Twister? 2025 relaunch cancelled after disastrous trials across all age cohorts
It was supposed to be the nostalgic blockbuster of the year: the highly anticipated relaunch of a classic game from the 1970's: Twister?. Sadly the project has been pulled and launch dates scrapped. A catastrophic series of pilots revealed that social games of physical skill and agility no longer have relevance for any age group of any gender in any geography.
"Obviously we are all deeply disappointed", says relaunch product manager Jim (49). "I grew up with the dotted vinyl mat, my parents played it as a drinking game at cocktail parties. I played it at least once with my kids when they were young. I honestly thought it would be hit."
Jim lays out dozens of photographs from the North American and European trials that ran over the past four months. "You can see we had high hopes, but it was a terrible run from start to end." He talks us through the age cohorts one by one.
"All children under 12 years of age simply didn't know what to do. They just stood there, perplexed. When our IT guy hacked a digital spinner to see if they'd respond to a mixed-media solution, a few kids engaged but they mat was ignored."
"The teenagers thought the whole thing was gross and would only go on to the mat individually. Which isn't fun, of course".
"The under 25's were quite excited at first, but they kept getting their piercings interlocked which made it a painful business."
"Millennials insisted on disinfecting the mat after every spin and refused to go on the mat together without wearing masks and gloves. Also, some referred to spinning colours as colonialist and refused to particate unless we made all dots the same colour."
"The Gen-X'ers were our biggest hope and perhaps most disappointing. Most would touch no fewer 7 dots no matter what position they took. There would always be some body part between hands and feet flopping around uncontrollably. We thought of creating a mat with stripes they could just roll on and off, but by the time we had printed a prototype all our respondents had checked out with injuries."
"The Boomers loved it, but as quick as they were to go onto the mat, they all needed help to get off again. In the end we considered this too much of a health risk."
Jim clears the photos from the table and pulls out a folder with sketches. "Maybe we lost connection with the times a little, but we're not out. We are preparing a new set of trials with Twister line extensions that might connect better to today's trends. For example we have prototyped a Twister-dotted yoga mat, a digital edition that runs as a Zoom group call plugin and a game with four separate single-dot mats you can play with a pet. We're so back!"
#Twister #Nostalgia
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