Animal Crossing talk

In the days of DS, one of the prominent games that I was pouring hours of my life into was Animal Crossing: Wild Word. I was completely taken by how freaking cute the game was. Animal Crossing sees you play a bright eyed character moving to a new town to start a new life. You meet with a kindly racoon who helps get you settled in, providing a house to you. Not for free of course, there is a loan that you will need to pay him back in full, but he’s pretty chill about it and doesn’t even charge interest.

I really loved playing Animal Crossing: WW, it was so differently paced to other games. You weren’t battling monsters or traipsing through dungeons, instead you were catching bugs and fish every day to pay back your loan, decorating your house and chatting with the other residents. I have so many memories that stay with me like giving the other residents greetings, using the Nintendo Wi-Fi USB Connector to play online and being mortified the first time Resetti appeared to scold me for not saving my game. Animal Crossing totally owned its vibe to be a sweetly addictive and enjoyable game.

Despite having loved Wild World I didn’t play any of follow-up games. I assumed they would follow the same formula, which is no bad thing because it’s a great formula. This is probably presumptuous of me, however I decided to buy New Horizons, which I would have given a miss but the pandemic that befalls us spurred me to try it out as there couldn’t be a more perfect game for this insane time we are living through.

In this instalment your character arrives on an island to live a new life and is welcomed of course by Tom Nook and two mini Tom Nooks. The island is empty but Tom Nook has great plans to transform it into a residential haven.  Naturally he enlists you to make his plans a reality and has you running around scavenging materials for a Nooks Cranny store and building furniture for new inhabitants. Completing these projects expands the game further, like gaining the ability to build a bridge over rivers which I can’t tell you how relieved I was, I was so sick of pole vaulting.

I see you have a football (US) and a football (rest of the world) for sale

There’s a lot of familiarity that I remember from Wild World, which again is not a negative, it works. I actually felt a great sense of nostalgia doing all the things I would do in Wild World. Once again I find myself collecting specimens for Blathers to populate the museum. I actually really like hearing Blathers tell you some facts when you present him with a new creature.

There’s also the charm of being able to decorate your house and talking to the other villagers who are always warm and in high spirits.

I started this game a few weeks after it was released, I feel way behind and desperately want to get some stairs to more easily reach the higher locations of the islands, however the construction of such structures requires hefty donations from myself of course. There’s a lot of grinding to do, this a game that requires dedication. People are really embracing this game, as expected, and have done some crazy impressive things with their islands. I hope to make my island as grand as others have though I know it will take some time and a lot of cash bells.