Aika village discussion thread

[manglegrove]

What does it all mean...?​

I feel like meta on the ACNH aika village will be a lot harder to find than meta on the NL version, so I'm making this thread so others can compile their theories. I'm going to be posting the few things I've been able to puzzle out below, so feel free to contribute if you have any ideas!

EDIT: man if you didnt like the island that's okay but i just made this thread to discuss potential story stuff with people who had theories about it, if you didnt like it make your own thread. i get not liking it but the purpose of this thread wasn't to say whether you liked it or not, just what you think it means

(warnings for potentially sensitive content below)

• The story of Aika from the original is present in some form - a girl whose toxic home life, pressure to succeed, and the doll who is her only friend have all started to take over her life, taking her childhood from her. She feels constantly watched, signified by the eye imagery - and I believe the added house with the Aika head garden and the Aika fishing pond adds to this. I think she feels like she's being "cultivated" in some way for other people's purposes, rather than being allowed to be her own person. The doll is the only thing of hers that is actually hers, and even that is beginning to have a negative influence on her.
  • At least three of the villagers on the island are meant to represent Aika. The others, I'm not so sure about. I think the blue-haired woman might be her mom. The one with long and curly hair has her own little house - Aika's friend? An older sister? I can't quite puzzle her out yet. There's also the doctor, who feeds into another subplot on the island. I'm not sure how it's related to Aika, but I'll detail it below.
• The island is made up of multiple smaller towns, each with their own ranks. Aika Village (D), where Aika's story is centralized; Erase Village (A), a town of scientific-looking things and meticulously arranged objects; Past Village (D), a dig site where figures in strange suits are looking for something; Frog Village (D), which I'll get into later; and Noisy Village (A), which seems to be focused around the girl with long curly hair. I'm not certain what they each symbolize, but I think it's worth noting that "Aika Village", Aika's town, is D-rank.
• Frogs are present on the island as some kind of symbol of rebirth. In the doctor's house, there seems to be some kind of experiment being run that turns ordinary animals into villagers. I've seen elsewhere that this might be even more sinister - with humans being killed, then turned into frogs, who are then turned into villagers. I looked into frogs a little deeper and apparently the word "kaeru"/"frog" in Japanese is the same as the word for "return", so frogs are good luck. Not sure if this is relevant at all, though.
• The otaku's house - the pink-haired character is some sort of collector (a ****ty google translate search translated to something like "horror spot collector"), and this seems interesting. is this a real person? the manifestation of aika's feelings of being commodified? and what is his basement prison?
• There's a lot of imagery of what looks like fetuses, or at least baby skeletons. With the NL town, I saw theories that there may have been themes of miscarriage in it. Is it the same here?
• The crab library...? I don't have any explanation for this one, I just wanted to point it out. Crab library.
• There's some cat iconography present. What stood out to me the most was the little "shrine" at the front of the island that was surrounded by NMT. My own theory for this is that Aika lost a beloved pet of some kind (this cat) and it died, and the NMT signify her attempts to bring it back somehow

That's all I've got right now. I wasn't able to translate much of the Japanese text all that well, so I'd love to hear other people's interpretations!

 

[tajikey]

All I know is that I didn't get it. It is cool to read that there's an elaborate back story to it.

 

[Millysaurusrexjr]

I didn't visit the NL Aika village. What I thought was going in the NH one was a young girl who became a pop star and was stalked and eventually abducted/murdered? But then there's all these frogs and astronauts so idk lmao

All I have to say is that I loved this island. Loved the crab library and cow abduction room

 

[RedPanda]

I feel like the New Leaf version was a little bit easier to interpret because it was simpler. There was a clearer narrative and because of the layout of the town, you could know where to start and where to finish. Each house had a gradual transition that was unnerving in a really powerful way. With this new version, the narrative is not as clear. There are some really compelling scenes throughout, but I am not sure how they all connect. I do really enjoy how the designer uses different things to create a sense of uneasiness. They do so with sound (all those stand mixers whirring frantically), they do so with texture (that intense static pattern), layout (claustrophobic set ups that make it difficult to move or easy to get lost), and context (objects put next to each other in a way that creates tension and confusion). In that sense the whole town, whether or not it is all understandable, is a great success in creating a sense of dread and discomfort. I spent a lot of time in this dream town today and I really enjoyed the unique experience.

 

[loveclove]

All I know is that I didn't get it. It is cool to read that there's an elaborate back story to it.

I'm with you @tajikey
I was totally lost on my visit earlier

Post automatically merged: Jul 30, 2020

They do so with sound (all those stand mixers whirring frantically)

Oh boy I didn't know blenders could be creepy until today

 

[Mick]

Well, it's uh. Different. Honestly walking around on this I don't wonder "what could the story be" but it's more of a "is this person okay?"

Some of the houses seem to be telling a story. That's neat, I wish they'd focused more on that so that they could have worked that out better. Unfortunately, a lot of it is just clutter. It doesn't help that most of the patterns seem to be photos ran through a pattern generator, leaving them nearly unrecognisable.

It's not scary or spooky to me, just odd. It's funny to see their collections of way too many climbing frames, socks and mismatched fossils because it's different but... why? The entire outside island bit is hard to navigate, and almost the entire island lags from the incredible amount of stuff.

Not my thing, I suppose.

 

[Ginkgo]

Alright, I usually despise intentional horror/subversive or obscene themes in childrens games, but I'll always make an exception for my dear Aika.

This will be my placeholder post for my analysis and theories on the NH version because rn it's 5 am and I'm going to bed LOL. Will revisit the town tomorrow and write out all my thoughts here!

 

[Cosmic-chan]

I've only seen the Aika town of Nl and I remember being spooked by it and I remember the story revoled around a girl and her horrid childhood. The last thing I remember was she ultimately committed suicide leaving her red shoes on the beach but she took her whole family with them..

 

[Miss Misty]

Well, I just went and I have no idea what it was all about, but it was a pretty interesting experience.

 

[skarmoury]

I've mainly been leaning towards theories that the doll is more of a symbolism or manifestation of Aika. I've always wondered why Aika wore the same red clothes as a red doll would.
Was her mom the blue-haired one? I thought she was the one with pink clothing, though I might have mistaken it entirely. I'm basing this off of Aika's paintings because there were two paintings of a woman in pink.
The theory of humans being turned into frogs is interesting-- as frogs are a symbol of rebirth, I've been seeing everything as more of "rebirth" than hard science; the experimentations and such might be the creepy exaggeration of the concept of dying and being reborn. Idk. It's probably a symbolism of Aika's death and how she wants to be reborn maybe?
The cat iconography to me was the amalgam of all the popular villagers. I could distinguish cat ears (Raymond?) and sparkly blue eyes (Judy?) and the fact that the painting is surrounded with NMT convinces me that it's a symbol of how these popular villagers are overly demanded and priced. I'm pretty sure I've seen a similar photo of it before, though I can't find it now.

 

[John Wick]

I didn't like the NL version, and have no intention of visiting an island version.

 

[Xara]

aika village was one of my favourite dream towns in new leaf - i visited it so many times and was so invested in the story and trying to understand what it all meant. despite it being a ‘horror town’, it never scared me - if anything, i found the story incredibly sad lmao.

i visited new horizons aika village island? this morning and uh,,, my entire visit consisted of me going “???” LMAO. ion have any clue about the ranked villages and the lab experiments or why there was a pile of nose drip accessories lmaoo. i still enjoyed my visit very much but i am Confused

Spoiler: spoilers?

the only thing i know is that i didn’t miss these eyes at all LMAO

 

[Cosmic-chan]

I didn't like the NL version, and have no intention of visiting an island version.

;; What do you like mr.negative?

 

[John Wick]

;; What do you like mr.negative?

Calling people out like that was recently added as against the rules.

Don't attack me because I don't share your opinion on a certain town or island.

There are plenty of islands I like that I've been to visiting people on here.

 

[Cosmic-chan]

Calling people out like that was recently added as against the rules.

Don't attack me because I don't share your opinion on a certain town or island.

There are plenty of islands I like that I've been to visiting people on here.

-v- at least you found something you like.

 

[Lavulin98]

Is it just me lol but I found that frog village and frog house completely adorable. ahahah

 

[Bilaz]

Is it by the same creator as the original? :O
I'm not sure it would work without that wonderful 4 AM music though

 

[RedPanda]

Is it by the same creator as the original? :O
I'm not sure it would work without that wonderful 4 AM music though

I have been wondering about this, actually. The original maker, as far as I know, never came forward to claim credit for their work. I have been wondering if this is a recreation with new additions by someone else, or if it's the same person.

 

[Bilaz]

Yeah it just seems a bit odd to me that a new Aika village would just happen
and it seems far too easy to use the name just to get the fame really quickly :/

 

[Lavulin98]

Why is it so odd? Of course the same creator of the original new leaf town could pick up new horizons too. this is their twitter https://twitter.com/a67502529 I believe it is the same creator!