Animla Crossing Let's Got to the City

Has arrived and been played by me. It's good or is it? Well yes I think it is.

You start off and it is all so familiar, you can import your face, hair and some of your catalogue from wild world but unfortunately, you are still back to square one otherwise. As ever, you need to meet the villagers, undertake some tasks for Nook, and then start afresh increasing your box flat to a mansion, destroying the local ecosystem through over harvesting and turning your hick town into a thriving country 'destination'.

Some veterans might be a bit peeved that although your catalogue can be transferred from the DS version, you still lose all your fish, bugs, gyroids fossils, art works, resident potraits, golden equipment and Sahara carpets and walls.
I am peeved at this. I don't mind catching them again to give to the museum but would it have been so hard to have transferred over the data so that it shows that you have, at some point, caught a banded dragonfly, without neccessarily collecting one yet again when summer rolls around. Playing the game throughout the year isn't difficult but it is annoying when you don't play it one month and you've missed three species of fish and two insects.

As for the rest, well it's Animal Crossing. Just goes to show the dearth of quality games out there when I'm excited about doing it all over again, again. Hell, much of my gaming in the last two, three years has been playing the same goddam game and going through the motions on Pokemon, Resident Evil and Animal Crossing. I still buy the things though so I am fully to blame.

From here on, we do a Kotaku style review:

What I loved about Animal Crossing LGTTC or whatever it's called:

1) Swear words are back! Yesterday I wrote a letter that went like this:

Whore Twiggy, I fucking hate you queer.

And I'm pretty sure in AC:WW that would have been censored to read

Whore Twiggy, I fucking hate you queer.

So expect Residents of Gaywood to be cursing each other within seconds. Some people might think that sending the above letter to Twiggy might be homophobic but I sent the letter and signed it 'Nook', I'm angling for some kind of blackmail situation. I'll keep you posted. (UPDATE: Twiggy got the letter and seemed positively pleased with it. Somehow he (she?) knew it was from me and rewarded me with a Lovely Carpet. I don't know what she (he?) is after so I pretended I knew nothing about it and sold the carpet to Nook, just in case).

2) Individual houses again!
For those who don't know, in the Gamecube version of Animal Crossing, each player (up to 4) gets their own house. In Wild World it was a shared house and sharing a house virtually is pretty much the same as sharing a house in real life. Endlessly tidying up after your housemates or coming home to find apples and turnips all over the floor starts to grate quickly. Also, depressingly, my housemates and I spent longer debating the decor of our virtual house than our real house. So thank Ninty for the seperate houses again.

3) The ability to take snapshots.
Yes, providing you have enough space on an SD card you can snap away, taking photos of all your virtual Kodak moments. Expect the SSBB images which have been dominating this site to be replaced with Animal Crossing images. You can also mess around with these images on the Wii Menu, in the photo channel and on the message board. Some of you may laugh but I find it oddly gratifying to do a virtual 48 piece puzzle of Nook asking me inappropriate questions or creating Warhol like images of my Mii holding a football fish.

4) Mii faces.
Mii faces are in, which is a win in my book. Visit the City and Harriet the hairdressing poodle will give you a Mii face of your choice. Unfortunately, the Mii face works as a mask so you can't add accessories or hats without reverting back to your standard Animal Crossing face. Some players may not like this but personally I am in love with the idea of wearing you Mii face as a mask. Or better, wearing your friends Mii face as a mask. And committing evil deeds. And taking snapshots of it. And posting it on the internet. Along with offensive letters signed in their name.

5) Bigger and better museum.
The museum has had a massive makeover and looks great! Small thing I know, but it matters to me!

6) Some Wii controls.
Digging holes and catching fish can either be done on the nunchuk, wiimote or using motion controls. Forcing motion controls would have ruined the game so it's good to have all the options available. Much like SSBB, there's no point forcing wiimote controls if it really doesn't add to the game.

7) The City.
Although relatively small and certainly not enough added extras to justify a whole new game the city is a cool place to visit and increases the daily to do list as well as centralising some of the pointless occassional visitors to the town. Now Crazy Redd, Katrina, Gracie and Dr.Shrunk can be found in the City instead of randomly turning up in the town. Also, there is a lot more for "endgame" play (endgame in Animal Crossing!) with the ridiculously expensive lavish sets and accessories available at Gracie's store. Yesterday the gorgeous set was on show. To buy it all will set you back approximately 1,000,000 bells if you were to go for the whole shebang.

8) Online stuff.
As well as Wii to Wii compatability (via the DS suitcase) there are a whole slew of features for online use. Auction house, HRA model room and wii messages are there for those who have friends that play Animal Crossing online and who are happy to share friend codes. As a 56 year old without an internet connection this will not be me but I don't feel like I'm missing out on too much for it to be grating at all.

9)Pattern designs.
Sounds totally gay (and it is) but the pattern designing is still in and slightly expanded, it is now possible to design the individual elements of a shirt whereas before, if you were to design a shirt to look like a naked body, you would end up with nipples and belly button on the front of the shirt, the back and the sleeves. Now it is possible to design the elements individually. Again, little thing but a nice inclusion. Also, for the Animal Crossing playing football fans (we know you are out there), you can create a football shirt now. Also, for the perverts who play Animal Crossing (perhaps a bigger demographic) you can now run around with your top half naked. Also, for the alternative crowd who play Animal Crossing (????) you can now run around with your tribal tats and piercings for all to see. etc.

10) Everything you were already used to.
Everything is back in there, the residents, the town hall, the bulletin board, Nook's Shop, Able Sisters shop, the Town gate and the museum. Even Resetti is back and he thanked me for buying Animal Crossing Wild World. Which is nice. People don't thank me enough for buying their games and throwing hours of my time into it when I should be doing the laundry, or paying bills or whatever it is grown-ups do. On top of that the politically incorrect holidays are back so we can all celebrate Christmas and Halloween again. I've not checked but hopefully La Di Da day is gone forever.

What we hated:
1) Losing all the stuff from the catalogue which is just a tad unfair.
Collecting the fossils and fish again isn't too hard but collecting all the insects and rare carpets, wallpapers, resident potraits and paintings is a bit galling. Although, if this stuff did all come over there would be a lot less to do once the mortgage was paid off etc...... Richie once described Animal Crossing as a single player MMORPG complete with grinding (with collection in the stead of levelling) and he was absolutely right but imagine having to start a new character from scrath to play every expansion. Then you get some sense of how annoying this is.

2) Tom Nook.
Seriously, isn't against the Geneva convention that this guy throws you into so much debt against your will because basically, the dude can't be bothered to collect fruit, items, insects and fish on his own?

So expect some Animal Crossing updates in the future. I haven't decided what the fate for Gaywood is yet, I've been watching the wire a lot recently so I might make it into a mini Baltimore. We'll see.