How Animal Crossing helped me explore my gender
It’s 2013, and tonight my friends and I are getting together to wish on falling stars during a meteor shower. Like many young teens meeting up with their pals, I want to show off my sense of style, so I spend a solid amount of time trying on different skirts, dresses, and accessories in order to find the cutest look. Luckily, I don’t have to worry about how comfortable the outfit will be or whether the fabric will chafe against my skin since the clothes aren’t going on my physical body but, rather, on my villager in the world of Animal Crossing: New Leaf for the Nintendo 3DS.
In real life, I’m a tall, slightly chubby, pubescent boy with the acne and self-esteem to match. Even though I go to a fairly liberal high school and have been publicly out as gay for nearly a year, there’s no way I could go outside in any sort of feminine attire without attracting the attention of every classmate and teacher, something I wouldn’t wish upon any 13-year-old. However, in Animal Crossing: New Leaf, I can be whoever I want to be — within the confines of New Leaf’s binary gender system, skinny player models, and light skin tones, that is.
It’s not perfect by any means, but New Leaf is the first game in the Animal Crossing franchise that lets male villagers wear feminine clothing and vice versa. So, for people like me who have masculine bodies but want to explore femininity, it’s a blessing. When I visit my online friends’ towns during our weekend Skype sessions, I can present myself in a way that makes me feel cute and confident. It’s almost like that digital version is a more accurate depiction of who I am than the person I see when I look in the mirror. I have no desire to dress like that in real life — or at least that’s what I keep
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