Hello, villagers! If you haven’t read it already, check out Mike Minotti’s interview with Aya Kyogoku, the director of Animal Crossing. After digesting it for a bit, here are my thoughts!
In the interview, some of the questions I posed in my previous post are answered (more or less). For instance, Minotti asked whether all furniture items would be available from the start and Kyogoku answered:
“Not every single furniture will be available in the beginning. Obviously, as you know, Animal Crossing has lots and lots of furniture. Having it all available might be too overwhelming at first. As you take on different requests, furniture that fits that request or theme will become available. We’ve designed it so that they become progressively available at a good pace. It won’t overwhelm you, but it’ll give you enough choices.”
Interesting! To be honest, if all furniture items were available upon start-up, that would make the game too easy and stale, so I’m glad to see that there are some item restrictions early on. It also means players have incentive to go back to an old villager’s house and update it with new items that have been unlocked.
No budget?
Now, the next part of the interview is intriguing because I never thought of it before. The writer asks whether or not players must work within a certain budget. While the development team thought about it, there is no budgeting system in AC:HHD. The idea of working within a budget is more realistic, and I’m kinda sad that it’s not included in the game, at least as an option. For example, if you manage to complete a renovation within a specific budget then you’d get additional rewards (or a gold star, because everyone likes gold stars, yes?).
Customization? answered! …Sort of.
In my previous post, I questioned the depth of the character customization since the trailers so far didn’t really show much. We finally have an answer! Kinda. Kyogoku says,
“You can definitely customize the player character, as you were able to in New Leaf. You can change the face, the hair. You can make him look exactly like your character in New Leaf. You’ll work for Nook’s Homes. Because Nook’s Homes has a dress code, you’re always in uniform while you’re working.”
Hmm, interesting (“interesting” seems to be my key word for this article). As I remember, you couldn’t really change your face after answering those questions at the beginning of New Leaf, so I wonder whether or not she’s referring to that or to an entirely new method of face customizations.
amiibo cards not required to play (technically)
While it was previously thought that Amiibo cards were necessary in order to get new gameplay, it appears that is not the case. The game director states,
“The animals will hang around in front of Nook’s Homes thinking, oh, I want a house like this. You’ll talk to them and take on their requests and build their houses. But with the cards, you can reach out to animals in particular. You’ll be making a call and saying, hey, would you be interested in building a house with us? For a lot of Animal Crossing fans, it’ll be great to be able to reach out to their favorite animal at will and come to build a house for them.”
So if you really really wanted Kiki to show up so you can design a house for her, then you can buy the Amiibo cards. However, I like the idea of villagers randomly showing up. Since I like collecting and the design of the Amiibo cards, I’m still going to invest in a pack or too. Since there are over 330 villagers in the game (as of New Leaf), and Nintendo has announced 100 cards, it’s very likely that the villagers featured on the cards aren’t going to be the ones that randomly show up in your game. I’m not sure what’s worse, to be honest – having to wait for Bob to show up in my game or hoping for a Bob Amiibo card!
Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer 