https://www.cybersport.ru/games/articles/tamagochi-v-2021-godu-mashina-vremeni-v-tvoi-nulevye

The theme for the article was thought up by the editor-in-chief of Cybersport.ru. He decided to give one of the authors a pet and see if the journalist survives when faced with real problems – cleaning up poop from the virtual space and entertaining a gadget that requires the attention of a resident. I didn’t mind, that’s why my friend came to me, named Arthas. The name is honestly “plagiarized” from another editorial staff member who had previously named his real pet that way. And memno, of course.

Getting to know the Tamagotchi in 2023

Hatching from an egg in the middle of the night, Arthas ate twice and … fell asleep until morning. From the first minutes it became clear that our biorhythms did not coincide as much as possible. I work mostly on the evening shift and often stay awake at night, mostly playing something. Tamagotchi, on the other hand, decided to stick to the standard schedule of larks: he sleeps sweetly all night, and in the morning he begins to do his dark deeds. At the same time, I have to wake up to vigorous sound signals informing me of problems with two parameters – hunger and discomfort.

The dark deeds turned out to be really dark. Tamagotchi Chibi from Bandai Co appeared in my hands – an official Tamagotchi, not a Chinese clone, which was enough in the 90s. This is a re-release of the 2005 model, which is 20% smaller than the standard device. Chibi in the name literally means “small”. The screen of my Tamagotchi is only 16 by 16 pixels, and it has no backlight. Viewing a pet on the screen is a difficult task, especially when sleeping.

Probably, I could adjust the biorhythms of the Tamagotchi for myself, simply by setting a different time when I first turned it on. The setting is quite friendly, but the original childhood experiences were still different. While playing with the Tamagotchi, I felt those very childhood moments like my skin – the first Tamagotchi, joy, boasting, subsequent disappointment and tears … A kaleidoscope of emotions – that’s why a Tamagotchi is needed in 2023.

My first Tamagotchi

My story with “those same Tamagotchi” in the late nineties was rather short. Being a very impressionable child and unstable to stress, I was deprived of the joy of having my own Tamagotchi – my mother and grandmother flatly refused to buy me a virtual friend. While preparing for the article, I asked why they took the path of prohibition, although usually, on the contrary, they were open to everything new. The answer did not surprise me: they were afraid that the toy would bring me negative emotions, and also doubted my ability to take care of the pet. The grandmother put it succinctly: “He would have died, you would have cried, did we need it?”

I got my first Tamagotchi only in high school – at a time when the only chance to buy something forbidden was to accumulate “money from breakfast”. I used to spend my pocket money on stickers with Natalia Oreiro, so I had to tighten my belt tighter. And yet I got a Tamagotchi.

The Tamagotchi named Artas is a pale copy of the Chinese monster that I bought at the Main Market in Petrozavodsk. A resident of Karelia had four buttons, many functions and settings, and most importantly, he wanted everything and always. Eat? Yes, immediately and more. Play? Of course, right now. Sleep? No, I will rest for an hour – and again into battle, pew-pew-pew. There was no smell of originality there: a Chinese monster hatched at a factory among millions of the same fakes.

Now, having access to Google, I read that some Tamagotchi had a bug (or even a feature) – it was possible to start the time acceleration mode so that the pet lived its life 60 times faster than at a normal pace. It so happened that my very first, but now not the last virtual pet ingloriously died on the third day of its existence. I was a great hostess, honestly! He just wanted everything at once, constantly defecated, begged for food and squeaked from lack of attention. It was a bug, or I just wasn’t ready for so many virtual feces, I don’t know. I don’t remember experiencing any upset after his death. It seems he just got me.

Arthas’s personality is completely different. He’s … boring. Perhaps the same feeling you get when you start a turtle. If the first virtual pet was more of an insane puppy, then the pupil of 2023 is definitely a slow reptile. He doesn’t care if I’m around or not. He will tell you that he is hungry, and even happy to have a snack if I decide to feed him. If not, then it will be interrupted. Having gone to the toilet, he will also inform about this, but he will not report twice – he does not care if I removed the pixel poop or not.

My first “night”, that is, day in the standard sense of most people, I woke up at the call “pip-pip-pip”, fearing for the well-being of Arthas and the Cybersport.ru experiment. In the second I decided not to react to signals … It turned out that there was no difference. Most likely, I will burn for this in virtual hell, but interrupting my sleep to care for a pixel friend seems like a strange action, so Arthas has every chance of not living to old age.

Apparently, in the new versions of Tamagotchi, the speed of reaction to his requests affects only the type of the last form of the pet. In my Chibi, there are no special functions in principle, so I just feed the Tamagotchi and clean it up for almost a week … By the way, Arthas got the second form. According to the instructions, the next transformation will be unusual. In the original, it depended on the user’s attentiveness to the pet. Let’s hope the Prince of Lordaeron will prove himself.

Who are Tamagotchi? You will be surprised, but virtual pets have lore!

The name “tamagotchi” comes from two words: tamago (from the Japanese for “egg”) and watti (derived from watch – from the English “watch”). This is why the original Tamagotchi are only available in egg shape (sometimes with shell designs). Other specimens in the shape of hearts and cat paws are Chinese fantasies on the topic.

The Tamagotchi did have a thoughtful history. The creatures trapped in a tiny gadget with a small screen are aliens. They arrived on Earth due to the fact that their planet … got drunk and began to sing loudly, which made it unusable for life on it. This happened in 1996. The culprit of the disaster was an ultra-rare Tamagotchi rebel named Oyajitchi, who was very difficult to grow: throughout his life he had to be a bully, but not die by the end of the cycle.

The singing of the planet was disgusting, moreover, it began to transform, so the Tamagotchi race together loaded into the UFO-chi and flew to plow space. However, the ship had a breakdown over Earth and crashed into the Sumida River in Japan. The spacecraft was found there by scientist Banzo and his assistant Mikachu.

The Earth’s atmosphere turned out to be unsuitable for the breathing of the Tamagotchi, but scientists have found a way to keep them alive. This is how small incubators appeared to be cared for. For two years scientists and children around the world have been caring for the Tamagotchi. By 1998, the planet had sobered up, and the UFO-chi had been repaired. The Tamagotchi thanked the earthlings and returned home, but some decided to stay on our planet and live in ordinary families.

The full lore of classic Japanese tamagotchi is reminiscent of the plot of a serial anime. There are many spin-offs to their history, different species and generations of aliens subsequently flew to Earth. New characters appeared in the plot and old ones died. In general, only a true fan can understand them. The plot was enough for me, a cool story about a drunken planet!

Do you need a Tamagotchi?

In the nineties, Tamagotchi made a splash all over the world. In those years we had “Gangster Petersburg”, and in Japan it was almost cyberpunk. Gadgets and equipment from the Land of the Rising Sun were the coolest, and this played a disadvantage: the original Tamagotchi rarely reached us and were expensive, and in the outback they never existed at all.

Whether it’s an original egg or a fake Chinese one, the virtual pet helped many kids learn a quick lesson on “Pets are so-so toys” in 2000s. Yes, it was cool to sit in the school company, show off your pets and put them back in your portfolio. Waking up at the call of a squeaking asshole is not very good. And of course, the most terrible moment awaited every (even the most caring!) Owner at the end of the life cycle. Tamagotchi always dies, this is the “chip” of the gadget.

The lifespan of a Tamagotchi is rather short, even for a child’s perception. According to various information on the network, virtual pets live from one to two months. The chances that the child will abandon the toy earlier is quite high, but nevertheless, many users have personally observed the grave on the screen. By this point, the owner of the pixel friend was already getting used to it, so death was most often painful.

My first experience with a Tamagotchi from childhood was a failure, and the death of Arthas, although he became the central character of an entire article, is unlikely to touch to the core. For an adult, a Tamagotchi can serve as a portal to childhood. Sit and twirl the “egg” in your hands, remember how Natasha pulled the pigtails from the fifth “A”. Nostalgia is powerful, and if you like mentally running a time machine, I recommend it.

Tamagotchi is hardly suitable for modern children, even the most unspoiled ones. Anyway, my version of Chibi is for sure – the technical characteristics are too bad for a generation that has not seen black and white screens. I see in Tamagotchi only an educational function, which was initially underestimated by opponents of virtual deaths. Tamagotchi can become the same hamster, which in some families, according to the bearded anecdote, has “the task in the spirit of Jesus – to show children death.” It’s still easier to come to terms with virtual death and realize its inevitability in a playful way. Those who have ever had real pets die will definitely understand me. In addition, the child will be able to understand that the kitten or dog does not always want to play and sometimes go to the toilet at the wrong time.