With our attention on latex fashions and alternative wardrobe styles, we’re often reporting on stories about movies, celebrities, and music. Seemingly every day, there comes an Instagram picture of a Kardashian rocking some cool new outfit or a ‘dropped’ video featuring some luscious fetish look. And even though the latest spate of superhero movies might be suffering delayed openings, at least for the time being, we all know cosplayers seemingly rule the world. But a sect of the culture we seem to have ignored, (for no true reason) is gaming, especially where new wardrobe trends meet the most popular social simulations. Nintendo’s Animal Crossing: New Horizons has grabbed the global sartorial zeitgeist by becoming an unexpected but genuine platform for worldwide fashion.
Launched in March, this most recent installation of Nintendo’s Animal Crossing game has exploded in popularity. As much do to the fact that it is fun to play as that the global population has been pretty much isolated the past few months, lots of folks have taken to the world and characters of the game. And it’s these players who have taken to dressing the games’ avatars. Recreated and shared among players recreating and sharing wardrobe ‘codes,’ the avatars as well as the landscape of New Horizons has been influenced from haute couture, have had houses like Marc Jacobs and Valentine host gatherings and ‘lookbooks,’ and even a fashion show happened online featuring the game’s characters.
And for Pride Month, one could outfit one’s island in rainbow colors.
It’s not clear when or if an Alligator Villager might sport a latex corset any time soon. Or if some alternate runway show might show up suddenly on an island. But we can all easily predict that with gaming and esports said to hit a 160 billion revenue uptick in 2020, the marriage of fashion and gaming is very healthy indeed.
