# I'm about to level my entire island and want thoughts from others who did it.



## TheKryptoKnight (Apr 15, 2020)

I'm thinking about completely flattening the left 2/3rds of my town, wiping out all the rivers and working from a blank canvas.

My biggest concern is that I don't really have a plan. Everything I've done so far has been spur of the moment... I'm not following any design. The only goal I know I have is to make more of my island cliffs.

To anyone who's done something similar... how'd it go? Do you regret it? Do you feel like you ruined your island?

Any thoughts at all would be appreciated!


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## TheKryptoKnight (Apr 15, 2020)

Maybe a better question was HAS anyone even done this.


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## Eirrinn (Apr 15, 2020)

I’ve done it. It took hours just to flatten everything so after I was done I was just like welp ok what now LOL took me another day to figure it out


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## Pyoopi (Apr 15, 2020)

I think people have done it after the numerous visits I've done for diys and stuff. I can't for the life of me remember who. The only real damage I did was fill in a tiny pond because it looked like a weird bean.


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## TheKryptoKnight (Apr 15, 2020)

Eirrinn said:


> I’ve done it. It took hours just to flatten everything so after I was done I was just like welp ok what now LOL took me another day to figure it out



Are you happy where things ended up? 

I know one thing I want to change is making my secret beach accessible. It's inconvenient currently, to say the least!


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## Tatimari (Apr 15, 2020)

I wanted to totally renovate my island so I flattened it and removed every drop of water I possibly could.
It took

_forever_

But it gave me a really clear mind and vision to plan out what I wanted to do!


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## Eirrinn (Apr 15, 2020)

TheKryptoKnight said:


> Are you happy where things ended up?
> 
> I know one thing I want to change is making my secret beach accessible. It's inconvenient currently, to say the least!


Yea I’m pretty happy. Probably gonna move my new rivers again tho


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## CJ8080 (Apr 15, 2020)

I did it and am very glad i did! Funny thing is i then made my entire island covered in hills and small mountains and loved it for a while. Then i got sick of it and wanted to try something else so i flattened my ENTIRE island all over again and made a city and am very happy with the results. Trust me, I didn’t know what i wanted to do but it’s hard to visualise things when there are so many distractions preventing you like rivers and cliffs. You’ll think of something but just warning it takes hours upon hours of work so be prepared to put in the time!


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## TheKryptoKnight (Apr 15, 2020)

Tatimari said:


> I wanted to totally renovate my island so I flattened it and removed every drop of water I possibly could.
> It took
> 
> _forever_
> ...



The part I'm not looking forward to is moving ALL the trees and flowers as I go.. but I've got plenty of time and patience! I'm mostly just worried the end result will be a disaster!


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## th8827 (Apr 15, 2020)

Just as a reminder in case you plan to finish the Museum, some fish only appear in the clifftop rivers.


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## TheKryptoKnight (Apr 15, 2020)

CJ8080 said:


> I did it and am very glad i did! Funny thing is i then made my entire island covered in hills and small mountains and loved it for a while. Then i got sick of it and wanted to try something else so i flattened my ENTIRE island all over again and made a city and am very happy with the results. Trust me, I didn’t know what i wanted to do but it’s hard to visualise things when there are so many distractions preventing you like rivers and cliffs. You’ll think of something but just warning it takes hours upon hours of work so be prepared to put in the time!


This is really really encouraging, thank you! I know some people had an island planned out before the game even released, so mass terraforming was just a matter of recreating their plan... It's good to hear from someone who didn't have a specific end goal in mind!

	Post automatically merged: Apr 15, 2020



th8827 said:


> Just as a reminder in case you plan to finish the Museum, some fish only appear in the clifftop rivers.



Thanks! Fortunately, my plan is to make much more of my island tier 2+! So hopefully, MOST of my river will be elevated!


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## DarkOnyx (Apr 15, 2020)

I flattened my entire island, because as much as I love the cliffs from the Gamecube days, I feel like the size of my island didn't warrant cliffs, if that makes sense. The map isn't nearly as big as the GC, so I wouldn't have been able to do what I wanted with them. No worries though, because I also enjoy the  WW flat look! I flattened everything and sculpted a few smaller cliffs as accents. I do not regret it one bit. It did take three days though...


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## TheKryptoKnight (Apr 15, 2020)

DarkOnyx said:


> I flattened my entire island, because as much as I love the cliffs from the Gamecube days, I feel like the size of my island didn't warrant cliffs, if that makes sense. The map isn't nearly as big as the GC, so I wouldn't have been able to do what I wanted with them. No worries though, because I also enjoy the  WW flat look! I flattened everything and sculpted a few smaller cliffs as accents. I do not regret it one bit. It did take three days though...


Nice! But oh man, if it took you three days just to flatten, I wonder how long it'll take to flatten and then rebuild!


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## DarkOnyx (Apr 15, 2020)

TheKryptoKnight said:


> Nice! But oh man, if it took you three days just to flatten, I wonder how long it'll take to flatten and then rebuild!


It was off and on! All together I would say it took 5-6 hours.


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## Campy (Apr 15, 2020)

I've not flattened my entire island, but I'm doing parts of the map one step at a time. Currently I'm working on the upper right part of my island where there's going to be a residential area. So I'm playing with cliffs and rivers to see how I'd like that area to look. Once I'm done moving houses there and decorating it, I'll move on to the next area of my island. This way it's a little less overwhelming to me and there'll be quicker results to keep me motivated.


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## s i r e n t i c (Apr 15, 2020)

I completely smoothened out my river, removed all of my cliffs and then rebuilt my cliffs and second level the I wanted it. 
At first I regretted it, but honestly I feel like it’s a lot better this way. My advice is to go slow and not to make any quick decisions, otherwise you’ll end up regretting things pretty fast. 
It’s also important to think of what you want to keep, or how you prefer things. Such as do you like the look of everything being polished and straight, or do you like the randomness of a typical river or pond?


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## Shyria (Apr 15, 2020)

I completely flattened out too, except for a small part I know I wanted to use on the top right. Mostly because I realized Midway it was a PAIN!! Haha I too thought digging all the flowers out would be the worst part but flattening and rebuilding is actually quite unnerving, especially is you keep hitting sideways like I do 

I'm super happy with it so far!
First of all, I don't TT so I realized it would take me one to two weeks to make it entirely the way I want it. (with the demolishing/building of inclines and bridges and moving houses)
Which can be scary but is actually great when you think in terms of durability of the game! 

I personally did plan it out first because I'm a huge perfectionist (I spent 2+ hours just SLIGHTLY changing the sides of one of my ponds to make sure it looked the way I wanted, both in game and on the map....)
But that's also great because if you keep looking at the map, you really see things taking shape and you can change it slightly as you go so it looks exactly you want it to be! Planning it out on paper or using the Happy Island Designer maps, there's lots of things you can leave out that actually appears once you're working it in game 

Not gonna lie, it requires a lot of patience & trial and error though.
But if you're looking for a challenge in your game, and willing to spend lots of time on it, go for it!


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## moon_child (Apr 15, 2020)

I not only flattened my entire island. I completely wrecked it. Lol. I destroyed all the cliffs and removed all the rivers and falls. Then I chopped all the trees. Then I worked portion by portion building as I go. I really can’t for the life of me envision anything with everything scattered there all around so I needed a blank canvas. Right now I’m slowly rebuilding my island the way I want to. There are days I love it. There are days I hate it. I just look at my villagers and as long as they’re happy, I’m happy. I know it’ll keep evolving as days go by so it’s all good.


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## Tatimari (Apr 15, 2020)

I will say there is something very peaceful about seeing nothing but empty expanse, that field of grass, in the game. So it won't be a disaster, don't worry!

And if anything, you can ALWAYS change it! Nothing is permanent!


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## CaptainFoulken (Apr 15, 2020)

I really super recommend the Happy Island Designer!

I was pretty much like you, I wanted to completely redo my island. But in the end, because I pre-made my plan and (mostly) stuck to it, it turned out that there was a couple of acres of cliffs that didn't actually need to be removed, so I just left those bits and built the rest of the cliff up around them. It would have taken me a lot longer, had I gone in and flattened everything. :') It also allowed me to tweak my design a few times too, sort out the spacing a bit more etc.

I'm still in the process of making my island how I want it... mostly because it takes forever to move all the villager houses around.


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## Mairmalade (Apr 15, 2020)

CaptainFoulken said:


> I really super recommend the Happy Island Designer!
> 
> I was pretty much like you, I wanted to completely redo my island. But in the end, because I pre-made my plan and (mostly) stuck to it, it turned out that there was a couple of acres of cliffs that didn't actually need to be removed, so I just left those bits and built the rest of the cliff up around them. It would have taken me a lot longer, had I gone in and flattened everything. :') It also allowed me to tweak my design a few times too, sort out the spacing a bit more etc.
> 
> I'm still in the process of making my island how I want it... mostly because it takes forever to move all the villager houses around.



Plan - yes.

I went full Godzilla on my island when I unlocked the tools and made a blank slate {no rivers, no cliffs). I didnt have a plan at first. Like yourself, I was building and adding little bits here and there trying to make it look good. It was frustrating at first because I’d spend 2-3 hours and decide ‘wait, this looks awful what am I doing with my life.’

This happened a few times because I didn’t have a general idea of what I wanted to do. 

I started checking out what others had done for inspiration and a few ideas translated similarly into my island. After a looooooooottttt of work, it ended up going places I’m happy with.

TLDR; go for it if you have ideas in mind and have the time/patience to execute. I’d recommend saving a lot of bells/hook miles beforehand for quick construction of bridges, inclines, and PWPs.


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## Romaki (Apr 15, 2020)

It really depends on you as a "designer". I did it and I never could make it look right, so now I design around my island as is.


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## Gingersnap (Apr 15, 2020)

I flattened it based off the different levels the island has, except I tore down the entire 3rd level and made it apart of the 2nd. Honestly its a long and very tedious process, but its very helpful if you have no ideas/want to test builds since it's a blank canvas! I recommend moving buildings to the beach (as hideous as that may look) so you have nothing in your way while moving stuff around.


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## Sloom (Apr 15, 2020)

hi. I also did this. I didn't put much planning into it admittedly.

one thing I can definitely recommend is watching or listening to something while you do it, it's very arduous and will take a long time, especially if you want to go full-on like me and remove all trees, all rivers, all cliffs and all buildings.
but to answer your questions, I don't feel like I ruined my island! I can't say I've made massive progress since I did it, since I'm making sure to have a concrete plan and also I'm moving all buildings to the beach (which is painful as a non-tter). but I've removed all rivers and cliffs and I'm really happy with the first part I've finished, which is a lead-up to my museum. definitely needs more work but im happy with it atm at least

I will warn you when it comes to happy island designer: it's a great tool, but it's not perfect, only use it for a general idea of what you want. I say that because I made part of my plan, got started and realised the big section I planned would come waaayyyy closer to the town hall than it did on the island designer, despite me trying to follow it pretty diligently (I also made sure to properly map out my town hall on the grid). I'm going to try the method of screenshotting and drawing over my current map to give me a better idea of what I'm doing. I can't say I'm not at least a bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of options I have to be honest

overall I'd totally recommend completely flattening your island to anyone interested, because it makes creativity and unique designs much easier. plus, even if you're not all that creative (like me) there is a lot of inspiration out there if you give it a good ol google.
of course, make sure you're completely sure before you do it because I have heard many people say they do believe they've ruined their island and have even had to reset because they were so unhappy with it lol


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