Animal Crossing: New Horizons has been out for about a month now and with most people stuck inside of their homes, the newest entry in the franchise has not lost it's hold over the internet. I've been spending some time with the original Animal Crossing,which was originally released for the Nintendo Gamecube in 2001. Here are just some of the reasons why I've been addicted to the original game as the internet has been to it's newest addition!
Nostalgia
The game came out back in 2001, so I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a hefty amount of nostalgia in this. This was the game that started it all! Everyone had to wear a hat that matched your hat, riding the train in with Rover. Man, you had to send your fossils to the Faraway Museum (that is it's actual name) because our favorite owl, Blathers, didn't have his certificate yet and couldn't identify them. It's a lovely, childhood feeling that I certainly needed right now.
Going Back To A Simpler Time
While the first game may be more clunky in mechanics than it's sequels, in some ways, it's more simple. There isn't any gathering or rage inducing eggs like in New Horizons. The only multiplayer function that existed was travelling from memory card to memory card. I've spent a painstaking amount of time getting villagers to send me fruit other than the fruit my village started with. Because of it's age, that chunkiness makes it simple and in a lot of ways easier than games out coming out in recent years. It's certainly a breath of fresh air.
I've Got Personal Beef To Settle With Tom Nook
I think most of us know who Tom Nook is, the raccoon (tanuki in the Japanese edition) land lord who you owe an inordinate amount of Bells too. He makes you work for him and then spend all your day toiling in the hot sun, selling fruit, bugs, fish and fossils just to pay him back for the house. I never paid him off in the original version of the game so I've decided to spend my time evening the score.
(At least he doesn't charge interest?)
Making A Routine
This is a game that encourages players to play every single day, in order to maintain their village and pay off their mortgage. Personally, I've found that playing the game, sending letters to all of my villagers every single day, planting trees, finding a fossil or two, etc etc, has kept me in more of a lock down routine than I anticipated.It's fun, it's built on real time so I have to stick with it and it makes everything seem a little less fire and brimstone. Nothing wrong with that.
Less Cute, More Just Plain Weird
Animal Crossing has always been cute! All of the villagers are adorable. But as the series as gone on it has gotten more cute and less....unapologetic about it's weirdness. The Harvest Festival was morbid, Gracie, the fashion designer, would show up and make you wash her car and if you did it fast enough she'd give you free clothes. Never without a scathing remark at your fashion sense, though. There was Wisp, the ghost, who needed you to collect some souls he had managed to lose. And who could forget the cat Blanca, who had somehow managed to accidentally wash off her face and needed you to draw her a new one? Yeaaaaah. Weird AF.
