed that idyllic town I so wanted to get lost in for real. I wanted to play again, trauma be damned!
So, when I was offered the chance to dive back into the MySims Collection, I tentatively took it. I expected a huge nostalgia wave to hit me, likely followed by the mother of all flashbacks, but instead, I was met with confusion.
It’s MySims, But Not As We Know It
So, it turns out that MySims on the DS is actually a completely different game to the Wii and PC version which this re-release is based on.
Tyler the tailor, Hawk the casino dealer, Sophie the furniture store owner, and most devastatingly, Helen, were all gone. Now the chef is called Gino, and I’m running around with people called Odin, Morcubus, and Goth Boy, as if these are all incredibly common names.
You are still tasked with restoring a town, but the people you meet and the quests you do are all different. Collecting essences is now a core feature of the game, rather than something pretty much hidden from you, and most importantly, you can build things instead of just buying and placing them.
This town is also larger and more populated, but the core cosy experience remains intact. I still wanted to befriend all the townies, even if I did miss Helen and her stupid snobby comments about guests wanting more from me. But the new stories and discoveries managed to perfectly balance the nostalgia with the new.
In the end, my experience has been both amusing and confusing. I’m thankful for the differences I didn’t know about - even though I’ve been caught out by this whole ‘the DS game is totally different’ thing before - as I suspect it saved me from the flashbacks I was expecting but never got.
Now I can enjoy the comfort of MySims with a whole new cast of characters, utilising the building skills I spent decades honing in the mainline Sims games. This is the MySims I remember at its core but wrapped in a new package of lore with a shiny bow of features. It’s like a sequel I didn’t know existed.
So, if you’re excited to play MySims and fondly recall the Wii or PC version, jump right in and enjoy the nostalgia trip. If, on the other hand, you played the DS version and had no idea it was different, then consider this a spiritual sequel.
