To TT or not to TT?

[tybalt_cake]

it depends how you wanna play tbh.

if you wanna keep a slow pace at the game and probably play for short sessions , you can just TT.

if you wanna go at a fast pace or get something quick and wanna play for hours , go ahead for TT.

i personally do it because of the reason i mentioned above , i wanna unlock the terraforming thing and also to make my town the way i want to (make villagers go away and bring better ones , focus more in hybrid flowers and such).

after all , it's your game and you decide how to play it.

 

[Farobi]

There's a feeling of being rewarded with your patience if you choose to play without time travel. Like you uphold your principle of playing the game legitimately. That's how I see it - and how many others I'm assuming approach the game as well.

You'll get quick dopamine hits if you Time travel though, with the faster pace, but with it comes an even quicker burnout and a lesser ceiling of enjoyment in the game after a much shorter period of time. I may be wrong in this assumption, but naturally I think spoiling yourself with the events in the game would make it harder for you to enjoy the intended pace of the game as a non-TT would.

Of course, the option to TT is there, Nintendo didn't just put it in without acknowldging people would not do it. But I think it's best used for just a few changes in a day or a week if irl schedules are crazy hectic, along those lines. I dont think the game is best approached just TT to summer in one day and winter in the next playthrough.

 

[Maiana]

lmao i told myself i wouldn't time travel and day 2-3 I ended up doing it to unlock the museum- and I might do it for the resident services/town hall, but we'll see. This game has just felt too slow-paced for me, and I am tired of hearing the same music in the background as well. : (
I think time traveling is fine and if people want to do it/if it helps them enjoy their game, by all means go for it! It speeds up a lot of processes and helps get work done faster. Adding on to what @ Farobi said, completing a non time traveling town is extremely rewarding. All the countless hours + work you put into your town pays off, and you're always building onto it.

Overall, to time travel or not to time travel is up to you to make. play and enjoy the game the way you want to : )

 

[solace]

I think everyone had valid points. As for me, I have not TT'd yet. However, I have two islands that I have grinded and has kept me really busy and able to complete ALOT of things. That being said, burnout is a HUGE factor. I remember people who TT'd in the beginning of ACNL and were burned out by the time Halloween came around and Pokemon X & Y was being released. It was a disappointment because I wanted to play with people in real time and celebrate the IG events and trade holiday sets/furniture.

There is something magical about how this game bonds you with other gamers in real time. And who know when the studio will release another AC cannon game... we had to wait 7 years for this one!

You could ask yourself if and when at any given point you felt the burn out by the last AC game? As for me, I played ACNL first day of release, ended up buying 4 3DS's (2 were special editions), managing 4 towns and after 2 years I felt ACNL was a chore just to keep my deer village in tact. Plus, my friends with whom I played had long gone.

Some food for thought. Hope that helped!

 

[Larimar]

I used to TT all the time in New Leaf, but I would end up getting burned out really fast and end up not playing anymore :'O but im also TERRIBLE at keeping up with the game daily too, and if i miss too many days i just lose all motivation to play, its kind of lose-lose for me.

But since New Horizons is new and exciting I've managed to keep up with it daily. I've also been excited to finally try out the Stalk Market (but i missed Daisy Mae this last Sunday because I didn't know what her schedule was like)

It kiiinda stinks that i'm trying to swear off TTing because the beginning part to unlock basic necessities like the museum is an absolute slog. I've had all my new bugs, fish and fossils sitting outside my house for days until I could finally shove it all to Blathers at once. And also with having an absurd amount of free time, New Horizons has been the only thing for me to play lately, but I'm already feeling a bit burned out from playing it twice a day in the morning and night.

I'd probably recommend TTing to unlock some of the essentials in the beginning and then stop. But I've also heard there's been bugs with people TTing so it's probably best to wait it out and see if any of that gets patched first. Overall it's your call!

 

[Speeny]

I’ve chosen not to. At least for the first year. It’s always nice waking up the next day and realising: “Oh yeah, wonder what’ll happen today.”

 

[Bluee]

I loved to time travel in NL in the beginning and quickly ruined every motivation for me with that. It was cool to have so much progress at once but it also took away the excitement from me I had when starting to play on a new day and seeing that something changed, so I personally won't time travel anymore in NH.

 

[TheRealWC]

I will not TT. I did not in New Leaf and I enjoyed the experience much more that way by waking up to see new things each day. While New Leaf sometimes I suppressed the urge to TT, I haven't even had that feeling yet in New Horizons. I've enjoyed running around doing Nook Miles+ tasks and earning bells so much that I've been contempt to play in real time.

It really does depend on your playstyle. It's very possible that you could become burned out quicker by TTing, as I probably would, especially if I got everything done relatively quickly. But, some people do not. It just depends how you play.

 

[Steampunk Mage]

I'm personally considering TT-ing to skip days where Nook's Cranny or the Residential Services Building are inaccessible due to remodeling, though I am willing to wait for the Museum to finish construction (especially since I can just send fossils to my future self in the mean time).

 

[Romaki]

I time traveled and rushed through New Leaf and got bored so quickly that I like landscaped tens of towns just to restart and rush through it again. I wanted the perfect town and never got it. Obviously New Horizons is better woth that, but also personally I think sticking to your island day to day and make it a part of your daily routine helps you grow fond of it. I think many time travelers just want to get the cool functions and don't really care about a sentimental experience.

 

[StiX]

Even though it's exciting to time travel I think it takes away from the charm of this game. It really depends what you want from it though. I have nothing against people who do either. But the way I see it, there's ALWAYS something to do. Go fishing to farm money for later, visit friends, design clohes, farm more materials for crafting ect. ect. Even if you dont have much time later, the game will still be there when you back and events will unfold at your own pace. Unless you just want to design your island I wouldn't time travel cause there's so much to do!

 

[StrangeDog]

On Twitter, @mugendaiyo said it very well: the only thing that time travelling allows you to do is advance the flow of time for villager move ins, fruit production, and construction. Rumor has it that Nintendo is intentionally staggering releases of patches to prevent time travellers from spoiling special holidary events for the rest of us. I'm glad that we're forced into this structure, because Nintendo is then forced to provide us with new content for the holidays.

As for myself, I've been in quarantine for 6 months (before the coronavirus) due to an autoimmune disease and I'm now in quarantine again. My partner is enjoying it, but the social isolation is definitely taking a toll on me. Animal Crossing is a great distraction. Animal Crossing isn't meant to be played for hours in isolation as a pseudo-Mincraft activity. It's meant to be played for maybe an hour or so a day.

I can open my town to visitors, walk away from the Switch, and come back in between doing other things. New Horizons is a casual hosting game. It's not something where my time travel can affect PvP or other player's runthroughs - unless they want it to. If you want to come to my island and pick some of my fruit, that's fair game. But the only reason I still have fruit - enough fruit for all of my visitors - is because I time travel.

The good part about all of this is that Animal Crossing, at its core, is a one-player game. Animal Crossing is nice because the amount of playtime you spend and the grinding you do doesn't affect the other players - it only affects your playthrough. Yes, they can come to your town and get recipes/furniture early, but nothing is forcing visitors to your island and nobody is forcing your island visitors to reap the benefits of your time-travelling.

 

[Mairen]

I personally am not going to time travel in this game. I did in new leaf, but I'm going to play at the natural pace this time. I DO run out of things to do after a few hours, but honestly that's okay. That's how the game is meant to be played (in my opinion). It also gives me something to look forward to each day, so when I wake up in the morning, I'm really excited to pop in the game and see what new things await me on my island. Of course I'm tempted to time travel, but more in the sense of "I'm having so much fun and I want to hurry and unlock new things!/See what happens next!". I know that playing at the natural pace will allow me to enjoy this game much much longer, rather than if I have everything accomplished and unlocked in the first week.

 

[band]

I time traveled today to get the 3rd resident moved in... 1 per day?? Oh no, I couldn't wait.

But that's IT for me. No more time traveling after today!