Now I know what you’re thinking, “What the hell is an Adult Mode supposed to be? It’s a kid friendly console you idiot!” I agree with you 100% but just hear me out.
“Adult Mode” doesn’t have to be anything vulgar or crude. Think of it more like an “advanced mode” for players that are sick of the repetitive nonsense of certain games or just want more of a challenge. There’s a lot of changes in a lot of games that I think would benefit greatly from having this option, making the games a lot more fun to play for older audiences.
Mario Party:
Let’s start with a well known classic series. If you’ve played the latest version of Mario Party, you’ve likely shared the same frustrations that I have. Scenes repeating again and again every time a player does something without the ability to skip, lack of difficulty and more. Here’s some changes we would suggest “Adult Mode” to have:
- Ability to skip cutscenes or a setting to have them only play once per game. (IE. when a player gets a goomba “friend” into their party)
- The option for longer games, like the classic 50 turns or a “play to 5 stars” option
- Stars and stealing Stars costs more
- Only the winner gets coins from most games
- Landing on the same space as another player triggers a rival battle between the two
- More maps with more difficult/complex layouts to allow more strategy
Animal Crossing: New Horizons
This game does offer a lot of different ways to play things and there is very little that I would change at the moment but here are just a few;
- Repetitive dialogue from characters only cycles once a day. For example the rug guy; instead of giving you his whole speech every time you talk to him he could instead say it all once and not repeat it again until the next time he visits your island. This would go for many interactions with a lot of players in the game.
- Digging up items only showcases it once per day. Digging up clams to make bait is a pain only made worse by “showing off” your find with every clam.
- Being able to select to craft multiple of the same item at once. Again crafting 15 bait, one at a time, is extremely annoying.
- Highlighting items either when found and/or in your inventory that haven’t been donated to the museum yet to stop players from having to check every single time. Especially for those islands with multiple players.
Trivial Pursuit:
This isn’t a game that caught nearly as much traction as the other two did but it’s one we play a lot, especially while drinking. Although it’s a lot of fun there are still a few little tweaks that would elevate the experience so drastically that everyone would be excited every time we mention it.
- All slices to win. Currently you only need to win 6 rounds to win the game. It doesn’t matter if all the “slices” you get are from the same category.
- Infinite rounds until someone wins. Currently there is an option of either 3 or 5 rounds and the final round goes through all categories extremely quickly to get a winner.
- Ability to “steal” pieces. Winning a category that you already have a piece for doesn’t get you anything but makes it so that no one else can get it that round. Perhaps after winning the same round multiple times you’ll be able to reach a number that allows you to pick a slice from another category. EI: 6 extras slices in history can be traded to any other color you don’t have.
Now I know that there is a lot of other alterations for different games out there that you would love to see implemented. Let us know how an “Adult Mode” could change gaming for you, in the comments below!
TLDR
Games from Nintendo can tend to be repetitive and often overly simple. With a few alterations games could be cranked up to a level where people will be captivated and won’t lose interest, no matter their age.