Animal Crossing: A game from Satan himself

Author's Rating:

Pros: Deep, deep, deep, tons to do, customization, GBA connection, included memorycard

Cons: NOT for everyone, poor graphics, virtual keyboard

The Bottom Line: 
You'll either hate it or love it. If you like collecting things and customization, you'll probably like it. Otherwise, well, give it a shot.

Author's Review
Overall: 9
Gameplay: 8
Graphics: 6
Sound: 8
Replay Value: 9
Concept: 10

In the world of 'true gamers', there is a certain type of game called the Guilty Pleasure. This is the game that a 'true gamer' would never admit to playing for one reason or another: Pokemon because it's too childish; Britney's Dance Beat because it's Britney Spears; Animal Crossing because well, what gamer would play that?!

While you may feel a bit guilty playing it, Animal Crossing is indeed a pleasure. Well, for some people anyway. This review should have a disclaimer: Buy this game at your own risk. It's one of those titles that you will either love or hate; you'll either find it endlessly enjoyable or end up asking yourself if it's worth the plastic it's printed on. It's just that this is hard to decide. This isn't a game you can rent for three days and really get the full experience. It's not even a game that you can fully appreciate after a week or two. Only after you play it for several days, then give up and return to it a month later, only to be disgusted and shelf it for a few more weeks until you finally sit down to really play it, will you really get it. Then you can decide if you like it or not. Of course, at the same time, Animal Crossing is also a huge Nintendo gimmick, but more on that later.

Officially, Animal Crossing is called a communication game. This label seems fitting; surely it doesn't fit into any other established genre, only tangentially related to a simulation style of game. A large portion of the game does consist of communication with other players and the game's characters. However, at its heart Animal Crossing is a collecting game, with much of the gameplay consisting of finding and collecting things to accomplish whatever goal you set out to accomplish.

The game is set in a small village. You're a new resident, and the local shopkeeper has agreed to set you up with a meager house, even though you don't have enough cash on hand. Oh, by the way, the shopkeeper is an animal (a racoon, to be precise), and so is everyone else in the village. Every village has a shop, a train station, a post office, a pond, a town dump, a museum, a police station, a large beach, and some other specific landmarks. The locations of these landmarks, the layout of the town, and the townspeople that inhabit it are random and vary from town to town, player to player.

Thus, paying off your home debt is the first of many goals. There are many ways to do this, but the most lucrative is selling things to the shop. You can sell any furniture you come across, fruit that grows in the trees, fish you catch in the river or ocean, bugs you can catch in the warmer months, even fossils or other items you can dig out of the ground. Of course, once you pay off your debt, you're not quite home free. You can (and will) upgrade your house several times, with increasingly larger debts to pay off. Yet, once these are paid, that's not the end of the game.

There are several goals to be achieved, and you can choose whichever ones you like. Perhaps you want to catch one of every single type of fish. Maybe you want to donate every requested item to the museum. Or, you might want to achieve the best house rating possible by having a good collection of furniture, carpet, and wallpaper. Or maybe you want to dump trash from the ocean all over your town, and hit the villagers with your axe until they all leave, then cut down every single tree. You can do whatever you'd like, and the gamer who loves depth will love this game. There are tons of little secrets to be found, from house layout to obtaining rare items. Finding these secrets is half the fun.

What Animal Crossing ultimately comes down to is what you put in. And there is quite a bit to put in if you want. Depending on what day and time you play, you'll have different options and events. The Gamecube's internal clock is used to set the correct season and time of day, as well as to gauge the passage of time (much like Seaman on the Dreamcast did). While one could play for three hours straight, generally more is accomplished by playing 30 or 60 minute stretches every day, and at different times of the day. For example, the shop is only open from dawn till dusk, but late at night is the only time you may meet certain characters, which have their own rewards. During the winter, you can build a snowman which again has its own reward, but you won't find any of the insects that buzz around during warmer months. Different fish will populate the river and ponds during, say, May and August, and fishing tournaments are held every Sunday in June. Of course there are special events on holidays and even your brthday. It is entirely possible to 'cheat' and change the clock, but the fact that the option to do so is built directly into the main menu brings up the question of whether this is really cheating or not.

As it's called a 'communication' game, a large portion of Animal Crossing involves communicating with the villagers. You can do errands for them, just talk to them, trade furniture with them, or buy and sell items with them. Each villager has a personality and an attitude, and while some of your villagers may have identical personalities, their attitude reflects how you've dealt with them. Send them letters, preferably letters with presents, and they'll be happy. Ignore them, and they'll eventually move out. The letters are actually letters you write yourself, and you even get responses. However, the game doesn't really have a vocabulary, so you can curse all you want abd get a cheerful response. The problem with this letter writing is that it's done with an on-screen keyboard, making it extremely tedious - Nintendo really needs to release a U.S. keyboard for this game and Phantasy Star Online 1&2.

Even better is sharing with friends. Up to four people can 'live' in one village, so siblings or parents can play alongside each other, albeit not simultaneously. If you have a freind with the game, you can even visit their town or have them visit yours by sharing memory cards. This is where the possibilities really expand; slanderous messages on the town board, ripping up the trees and flowers other players have planted, taking things they've 'forgotten' on the ground. There are some serious implications in, say, a dorm room.

Players can even trade items! This is done without any kind of internet connection, but rather through the use of passwords. Provide the character and town name of the person you want to 'send' your item to, give up the item, and you get a code that person can input to get the item.

The graphics in Animal Crossing are generally mediocre at best. This is to be expected for a game that was originally designed for the Nintendo 64 and only turned into a Gamecube game late in development. Overall, they are actually fairly appropriate, somewhat cutesy and cartoonish, very appropriate for kids. But there are problems beyond just what the graphics look like. Inside your house, you have the options of zooming in and out and rotating slightly (maybe 25 degrees or so). However, these options disappear once outside of the house, which is where they are actually needed - in the village, where things can be hidden by trees, for example. On the other side of the coin, facial expressins and animations of the villagers are great, as well as the very Japanese 'emotions' they display; when angry, storm clouds float over their heads, when happy, daisies radiate from them.

Sounds are actually fairly good. Sound effects are appropriate, but the music is really great. There are several different village songs, and dozens of songs you can put in a stereo in your house to play. You can even customize the short 'town tune', which plays when the clock strikes the hour or when you talk to someone.

But, as I said above, this game really is a gimmick. When rumors of the Gamecube first leaked out, it was widely publicized that the Game Boy Advance would be able to hook up with the gamecube for more functionality. Animal Crossing takes this idea and runs with it. Not only can you use the GBA to avoid paying to design your own clothing patterns and visit the otherwise unvisitable island, but even the e-reader comes into play with special e-reader cards that provide you with special bonus items, some of which can't be obtained any other way. Some of the most coveted of these are the NES games; Animal Crossing includes an NES emulator, and in the game you can find NES games which you can play. Some very rare ones are only avilable on e-reader cards. While the game is fully functional without these gimmicks, you'll need to spring an extra $100 for a GBA, e-reader, and cards if you really want to have everything. Luckily, the game includes its own memory card, but spending that kind of money for one game is a bit absurd.

Animal Crossing really is a game you'll either love or hate. I would not suggest renting it to figure it out; if you're a fan of other 'collection' games like Pokemon, or other 'life sim' games like The Sims, there's a good chance this game is for you. If you like to play games for 8 hours at a stretch, finish them in a few days, and then pack them away never to be seen again, this game is not for you. Animal Crossing requires a long-term investment to really get the maximum enjoyment. Personally, I love it, but it's hard to recommend to others. This also made it very hard to rate, which is why I'm giving it a 9 instead of a 10. It's not for everyone, but hey, maybe this guilty pleasure is for you.