Press Play to Start: Remakes prove nostalgia is an untapped resource for esports industry

I can’t believe it’s March again. This month marks one year since in-person classes were canceled at USC due to the coronavirus pandemic. At the time, many students thought the virus would be gone in a few weeks, including yours truly. Oh, how naive I was.

Faced with this anniversary,
I couldn’t help but feel nostal- gic about life before the virus. Stuck in my childhood home, I spent a good deal of post-March 2020 scavenging through my childhood possessions, eventu- ally finding my old Nintendo DS. It rapidly consumed my waking hours as I played through every single DS game I owned.

So imagine my surprise when Nintendo announced a remake of “Pokémon Diamond Version” and “Pokémon Pearl Version.”

For those of you who don’t know, a remake in the gaming world is when a studio gets an

old, popular game and remakes it with the newest technology, improving graphics and gener-
al mechanics. Usually, the over- all plot remains the same, but there are some exceptions. In terms of the Pokémon games, Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl were originally released back in 2006 for the Nintendo DS. And while they introduced a lot of new features, such as inter- net play and a whopping 107 new Pokémon, they were also the first Pokémon games I ever played.

Naturally, I was excited to re- visit them, even with the ques- tionable art style they decided to adopt. But when I turned on my PS4 and started playing “Final Fantasy VII remake,” I noticed something strange. Are we get- ting too many remakes?

Sure, Pokémon and Final Fantasy are the first ones that come to mind, but let’s not for- get “Resident Evil 3”, “Demon’s Souls,” “Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2” and even “Spongebob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom- Rehydrated.” All of these remakes — and so many more like them — were released with- in the last year. I can’t help but ask…why?

There is no clear answer to this question, although I’d bet video game companies are trying to capitalize on nostalgia. After all, the games that are being re- made were all originally released around the 2000s. This means that the teens who played them back then are now young adults who can buy games for them- selves. So, from a purely econom- ic lens, it makes total sense to cater to that audience and pro- vide them with a chance to re- live the experience they remem- ber having. And if sales numbers are anything to go by, this strat- egy is definitely paying off. But what can this mean for the world of esports?

Well, it depends. Usually, with a setup like this, you might ex- pect me to say something like, “esports should adopt older games.” But that isn’t the lesson we should learn. What remakes prove to us isn’t that old video games are better, but that nos- talgia is a powerful factor in the gaming sphere. And if the esports scene taps into its history just a little bit, you might see an in- credible result.

An easy way to promote his- tory is to emulate the feeling

of past tournaments. In other words, a tournament environ- ment without a lot of special ef- fects and sellout arena crowds, but rather focusing on enhancing the feeling of community.

One possible way to do this is simply to run multiple tourna- ments simultaneously. In oth-
er words, instead of renting out small venues to run individual events that lead up to a grand tournament, promoting compa- nies could rent out exposition halls where all the minor tour- naments are held at the same time. This would not only save companies a lot of money and time (since they wouldn’t have
to rent out multiple venues and deal with the logistics of running them), but it would also likely guarantee a better profit. After all, fans would only have to at- tend one event instead of many. The simultaneous tournaments would also guarantee no sin-

gle room would be jam-packed, as attendees would spread out throughout the venue to watch different events.

Another way to capitalize on nostalgia would be to involve for- mer esports stars more regularly. By giving them the spotlight once

more, esports fans and attendees would be able to relive childhood memories and, in many cases, meet their idols for the first time. For the pros, this would also be an incredible opportunity to step into the competitive scene again with people of similar skill lev- els. Companies could even pit the newer generation against the old- er, creating a “clash of the ages” tournament that can cross over and appeal to target audiences.

While we might see nostalgia as a cheap gimmick to bring in older audiences, these examples show that relying on this feeling can lead to innovation in the industry. New tournament for- mats, utilization of retired athletes, a heightened sense of community — all of these things can be seen as a “cash grab.” But if implemented successfully, these concepts can be permanent additions to the esports landscape. And, much like remakes, they would allow us to celebrate the rich history of professional gaming in an authentic way.

Guilherme Guerreiro is a sophomore writing about esports. His column, “Press Play to Start,” runs every other Wednesday.