Animal Crossing Series

[trinityexe]

I've only played New Horizons and Pocket Camp so I can't speak on the other games really, but I've always loved the villagers and the ability to build your own town/city/island and personalize it however you want. I will say I enjoyed the social aspect of the game way more than the design portion. Once you're done making everything how you want it, you kinda realize that the villagers are a bit of an afterthought. Hopefully they make it more of a sim life than a design game in a future installment 

[Memory]

I am not sure that any game will ever capture the intensity and mood of playing the game cube version in the den under my bed on a hand-me-down 1980s colour TV secretly at night when I was 8  It was so mysterious and so full of lore and unexpected moments; the villagers were almost spooky and often harsh (and they always stood way too close to you); Wisp the ghost was more of an urban myth than someone you ever met; Red felt like he was really sketchy; the dump felt super trashy and somewhere you'd avoid; and the police station always exuded a feeling of quiet control and danger. Nook was like a grubby middle-aged businessman who forced you to work for him or go homeless; I had a stove/fireplace shop in my house; somehow this game was almost trashy but in the best way. It almost feels like a memory of a ludic dream now.

THAT SAID; all of that is looked at through the eyes of nostalgia and the game itself had some really annoying technical limitations; almost all of which were fixed and improved in Wild World. Plus the multi-player in Wild World was a quantum leap forward! We had a sinister wild world gang in school where we would go around to people in the schoolyard and convince them to let us into their town (we all had scary outfits, mine was the Tutankhamun mask) and we'd all have axes and look threatening  (I think we cut down one tree once then felt bad)

After that City Folk was basically just Wild World with a somewhat poorly implemented city stuck on to it; I like the super expensive shop and the better online play, but its worth skipping.

Leaf was fine; the town was better than in City Folk, but it never quite clicked for me; buying socks was fun!

Horizons is a great game and it was perfect for the pandemic; the characters are cute, the gamification stuff is fine, and the landscaping is great; but somehow it misses a lot of the mood that the early games had - I would say its a little too good, its overpolished.

So I think that Wild World is the best of them so far 

I loved reading your post/memories 

I agree though Horizons was perfect for the pandemic. I honestly would have struggled without it... When Pietro moved onto my island my entire life was altered, for the better!!!

I've played all the AC games and honestly loved them all tbh - though I think Horizons was my fave!

[Melooon]

That's cool! How's the framerate? I've tried to play WW on my 3DS but it didn't feel very smooth and gave me motion sickness :(

I finished my custom skin! (If anyone else is playing on the Delta emulator and wants the skin here it is!)


The framerate is fine, any phone made in the last 5 years should be more than powerful enough to run a DS emulator - that said though the game was never the smoothest, it was a very big game to fit on a DS and you can really see them hitting the limits with the world lighting. It's definitely choppy at times!

I agree though Horizons was perfect for the pandemic. I honestly would have struggled without it... When Pietro moved onto my island my entire life was altered, for the better!!!

It really helped, I had my birthday alone during the pandemic and while family called and stuff, the thing I really remember about that day was all the AC villagers throwing a party for me, it felt really special

[bees]

The framerate is fine, any phone made in the last 5 years should be more than powerful enough to run a DS emulator - that said though the game was never the smoothest, it was a very big game to fit on a DS and you can really see them hitting the limits with the world lighting. It's definitely choppy at times!

Yeah, I have no idea why it looks so bad on my 3DS. I'm not sure it's just due to it being that way from the start, because I've seen people complain about it looking choppier on the 3DS due to the framerate... who knows. I definitely want to give it a try on my phone once it's fixed. That skin looks awesome, by the way, love the pink palette for this!

[Void]

I really like new leaf ((biased because i don't have new horizons)) , but if i have to go for aesthetics, 100% wild world, i just adore the ds's graphics and how crunchy they look , but i do appreciate customization a lot, so new leaf is my go to for that reason.
and when it comes to the villagers personality , anything but new horizons is better i think, they seem so bland and samey there... 

[sig]

Yeah, I have no idea why it looks so bad on my 3DS.

NDS games on the 3DS don't run on the same resolution as they do on the original DS: they're stretched to fit the screens, so they look worse (IMO!). If you hold start while booting the game, it'll run at the original resolution but you'll also get black borders around the screen, so you can see if it makes things better or worse for you!

[Winternet]

For me Wild World is my favorite installment, and I must confess nostalgia is the main reason. I also like New Horizons, but I've fallen out of it due to the inability to make another island without deleting the old. I am too sentimental to delete my old island.

[glassVaseCamelCase]

I just picked up New Leaf again after not playing for five years. Been playing it nonstop. It's just fun and cozy

I feel like new leaf probably has the best balance between lifesim and customization but I'm biased. Looking forward to the next installment

[MrsMoe]

New Leaf is my favorite game of the series (as to be expected), but I have a huge soft spot for City Folk. I know now that it's essentially a Wild World clone, but it my first AC and one of the games I played the most as a kid. It's what got me into cozy life sims in the first place (which I still really like, even if the genre's got really oversaturated and stale).

Honestly, one of my biggest gripes with New Horizon that I don't see a lot of people mention is that it really seems to have scrubbed the franchise of its quirkiness. Everything, from the dialogue, the visuals, and the atmosphere, are so squeaky clean that I feel like a lot of its personality is gone. The older games even had a lot more random events that did explicitly benefit you in any way, but gave the world a lot of character. But in New Horizons, the point of everything is to get Nook Points or more furniture 

[bees]

NDS games on the 3DS don't run on the same resolution as they do on the original DS: they're stretched to fit the screens, so they look worse (IMO!). If you hold start while booting the game, it'll run at the original resolution but you'll also get black borders around the screen, so you can see if it makes things better or worse for you!

Thank you! Does this affect the frame rate, though? I'm going to give it a try and see if it helps 

[sig]

Does this affect the frame rate, though?

Unfortunately not, Wild World has pretty abysmal framerates as a 'feature'...

[s_redpine]

Wild World was the first one I played, but New Leaf is the cake with the cream to me. I used to play it a LOT in highschool, and the dreamtowns were my favourite feature. I liked that it introduced swimming too, as well as the on-line island where you could talk with a load of people. It was good fun, that game. But Wild World's soundtrack will always have a place in my heart. That accordion sound was my favourite.

[halcybutton]

it's hard for me to pick a favorite, maybe wild world? i love the customization options in later games but i miss how involved the neighbors used to feel. i also prefer feeling like i am living amongst the town rather than above the town, and being mayor/island leader just doesn't feel the same to me

[muttthecowcat]

So this might be an uncommon opinion but: I never got into New Leaf. I had the original game on Game Cube, which I loved. Then I heavily played City Folk and tried to make it work despite some of the bugs (ie no grass desert town). And I started New Leaf but it just didn't interest me

But I personally love New Horizons! I love the island theme! I think because I mainly come to AC for the comforting experience and not necessarily all the features is what makes me like NH the best. I personally think it got rid of some of the more stress inducing/fatigue inducing elements of the older games and created a really relaxing experience

[azalea]

i don't think i've played an animal crossing game since the original gamecube one?

it's not that i don't dislike the games per se... it's just that the games have turned from "you're living in a town" to "you're in charge of your own town" and now "you're in charge of your own island". and i think for the more creatively-minded individual this is fine since it affords them freedom to design their island and space to their liking, but it's not really been my thing. i've always preferred the original's approach to being a part of a community and participating in that community.