My [Potentially] Major Concern with New Horizons

[Frisket]

The town-building vs life-sim is a worry I've had for ages because I figured the next logical step from New Leaf was to give players more control. I was a kid when the gamecube game came out and so that's the standard I hold Animal Crossing games to: you had like, no control, life went out, and it was kooky and weird and colourful and that was the beauty of it. Now that I'm a whole adult, and perhaps because of my own change in life, I was hopeful (but not optimistic) of a game that would allow me to relax, not push me into building a great town/island paradise. But if they nerf the villagers again and give us too much control over everything, it's going to feel less like an experience to switch on the console and see what's happening around town, and more like a game with structure and tasks and ugh. That's just not Animal Crossing to me. I don't know if I'm wording it right.

I'm going to buy it, I'm going to play it, but I am worried I just won't like it.

.

 

[Soot Sprite]

I don't mind the creative freedom. I think the island has grown on me a little bit, and whether you're creating your own town or moving into a pre established one it's still animal crossing. It would be kind of weird to go to a deserted island and right away you have a ton of villagers already living there - it wouldn't be deserted and then there wouldn't be much of a reason to build it up.

As for the villagers, I think new horizons is heading in the right direction. We don't know much about the game, but there's already a big difference in what the villagers were like in NL versus NH. THey're more detailed, they have better clothing options, and even while they're going about their business they're doing more like sitting and holding things. We'll really just have to wait for either a direct or the game, nintendo has been pretty stingy with details.

 

[John Wick]

I installed Pocket Camp 26 days ago to complete a forum event. I've just uninstalled it as apart from the money grab, it did what AC tends to always do. It became a grind.

I was constantly crafting and gathering materials, and I enjoyed it for a little while as it was the only AC I had played since deleting my NL town over a year ago.

I see how crafting works, and knowing it's a big part of NH has put me off.

PC should have been called "Supply & Demand".

There is so much PC in NH.
Yeah, folks are sick of hearing about it.

May I suggest installing PC and playing it for 26 days. Then tell me if you really want crafting to have such a big role in NH. Because it will entail more than just gathering wood, and crafting a couple of tools.

We will be crafting just about everything. After we unlock it, of course.

Then there's the waiting. Some things take days. It's not all instantaneous just because we saw something crafted quickly during the direct. That was just a small item. Again, my opinion only.

We may have to have villagers we don't want, just to obtain certain crafting materials.

I had a sudden urge to break my phone this morning.
I don't want to buy a switch and find that NH is a grinding crafting game, and end up breaking that.

Again, this is just my opinion, but those who have played PC know what crafting entails, and maintaining materials and gathering them ends up a chore that will monopolise every moment of your spare time.

NH may not be like that. But like PC, the Nooklings sell very few furniture items. I think I counted maybe 30.

The rest we will have to unlock and craft. (My opinion only.)

There is the addition of stamina. To allow you to dig up trees. It makes me wonder if we will have to monitor our stamina, like in action games.

There is an apple count icon that goes up as you eat, and down as you work.
This truly sucks.
What if we need to always eat in the game to do all the usual stuff, like fish, and bug catching?

AC isn't the type of game that needs power-ups to complete tasks.

I know I don't want to monitor my stamina.
Keep that for the action games.
Action games are not relaxing.
AC does not need stamina.

In the trailer it showed bait being thrown out to lure fish, and clams can be crafted into bait, so... does this mean we can't fish the old way?
Do we need to craft bait and monitor it's supply?

With all that (possible) monitoring of materials for crafting, fruit for stamina, and bait for fishing, it doesn't leave much time for real life.

The core of AC is not the same anymore.

Back to PC.

They said that Pocket Camp was created to get people interested in Animal Crossing, and it's upcoming mainline game, but it's starting to look and feel like Pocket Camp was created (to make money, firstly) to ease long time Animal Crossing fans in to a Pocket Camp style mainline game.

To the menu.

It has the feel of that bland, white, Android OS, I am currently using.

Not a good look for AC.

Again, we'll see when it's released.
Please remember that if you don't share my concerns that's fine, but please don't be angry at me for sharing mine.

It is an important game for all AC fans, and our concerns are valid. All of our hopes and dreams for this game are important, because we all have something we want, and things we don't want.

But we can't all get what we want. I know that.
Like the song says, we'll (hopefully) get what we need.

I think I'm voicing the concerns of many others as well, that maybe feel too nervous to post, because of the possible backlash for not being fully on the NH bandwagon.

I truly hope it's not a cold supply and demand crafting game, because I really want to like it.

EDIT. I truly hope I am wrong about everything.

 

[Garrett]

The grind of Pocket Camp has absolutely nothing to do with New Horizons. The Treehouse presentation last year at E3 already explained that players would have a choice between buying items from Nooks or crafting items themselves from gathered materials.

 

[John Wick]

The grind of Pocket Camp has absolutely nothing to do with New Horizons. The Treehouse presentation last year at E3 already explained that players would have a choice between buying items from Nooks or crafting items themselves from gathered materials.

A choice between crafting an item or buying an item, yes, but the same item you crafted might not be an item you can buy.

That is my point.
All the furniture sets and just about everything we've owned in previous games -> unlocked -> crafted.

Again, we will see.
I'm hoping not, as I've already said many, many times.

Edit. I can't stress this enough. I want to like it so much. I've waited long enough for it, I certainly don't want to dislike it.

 

[Blue Triangles]

I feel that Nintendo felt pressured into introducing a totally new mechanic to the mainline Animal Crossing series, and unfortunately, crafting seems to be the focus. I'm really hoping it doesn't break the game for me.

I'm not at all convinced that farming for materials to craft items will enhance the experience at all. If it's not broke then don't fix it.

 

[matchaman]

I installed Pocket Camp 26 days ago to complete a forum event. I've just uninstalled it as apart from the money grab, it did what AC tends to always do. It became a grind.

I was constantly crafting and gathering materials, and I enjoyed it for a little while as it was the only AC I had played since deleting my NL town over a year ago.

I see how crafting works, and knowing it's a big part of NH has put me off.

PC should have been called "Supply & Demand".

There is so much PC in NH.
Yeah, folks are sick of hearing about it.

May I suggest installing PC and playing it for 26 days. Then tell me if you really want crafting to have such a big role in NH. Because it will entail more than just gathering wood, and crafting a couple of tools.

We will be crafting just about everything. After we unlock it, of course.

Then there's the waiting. Some things take days. It's not all instantaneous just because we saw something crafted quickly during the direct. That was just a small item. Again, my opinion only.

We may have to have villagers we don't want, just to obtain certain crafting materials.

I had a sudden urge to break my phone this morning.
I don't want to buy a switch and find that NH is a grinding crafting game, and end up breaking that.

Again, this is just my opinion, but those who have played PC know what crafting entails, and maintaining materials and gathering them ends up a chore that will monopolise every moment of your spare time.

NH may not be like that. But like PC, the Nooklings sell very few furniture items. I think I counted maybe 30.

The rest we will have to unlock and craft. (My opinion only.)

There is the addition of stamina. To allow you to dig up trees. It makes me wonder if we will have to monitor our stamina, like in action games.

There is an apple count icon that goes up as you eat, and down as you work.
This truly sucks.
What if we need to always eat in the game to do all the usual stuff, like fish, and bug catching?

AC isn't the type of game that needs power-ups to complete tasks.

I know I don't want to monitor my stamina.
Keep that for the action games.
Action games are not relaxing.
AC does not need stamina.

In the trailer it showed bait being thrown out to lure fish, and clams can be crafted into bait, so... does this mean we can't fish the old way?
Do we need to craft bait and monitor it's supply?

With all that (possible) monitoring of materials for crafting, fruit for stamina, and bait for fishing, it doesn't leave much time for real life.

The core of AC is not the same anymore.

Back to PC.

They said that Pocket Camp was created to get people interested in Animal Crossing, and it's upcoming mainline game, but it's starting to look and feel like Pocket Camp was created (to make money, firstly) to ease long time Animal Crossing fans in to a Pocket Camp style mainline game.

To the menu.

It has the feel of that bland, white, Android OS, I am currently using.

Not a good look for AC.

Again, we'll see when it's released.
Please remember that if you don't share my concerns that's fine, but please don't be angry at me for sharing mine.

I think I'm voicing the concerns of many others as well, that maybe feel too nervous to post, because of the possible backlash for not being fully on the NH bandwagon.

I truly hope it's not a cold supply and demand crafting game, because I really want to like it.

EDIT. I truly hope I am wrong about everything.

dude. literally everything you just said can easily be contradicted. you seem to have a very strict and closed mindset on what New Horizons is going to be like.

- you say that crafting is going to be a chore, yet we have seen that crafting in PC and NH are two very different things. NH does not take hours to craft an item, and you do not collect materials through villager requests.

- you also mentioned that there is 'so much PC in NH'. besides from it both being an AC game, crafting is the only thing we've seen returning in NH from PC (and as mentioned, it's very different).

- you complained about having to monitor stamina. dude. it's literally just eating an apple to dig up a tree. it's just consuming a fruit (takes no time at all) to dig up a tree and have it in your inventory, which you couldn't even do in past games.

- saying that we might need to eat fruit to do basic things like fishing and catching bugs is an extremely bold assumption, and obviously we won't have to. it just seems like you're taking a dump on NH tbh. we've also seen fishing and bug catching in trailers without anything to do with stamina.

- we won't need bait to catch fish. it's most likely just for catching a certain type of fish or rarer fish.

don't get so worked up over a game we barely know anything about still.

 

[John Wick]

You really didn't read my post.

I'm not getting 'worked up'.
I'm merely asking questions of the game itself.

I don't know how many times I can state that some things are just speculation/concerns/questions that will be quieted when the game is released.

I'm allowed my doubts, concerns, opinions and questions, because it is a game we've barely been told anything about.

I never stated anything as fact apart from what was in the trailer, therefore there's nothing to contradict, because there is no debate.

It's just what I've already said.

Yes, maybe the crafted bait is for certain fish.
I don't know. That's what we have yet to discover, so there's no need to get yourself worked up over my post.

Not going to go round in circles saying "in my opinion".. and "I hope I'm wrong", over and over.

They are only concerns and/or questions that only the game itself upon it's release can be answered and/or alleviated.

 

[matchaman]

You really didn't read my post.

I'm not getting 'worked up'.
I'm merely asking questions of the game itself.

I don't know how many times I can state that some things are just speculation/concerns/questions that will be quieted when the game is released.

I'm allowed my doubts, concerns, opinions and questions, because it is a game we've barely been told anything about.

I never stated anything as fact apart from what was in the trailer, therefore there's nothing to contradict, because there is no debate.

It's just what I've already said.

Yes, maybe the crafted bait is for certain fish.
I don't know. That's what we have yet to discover, so there's no need to get yourself worked up over my post.

Not going to go round in circles saying "in my opinion".. and "I hope I'm wrong", over and over.

They are only concerns and/or questions that only the game itself upon it's release can be answered and/or alleviated.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dt9P9wv59R-HDX1cuRXCUAwPbeNBqJd3fDixITI43K8/edit?usp=sharing

 

[John Wick]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dt9P9wv59R-HDX1cuRXCUAwPbeNBqJd3fDixITI43K8/edit?usp=sharing

That link tries to open google drive on my phone, and I'm not doing that.

As a sidenote, It really is exhausting having to put these personal disclaimers in to every post, so people don't take it as fact.

 

[matchaman]

That link tries to open google drive on my phone, and I'm not doing that.

As a sidenote, It really is exhausting having to put these personal disclaimers in to every post, so people don't take it as fact.

the link is just a response and I couldn't be bothered to move it over onto here and format it with the quotes and all that jazz.

 

[John Wick]

Ok.

Done here anyway.

Moving along.

 

[Animecafe102]

Omg I get so bored of the same dialogue over and over, there wasn't enough variety at all so now that I think about it, I don't talk to my poor villagers as much anymore and I feel kinda bad, I wish they had as much personality as they used to, however I don't want everyone to be mean like in the GameCube one although it's kinda hilarious, but the cranky and snooty are definitely too nice.

 

[zujika]

May I suggest installing PC and playing it for 26 days. Then tell me if you really want crafting to have such a big role in NH. Because it will entail more than just gathering wood, and crafting a couple of tools.

We will be crafting just about everything. After we unlock it, of course.

Then there's the waiting. Some things take days. It's not all instantaneous just because we saw something crafted quickly during the direct. That was just a small item. Again, my opinion only.

We may have to have villagers we don't want, just to obtain certain crafting materials.

Out of curiosity, is there any factual information are you using to confirm any of these assumptions?
I want you to be wrong as well, obviously. Is there some bit of information you are using to support these opinions of yours. I haven't been following New Horizons info very closely yet, so i'm intrigued as to the origins of these claims.

I get that you don't want any of these things to be true, but what supports that they may be other than PC?

 

[Envy]

The assumption that crafting will take time is a pretty safe assumption. Of course, I'm hoping we don't see PC style waiting, but I feel like that is overblown because they're trying to make people impatient. Mainline Animal Crossing has no reason to do that... However, mainline Animal Crossing is still a game of waiting.

I can't tell you how frustrated I was with all of the waiting in early New Leaf. I remember getting the game (which was released like eight months after Japan, which made this worse) and barely getting to do anything on the first day before Isabelle was like "Tomorrow I'll let you do more".

If we add crafting into this formula, it will only make things worse. Hopefully they've found some way to amend that for New Horizons.

 

[John Wick]

Out of curiosity, is there any factual information are you using to confirm any of these assumptions?
I want you to be wrong as well, obviously. Is there some bit of information you are using to support these opinions of yours. I haven't been following New Horizons info very closely yet, so i'm intrigued as to the origins of these claims.

I get that you don't want any of these things to be true, but what supports that they may be other than PC?

Yep, zujika, but PC has a lot to do with why I think the way I do, and the fact that they introduced it (crafting) in the direct, saying we'll be basically building from scratch.

Ok. I recently installed Pocket Camp to complete an event on the forum, and not having had my 3ds or New Leaf for well over a year, I ended up keeping PC installed until today. Around 26 days later, because I did get a little hooked.

What can I say. Wolfgang was there so I kept it longer than intended.

The furniture available is unlocked when you unlock certain villagers.
It appears in your crafting menu.

This furniture includes many of the regular sets as well as the golden furniture, Gracie's furniture etc.

Now, the Nookling sells two fortune cookies a day. They contain other furniture, as the stuff they sell is very limited. They kept cycling through the same two dozen (maybe a little more) items over and over.

You can of course, buy the better items inside fancy fortune cookies with leaf tickets. You can get a certain amount without spending real money but it's slow.

Basically, when you craft an item it has a vibe. Cool, cute, modern, hip, historical, elegant, sporty, etc.

You need materials like steel, cotton, paper, wood, and the essence of whatever vibe the item is.. like cool essence.

If New Horizons does include essence, then we will need a villager that gives that essence. Example. Wolfgang gives modern essence.

We may have to cycle through a bunch of villagers we don't want, to gain the essence needed to craft certain funiture/items. And we may firstly have to unlock the items we want, by having a particular villager.

That is IF New Horizons goes about crafting the way Pocket Camp does.

I noticed (in the limited video they showed) they crafted tools and it was instant. Some things take no time at all, but there are items in PC that literally take days. Granted, those are amenities, but some 24 hour items were the previous Public Works Projects from New Leaf.

You can craft them in Pocket Camp.
I crafted several. The Log Bench, Fire Pit, and Zen Bell. I had to build up a friendship with certain villagers to unlock the option to build those special items, but I have been wondering if PWP's were going to be in NH, and I'm basing my concerns, or theories on what I've crafted in PC.

I think we will need to unlock furniture and the PWP type items, in a similar way to PC.

I don't think we'll be able to buy an extensive amount of furniture.
I think we'll possibly be crafting it.

As for the fishing, the girl tossed some bait into the ocean in one of the video's, and when picking up a clam said it could be crafted into bait.

So I didn't just have all these random thoughts. They came from what I've seen and done, and maybe that's the way it will be, or maybe not.

As stated, I'm just waiting for the final product, and hoping that crafting doesn't entail everything that it entails in Pocket Camp.

^_^

 

[Garrett]

Good grief. I'll state it again, Pocket Camp's tiresome mechanics have nothing to do with New Horizons. The E3 Treehouse presentation clearly shows crafting items happening instantly, in real time. I'm baffled why people are trying to push this narrative that New Horizons is based on Pocket Camp. It isn't.

 

[Corrie]

I'm all for moving villagers I want in, with amiibo cards and figures.

I don't have time to cycle through hundreds of villagers until I finally get who I want, and I will never trade for a villager. I had a shocking experience with that.

As for the NL dialogue, I agree. It sucked.

Wild World to this day, has the best villager interaction and dialogue. It's true to the villager's personality, and it was extensive and witty.

I fully agree. I hope they bring back the same tone and personality to the villager dialogue like they had in WW. It was the best!!

 

[Junalt]

Good grief. I'll state it again, Pocket Camp's tiresome mechanics have nothing to do with New Horizons. The E3 Treehouse presentation clearly shows crafting items happening instantly, in real time. I'm baffled why people are trying to push this narrative that New Horizons is based on Pocket Camp. It isn't.

Totally agree. Some people are really determined to spread the doom and gloom rhetoric that ACNH will follow in ACPC?s steps when the usual practice is that Nintendo?s mobile games don?t reflect on their console releases at all. Fire emblem heroes is a typical gacha filled with in app purchases but fire emblem three houses was a great game with reasonable season pass that doesn?t affect the gameplay at all. Already been said by the developers that ACPC has no connectivity to ACNH that?s already a plus point to me.

 

[John Wick]

Totally agree. Some people are really determined to spread the doom and gloom rhetoric that ACNH will follow in ACPC’s steps when the usual practice is that Nintendo’s mobile games don’t reflect on their console releases at all. Fire emblem heroes is a typical gacha filled with in app purchases but fire emblem three houses was a great game with reasonable season pass that doesn’t affect the gameplay at all. Already been said by the developers that ACPC has no connectivity to ACNH that’s already a plus point to me.

I wasn't spreading doom. I was voicing a concern/theory based on what I've learned, in a topic about a 'major concern in NH'.

People without concerns should stop jumping on those that do have them.

Each should be respectful of the other persons thoughts and concerns, or lack of.

- - - Post Merge - - -

I fully agree. I hope they bring back the same tone and personality to the villager dialogue like they had in WW. It was the best!!

Oh I'm so hoping for that!

It was tragic in NL seeing my Wolfgang reduced to asking "Do you prefer spaghetti, or mac & cheese".