"A thoroughly entertaining chance to play chores. Or something."

Never would I have ever thought I would be so interested in picking weeds, talking to animals and designing clothing. Never would I have thought millions of others would be so interested, too.

Animal Crossing has effectively proven my thoughts wrong.

When you start a new game, you'll immediately notice the poor, blocky and physically incorrect blurs and blocks that make the characters, the environment… the game. As Animal Crossing began life as a Nintendo 64 game, it's only natural that it would not exceed graphically. No noticeable tweaks in the textures or sprites indicate that the graphical prowess was not of top concern. Thankfully, AC makes up for this minor pitfall but offering wonderfully colourful environments; though blocky, one can certainly respect the changing leaf of the tree as the season turns from summer to autumn. When the white snow drapes the once brown grass and even before that sharp green, AC creates an image of beauty in the small whatsitcalled town where your horned human lives. The animals, whom talk and move about like humans and whom you live with, all vary in type, colour and appearance. It looks like an N64 game, but it looks like a nice one, pleasing to the eye.

Considering the next five minutes will have you staring at one of these animals, the looks of them had better have been eye-pleasing. When you begin, you meet a cat by the name of Rover who's aboard the same train you are. As he talks to you, he asks you what your name is and where you're headed. As one would assume, this is where you create your character's name and the town in which he and the animals live. Through a series of questions (which build the appearance of your character's eyes, though it's never clarified that such is happening nor are hints to the ultimate looks of the eyes ever given) you discover that Rover has connections in the town you're headed to (from here on out referred to as ‘Sizzler', as I named my town). See, he knows a fellow by the name of Tom Nook who runs the store there (the one and only store, which carries everything from paper to alien spaceships), and Tom Nook has houses for sale. You're headed to Sizzler, sure, but you've got no place to stay! Fear not, for Tom Nook is quite a generous fellow and offers you a house regardless the sudden request. Rover converses with Tom, works out what goes down, and off you are from the train and into Sizzler!

When you arrive, you'll be greeted by a monkey who is the town's porter. After departure from the income zone, you're quickly met by Tom Nook, who is quite eager to explain all of the game's basics to you (and to sell you that house, of course). A conversation with him about the town generally and your condition later, and you're looking at several houses to choose from. None are different in outer appearance (sans roof colours), meaning the difference relies entirely on the indoors. It is true that you cannot customize the outside of the house aside from the roof colour (and a few neat unlockables gained after completing certain tasks down the road), though that's of no issue as the indoors provides plenty of entertainment in this regard. At the moment, each of the houses look virtually identical indoors as well, the only differences actually being the wallpaper and flooring. After selecting which house you so desire most, you pay Nook for your new home. Of course, a problem arises from this happening; you're short of cash! Not to worry, though, for as said Nook is a generous person. It is under his word that you shall now work for him part-time!

Of course, this part-time work is all pre-programmed to server the same specific tasks in the same order under the same conditions as a sort of tutorial to help you get to know the game. The very first task you receive is the request that you change your clothing to Nook's work clothing. Once you learn how to change shirts, you're to go outside where you'll spruce up the life around Nook's Cranny by planting plants and trees (the trees may later in the days to come die or thrive with life). After these two very simple goals, you'll get to be on your own for a short while as Nook requests you meet the townsfolk and get to know the town. This is vital for the future requests Nook has that make up the rest of the tutorial of sorts.

Your town is filled with things to do. Unfortunately, you can't do a whole lot when Nook asks you to meet everyone. Actually, for the most part the only thing you can do is talk to the animals or pick fruit off trees, and at this stage in the game you can't even use the fruit as a redeeming item (by selling it), but rather can only eat it (which does absolutely nothing aside from waste good fruit). You'll quickly realize that the town has an abundance of personalities to interact with, making sure that everyone can find a good animal friend or two (though in this community every animal considers you their friend). This makes for more interesting conversation whenever you simply talk to the animals to chit-chat about whatever. While you can't control what's discussed, nor can you control what you say in the conversation (with several exceptions that I'll get to) you can at least humor yourself from the animal's replies (which are often very lovably idiotic).

After walking about meeting all the folk (and the mayor of the town, consistently among all games the turtle Tortimer), you'll report back to Nook for your first real duty; transporting goods from the store to the customer! You're given an object to deliver to a particular animal in the town, and so you head off to do so. Upon delivering, you come to understand that Nook isn't the only generous being in this town; all the animals are! Once the product is received by the animals, they happily return the favor with a gift for yourself. The gift can range from a shirt to a new dresser; essentially anything that you could buy in-store from Tom Nook. This nice offering on account of your work is something to remember, as you can take advantage of the generosity after completing the tutorial.

Heading back, Nook has already started paying off the bill from your work, but now you're given a letter to write. Here you get to experience first-hand how terribly annoying it is to write a letter without a keyboard or a physical pen. AC's keyboard structure is of no serious issue, it simply takes a good, long time to get the words on the paper. Here you can write the most clear, wonderful letter you've ever crafted. However, I strongly advise you not do so; all effort would be a waste, for the animals apparently never attended grade school and thus never learned to read. You'll always get a letter back from an animal, and each one, almost guaranteed, will complain about how they couldn't understand a thing you said. Shame, maybe if they could trade some of their generosity for inspiration to learn how to read!

It's of no matter, though, as the only time you would write a letter is when transferring a gift to an animal (such as, say, a shirt - and they will wear this shirt when received) or when cheating using Universal Codes, which are exploits you best steer clear from. Completing this task and returning to Nook, you continue with the tutorial. Throughout the final tasks, you learn how to use tools such as axes, and you learn how to post messages on the bulletin board located in your town (a useless thing to do unless you have others with game saves on your same memory card, as the animals pay no mind to whatever messages you post). After all this running about, finally, you're off the hook and home free! No more working for Nook, no more bill to pay!

Oh, wait, there is bill to pay. A lot of bells (AC currency) to pay back. Tens of thousands of bells. Fear not, however; while Nook may not have any more work for you, you can easily gain bells to help get the house's payment down. Selling such petty things as shells collected from the southern end of the town by the ocean often gains cash upwards 320 bells, so it's not such a big deal. With items such as paper costing 160 bells at Tom Nook's, it should be rather blatantly obvious that the currency has more in relation to the Japanese currency than the United States currency anyhow.

From here on out, it's total freedom. Anything you want to do that AC provides is now physically possible (though some things take a much longer time than others). This is where the meat of AC is, and where it becomes immediately obvious that AC became popular for a reason.

The first thing you may want to do is pay off the bill, or at least get started on it. To get on the road to doing so, you could collect and sell the aforementioned sea shells, you could pick fruit to sell (all native fruit runs at 100 bells per piece), you could go to the dump and sell whatever spare items they have in there that are of no interest to you. It should be an easy couple thousand bells right off the hop, and the key thing here is easy. Relaxing, almost. AC doesn't run off the idea of extreme killer difficulty like in shmups like Ikaruga and The Guardian Legend, nor does it play like The Sims with its constant need of keeping player stats balanced, nor Harvest Moon where there's a farm in constant need of care and animals to feed. You don't have to do anything in AC at all, and there will be no disadvantage. Things can't go downhill (sans mass growing of weeds, though as it doesn't negatively affect the game in anyway it really isn't so big a deal), rather only up. From the broke boy (or girl) our of short work, you can grow into the millionaire of Sizzler. It's entirely possible. Maybe you want a massive house stocked full of classy objects. Get rich and make your dream come true!

Earning money isn't as restrictive as selling sea shells and native fruits. One could also go about digging up fossils, and then sending them in to be examined. Upon return, one could sell said fossil for a price consistently somewhere in the thousands, often around 5,000. While this wouldn't be a good thing for the Museum (which I'll get to), it'll certainly make for an easy payment down on the house. Fossils aren't the only thing you can sell at a fine price, either; go fishing or bug hunting and sell your catch. Bells in return range from embarrassingly low to insanely high. It's an open world for building up your little empire.

Or maybe you care more about the health of your town rather than your own personal well being. Nook can wait; we shall now plant some trees! A wise tree in your town shall tell you when all in your town is well. There are semi-specific requirements needed to get your town into a sort of ‘perfect' state, and you could abide by those to help out the town and make it more user friendly (meaning more animals are likely to move in). Requests generally are asking for the removal of weeds or the planting of trees in specific acres of the town.

The Museum is another fine building in the town which offers a host of rooms for visiting. While you could dig up, verify and then sell fossils, here you can donate your findings for the better of the Museum, owned by none other than an intelligent owl by the name of Blathers. Blathers handily keeps track of who in the town donated what, so you're never at fear of lacking credit for your findings. You can also donate fish, bugs and paintings, the former two caught throughout the different real-time seasons, and the latter purchased in such places as Nook's Cranny or the black market ringleader Redd's own little tent which comes by every now and then.

Perhaps the town's being isn't of priority, though neither is your own. I mean, who cares about paying Tom Nook so to expand into some massive mansion? Who cares about picking weeds to make the place look a little nicer? Maybe you want to simply design. The Able Sisters' shop-of-sorts here offers you a neato offering; design your own clothing! Well, specifically, your own texture that can be used as clothing, or wallpaper, or flooring, or whatever. It's relatively cheap and it offers the creation of rather complex design, offering a multitude of colour palettes meaning the inner artist can feel free to get down the best work he or she can, and enjoy it. This sole option can suck a good amount of time out of a gamer.

Those who are visually artistic aren't the only ones who get fun, however; musically artistic folks can just as easily get their jam on, though not in a deep, fulfilling sense. Sizzler has its own town theme, which is created automatically when you first enter the town but can later be changed by someone living in the town. One could craft a short, petite piece that caters to the simplicity of pop, or possibly produce a harsh, short thrash with crazy, uncontrolled beats. You don't get a whole lot of time with the created music, but it's a nifty feature. You can also check out K.K. Slider, local guitarist who enjoys playing a tune for free for the fellows that care to listen. He gives you an air-check after a performance, so you can rock out in your house to his jams, too.

Another thing you can do should you ever feel the need to do more work is to ask the local animals if they need any favors. Generally they'll ask you either give or take back an item to/from another animal. It works exactly the same way it did with Nook's part-time work and it rewards you in the same way, too (sans bills paying). It's a great way to get ‘free', so-to-speak, stuff, like furniture and new shirts. When you begin to get bored with the same old, same old, you can at least remind yourself of furniture to collect by doing this.

Or you could visit a friend's town. The easiest way to extend playtime is to go with this route. By having another town on another memory card, be it another of your own or a friend's, you can visit the other town and check things out there. You can buy different items, pick different fruit (which sells for 500 bells at your native town! A wise choice would be to plant some at your place), meet different animals and generally re-live the initial experience all over again, and your friend can do the same. It's through this that AC can extend its longevity to surprising lengths.

Of course, it can't last forever; nothing does. In time (though a long time), AC will become the same old, same old to a point where you simply won't ever want to touch it again. Because there's no set goals and no specific paths to follow, and because everything you do after upgrading to the biggest house and after you complete the Museum generally amounts to nothing, it's inevitable that boredom shall strike and cause you to put the game down for good. However, all the entertainment received beforehand makes it all worth it, even if the game ultimately becomes worthless. It's flawed on principle simply because it isn't infinitely interactive, much in the same way as The Sims. While The Sims and AC are very comparable, one advantage TS has over AC is that it can expand itself; it's a PC game, so there can always be something new. In AC, this is simply not possibly unless you constantly make new towns so to suit your wants. AC is ultimately a great game that will die in time, though provide enough entertainment beforehand to make the death one which is not in vain. It's a fantastic title you have no reason not to check out (unless you already have the DS version, in which case, steer clear!).

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/24/06