a90skid.com
  • Home
  • News
    • Nintendo
    • PlayStation
    • Xbox
  • Reviews
  • Opinion
A 90s Kid
  • Home
  • News
    • Nintendo
    • PlayStation
    • Xbox
  • Reviews
  • Opinion
SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER

For the latest video game news, reviews and more subscribe to our weekly newsletter.

  • Nintendo
  • Review

Why New Leaf Is the Best Animal Crossing

  • September 27, 2016
  • Mischa McGill

We’d pay a million bells for an HD console version.

animal crossing new leaf

The Animal Crossing video game series has been a favorite to many since its original release in 2001. In this beloved sim game, the player lives in a cozy town as a human character with anthropomorphic animal villagers and NPCs. Gameplay is in real-time and is open-ended, meaning there are no clear objectives to “beat” the game. Instead, players spend time collecting and selling various items, growing plants throughout the town, socializing with the other characters, and participating in occasional special events.

Subsequent to its debut, Nintendo has released three other Animal Crossing games. These titles include Wild World on the DS, City Folk on the Wii, and New Leaf on the 3DS. Each installment is wonderful in its own way, but New Leaf has to be the all time fan favorite for several reasons, all of which involve one key element that gamers ceaselessly crave: customization.

Public Works Projects

pwps1The most exciting new feature in AC:NL is Public Works Projects (or PWPs), which allow players to modify their towns like never before. These PWPs are buildings and features the player can add to their town as mayor. They include additions like a lighthouse, a campsite, a coffee shop, a water well, topiaries, various types of benches, and so much more.

Players often use these PWPs to create thoughtfully designed areas in their PWPs 2towns such as playgrounds, farms, outdoor sitting spaces, etc. In previous games, towns could be customized with trees, flowers, and custom designs, but PWPs introduce a unique way of designing towns with unprecedented personality and creativity.

Custom Furniture

 

Every game in the Animal Crossing series mostly has the same numerous and diverse furniture pieces with which players could decorate their houses. Players could never change any of the furniture’s design elements–that is, until AC:NL. Now, players have the ability to take most furniture to a blue llama named Cyrus who can change certain colors and patterns to meet personal desires. So if you don’t quite like the tablecloth that table came with, you can have Cyrus change it to an option he has or give him a clothing pattern or custom design to use! This feature allows players to give their houses very specific aesthetics and themes that have been out of grasp until New Leaf.

New Leaf custom furniture

House Exteriors

Houses in Animal Crossing have always looked basically the same: white exterior, wooden door, brightly colored roof, gray pavement, a small fence, and a mailbox. While the size could be expanded and the roof color could be changed, not many other customization options were available to players until AC:NL introduced Nook’s Homes into the town shops. Here, players can choose from a broad selection of house exterior renovation options, including pavements, roofs, doors, mailboxes, and the exterior walls, all of which change daily and come in a variety of colors, textures, and themes.

new leaf houses 1                                      new leaf houses 2

Additionally, when a player has fully expanded their house, they can choose to completely change the architecture of their house design to a castle, zen castle, or modern house. Much like PWPs and custom furniture, this feature finally allows players’ design tastes and personalities to be displayed in their towns.

Dream Towns

With all these new layers of customization, it would have been silly of Nintendo to not allow players to share their personalized, creative towns with other gamers. The feature they created to accommodate this was the Dream Suite, which allows players to share their own towns and visit the towns of others from around the world.

new leaf dream towns

All you need to have in order to visit someone’s town is their dream address, which players are constantly sharing on social networks like Miiverse, Tumblr, Instagram, and various Animal Crossing forums. This feature allows players to visit each other’s towns without playing at the same time in a traditional multiplayer fashion. Popular dream towns have thousands upon thousands of visits, and all dream towns are consistently providing inspiration for players working on their own towns.

Popularity

new leaf popularity

Nintendo really benefited from the effort they put into the new features of New Leaf—it’s popularity soared even before its release, receiving rave reviews and high anticipation from the gaming community. The level of design detail was a focal point in positive reviews, many of which noted that the graphics surpassed the game’s predecessor City Folk. After its release in 2012, AC:NL became the first 3DS game to exceed two million sold units in Japan, and it achieved this in only two months.

As of June 30, 2016, New Leaf had worldwide sales of 10.11 million units with an unusually large community of players who remain just as addicted as when they first picked up the game. Pick it up yourself and see what all the fuss is about – you won’t be disappointed.

Total
0
Shares
Share 0
Tweet 0
Pin it 0
Related Topics
  • 3DS
  • Animal Crossing
  • Animal Crossing: New Leaf
  • Nintendo
  • Nintendo 3DS
Mischa McGill
Mischa McGill

Mischa grew up with video games and still has a deep love for many - especially fun, colorful RPGs. Some of her favorites include Pokémon, Animal Crossing, Pikmin, Fantasy Life, Kingdom Hearts, Skyrim, Civilization V, and Stardew Valley. She loves nights in with her boyfriend cooking Mexican food, watching Studio Ghibli movies, and going head-to-head in their favorite games. Mischa might not beat you in Super Smash Bros, but she owns a replica of Arwen’s sword and Hermione’s wand, so... don’t rub it in too much.

You May Also Like
Hitman 3 Title Screen
View Post
  • 5 min
  • PC
  • PlayStation 4
  • PlayStation 5
  • Review
  • Xbox One
  • Xbox Series X

Hitman 3 Review – The Thrill of the Hunt

  • Matthew Owen
  • February 21, 2021
February NIntendo Direct
View Post
  • 7 min
  • News
  • Nintendo

Everything Nintendo Announced During the February Direct

  • Matthew Owen
  • February 18, 2021
Gate to Niwa Resort in The Medium
View Post
  • 6 min
  • PC
  • Review
  • Xbox Series X

The Medium Review – Resort of the Dead

  • Matthew Owen
  • February 15, 2021
Scott Pilgrim vs the World Seven Evil Exes
View Post
  • 4 min
  • Nintendo
  • PlayStation 4
  • Review
  • Xbox One

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game – Complete Edition Review

  • Matthew Owen
  • January 22, 2021
Overlooking Night City
View Post
  • 9 min
  • PC
  • PlayStation 5
  • Review
  • Xbox Series X

Cyberpunk 2077 Review – Neon Nights and Buggy Fights

  • Matthew Owen
  • January 3, 2021
Black Ops Cold War Vietnam
View Post
  • 7 min
  • PC
  • PlayStation 4
  • PlayStation 5
  • Review
  • Xbox One
  • Xbox Series X

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Review – A Satisfying Duty Done

  • Matthew Owen
  • December 13, 2020
Assassin's Creed Valhalla Hillside
View Post
  • 10 min
  • PC
  • PlayStation 4
  • PlayStation 5
  • Review
  • Xbox One
  • Xbox Series X

Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla Review – A Wonderful Journey West

  • Matthew Owen
  • December 6, 2020
Watch Dogs Cargo Drone Flying
View Post
  • 10 min
  • PC
  • PlayStation 4
  • PlayStation 5
  • Review
  • Xbox One
  • Xbox Series X

Watch Dogs: Legion Review – An Underwhelming Future

  • Matthew Owen
  • November 14, 2020
1 comment
  1. Jimmy Boy says:
    October 13, 2016 at 5:03 pm

    WOW! You know Japanese! How’d you learn it in the 90’s? You had to know it to play doubutsu no mori in 2001, it was the only way to play the game, it was only released in Japan until 2002.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

TRENDING
  • Gate to Niwa Resort in The Medium
    The Medium Review – Resort of the Dead
  • Sonic 1 World Record at AGDQ 2021
    The Best Speedruns of AGDQ 2021 Day Two
  • Spyro 3 Skateboarding
    The Best Speedruns of AGDQ 2021 Day Four
  • Super Mario 64 Blindfolded at AGDQ 2021
    The Best Speedruns of AGDQ 2021 Day Six
  • Zelda Wand of Gamelon AGDQ 2021
    The Best Speedruns of AGDQ 2021 Day Five
Instagram
Get everything you need to know about the latest #nintendodirect on our YouTube. Including synced voice to my lips! 7 0
Celebrating the best game music of the decade in less than an hour on YouTube Facebook twitch dlive but not Instagram. 7 0
#gaming #gamingdaily #gamingmemes #morrowind #skyrim 6 0
#skyrim #morrowind #gaming #gamingmemes 8 0
#morrowind #skyrim #elderscrolls 8 2
#finalfantasy #nobuouematsu 7 0
#hyperlightdrifter streaming now. :) 7 0
When you typo links awakening and stumble into a very specific YouTube niche 6 0
Please check out our review of #MarvelsAvengers if you're interested! Many thanks to @msigaming_anz for letting us review the game on their powerful and sleek GE66 Raider. @intelanz is throwing you the game with any MSI laptop with a 9th or 10th Gen INTEL Core i5, i7, or i9 Processor H-Series (Australia and New Zealand) Link is in the bio! 10 0
Our review of #SeriousSam4 by @officialcroteam is live! Shout out to @msigaming_anz for letting us review the game on their super impressive GS75 Stealth gaming laptop (link in bio) 9 0
#itdobelikedat #belikedat 7 0
Streaming #ico in 10 minutes.  First time playing.  Also trying to just play with the obs monitor on my tv.  Anyone else do that ? 4 0
Follow
Author
Mischa McGill
Mischa McGill
Mischa grew up with video games and still has a deep love for many - especially fun,…
View Posts

a90skid.com

26 User(s) Online Join Server

Subscribe

Subscribe now to our newsletter

Get everything you need to know about the latest #nintendodirect on our YouTube. Including synced voice to my lips! 7 0
Celebrating the best game music of the decade in less than an hour on YouTube Facebook twitch dlive but not Instagram. 7 0
#gaming #gamingdaily #gamingmemes #morrowind #skyrim 6 0
#skyrim #morrowind #gaming #gamingmemes 8 0
#morrowind #skyrim #elderscrolls 8 2
#finalfantasy #nobuouematsu 7 0
A90KID.COM

VIDEO GAMES COMMUNITY & ENTERTAINMENT

A 90s Kid is an active website and media channel, dedicated to providing you information and entertainment related to the video games industry

Navigation
  • Home
  • News
    • Nintendo
    • PlayStation
    • Xbox
  • Reviews
  • Opinion
Recent Articles
  • Hitman 3 Review – The Thrill of the Hunt February 21, 2021
  • Everything Nintendo Announced During the February Direct February 18, 2021
  • The Medium Review – Resort of the Dead February 15, 2021
  • Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game – Complete Edition Review January 22, 2021
  • The Best Speedruns of AGDQ 2021 Day Seven January 12, 2021
A 90s Kid
© 2021

Input your search keywords and press Enter.