A big part of growing up in the early 2000’s involved endless dicking around on useless internet games and fiddling around with MSN Messenger until it showed the song you were listening to in your display name. Simpler times, folks.
Like internet sweetheart Chrissy Teigen, heaps of young people played a game called Neopets, which is essentially one of those virtual pet communities with message boards and such. I never played it myself, I was more of a RuneScape weirdo, but kids lost their shit over Neopets.
Like so many of us, Chrissy began reminiscing about the game and from there, it only took her 20 minutes to dive straight back into it. Of course, she documented the whole thing via a series of tweets. She even moderated comments back in the day.
I miss neopets
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) April 19, 2018
I was a comment board moderator. I won multiple caption contests. I’ve basically been told to barely move and let my baby grow so fuck it, I’m going back on neopets
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) April 19, 2018
oh my god neopets has not changed a bit. the omelette…is still cooking
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) April 19, 2018
I vaguely remember these concepts. I remember the faeries. The paintbrushes. The guilds, kind of. But only specks of them. Father Time has stolen my youthful memories of neopia and instead replaced these innocent times with tattered images of a world once simple and kind, (1/59)
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) April 19, 2018
I have no fucking idea what “the omelette” is, but I can only assume it’s an iconic part having a digital blob with dragon wings or whatever.
But what Chrissy’s doing speaks for the enormous nostalgia trends happening right now, particularly in gaming. Publishers have realised just how horny we get for the games we grew up with and that we’re happy to shell out cash for whatever remasters they pump out.
I mean, the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy was an excellent way to revisit such a classic game, and more are on the way, like Spyro the Dragon and the Sega Mega Drive Mini.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to spend the rest of my day resisting the urge to login to my old RuneScape account. Pray for me.
