Attention all DPAD cuties, oogleys and egomaniacs: My normally exuberant brainwaves have reached a critical mass. I have to get something out of my system, preferably now, or my mind is liable to implode. It seems I’ve been infected with the nostalgia virus, you know, the kind that always shows up before that next big game sequel hits the shelves. Unrequested remembrances of bug-eyed, bipolar & culturally inclined animals have been jogging across the dilated remains of what used to be a fine damn pair of conscious eyes. This is one of those rare moments in life where you wish you had an exceptionally lazy eye to steer away all the thoughts down through your nose and out of your mouth. Lucky me though, instead I can quite simply transfer everything directly from my head to my fingers and onto fully digitalized parchment. It's one of the perks of being a writer, or at least an aspiring one.

We’re getting too far ahead of ourselves though, and certainly too far away from the problem at hand. Which, as it would seem I’ve yet to disclose to you. Well, take a seat my aesthetically gifted readers (yes, I just called you beautiful), that is, assuming for some reason that you usually browse the internet standing up like I do — because I'm going to throw all of my problems right at you. In fact, we can even role play, I'll be the oil polluted ocean and you be the innocent penguin - let's see where this goes. Hopefully by the end my problem will be your own.

So here’s the deal, it’s the soon-to-be Animal Crossing 2 on Nintendo’s upcoming Wii platform. There’s something about it that seems to resonate potential from top to bottom, starting with the leap it will undoubtedly take from its predecessor. I wonder if everyone has so soon forgotten that the Animal Crossing we all enjoyed and loved was in actuality pretty much a direct port from the Japanese N64 title, Animal Forest. What this means for the next installment is pretty substantial, because AC didn’t even make good use of the technology gap between the N64 and GameCube, so the Wii version should be one heck of an upgrade.

Animal Crossing 2 will be one of the greatest niché titles to ever hit a next-generation console. Go ahead and mark that in stone, start your carving now so that the cavemen of post WWIII have something to worship because my prophecy is as bankable as the latest Pirates flick. Heck, it’s not even a risk, it's easy money. But this is where my mind starts running without gas, dragging me along for the painfully seductive ride. There are so many tickets to the possibility-coaster, “All these tickets… there’s so maaannny!” (Bonus eSports points for who can tell me what CS movie that is from).

Remember how scavenging the land of AC was all about collecting those NES emulations? Well, say hello to big brother, SNES and N64. Keep in mind that around the time the GameCube was introduced, the N64 was still in production. Nowadays you would be hard pressed to find games for it, much less the console itself. Of course they couldn’t fit a whole collection of elaborate N64 titles on the AC2 disc, but surely we could see a level or two from our favorite oldies. That’s just the tip of the iceberg though.