Replaying Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game is a Time Machine to 2010

Times have changed, but some things stay the same

Remember 2010? Mark Zuckerberg was Time’s “Person of the Year,” Apple released the first iPad, Lost ended, Harry Potter films hadn’t, Lady Gaga wore meat, and “Tik Tok” wasn’t an app—it was the top song of the year.

And somewhere in that strange hodgepodge of pop culture delirium, Ubisoft released Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game, a retro-styled beat ’em up adventure that nods not just to the fantastic Edgar Wright film, but also to the comics on which it’s based.

It was beautiful. It took the essence of what made the comics and film so great — the humor, the nostalgia, the clear love of video games — and presented it to audiences in a fresh way. It wasn’t just some recycled, lazy attempt at licensing out a franchise: it was an homage to a bygone era that recaptured the spirit of couch co-op in a world that was growing increasingly distanced.

Then, in 2014, two major things happened. I graduated high school, and the Scott Pilgrim game was delisted from digital marketplaces. That’s it. Those are the only things that happened in 2014.