what motivates you most to play/what are your favorite aspects of the game?

[jejune]

just out of idle curiosity! feel free to post and explain why, as well.

honestly, most of the ones i've listed appeal to me or are things i engage in enthusiastically, but if i had to boil it down to three, it would be:

1. community aspect. this is by far the most important part of the game for me. if i played alone i would lose my motivation entirely. i love going to my friends' islands and i love having guests, i love giving and receiving island feedback and watching people do villager hunts or terraforming builds or something
2. decorating my island's exterior/terraforming/waterscaping. watching the island transform from a barren wasteland into a beautiful little micro-utopia has been so rewarding, and i feel like i'm finally starting to get decent at terraforming and waterscaping (my friend put down the game for a few months and came back to it today, and she visited my island after i restarted a while back and said "look at all of this! i remember when you first started, you never could have done this, i'm so proud of you!" and my heart grew three sizes this day)
3. there's something to do every day. this is pretty self-explanatory, it's just always fun to log on for the day and see which hapless npc has rolled up onto the island today or whatever

in the past i would have marked villager hunting as one of my top three activities/motivations, but i just don't do that as often as i used to these days. i still do occasionally, but i really like most of my island roster and most of it is set in stone, so it's just not something that happens anywhere nearly as often anymore. i love following along with other peoples' still, though

what about you?

 

[Tiffkaboo]

Decorating my island's exterior/terraforming/waterscaping: Even though I'm not totally sure what I want to do with my island, I am so excited to decorated and terraform it! I love all the new DIYs and items that are available to customize my island! Also, making a residential area is so much fun, I love having all my residents in the same area and with cute little house plots!

Completing collections: I LOVE exploring and figuring out how to get new fish/bugs/fossils. And even though some of them take ages and multiple tries (glares at Mahi Mahi), I love having goals to go after!

Interacting with villagers: I love listening to conversations that my villagers have! Even though a few can be repetitive, they make me so happy to be around them!

Villager hunts: Currently my favorite activity! I've been travelling to different islands for a few days looking for my two last kitties and Muffy. In all honesty, I enjoy it way too much.

Something to do everyday: I love encountering Labelle, Leif, Redd and everyone else! All the NPC's make it so much more fun!

Online!: Even though I don't do much more than trade items and occasionally visit my friends island, I do enjoy the online portion of the game! I hope I find more ways to fully take part in the online features.

So many things that I love about this game...I don't even care that I've got so many hours invested in it!

 

[Dunquixote]

First and foremost it is decorating interior/exterior for me. I love collecting furniture (not really in NH since I don't like a lot of the furniture right now) and decorating with them and making something totally unique or if not unique something that reminds me of something I like -- such as room from a favorite anime or something. My first two votes go to the second and third options for this reason. I have so much fun decorating and coming up with experimenting with furniture (at harv's studio) and ideas out even if I don't end up keeping them. These two things also are why I have slowed down and cut my playing time a bit (in addition to other things I have going on); I have improvised as best as I could as well as substituted as much as I could for my ideas and I'm at the point where I can't come up with anything different no matter how many times I swap out items at harv's studios and change positioning and try to come up with a new idea. Plus, I'm not inspired by a lot of the current furniture (I was by the Frozen set but I've used so much of it already).

My third vote went to trading, though I wanted to vote for the first choice as well. I've made so many friends that I would maybe never have become friends with had we not traded, I've made just as many friends through the discussion threads and basement as well. The funny thing is when I first joined TBT, I was extremely timid and shy and was so nervous about trading. Now, not only can I not stop trading (and I feel bad when I don't shop at my friends' shops for awhile), but I also invite some visitors over just to hang out even when not trading. I really wish I had done this in NL; I didn't realize how much fun it was to pitfall each other and run around chasing each other. I had so many laughs with my friends and found out some people that I thought wouldn't take well to a pitfall, didn't get mad at me at all and somehow it helped turn it into a game running around my island, playing hide and seek. While my island is still wip and is a mess, now I welcome people that want to hang out; only friends at the moment since too much junk lying out in the open atm lol.

I also enjoy villager hunts even though I regrettably used three amiibo cards (not counting the times I kicked them out and reinvited them because I messed up their house) and I bought (don't regret) one of them from someone (who is now a friend and to this day and more I am still grateful for him trading with me ^.^).

I've been having a lot of fun working on my island journal. While I've slowed down on my island and game playing time, the island journal has helped me maintain my interest and has been a huge amount of joy to work on. I turned it into a story and have been kinda unsure how it is, but, a friend said they really liked it so it looks like I might be continuing with the story. I also commissioned and plan on commissioning more artwork to post in there to accompany my story (with the permission and while crediting the artists of course). This has kept me involved in my game because for my entries I've been using screenshots and also coming up with some extra designs at harv's studios to provide filler content and info.

Sorry if this is all over the place.

 

[Pyoopi]

If I could pick four choices I would.

1. Community aspect
At the most primitive stage, I enjoy playing with other people. Most cases, it's usually to trade or visit a npc but if 3-4 visitors just want to fish, dive and casually talk; it's always a treat.
I've opened my island for strangers to play, more than any other previous game.

2. Terraforming & waterscaping
This ties in with the theme, but I enjoy creating fluid pathways and guiding visitors to explore my island. Like if my island had two modes: story & adventure. A lot of people can strictly stay on the path but I'd encourage them to stray off.

3. Creating custom designs
Before I bought this game, I made it a personal goal to only use designs I've created. I stayed away from the medium pixel art as it's a bit more technical for my standards but I decided to try it.
I wouldn't say I've mastered it but I think just having a creative background has helped a lot. I try to share most my designs.

4. Theme
This is tied in with the last two: terraforming/waterscaping & designs. Also appeared as a beginning goal and why a couple weeks before launch, I began to think of island names. Then from there, I created an 'official' mascot. It helps me be strategic in my designs and organize ideas yet still have fun.

At the moment, I'm taking a small break but these four categories always bring me back into the game.

 

[princess.looking.for.frog]

I love villager interactions, even if the dialogue isn’t really the same as in Wild World (I still play ww btw), talking to them to maintain our friendship is something I get on to do. I also go around giving gifts and watching out for a thought bubble in case someone wants to move.

I also love the fact there are always things to get on for. The npc visits and waiting for each day to move things and build projects makes me want to get on the do something productive. Also finishing all the miles I can for the day and earn as many as I can along with all the diys I need to unlock.

Finally, I love theming my island/designating areas on my island for special areas to visit. I try to make my island a city yet all foresty, and finding a way to tie the two together is fun in itself. Acquiring furniture to finish off the areas is also motivation to get on. The game overall in being able to make me get on seems to work very well!

 

[dizzy bone]

My favourite aspect of the game is definitely terraforming/landscaping/and general decorating. I'm not big on interior decorating but it's something I enjoy doing once in a while, both in my rep/alt's homes and also at Harvey's. I tend to play this game mainly with island design in mind. Once I've "completed" the version of the island that I like, I like to invite people over and hang out online, bringing in the community aspect of it. I also really like visiting friends islands. Even though I think the dialogue in this game can get a little repetitive, I still enjoy interacting with villagers and come up with little stories for them too. Basically I "play the game normally" after I'm happy with how my island is looking. Since I'm always terraforming, that part never really bores me, and I always enjoy online interactions in between. I think that's why I like this game a lot more than the others (even though I'm nostalgic for both NL and WW) because I feel like there's always something to do. After a while there will come a point where I want to change my island again, so I'll get back into landscaping, and the cycle will repeat. I'm currently in the stage where I'm back into landscaping after destroying a huge chunk of my island and re-themeing.

I'm pretty slow with completing things like the museum and other milestones, but that's also another part of the game that keeps me motivated to play. But once I complete my museum eventually I'll probably go back to my usual routine without having the desire to repeat this process in a new file or anything like that. I like working with the same island and even the same villagers, so resetting has not really been on my mind in terms of how I could make the game feel more fun or new.

 

[mirukushake]

My motivation pretty much just boils down to "I just like collecting stuff."

I think the decorating is fun when I'm in the mood for it, the animals are cute but I don't particularly care about them that much (I'll go days without talking to them if I feel like doing something else), and trading with people is usually fun.

But there is nothing better to me than a huge, in-depth completion spreadsheet I spent hours on and the nerdy adrenaline rush of checking off items as I catalog them and creatures as I catch them.

 

[Tinkeringbell]

I'm a completionist, so definitely the collecting. I've also picked the daily things because part of the things I'm collecting can only be done daily.

These days I log in every day to gather all the mushrooms, and I've spent quite a few hours hunting down all the mush DIYs from balloons in the past two weeks. I regularly overdo things on events, I fished my way to 999 points on the fishing tourney (and got mad after because I had fished up more points but the counter just stopped at 999 without a warning). I want to collect everything but I can't just collect 1 of some stuff.

Next week, I'm bound to go nuts on collecting the maple leaf DIYs and way too many stacks of maple leaves. I've already got too many acorns and pinecones to ever use up by crafting.

I mostly like this game because there's always something you can 'grind'. There's the everyday stuff like hitting your rocks, gathering your mushrooms, digging up the fossils and having them assessed, gifting villagers and getting their photos... There's the seasonal stuff you got to finish before the time is up (bug-offs, fishing tourneys, getting certain bugs or fish for to complete the museum collections and the encyclopedia, getting DIYs and seasonal materials). There are the NPC visitors, some of those have their own nook miles goals to complete...

So yeah... I'm mostly motivated by an urge to complete everything. And I have a second character for storage already, but once I have completed most things on my main character, I can switch them around and start 'completing' Tonk.

 

[Blood Eclipse]

What kept my interests up in playing NH was

1. Decorating: this is definitely the best part of NH (for me) now that you're given the power to build, shape and destroy almost everything in your island's exterior. It's what kept me going the longest, and despite currently giving NH a break, it's what I plan to return for because I want to see my idea come to life of an island that has a little of everything I like. I still think it's a missed opportunity not to have all the furniture NL offered, but hopefully they'll come back in a future update.

2. Completing my museum collection: this isn't as top priority as decorating my Island is, but it still is something I want to do. My paintings and fossil side are already 100% completed. I just need to complete the rest of it: underwater creatures and bugs. I have yet to finish a museum in any AC game though

 

[CrankyCupcake]

I'm likely in the minority camp, as I don't play to complete any collection or to decorate. For me, the game is all about the animals, so I play every day to interact with them. Even villager hunting via mystery island hopping is fun and exciting because there are so many animals out there I have yet to meet.

Of course, I do decorate my island and rooms even though I don't particularly enjoy decorating. I've played AC since Wild World and New Leaf; I never played Happy Home Designer.

I'm not a completionist either. Sure, I enjoy catching new bugs or fish, but if I don't complete everything within a year, that's okay with me. I'm pretty certain I'll be playing for more than a year, so I'll always have another chance to catch what I haven't caught. I don't keep track of the number of DIYs I have. I don't buy or try to catalog every item in the game. It doesn't bother me that I'll never own every single KK Slider song.

The animals are what matter to me. I know a lot of players consider NH to be bad in terms of villager personality and interactions. Things are definitely not perfect. But I still find a lot of joy in greeting my islanders every day, interacting with them and unlocking new conversations. It's not tedious to me. Because the animals are my primary focus in playing the game, I enjoy moving them in and out of my island. I enjoy the relationships we build and the memories we make together.

It may seem contrary that, for someone who claims the animals are the most important motivating aspect of the game for her, I never have a list of "dreamies". For sure, there are some animals I like better than others. I think I don't have favourites because I enjoy change and discovery. I enjoy meeting new animals. Every game is different. So I get attached to different animals in different versions of AC.

The day I end up with an island full of residents I love so much I cannot let any go, is probably the day I stop playing. Because it would get boring. Change and discovery are important to me. (For instance, Divinity: Original Sin 2 is a long, meaty CRPG game I've done multiple playthroughs of and, every single time, I discovered something new, and it made me happy.) The longevity of a game is related to its ability to entertain and surprise me each time I play. ACNH will be engaging to me as long as there are animals I have not met and still want to meet.

Before I end this ridiculous essay I want to say that being able to take in-game screenshots is also a motivating factor for me. I enjoy photography in real life. It makes me appreciate camera mode in any game I play. There is challenge and satisfaction to be had in being able to compose a good screenshot, to find new ways of expressing the same sentiment in different environments, and to overcome the real-time limitations of any given situation in any instance of time in the game. Long after I'm done with ACNH, I will still have these screenshots to remember the best in-game moments by.

Sorry for the wall of text. The older I get, the longer I take to get to the point. And sometimes I get completely lost on my way there.

 

[TheSillyPuppy]

Great question and interesting to see everyone's thoughts/opinions.

1. Community aspect
This game could not have been released at a better time for our world. I feel so fortunate that we have this platform to stay in touch with friends and make new ones. My S/O and I are long-distance, and we're able to meet up and hang out/do stuff together. I also have another IRL friend starting the game around December, so I'm really looking forward to having another best friend to play with. It also brings me a lot of joy to help out friends/other players with missing items, recipes, etc.

2. Interactions with villagers
Villagers never fail to make me smile or laugh. They're adorable, and I enjoy the process of looking for them, moving them in, and parting ways for them. I love giving my loved ones gifts, so it's a joy to be able to give gifts to my residents everyday without the guilt/worry about overspending. I'm good at making friends, but there are very few people that I regularly keep in touch with in the long run, and that mindset is reflected in how long I keep the majority of residents around.

3. Decorating
I love getting my creative juices flowing. I'm just alright in doing art from scratch (drawing, painting, etc.), so decorating is the perfect activity for me. xD I'm holding off on a second major island overhaul for next year, and it's been fun to plan out how I want my island to look. I love optimizing the functionality and playability of my island, as well as giving my villagers fun features and unique yards for each of them to enjoy (at least in my head).

As for runner-ups:

4. Completing collections
I'm so excited to complete the bug and fish sections of the critterpedia for my main character in the coming months. I'm very impatient, so it's been a huge test of patience for me in working with my S/O to collect artwork whenever Redd visits one of our islands. However, I know I won't experience the same degree of satisfaction if I trade/buy art from the forums, so I'm more than willing to wait it out -- albeit impatiently. xD It's also amazing to be able to buy all the clothing in all the colour variations without having to worry about IRL limited closet/house space.

5. Villager hunts
I know some players dislike it, but I find island hopping so much fun. I've come across so many villagers that I would have otherwise overlooked if I had never bumped into them on Mystery Islands. Although we don't have capture cards to stream our villager hunts with each other over Discord, my S/O and I like to report on who we run into whenever one of us goes island hopping as we're watching shows or videos together.

 

[Mairmalade]

I see my fellow terraforming friends. It's something we've never experienced in Animal Crossing before (to this extent), so bringing ideas, scenes, and stories to life through it is something I enjoy. I've flattened my island twice, and redecorate to try out new ideas when I have them. First I went for a city-like vibe with a city center and 'apartments' or villager houses above, a natural Japanese-styled town after, and now a desert based off of Gerudo Valley/Gerudo Town and Dry Dry Outpost from Paper Mario. The true motivator is looking at images of places I like in games and trying to translate them into New Horizons. All the work makes it more fun to actually play in later, and I love taking photos of completed projects!

 

[Your Local Wild Child]

I’d have to say that 2 of the 3 reasons I have (decorating the outside and theming my island) are intertwined. I absolutely love how much customizability is in this game! I don’t think I would’ve stayed as long if this weren’t the case. I also appreciate that there’s something to do almost every day.

 

[coldpotato]

From this list I'd choose:

community aspect (online play/playing with friends/helping people out)
Helping people out has been my main reason right now. I've completed a lot in the game - the museum, got all my DIYS, got all my favorite villagers, got a 5 star island, and for the most part am cozy on my main island and don't want any major changes. My goal right now is to give back to the community. That is one major reason why I bought another switch/game and turned my island into a free catalog island. I host all sorts of events with prizes ranging from popular villagers to large amounts of materials/NMTs. It's so much fun for me to give back to the community and see people be grateful and happy.

decorating your island's exterior and/or terraforming & waterscaping
While I don't want any major changes on my island, I love decorating for the different seasons and holidays!

the fact that there is something to do every day (daily npc visitors or etc)

I love this as well. Things change each day and that's exciting to me.

but another huge reason I keep playing is for the updates. Even just seeing a trailer for an update gets me more excited than most things!

 

[maria110]

I like decorating the island's exterior although I don't do a lot of terraforming. I prefer the more natural, basic look. I also enjoy decorating interiors but I have to be in the mood to do it.

I guess that's an important factor for me: there are a variety of activities within the game that I can do depending on my mood and how much time I have. Recently, I've been playing in a haphazard way, just doing whatever I feel like doing at the moment.

 

[6iixx]

you needed to add more votes, seriously; i like so many aspects of this game on a daily basis so it was really hard just to narrow it down to only 3 selections. so i went with the 3 that hit home the most:

decorating home interior, decorating island exterior, & completing museum collections, etc.

the first two options almost go hand-in-hand for me; i desperately love design, i have since i can remember. when it comes to coming up with new ways to sort out a room, or landscape an area, i'm all over it. i've been a huge fan of games like rollercoaster tycoon where i got to essentially make my own landscape and do what i wanted with it; same with the sims franchise. when it comes to animal crossing, i love that i have that ability to have my own home and essentially an entire island to decorate how i choose. i can set my villagers where i want them, i can make little community areas that i like, etc.

the museum completion is just something that comes with being a competitionist. i want to get every fish, bug, sea creature, and art piece possible and fill it up. it's a sense of accomplishment, even though to most people, accomplishing something like that in a video game still isn't accomplishing anything. but for me, it is. and i enjoy the time i spend working at things to achieve them. like grinding all three of those bug off event trophies in one day.

i absolutely love the daily aspect, too, though; getting to greet your villagers for the first time that day, collecting all your things and digging up your fossils, etc. interactions with villagers are getting more and more broad, so i'm always excited when i see a new interaction between two villagers or my rep and a villager. trying to achieve their pictures has my completionist streak going a little crazy, but it gives me something to stay motivated for that isn't just redecorating.

don't get me wrong, i absolutely love a lot of the trades and online interactions i've had so far, but i could go without them. this game wouldn't be lacking for me without an online option. just, for me, i tend to get more out of playing my island by myself. dream addresses are very nice, but once again, it wouldn't be a game-changer for me without the option.

 

[Radio]

community aspect: three of my friends who i talk to daily also have this game and we play it together all the time. they helped me out a lot at the beginning and i send them duplicate fossils and DIYs that I have in return. We take tons of silly photos and overall just enjoying laughing on voice call with each other while we go around and catch animals on each other's islands. it's definitely making my motivated to play so that i can progress and show them what i've been able to come up with the next time that they visit my island.

decorating your home's interior: i love making themed rooms and with every newly acquired DIY or catalogue/shop item i am able to make improvements to current ones or just switch them up entirely. i do wish there were more items overall, but i appreciate the customization option so that i can colour-code better.

decorating your island's exterior and/or terraforming & waterscaping: i have so many ideas.

i'd vote for the villager one if they had more personality. i normally love interacting with villagers, but i wish these ones did more than repeat the same 6 lines over and over again. it's amusing to follow them around for a bit, but i've found that they don't interact with one another much because the map is so big, they're usually spread all over.

 

[daringred_]

voted "something else" because i don't really have a select motivation.

i play daily because it's pretty much the crux of the little routine i have these days. i'd feel super weird if i skipped a day when i certainly have the time.
right now, the main thing i play for is the flowers. the blue rose is the only one i'm missing before i can fill out my rainbow garden, so i've been saving one of every flower color in preparation. since it rained yesterday, i lowkey can't wait to log on today and see what duplicated.

 

[thatawkwardkid]

I have periods where I'll stop playing for a while but these are just things that keep me coming back

interactions with villagers
This was one of the first things that got me into this game when I first started back in Wild World. It was also during the Winter season so there was pretty much nothing to do besides chatting with villagers. I feel without the villagers, this game wouldn't feel the same to me.

the fact that there is something to do every day (daily npc visitors or etc)
It's nice to have them around, they keep things interesting and new when you start to get bored, and I'd definitely get bored without them. I mean I do like my regular villagers but I feel like things would get old quick if visitors were to stop showing up.

decorating your island's exterior and/or terraforming & waterscaping
In Wild World, this was the thing that kept me going for a while. It kept me busy for long periods of time. I didn't even know decorating your town/island was a thing until I started looking up Youtube videos. Before that, literally all I would do in the game was fish, talk to villagers and cutting down trees. Also, I tend to get bored with certain looks pretty quick so I always end up redoing my town which keeps me busy for even longer.

Theres more things I like about this game but the poll would only let me choose 3 options but some other things I like about this game is the community aspect, decorating my house, theming my town/island. I also enjoy all the holidays the game has to offer. Also, one thing in particular I like about New Horizons in particular is that they added more realistic things like wind and certain sound effects.

 

[moonlights]

Decorating my island's exterior and/or terraforming and waterscaping: I find decorating and seeing an area develop really fun. I've opted to try to avoid overdoing terraforming and waterscaping but creating small terraformed areas is something I also enjoy aha.

Villager hunts: I actually really enjoy island hopping and the excitement of waiting to see which villager will be on the island.