I didn't realize the game is using real game time before I bought it, I really hate this feature because you have to wait, wait and wait. But since I'm on semester break now and have lots of free time, I can bear with it. I don't want to time travel because I feel like it's cheating.
I don't think Time Travelling is cheating, otherwise they wouldn't have a very specific and visible option to TT right on the main menu.
When I can't play as much during the day I'll just set my town back by a few hours so I can play on it more. There's also the Night Owl ordinance depending on how late you usually play, it makes shops close later.
Anyway, I'm completely loss at what to do. Everyday I just try to earn money as much as possible to repay home loans and earn funds for public works project. So I spend most of my time playing the game by shaking trees, catching fishes and stung by bees. Thus, it feels boring. Is this the correct way of playing?
You'll have more stuff to do as you play the game, like being able to customise your character more, laying down paths in your town, breeding hybrid flowers, rearraging trees, planting bushes, playing games on the island, etc.
It'll also be easier to make money as you move along. Once you're able to plant more kinds of fruit (like perfect fruit of all kinds and even normal versions of non-native fruit) you can sell them for a decent sum at Re-Tail if you have a lot of trees. You can also make lots of money once you unlock the island, are able to dive, and once you get around to buying turnips.
You can also make money by using the forum, since you can sell/auction items and characters, or trade in your TBT for in-game bells.
By the way, even as early on as you are, you can do more than just that to make money. You can sell pretty much everything (like furniture, bugs, shells). You can also find the money rock in your town. Every day, a random rock in your town will give you money if you hit it. The faster you hit it, the more money you'll get so some people dig a hole behind their character to avoid recoil from the shovel and hit the rock faster. I never do that since I can't bother but I tend to get about 2000 bells on average just from that. It's always a different rock each day. You should also keep an eye out for rocks that randomly appear in your town, if they weren't there before you can smash them and you'll get a gem and sell it. If you want to get furniture made from things like gold ore don't sell it, of course, but otherwise you can get some decent money from it too. Every day, read the sign next to the Re-Tail door, it'll tell you which item they're paying more for on that day.
You can also use the flea market feature on Re-Tail if you don't mind villagers changing up their houses, sometimes you can re-sell items that way for more than they're worth.
It'll also be easier to figure out which fish and bugs are worth more as you play so don't be discouraged. Once you get the hang of it you can make a few thousands in half an hour at least.
May I ask where to exchange friend code? I wanna try playing online though I still don't understand about this feature despite looking around in forums online. Let's say I shake the tree with oranges, so that tree no longer has oranges, so the visitor will not see any oranges? And if the visitor running around my town and stepping on flowers, will the flowers no longer be there when I play in my town again? And what's with turnips and entrance fee? Is entering the other player's town the same as playing in your town, that is you can talk to villagers as usual, sell stuff, catching fishes etc except that you're not the mayor? And whatever that visitor do will effect the host's town? Sorry for asking lots of questions :/
To get your FC, you have to go on your Nintendo main screen. At the top of the screen there's a little bar with icons. Click on the orange one with a smiley icon. There's an option there to get your Nintendo friend code and to add people's friend codes. To be able to visit your town I think you have to be mutual friends with them. You can also decide when people can visit you by talking to Porter at the station, there'll be an option to open your station gates so people can visit you. There's a "best friend" feature so you can filter out people if you only want a few friends to be able to visit but not others.
I don't recommend adding people unless they're trustworthy. I usually add people for trades and then remove them from my Nintendo friend list, unless I want to play with them again or trust them.
If someone goes into your town it'll be like playing in theirs and vice-versa. So yes, they can trample your flowers and pick fruit, if you have no fruit on your trees they won't be able to see it either. You can pull the wi-fi switch if someone is damaging your town as well but it's best to be on the save side since it can be too late sometimes.
If you want people to visit your town without ruining anything, you can make a Dream Town. As you play, you'll unlock a project that lets you do this. A Dream Town is a static version of your town that you can save and which has its own special code for people to visit through the same project in their town. They can tear down trees and trample flowers in Dream Towns but that won't be saved, so even if someone ruins your town in Dream-mode, it won't have any effect on your town when you play. They won't be able to visit your shops though.
