40 Fun Facts About Tomodachi Life

Kept in Tomodachi Life's Western title for intrigue, the Japanese word "tomodachi" means what?

Friend is the literal meaning, and Nintendo kept the word abroad to make the game stand out. In Japan the 3DS game was sold as Tomodachi Collection: New Life.

Before making births automatic, Tomodachi Life's developers pictured married Miis having babies how?

Laying eggs was an early idea, with babies hatching out, while a slowly growing belly was rejected as too graphic. In the finished 3DS game, babies simply arrive.

The name Mii, shared by every Tomodachi Life islander, blends a console's name with which word?

Me plus Wii gives Mii, because the avatars usually stand in for the people holding the controller. They first appeared on Nintendo's motion-control console in 2006.

Which option, missing from Tomodachi Life despite a fan campaign, did Nintendo add in Living the Dream?

Same-sex romance arrived with the 2026 sequel, years after Nintendo apologised and promised a more inclusive follow-up. Each Mii's dating preferences are now set by hand.

Which HBO host mocked a Tomodachi Life controversy with cartoons pairing off Nintendo characters?

John Oliver used Last Week Tonight to spoof the row, showing Nintendo mascots as couples. The row had flared when Nintendo said the missing feature could not be patched into the 3DS game.

Tomodachi Life's North American website offered Miis of Christina Aguilera and which basketball star?

Shaquille O'Neal and the pop singer were offered as QR codes on the North American site, each dressed in custom outfits. Scanning a code moved the star onto a player's island.

Reviewers often likened Tomodachi Life to which other Nintendo series that had a surprise hit on the 3DS?

Animal Crossing is the usual comparison, yet Tomodachi Life keeps the player outside the action as an all-seeing observer who never walks the island in person.

Which Nintendo series has a Tomodachi Life stage whose background Miis come from the player's console?

Super Smash Bros. turned the Mii apartment block into a fighting arena on the 3DS in 2014, with the handheld's saved Miis watching from the rooms. It came back in Ultimate.

Which Nintendo designer, long keen on player avatars, turned Tomodachi Collection's face maker into Miis?

Shigeru Miyamoto saw the DS prototype and pushed to rework it as built-in software for the Wii. Many colleagues first judged the simple faces too crude.

Tomodachi Collection stayed in Japan largely because its Mii voice software could not handle which language?

English sounds proved too complex for a voice program built around Japanese speech. The producer suggested trying again on stronger hardware, and the 3DS sequel finally managed it.

Tomodachi Life's Miis speak real words, unlike the invented language of which rival life-sim series?

The Sims gives its characters a made-up tongue, so one IGN reviewer praised the Miis' understandable speech for adding an extra layer of context to island gossip.

Time on a Tomodachi Life island runs in step with what?

The console's clock drives island time, so mornings and nights match the real day. Nintendo warns that changing it can block money collection for a day or two.

Living the Dream's sound director processed Tomodachi Life's realistic new Mii voices to sound how?

Robotic voices are a series trademark, so Toru Minegishi roughened the lifelike new speech engine on purpose. Too much realism, he found, stopped a character sounding like a Mii.

At which Tomodachi Life building do players create new Miis and scan QR codes to add islanders?

Town Hall is the island's office for making, editing and trading Miis, and its options menu hides the delete-save button. The population can grow to 100 from here.

In Tomodachi Life's reveal broadcast, Eiji Aonuma's Mii chats with which princess from his own series?

Zelda appeared as a Mii so Nintendo could demonstrate islanders talking to each other. Mii caricatures of Satoru Iwata and Reggie Fils-Aimé also starred in the April 2014 video.

In Tomodachi Life's North American release, football replaced a minigame about which Japanese sport?

Sumo gave way to gridiron during a localisation that took over a year. Nintendo also changed gestures and currencies so the islanders would feel like locals.

Which 2016 smartphone app, built by Tomodachi Life's lead developers, was Nintendo's first mobile release?

Miitomo had avatars trade answers to light-hearted questions and passed ten million downloads within a month. Nintendo shut the service down in May 2018.

In Tomodachi Life, grown-up children can travel to other players' islands through which 3DS feature?

StreetPass swaps data between consoles that pass each other in the real world, carrying a traveller to a stranger's island. Travellers then mail letters home about the trip.

In Tomodachi Life, a Mii handed its super all-time favourite food shows delight by doing what?

Flying into space is the reaction saved for the one dish a Mii loves most, while hated foods make it retch and add no happiness. Every islander's tastes are different.

At which landmark on a Tomodachi Life island do Miis gather each day to donate money to the player?

Fountain gatherings work as a daily fundraiser, with residents chipping in cash that can be spent in the shops. Nintendo joked that every classy town has one.

Tomodachi Quest, a retro minigame in Tomodachi Life's amusement park, spoofs which video game genre?

Role-playing fights in the turn-based style of Final Fantasy pit a party of islanders against inanimate objects, including a Super Scope light gun.

Tomodachi Life opens with two jobs: naming the island and creating which special first Mii?

The player's look-alike is built to resemble whoever is holding the console, and it moves in as the very first resident of the Mii apartment block.

Which Nintendo 3DS game includes a seconds-long challenge based on Tomodachi Life?

WarioWare Gold shrank Mii island living into a challenge lasting a few seconds, one of more than 300 microgames in the 2018 release.

Which 3DS Mii adventure, in which a Dark Lord steals faces, can take in Miis straight from Tomodachi Life?

Miitopia borrows more than its cast: heroes bond between fights at inns, and party members who quarrel perform worse in combat.

The prototype that became Tomodachi Collection was first pitched as which kind of DS software for adult women?

Fortune-telling drove the 2005 pitch, which stored only names and birthdays until the team added a 3D face maker. That face maker became the basis for Nintendo's Miis.

Which hands-on feature of Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream began as a debug tool for its developers?

Picking up Miis let testers force far-flung characters together on the roomier map. The team enjoyed nudging pairs to meet so much that the tool stayed in the game.

Which Nintendo veteran, known for directing Metroid games, produced Tomodachi Collection and its 3DS sequel?

Yoshio Sakamoto juggled the first game with Metroid: Other M, which stretched its schedule. He later said the delay gave the team room to try odd ideas.

Which Tomodachi Life staple was almost cut from Living the Dream until a younger designer objected?

Mii News survived because the designer argued the sequel would not feel like the series without its bulletins. A shortage of time had nearly squeezed the broadcasts out.

Tomodachi Collection grew from a plan to remake, for adult women, a Game Boy Color game based on which anime?

Hamtaro lent its name to a 2000 game in which young girls logged profiles of people close to them to measure compatibility. Female staff at Nintendo asked for a grown-up version.

Tomodachi Collection's face maker, forerunner of the Mii, drew on which Japanese face-arranging game?

Fukuwarai involves assembling a face from loose parts, and the DS prototype worked the same way. Letting users rotate, resize and shift each feature made its caricatures sharper.

Explorers camping on a Tomodachi Life island sell special goods for which 3DS currency earned by walking?

Play Coins build up as the handheld counts its owner's steps, at most ten a day. Travellers who pitch a tent overnight at the campsite swap rare products for them.

Tomodachi Life reached North America alongside a new Sea Green edition of which Nintendo handheld?

Nintendo 2DS consoles in the new colour went on sale the same day in June 2014. The slate-shaped handheld has no hinge, so a switch stands in for closing the lid.

Which X Factor Australia winner, later a Eurovision runner-up, promoted Tomodachi Life for Nintendo?

Dami Im starred with her own personalised Mii in Nintendo of Australia's YouTube videos in 2014. Two years later she finished second at Eurovision in Stockholm.

Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream varies food by region: Japan gets rice balls, the US gets which treat?

S'mores greet US players because early shop stock matches the game's region setting, though every food unlocks in time. Prices follow suit, shown in yen, dollars or euros.

Which studio, maker of Fire Emblem and Paper Mario, assisted Nintendo on Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream?

Intelligent Systems joined Bandai Namco's studios in Singapore and Malaysia in supporting Nintendo's in-house team. Work on the sequel began in 2017 and ran for nine years.

At which Tomodachi Life hangout do Miis meet to trade gossip that reveals how island relationships are going?

Café chatter lets a player eavesdrop on who gets along and who does not. Nintendo's site promised gossip, romance and, almost as an afterthought, coffee.

A Tomodachi Life islander struggling to sneeze asks the player to help in which way?

Tickling its nose on the touch screen brings on the sneeze. Other small favours include handing over cold medicine or a bath set for a long soak.

Which musical showdown between Miis was newly added to Tomodachi Life for its Western release?

Rap battle scenes were missing from the 2013 Japanese original and arrived with the localisation. Personality types and foods were also reworked for overseas tastes.

Tomodachi Life's sixteen Mii personality types were likened by one reviewer to a simplified version of which test?

Myers-Briggs also sorts people into sixteen types. In the game, sliders for traits such as movement, speech and quirkiness decide where each islander lands.

Tomodachi Life's long-time director says the series aims to be the ultimate game built around what?

Inside jokes shared by people who know each other are the point, Ryutaro Takahashi explained. That idea led the Switch sequel to let owners create their own content.