Animal Crossing New Horizons – First Few Days

My experience with Animal Crossing games in the past have always turned out the same, more or less. I would play the game for two weeks straight, really enjoying it bu ultimately getting bored and moving on. I went into New Horizons fully expecting to do the same thing with it, but it honestly has grabbed me in a way that other games in the series haven’t

First off, Animal Crossing New Horizons is a really fun game so far. You get to pick out your own island layout, pitch a tent and slowly start evolving this island into your own. I have two other people in my town currently and they are Teddy and Katt. I really don’t interact with them all that much, but I do stop and say hi when I see them. I’m really just focused on all the tasks that are laid out in front of you from the start.

The game play loop for New Horizons so far is essentially build new stuff like the Museum or a home expansion, wait till the next day, get new crafting items like a shovel or pole vault, build again, and wait. This loop reminds me of a mobile game that has daily check ins and missions. Jump on, get your dailies out of the way, play a little bit more, then turn off the game. The feeling that I know I can hit a certain point for the day and know I will have new content the next day is definitely how I want to keep playing this game.

Not getting the Museum set up on my first day kind of screwed me though. I ended up having to wait two days to actually really progress in the game at all. They hid the shovel and pole vaulting tools behind Blathers showing up for the Museum and being secluded to me little third of the island and not able to do most of the Nook goals, the day just felt a little wasted. So this is where I knew I had to hit a certain goal each day to make sure I had more stuff to do the following day.

New Horizons has a new system called Nook Miles. These are essentially in game achievements that award you points. You can spend these points on customization, new crafting tools, and even flight tickets to go to remote island to scavenge around and find new stuff. It’s actually a pretty welcomed new addition to the game. It gives the player a little more stuff to do outside of “build this thing and wait till tomorrow.”

So far I have the Museum up and running, the first expansion on my home constructed, but not paid off yet, and I set up three other fully furnished houses on the island as well! That last bit was my main goal today that took me a bit to hit, but I am glad I was able to do it. Now we wait till tomorrow, to see if I have some new people joining me on my island, and also to give Tom Nook all my money. 198,000 Bells takes a bit to get if you don’t find an island with tarantulas apparently.