I bought Animal Crossing the second that it was released. I loved the graphics and the villagers were hella cute, I was obsessed. The game's idea is to build and design your island, upgrade your house and public houses, make bridges, develop your friendship with the villagers and collect items for the museum such as fish, fossils and bugs. You have to pay debt to Tom Nook and to do so you fish, gather fruits or sell turnips.
The gameplay follows the same structure every day. There are certain things you can do daily and what will respawn into the world. Such as one money tree and a rock. Also you can talk to the villagers a few times and they will respond in a new way maybe three times and after that their only answers differ from why are you so obsessed with me to why do you follow them everywhere. The shop's items change every day and sometimes some characters spawn on your island, at day a seagull and at night a ghost. You do the same tasks for them, gathering the same things and then you get an award which is usually an item. There are also some characters that will come to your island and buy fish, bugs or weeds at a higher price.
As said, very repetitive and daily things usually take too much time for what the gameplay is and if you are upgrading something or some villager is moving in, you have to wait one day for it to come to the island. I am super impatient so I just hop straight for the switch’s settings and switch the settings to trick the game to think it’s the next day. I did it, the controversial time traveling. Some people don’t accept time travelers in the game and think it's cheating, but hey if it's allowed that is one of the things that devs wanted to include as well. I counter every objection with, people have something else to do. It’s a real time game and people have work and they can easily miss the island activities or certain fish that appear only for example 12pm-2pm. That is why I think time travelers are legit although I time travelled just to progress and I didn't have anything else to do than play animal crossing, but like I said I am very impatient.
I quickly got to the point where I didn't have anything to do and the whole game was repetitive. Action animations took a long time and you had to perform the same actions day after day and I literally didn't have anything new to do. I am sure that animal crossing is not the best game for me.. I am very content driven and if a new game is released I forget the outside world and just play it till I have experienced everything with the gameplay, the reviews and the memes. I am not saying that Animal Crossing doesn’t have content but it all seems to be a have to and I could only see the same patterns of what you can do and what the end game is. That’s the problem, the game never ends.
Most frustrating part of the game was to scroll instagram and see that everyone has an amazing island, outfits, houses and “the best” villagers. It did unmotivate me a lot. The fandom is just so bizzare and too high on achieving the best. I KNOW, I am the same, but I couldn't compete with the other players. As I am writing this I can see that I totally miss the point of the game which is to chill, but I CAN’T.
Post summarized: First month with the game was amazing! but after a while it was not so amazing.. I have no chill💣💣
You make some really good points about animal crossing! I am definitely the sort of person that loves repetitive tasks, so animal crossing suits me really well, but even I have had times where I've felt like there was nothing new for me to do. Animal crossing really requires people to make their own goals for what they want for their islands. I've started watching videos of island tours and the complexity of some people's islands is crazy!
ReplyDeleteI also agree with you about time travelling. I don't time travel myself, but people that have the game should be allowed to enjoy it as they please. People find ways to "cheat the game system" for basically any game, like how speedrunners will use glitches in random places to speed through games. As long as you're having fun, it shouldn't matter how you're doing it.
Yep, I enjoy watching other players islands too, the islands are just super and very creative. I think I just failed to make my own personal goals (as you said) and the game was in the way of making them, it frustrates me that the game itself just makes the gameplay slow. On the other hand it just doesn't work for me but maybe I visit my island in the future and it will spark the villager in me.
DeleteYou mentioned a very interesting point! I've never thought of it that way before, but it's true that it's the same thing every day and unless there's an update to add new features, I get bored of it, and when I see the best islands on social media and the like, I want to start my own island from scratch.
ReplyDeleteI also have Sprinkle on my island too! <3
Damn, thats a lot of work to start from sctrach but very admirable! I wouldn't be able to do it :D
DeleteAah sprinkle love !!