The Villagers Dialogue is still an issue that really needs to be Addressed.

[Your Local Wild Child]

New Leaf's dialogue (in my opinion) is superior to New Horizons' dialogue—especially in regards to the snooty villagers.

I'm playing New Leaf from scratch for the first time in years and I am endlessly entertained with how much crap Baabara gives me. I don't have enough in the museum, and she constantly tells me how disappointed she is in me and how I should be doing more. She came over to my house and, the next day, I got a letter from her with a refrigerator attached. The letter simply stated that I'm gonna need that storage unit to clean up the mess in my room. It's a stunning letter and I can't help but include it in this post.

View attachment 340422

But in New Horizons, Purrl is nothing but nice to me. She's constantly complimenting me and seems to be one of my biggest cheerleaders. Among the only "snooty" dialogue in that game I can think of is the dialogue between an uchi and a snooty. The snooty sometimes implies that the uchi, among other villagers, should have more style. The uchi gets visbly flustered at this. Another thing I can recall is the snooty occasionally being passive-aggressive towards smugs, rejecting their advances and calling them "island boy" and making fun of them "showering in coconut milk." Not gonna lie—I love that one!

If you guys can come up with other examples, let me know. But nothing can possibly top that letter Baabara had sent me. It will always have a special place in my cold, dead heart.

It might be that I have a different sense of humor, but I never really liked snooties before New Horizons. I don’t like being put down constantly by someone who’s supposed to be a friend. I dislike the likes of Allie, Violet and Queenie not because of their appearance (I actually kinda like Allie’s design in retrospect) but because of bad experiences with them back in CF. I find the snooties in NH to be a breath of fresh air (Diana is my favorite female villager now because when she’s on my islands she always breaks the snooty stereotypes, somehow).

I wouldn’t mind if they were a bit cold at first, but not mean to the point where I want them off the island before I can even start to befriend them.

it is enlightening to see another point of view. I watched a YouTuber who said that they liked having a snooty as a sort of rival, and you said that you find the jabs funny, so pre-NH snooties do have appeal to a decent group of people.

 

[Kalle]

I think what needs to change is the personalities. Nintendo doesn't have to axe the current eight, but they should have additional sub-categories that not only would provide more dialogue but also make the villagers stand out more from one another. Nintendo did something for NH where villagers now have hobbies such as play, fashion, etc., but these hobbies don't play any important role in differentiating their dialogue or adding more. Instead hobbies only act as a way to differentiate what they tend to do more on the island.

It's a missed opportunity for certain, but it's not surprising because to me NH still feels like an incomplete game compared to most of the past titles. I love this game, but the lack of regular special characters, unique dialogue, and even new villagers and animal types has always been a concern. We'll just have to wait and see if they address anything like dialogue or anything else going forward.

 

[niko@kamogawa]

I don't really pay attention to their dialogue anymore. It just repeats endlessly.

In my opinion, I rather enjoy the other aspects of game.

 

[CrankyCupcake]

All I'm saying is that the dialogue needs to be improved because if there is one thing that I don't see anyone talking about is the villager dialogue. If Nintendo can bring back certain hairstyles then I say they need to add new villager dialogue options that the old AC games had. Do any of you find it hard to connect with your villagers?

Most threads on dialogue in the game are complaints. I've been playing since the game launched. Every single day. I am still discovering new dialogue with my islanders. Earlier this week, I heard something new from Dom. Two weeks ago, something from Deli. It feels to me like every time I talk to Fuchsia or listen in on a conversation with her, I hear something new. Fuchsia (uchi) is arguably the most developed character on my island. She's talked about the island she grew up on, her grandparents, her parents, her father's birthday present, the neighbour kid, her tone-deaf friend, the old woman in the park, the band she was a part of, then how they broke up, a fancy dinner party she didn't enjoy, and so on. She rarely comments on what I did the day before, or what I'm wearing today. Just yesterday, she told me about a dream she had that I heard for the first time, which involved the copious use of her catchphrase.

Not too long ago, @TheKryptoKnight made a good discussion topic about dialogue:
https://www.belltreeforums.com/threads/not-new-information-but-just-a-psa-to-those-who-arent-aware-how-dialogue-works-here.578273/

I believe there's a ton of dialogue in the game that's interesting. (Albeit for some personalities more than for others.) But it's locked behind, for want of a better phrase, invisible-and-what-seems-like-luck-based triggers. Two types of triggers, as far as I can tell. One is, you need to achieve the highest possible friendship level with your resident. The other is, you need to do different things to unlock different dialogue. For instance, if you interrupt an animal stalking a bug, you get dialogue. At least 3 different variations.

Even though I've been playing for months, I'm still hearing new things. I do talk to my islanders every day. I know it's something very tedious for many players to do. But it's rewarding when you persist and when you get lucky enough for the game to throw new dialogue at you. So much dialogue, so much more than what we already know, is in the game. The way to get to it, unfortunately, was not well implemented.

As for connecting with villagers. I don't have trouble connecting with most of my residents. While dialogue is important, it is never the only way I connect with an animal. As shallow as it sounds, I've got to like the way the animal looks to me. To some extent, even the animal's hobby matters. Most of us, consciously or otherwise, probably place more emphasis on one factor than other factors. For some, personality is the most important thing. For others, appearance is paramount. For some, if an animal is overrated, there can be only intense dislike. For others, the first personality or species they encounter is the one they fall hardest for. And so on. Because all animals of the same personality essentially share the same dialogue, I would argue that dialogue is probably not the most important thing when it comes to determining whether an animal stays or leaves, is a favourite or an outcast.

I'm well aware of the fact that, after constructing this laughable wall of text, I've probably veered utterly off-course. I know many players are complaining about the quality of the dialogue in the game and not simply the quantity of it.

Personally, I embrace New Horizons as a "different" game from Wild World or New Leaf. (Both of which I played and enjoyed very, very much.) So I don't expect the exact same items from the other games to be available in New Horizons and I don't expect the animals to say the same things or act the same way they did in the other games. To be perfectly candid, it'd be boring if everything was simply copied and pasted from one game to the next. New Horizons is far from perfect. (Or complete.) But it isn't the worst by a long shot. That's why I'm still playing it.

The longer I live, the more words it takes for me to say what I want to say. Not that it means I've actually managed to get to the point of saying what I want to say... I'll see myself to the Lost & Found now.

 

[Bugs]

To be honest, I could totally forgive the dialogue if the villagers interacted more with the scenery. There are more things that they can do in this game, they can use furniture, interact with objects that can be activated, they follow paths, but all ever see them doing is sit on the floor, leave whenever I get my camera out, and stand around the plaza in a huge crowd not going anywhere else on my island

If they focussed on having the villagers use furniture and stuff, that would make sense to me why they didn't have as much dialogue, cause it's something new for them to so, but they don't even really do it!

 

[Monokuma73]

Many of you probably noticed this, as AC has almost 20 years of presence on the market and developers have enough experience to improve many things for those years.
The question is: "If they want to do this". Many of "old things" has been implemented into new iteration and customers bought it.
So many people decided to almost worship developers for any events - which can be cool, but just for couple hours in one day per year.
Game needs something fresh... including dialogues and interactions.

About year ago (more or less) as a hobby, I was translating Cube World to different language - and dialogues were procedurally generated, for example:

<speech id="i_was_gathering_ingredients_in_the_location">
{ Yesterday | Recently | A few days ago | Two days ago } I { was gathering | was looking for } { $stress { mushrooms | heartflowers | mana orchids | shimmer mushrooms | dragon roots | iron nuggets | silver nuggets | gold nuggets | emeralds | sapphires | rubies | diamonds | cotton capsules | plant fibers | wood logs | cobwebs | dewdrops | ginseng | crafting ingredients }} *in_the_zone *direction_of_here.
</speech>

I'm not saying this is a perfect, as this solution is also finite and finally players become bored anyway - but at least it's something.
If game is made for one nationality, using single language - there's no problem with translation, tests if everything fits correctly etc.

I don't believe developers want to spend more time than really necessary and as was announced already, future updates will be focused on events.

I may be wrong, I may be surprised in the future, but for me it looks like it's final version with some additional events in the future, but whoever expect some more - got nothing or not too much.

 

[Solio]

I agree with what @CrankyCupcake said: There's actually a ton of dialogue in NH, but it's locked behind certain triggers like context and friendship-levels, unlike in the older-games where it's more or less all laid out to you.
On an other note: This complaint comes up all the time. It's kinda ironic, the complaint of repetitive dialogue is just as repetitive at this point... Anyway, I wonder when people finally will move on and accept the situation how it is. There is no point in keeping to complain about the same thing!

 

[ieRWaZz]

I thought it was because this is the first animal crossing I play in my own language, but indeed the conversations with the villagers are getting more boring with each new animal crossing game released while it's such an important factor of the fun in the game

 

[Bilaz]

Tbh my opinion on the dialogue in this series worst to best:
- City Folk, the weird dialogue tree system made it so your villagers repeat their last sentence over and over and over until you enter a building or somehow reset it
- New Leaf: no tree system but man was this repetitive, 7 years later I still got told, YOU CAN USE THIS SUPER EASY TRICK TO EQUIPT YOUR TOOLS, everyyything was repeated. Isn't anyone talking about the fact that in New Leaf we used to rely on villagers giving specific 'rumor dialogue' to find out if nobody is moving? The dialogue was *so* repetitive that searching for a *specific line* was reliable information
- New Horizons: New Horizons' majoor problem seems to be some sort of conversation hierarchy you have to get through before they say interesting things. I notice when I just talk to each villager until they're bored and then talk to them again later on that day you get a tonnnn of new, cute and funny dialogue. I had myself laugh and screenshot, which I didn't bother in New Leaf after one year because I knew I could get the same conversation to repeat. Honestly it's just annoying you need to talk to everyone 7 times before this happens. I feel like this could easily be patched out, since the cute dialogue is written

-BIG GAP-

Gamecube: amazing, not repetitive at all, maybe a little too mean? Still great

Wild World: perfect, the right balance of mean and sweet, so much variety and the hobby system made each character in your town unique

 

[JKDOS]

Majority of the dialogue is extremely linear too one-sided.

Villagers talking about visiting players as-well-as other local players is also annoying. Such as

"Do you know what kind of movies <local player> is into?"
> Yes
> I don't know

I also find it annoying they will initiate communication with you so they can talk about an item you have in your inventory, and then ask for it once they realize you have it.

Gamecube: amazing, not repetitive at all, maybe a little too mean? Still great

I feel like having them have attitudes gives the game more depth and gives you a better reason to friend the villagers, and at the same time can be fun when you're bored and messing with villagers you dislike.

 

[iamjohnporter67]

Most threads on dialogue in the game are complaints. I've been playing since the game launched. Every single day. I am still discovering new dialogue with my islanders. Earlier this week, I heard something new from Dom. Two weeks ago, something from Deli. It feels to me like every time I talk to Fuchsia or listen in on a conversation with her, I hear something new. Fuchsia (uchi) is arguably the most developed character on my island. She's talked about the island she grew up on, her grandparents, her parents, her father's birthday present, the neighbour kid, her tone-deaf friend, the old woman in the park, the band she was a part of, then how they broke up, a fancy dinner party she didn't enjoy, and so on. She rarely comments on what I did the day before, or what I'm wearing today. Just yesterday, she told me about a dream she had that I heard for the first time, which involved the copious use of her catchphrase.

Not too long ago, @TheKryptoKnight made a good discussion topic about dialogue:
https://www.belltreeforums.com/threads/not-new-information-but-just-a-psa-to-those-who-arent-aware-how-dialogue-works-here.578273/

I believe there's a ton of dialogue in the game that's interesting. (Albeit for some personalities more than for others.) But it's locked behind, for want of a better phrase, invisible-and-what-seems-like-luck-based triggers. Two types of triggers, as far as I can tell. One is, you need to achieve the highest possible friendship level with your resident. The other is, you need to do different things to unlock different dialogue. For instance, if you interrupt an animal stalking a bug, you get dialogue. At least 3 different variations.

Even though I've been playing for months, I'm still hearing new things. I do talk to my islanders every day. I know it's something very tedious for many players to do. But it's rewarding when you persist and when you get lucky enough for the game to throw new dialogue at you. So much dialogue, so much more than what we already know, is in the game. The way to get to it, unfortunately, was not well implemented.

As for connecting with villagers. I don't have trouble connecting with most of my residents. While dialogue is important, it is never the only way I connect with an animal. As shallow as it sounds, I've got to like the way the animal looks to me. To some extent, even the animal's hobby matters. Most of us, consciously or otherwise, probably place more emphasis on one factor than other factors. For some, personality is the most important thing. For others, appearance is paramount. For some, if an animal is overrated, there can be only intense dislike. For others, the first personality or species they encounter is the one they fall hardest for. And so on. Because all animals of the same personality essentially share the same dialogue, I would argue that dialogue is probably not the most important thing when it comes to determining whether an animal stays or leaves, is a favourite or an outcast.

I'm well aware of the fact that, after constructing this laughable wall of text, I've probably veered utterly off-course. I know many players are complaining about the quality of the dialogue in the game and not simply the quantity of it.

Personally, I embrace New Horizons as a "different" game from Wild World or New Leaf. (Both of which I played and enjoyed very, very much.) So I don't expect the exact same items from the other games to be available in New Horizons and I don't expect the animals to say the same things or act the same way they did in the other games. To be perfectly candid, it'd be boring if everything was simply copied and pasted from one game to the next. New Horizons is far from perfect. (Or complete.) But it isn't the worst by a long shot. That's why I'm still playing it.

The longer I live, the more words it takes for me to say what I want to say. Not that it means I've actually managed to get to the point of saying what I want to say... I'll see myself to the Lost & Found now.

With due respect I get what you're saying but still everytime I try to talk to the villagers don't seem to talk to me whenever I talk to them like 4 or 5 times. Also they all keep repeating the same lines I heard over and over again. Thats why I got so tired of them reminding me what I was doing, asking me if I ever been into any villagers homes, and of course just going by themselves based on whatever their personality is. Let me clear this up. I have no issues with what they are saying but when you have to hear it like 100 times every day it gets repetitive. Thats the issue!

Post automatically merged: Dec 3, 2020

I agree with what @CrankyCupcake said: There's actually a ton of dialogue in NH, but it's locked behind certain triggers like context and friendship-levels, unlike in the older-games where it's more or less all laid out to you.
On an other note: This complaint comes up all the time. It's kinda ironic, the complaint of repetitive dialogue is just as repetitive at this point... Anyway, I wonder when people finally will move on and accept the situation how it is. There is no point in keeping to complain about the same thing!

Again all I'm saying is that when you have to hear what the villagers say each day its the same lines again and again. Even though you talked to them yesterday they will still talk about the same stuff over and over again. Sure there is a few occasions when they talk about different stuff but then most times its just the same stuff over and over again. Also this is a valid complaint and this is not what Animal Crossing was suppose to be. I cannot stress this enough the original did it so much better and I think the issue is that some people never played that game because they don't understand how the dialogue is much different in that game compared to New Horizons.

 

[saucySheep]

I connect with... SOME of mine well. I seem to be getting more unique dialog out of some of my villagers than others. Willow, Ed, and Bam all have interesting dialog, and so does Flo and Beau.... Cheri, Tia, Rory, Mathilda, and Wolfgang are yet to be heard with anything interesting to say.

It does get incredibly irritating. I cannot believe Nintendo has let this go for so long.
They have at least been making an effort - over the past few months I've seen some added dialog, though it's still repetitive - i.e. when the turkey day stuff was a thing, the villagers only had one line of dialog to acknowledge it which got annoying.

*sigh*

 

[Bilaz]

I feel like having them have attitudes gives the game more depth and gives you a better reason to friend the villagers, and at the same time can be fun when you're bored and messing with villagers you dislike.

I like mean dialogue too, but I think the Gamecube took it a bit too far, *I* personally found all the things they said amusing but I don't want anyone to be triggered when it comes to weight comments or something like that :/
Wild World villagers were still mean but in a rude neighbour way

 

[Corrie]

I remember people complaining about this in NL but honestly I think it's just as bad in NH now. I was hoping they'd improve but clearly not.

 

[Purities]

I really thought going into New Horizons that there'd be a larger variety of dialogue, especially between villagers and thought i was losing my mind when my villagers kept repeating themselves over and over, if just makes me less excited to talk to them, as i quite enjoy playing the slow paced day by day, not online game, but it's really boring, and i get to a point where im sick of taking to them lmao.

 

[EmmaFrost]

I completely agree with everything you said. I used to love interacting with the villagers because the dialogue seemed less repetitive. I really hope that with future game updates, they will add new pieces of dialogue. Every once in a while a villager will say something a bit different and I get excited that new dialogue was added in updates but think the only thing they added is seasonal dialogue?

I absolutely love Dom's design, I find him adorable and I think he's the cutest of the sheep, but holy crap is he annoying. The jock dialogue is the most boring and pointless to me. I do not care about your sheep muscles, Dom. Stfu.

 

[iamjohnporter67]

To give people a better understanding of what I'm trying to say I did a test with 2 Normal villagers Maple and Molly. This is the issue you noticed what they say is the same thing. Its a problem with the personalities how they copy each other and there is no way its different. I used to have 7 Normal villagers before and they all were saying the same thing and I just got tired of it. Even though I have Maple and Molly they still say the same stuff. This is an example:

 

[Your Local Wild Child]

I feel like having them have attitudes gives the game more depth and gives you a better reason to friend the villagers, and at the same time can be fun when you're bored and messing with villagers you dislike.

While I agree with that second part, I wouldn’t agree with that first bit. I find villagers being especially mean to me a reason to move them out faster, not a reason to make friends with. I remember everyone who played CF in our house at the time was ecstatic when Allie finally asked to leave because she was so rude to everyone.

 

[AssassinVicz]

Just to input again...

Anytime they remind me that someone has visited, I usually just show my friends and be like they remember you. It’s kinda nice that they remember, it’s a charming feature ig.

Just to be honest from reading this thread, I feel like a lot of people are expecting rpg levels of depth. Like they have their own backstories or maybe go through different emotions. Which is fine.

But just my opinion.... I feel like villager interactions are only a small part of the game, since acnh is more focused on designing the island the way you like, using terraforming and items you’ve gathered. Just like acnl was more of a city escape where you used public works projects to improve your towns.

I feel like the minimal dialogue in acnh is fine and again, I’ve seen different dialogue and I normally try to speak to all my neighbours two/three times a day.

If Nintendo did want to update the dialogue (which I presume they have since I’ve been seeing my neighbours talking about new stuff.) then i’ll Appreciate it. If they decide not to then its not going to affect my play with the game.

 

[iamjohnporter67]

Just to input again...

Anytime they remind me that someone has visited, I usually just show my friends and be like they remember you. It’s kinda nice that they remember, it’s a charming feature ig.

Just to be honest from reading this thread, I feel like a lot of people are expecting rpg levels of depth. Like they have their own backstories or maybe go through different emotions. Which is fine.

But just my opinion.... I feel like villager interactions are only a small part of the game, since acnh is more focused on designing the island the way you like, using terraforming and items you’ve gathered. Just like acnl was more of a city escape where you used public works projects to improve your towns.

I feel like the minimal dialogue in acnh is fine and again, I’ve seen different dialogue and I normally try to speak to all my neighbours two/three times a day.

If Nintendo did want to update the dialogue (which I presume they have since I’ve been seeing my neighbours talking about new stuff.) then i’ll Appreciate it. If they decide not to then its not going to affect my play with the game.

Villager interactions are a important aspect of the game. Again If you played the original AC it had more dialogue in it that made the villagers have more character to them and made them so memorable. I don't think you understand but the director once said that the reason why he made Animal Crossing was because he didn't want to feel lonely hence the reason why most people connect so well with the villagers. It was never suppose to be an RPG. Don't misunderstand we are not saying that AC should be an RPG but its just that we want the villagers to have more character to them that makes them likable. Them talking about the same lines over and over is not a good way of having fresh conversations.