I love this game but......

[Saga]

I agree that I wish the personality subtypes contributed more to dialogue and not predominantly idle actions. A dataminer said that maybe 5% of their dialogue differs based on subtype, which I feel like really is not enough.

I hate that I have to talk to my villagers so many times to get past the dialogue about what I did the previous day and about my other character. ("Do you know what kind of sports so-and-so likes?") So now I basically ignore my villagers. I talk to them exactly once per day (which is always them talking about one of the two aforementioned topics), give them a present, and I'm done.

It makes the game a lot less fun. I used to play for hours in WW and talk to each villager many, many times per day just to see what they would say. Now I know exactly what they're going to say, so I don't bother. I log in, talk to everyone once, give presents, dig fossils, buy furniture/clothes, water my flowers, and shut off the game. I almost never play for more than an hour per day, as it just feels pointless to spend any more time than that.

I wish they would make it so no more than one villager would talk to you about something you did the previous day, and no more than one would discuss any other characters on the island. That way, you would be guaranteed at least eight actual conversations every day, without having to talk to them multiple times!

 

[Pintuition]

This is a really good point- so much of the personalities and villager dialog is so repetitive. I hate that all the peppy's are wannabe popstars, the dialog is so nauseating. They seem to have taken away all the character to the villagers. I have my doubts as to whether they'll really make huge wide-sweeping changes to personalities but it would be nice to have a more unique experience with each villager regardless of personality. It's come to a point where I'm unwilling to have more than two of each type because they're essentially carbon copies of each other personality-wise. I do think this was a bad choice and does contribute in many ways to the game feeling kind of stale after playing for a while.

 

[shuba]

Yeah, I've completely avoided dupe personalities in NL already, so I just automatically did it in NH. Seeing people say that they have more than 2 of the same type, or even more than 3 which must mean they are missing out entirely on another type is so weird to me lol.

For me, the main problem isn't really that they act very similar, though I would definitely love it improved. I was quite happy when I saw the different personality sub traits in the datamine, only to find they don't matter nearly as much as I hope. I kind of accepted that it is a bit of a technical limitation, they won't write unique dialogue for 400 characters. It does introduce problems such as only wanting to pick the prettiest villager out of your sub category and never wanting him to move out, because the other characters are just going to be clones of him that look worse to you, but it's not bothered me too much. I simply populated my island with every villager type and only kept dupes of my favorites.

For me, the worst part about NH is that they just never have any conversation. You talk with them, they repeat one of 3 one-liners, and then become lost in thought so you can't talk anymore. Why is all the dialogue so short? Why do they always start with the same sentence every day, and then talk about you digging up fossils in the next 4 conversations? My least favorite personality now is Lazy, which used to be one of my favorites. They kinda seem like they are complete airheads devoid of thought right now, and it's difficult finding a lazy villager it fits. The one I have on my island right now does not give that vibe off at all, and it is jarring somehow. They also bumped them up from just being chill guys to weirdos that talk to bugs, which again, if 74 villagers with completely different designs all have an extreme obsession with bugs, it just comes off as weird and usually doesn't fit any of them.

I feel like they really just need to add a few sub personalities. Maybe a few unique dialogue lines for species, a few unique lines for random hobbies they acquire... And in the case of NH, definitely a lot more writing on the base personalities.

In any case, the villagers were actually always the most important part of the game to me so I really, really hope they improve them. They were always at the top of my list of "What I want in NH", along with other features that have all been implemented (don't make my villagers move out randomly, don't make them move into completely random plots, let us place furniture outside...)

It all just feels a bit cosmetic now instead of interactive.

This. Most of the good additions (villagers walking around carrying things, doing stuff) are really cute if the villagers are a "cosmetic" decoration to your island, but if you go up and talk to them, it's the same again. If you went up to a villager that was singing, or that was staring at a bug, and talked to them - and they said "I really love this song, I think I still need to improve my singing abilities though" or WHATEVER. It would already add a lot, I think.

 

[Manah]

They really need to get rid of the fossil/money dialogue. Who cares? I know I dug up fossils, i literally just performed the action myself. I don't have other people playing on my file but if I did and they wanted me to know, we could talk about it in person.

First thing Raddle told me today is that he was hoping to see me and that was the first time I ever heard something that felt like special dialogue. Even though Alice's friendship should be much higher.

 

[yoohamsta]

I agree! I really wish there was more dialogue. If talking to them many times a day just to be able to get to the more unique dialogue (but still pretty repetitive imo) wasn't enough, them reacting like oh it's you again only the second time you talk to them is also pretty off-putting.

 

[marieheiwa]

With the subtypes I notcied that the same personalities usually have the same subtype. My normals are into education/reading. My peppy villagers are into fashion. It would help if they talked about these more as well because just doing a different action really isn't doing it for me.

Post automatically merged: Aug 5, 2020

YES THANK YOU. This.

Even the backstories with the NPCs were the best! I miss those! There were so many cute little surprises like that.

Oh my gosh I miss peeking at their mail and opening their presents! In wild world Tiffany was my nemesis because she always said I had ugly clothes so I used to always do things like this to get her mad lol..... but after a while we became friends and she got a lot nicer to me and it was really cool to see that character development.

no no, the subtypes were datamined information - it’s not to do with their hobbies, it’s their dialogue. they were divided into type A and B and they have special dialogue for both! the hobbies are another thing entirely.

edited to add: the subtypes are specifically between the same personality, that’s why they’re called subtypes

 

[Kristenn]

I agree that I wish the personality subtypes contributed more to dialogue and not predominantly idle actions. A dataminer said that maybe 5% of their dialogue differs based on subtype, which I feel like really is not enough.

I hate that I have to talk to my villagers so many times to get past the dialogue about what I did the previous day and about my other character. ("Do you know what kind of sports so-and-so likes?") So now I basically ignore my villagers. I talk to them exactly once per day (which is always them talking about one of the two aforementioned topics), give them a present, and I'm done.

It makes the game a lot less fun. I used to play for hours in WW and talk to each villager many, many times per day just to see what they would say. Now I know exactly what they're going to say, so I don't bother. I log in, talk to everyone once, give presents, dig fossils, buy furniture/clothes, water my flowers, and shut off the game. I almost never play for more than an hour per day, as it just feels pointless to spend any more time than that.

I wish they would make it so no more than one villager would talk to you about something you did the previous day, and no more than one would discuss any other characters on the island. That way, you would be guaranteed at least eight actual conversations every day, without having to talk to them multiple times!

Yes 5% is NOT enough.... I really haven't even noticed it because it's so small.

Yes... this makes me want to avoid villagers and it seem like a chore to talk to them whereas this used to be my favorite part of the game.

I completely agree! Thank you for adding such great points!

 

[nightglow]

I have quickly noticed that characters of the same personality type are practically clones.
ACNH is my first animal crossing game and while preparing to play it I was reading and looking at the characters online trying to figure out who I liked and disliked... but in the end decided just to attempt to rotate through all of them because, sometimes you don't know if you like something until you tried/had it.
well... I feel like now that the characters are basically just different skins. Kind of disappointing.

Does anyone know if on the characters that are supposedly allergic to cherries, if you give them cherries in NH if there is a negative response or not?

 

[Kristenn]

This is a really good point- so much of the personalities and villager dialog is so repetitive. I hate that all the peppy's are wannabe popstars, the dialog is so nauseating. They seem to have taken away all the character to the villagers. I have my doubts as to whether they'll really make huge wide-sweeping changes to personalities but it would be nice to have a more unique experience with each villager regardless of personality. It's come to a point where I'm unwilling to have more than two of each type because they're essentially carbon copies of each other personality-wise. I do think this was a bad choice and does contribute in many ways to the game feeling kind of stale after playing for a while.

Yes!! I feel the exact same way Ugh peppy villagers used to be my favorite but it's so "in your face" popstar/famous talk. And lazies were my second favorite, but now they only talk about bugs.

Post automatically merged: Aug 5, 2020

Yeah, I've completely avoided dupe personalities in NL already, so I just automatically did it in NH. Seeing people say that they have more than 2 of the same type, or even more than 3 which must mean they are missing out entirely on another type is so weird to me lol.

For me, the main problem isn't really that they act very similar, though I would definitely love it improved. I was quite happy when I saw the different personality sub traits in the datamine, only to find they don't matter nearly as much as I hope. I kind of accepted that it is a bit of a technical limitation, they won't write unique dialogue for 400 characters. It does introduce problems such as only wanting to pick the prettiest villager out of your sub category and never wanting him to move out, because the other characters are just going to be clones of him that look worse to you, but it's not bothered me too much. I simply populated my island with every villager type and only kept dupes of my favorites.

For me, the worst part about NH is that they just never have any conversation. You talk with them, they repeat one of 3 one-liners, and then become lost in thought so you can't talk anymore. Why is all the dialogue so short? Why do they always start with the same sentence every day, and then talk about you digging up fossils in the next 4 conversations? My least favorite personality now is Lazy, which used to be one of my favorites. They kinda seem like they are complete airheads devoid of thought right now, and it's difficult finding a lazy villager it fits. The one I have on my island right now does not give that vibe off at all, and it is jarring somehow. They also bumped them up from just being chill guys to weirdos that talk to bugs, which again, if 74 villagers with completely different designs all have an extreme obsession with bugs, it just comes off as weird and usually doesn't fit any of them.

I feel like they really just need to add a few sub personalities. Maybe a few unique dialogue lines for species, a few unique lines for random hobbies they acquire... And in the case of NH, definitely a lot more writing on the base personalities.

In any case, the villagers were actually always the most important part of the game to me so I really, really hope they improve them. They were always at the top of my list of "What I want in NH", along with other features that have all been implemented (don't make my villagers move out randomly, don't make them move into completely random plots, let us place furniture outside...)


This. Most of the good additions (villagers walking around carrying things, doing stuff) are really cute if the villagers are a "cosmetic" decoration to your island, but if you go up and talk to them, it's the same again. If you went up to a villager that was singing, or that was staring at a bug, and talked to them - and they said "I really love this song, I think I still need to improve my singing abilities though" or WHATEVER. It would already add a lot, I think.

This whole post is SO TRUE and everyone needs to read it. YES YES and yaaaas. I completely agree with you. The villagers were also my favorite part of the game so it's really hard to deal with.... I hate them just feeling like pointless cosmetic features.

 

[icecreamcheese]

i agree i want them to visit my house and the retail shop can be fun
cuz u had more interactions with them and u get random new stuff there,
they're ai is pretty annoying u cant even change the starting villager wallpaper/flooring. - they should make them smarter.

even when u become best friends with the NH animals they still say annoying stuff like - "wow i cant shake you today"
which give ur friendship progress feels like it almost hasn't changed since the villiager moved in.

once ur best friend with a villager u should - give each type an arc where all the villagers talk about them and theres a story.

for example a lazy arc - the villager fridge got ruined and everyone talks about him and trying to get him stuff to fix it.
or the cranky villager - got really mad and started to yell at town square and u talk to different villagers to understand who made him so mad and get more deeper dialogs about the relationships between them.
and so on.
i don't want to get a villager photo by luck. i want to earn it with a short story/challenge.

it can be really fun if they gave them more dept.
right now they are mostly aesthetic.

 

[Nefarious]

If they got rid of the contextual dialogue, I believe there would be much less complaints because the quality of dialogue is there, but hidden under all the pointless chatter. If there were a bit more interactivity with the villagers, like hide and seek, house visits, mail delivering, fetching loaned items, etc. it would fix most of the problems everyone has with villagers in this game.

As much as I’d want it, completely unique dialogue for 400+ villagers would be a coding nightmare. Best way to do something as close to this would be to have dialouge that branches from multiple catagorize so there’s an illusion of being unique. Set of dialogue that stems from species, personalities, goal, hobby, skill, and family. It seems that they are attempting something like this with the introduction of subtypes in personalities, but it should change more than just 5% of dialogue, a missed opportunity I’d say. Though, there’s always hope they improve it down the line through updates.

 

[JSS]

Villagers have always had repetitive dialogue. Just the other day I was watching a video of the original AC and noticed some said the exact same lines as others at times. I do wish there was more variety though, that way we wouldn't see the same ones so often. In NH I usually have to talk to a villager multiple times in a row to find some interesting/different lines.

I agree 100% about their interests though, and was vocal about it all the way back in NL. It never made sense to me how during the few days leading up to April Fool's they would sometimes talk about that stuff, and then never mention it the rest of the year. The very things that set villagers apart are hidden information. How was I supposed to remember those things if I read them once a year at best? I sure wasn't gonna take notes about how many siblings they have. In NH once again apparently each villager has interests but you're lucky if they react to a clothing style/color.

 

[spawnpoint]

I agree, the dialogue is so b l a n d
I'd kill for better dialogue man
Heck i remember nl being better than this

 

[icecreamcheese]

Villagers have always had repetitive dialogue. Just the other day I was watching a video of the original AC and noticed some said the exact same lines as others at times. I do wish there was more variety though, that way we wouldn't see the same ones so often. In NH I usually have to talk to a villager multiple times in a row to find some interesting/different lines.

I agree 100% about their interests though, and was vocal about it all the way back in NL. It never made sense to me how during the few days leading up to April Fool's they would sometimes talk about that stuff, and then never mention it the rest of the year. The very things that set villagers apart are hidden information. How was I supposed to remember those things if I read them once a year at best? I sure wasn't gonna take notes about how many siblings they have. In NH once again apparently each villager has interests but you're lucky if they react to a clothing style/color.

i'm still traumatized about the NH bunny day dialogs. "did u know if u shake a tree eggs falls out of it"?
yes i know. each and every one of u mentioned it like 5 times today.

 

[naranjita]

I played WW for YEARS as a kid and I would still find new dialogue every now and then. the villager interactions in that game were just so good.

I was very disappointed with the lack of villager dialogue in NL and it's the main reason I didn't play that game that much. NH is a bit better (although I'm not sure whether there's actually more dialogue or it's just that I like it more), but it's still nowhere near what WW had. I wonder why they took such a huge step backwards. I mean, everything costs dev time, of course, but of all the things to implement, surely extra dialogue is one of the easier ones? I don't understand why this isn't one of their main priorities. even when you can terraform your entire island or when the graphics look beautiful, if the characters keep repeating themselves it makes the whole game feel cheap.

I will say though that on the days where I actually bother to talk to some of my villagers several times in a day, I'm often surprised by new dialogue I haven't seen before. I think making all the characters start out with the "it's a nice day today!" or "you dug up a lot of fossils yesterday!" dialogue was a big mistake. it makes people not want to keep talking to their villagers to reach the more interesting conversations. I wish they would change that

 

[tajikey]

For me, once I get their picture, I don't actively seek out conversation.

 

[Insulaire]

With every update they’ve folded in new dialogue for all of the villagers, there’s no reason to think they’ll stop anytime soon.

As for making sure you have every personality type, yes, this will give you access to the maximum of dialogue, but you’ll always miss out on some: there is special dialogue you only hear in conversation between two villagers of the same character type, so unless you cycle through doubles of every type, you’ll always miss some dialogue.

And if you don’t like the dialogue of one particular character type (COUGH Jocks ), why subject yourself to it? I’d rather hear my multiple snooties tell me I look fabulous again than hear about how sweaty some animal is...

 

[Kristenn]

With every update they’ve folded in new dialogue for all of the villagers, there’s no reason to think they’ll stop anytime soon.

As for making sure you have every personality type, yes, this will give you access to the maximum of dialogue, but you’ll always miss out on some: there is special dialogue you only hear in conversation between two villagers of the same character type, so unless you cycle through doubles of every type, you’ll always miss some dialogue.

And if you don’t like the dialogue of one particular character type (COUGH Jocks ), why subject yourself to it? I’d rather hear my multiple snooties tell me I look fabulous again than hear about how sweaty some animal is...

It's the variation in dialogue that I have the major issue with. Even if they add more dialogue, it ruins the experience for me if all my lazies say the same thing to me. So all the villagers types seem exactly the same which just defeats the purpose of having two or more of the same personality types.

Post automatically merged: Aug 5, 2020

I played WW for YEARS as a kid and I would still find new dialogue every now and then. the villager interactions in that game were just so good.

I was very disappointed with the lack of villager dialogue in NL and it's the main reason I didn't play that game that much. NH is a bit better (although I'm not sure whether there's actually more dialogue or it's just that I like it more), but it's still nowhere near what WW had. I wonder why they took such a huge step backwards. I mean, everything costs dev time, of course, but of all the things to implement, surely extra dialogue is one of the easier ones? I don't understand why this isn't one of their main priorities. even when you can terraform your entire island or when the graphics look beautiful, if the characters keep repeating themselves it makes the whole game feel cheap.

I will say though that on the days where I actually bother to talk to some of my villagers several times in a day, I'm often surprised by new dialogue I haven't seen before. I think making all the characters start out with the "it's a nice day today!" or "you dug up a lot of fossils yesterday!" dialogue was a big mistake. it makes people not want to keep talking to their villagers to reach the more interesting conversations. I wish they would change that

Yes I completely agree!! Thank you for these points!!

Post automatically merged: Aug 5, 2020

If they got rid of the contextual dialogue, I believe there would be much less complaints because the quality of dialogue is there, but hidden under all the pointless chatter. If there were a bit more interactivity with the villagers, like hide and seek, house visits, mail delivering, fetching loaned items, etc. it would fix most of the problems everyone has with villagers in this game.

As much as I’d want it, completely unique dialogue for 400+ villagers would be a coding nightmare. Best way to do something as close to this would be to have dialouge that branches from multiple catagorize so there’s an illusion of being unique. Set of dialogue that stems from species, personalities, goal, hobby, skill, and family. It seems that they are attempting something like this with the introduction of subtypes in personalities, but it should change more than just 5% of dialogue, a missed opportunity I’d say. Though, there’s always hope they improve it down the line through updates.

YES. You're honestly right. We can only hope!!

 

[Insulaire]

Beyond a few variances in dialogue trees, they are the same. You form connections to their appearance, activities, and reactions to differentiate between them. I’m surprised you aren’t used to it by now, I just shrug it off. To me, for instance, it’s funny when my two peppies both talk about being the most popular resident on the island and seem unaware that the other thinks so. I think there are ways to similarly head-canon a lot of mechanics like this. Because there’s zero evidence the game will change completely how dialogue works, so effort has to come from the player (and with 400 or so possible villagers, it is unrealistic to ever expect varied differentiation for every one)

 

[DJStarstryker]

They really need to get rid of the fossil/money dialogue. Who cares? I know I dug up fossils, i literally just performed the action myself. I don't have other people playing on my file but if I did and they wanted me to know, we could talk about it in person.

I hate talking to my villagers on Saturdays and Sundays, but Sundays most of all. On those 2 days they talk about HHA too much. It's irritating. I think the fact that villagers are programmed to talk about the latest events and what you've been doing, and put that priority over anything else, is a large reason why dialog in NH feels so repetitive.