Tomodachi Life

Tomodachi Life, known in Japan as Tomodachi Collection: New Life, is a 2013 social simulation game developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo 3DS. It is the sequel to the Japan-exclusive Nintendo DS title Tomodachi Collection (2009). The game follows the day-to-day interactions of Miis, customizable avatars, residing on an island as they build relationships and solve problems, all overseen by the player. Much of Tomodachi Collection's staff returned to produce the sequel, including directors Ryutaro Takahashi and Eisaku Nakae. The directorial foundation for Tomodachi Life was set to be a more focused and grounded process compared to its predecessor. The team sought to establish a sociable and warm atmosphere, wanting to inspire players to observe their real-world relationships more positively through the Miis. At the request of Nintendo SPD's General Manager Shinya Takahashi, the game's art director, Mai Okamoto, worked to elevate the series' visuals to a "next-generation" feel, and worked closely with returning programmers Nakae and Masanori Nakagawa to develop the game's surreal situational comedy. Tomodachi Life was initially released in Japan on April 18, 2013. Unlike its predecessor, Nintendo released the game abroad. One roadblock in localizing the original DS game was the inability of the Miis' text-to-speech voices, natively built for Japanese, to process the phonetic complexities of English. To rectify this, American and Japanese developers worked to develop enhanced voice components for several years. Certain imagery native to Japan, currencies, and particular Mii animations were adjusted to better reflect foreign cultures; this stage of localization took over a year. Overseas editions were released on June 6, 2014, in North America and Europe; June 7, in Australia; and July 17, in South Korea. Tomodachi Life sold over 400,000 units in Japan in its debut week and sold 6 million copies worldwide by March 2025, making it one of the best-selling 3DS games. It received generally mixed reviews; it was praised for its humor and overall charm, but critiqued for its repetitive gameplay and lack of user control. The inability for Miis to have same-sex relationships was criticized by reviewers and became the subject of online controversy. In the years following its release, some publications have deemed Tomodachi Life a cult classic among audiences. A sequel for the Nintendo Switch, Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream, was released on April 16, 2026. Among other customization additions, the player can manually select their Miis' romantic preferences, permitting same-sex pairings.