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Why are there always so few people looking for friends

I also agree with the two posts above, I'm 21 years old. I'd play the game with someone 15-16 at the youngest but I prefer to play with people closer to my age (or at least roughly close). Playing the game with children is fine, but I'm not necessarily going to make friends with them either. It's just really awkward because I know there's a big age gap there and I'd just rather not fully engage.
 
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i made a thread ages ago and like 1??? person replied to it in 2/3 days so i gave up
 
This is such a depressing thread lol
But I totally understand XD
The only reason I like having friends is so we can admire each other's towns and enjoy each other progress. Give advice and stuff.
But I keep getting friends who haven't decorated at all and just want to do tours lol

But everyone on the bell tree seems so nice, it's hard to believe people are worried about psychos ruining everything
I always assumed if something ever happened you could quickly hit the off button or end session
How much damage could even happen?
 
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But everyone on the bell tree seems so nice, it's hard to believe people are worried about psychos ruining everything
I always assumed if something ever happened you could quickly hit the off button or end session
How much damage could even happen?

i agree with this, but it's also easy to take anything if you're sneaky about it. i've never had bad experiences and i let people roam around my town if i'm playing with them, i've never found anything fishy or missing too. although the chances are low, just be aware that one experience can put you/someone else off. also, these people can have the consequence of getting a negative rating. it's not worth their time to steal a few hybrids or trample on things and it shouldn't have to take up your time to deal with it either.
 
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there are a few factors in it for me:

1) the chat function in-game is painfully slow and clunky, so I don't like using it unless I have to
2) my town is still very much a work in progress, and I don't want anyone but my very close friends to see it before it's done (also, I don't trust strangers to not steal/wreck the place/talk to villagers that I might want to trade later)
3) I don't like doing multiplayer stuff much anyway unless it's with someone I already know
4) I'm 28 years old (29 in May), and most of the people on this forum are significantly younger than me, which can make socialization awkward sometimes... I don't have any problem with younger folks, but I know some kids are wary of adults (often with good reason) and I don't want to make them uncomfortable

hence why I tend to stick to single-player for the most part
 
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I'm pretty open to making friends and opening my town gate (i dont really care if they take anything), but I have a really hard time talking with people that I don't know, so I usually dont do it so often
 
Honestly, I used to be super open to opening my gate and having people over, but people started abusing it by showing up unannounced with axes or shovels. Now I try not to open up my gates unless I'm trading (even then I prefer visiting the other person's town). Not to mention what everyone above said.
 
I'm in Oz too, Queensland (GMT +10). I feel your struggle.

Ah, solidarity!

I doubt it will get much action, but I just created "The Australia, New Zealand & South East Asia Thread!" over at the train station.


I have to stay up quite late to trade with a lot of users on this forum because I live in South East Asia, basically in the same boat as the aussies. Trading is fine, but because it's so late for me (or so early for a lot of folks) I never really get to do anything longer than a trade.

I must sound like such an uptight person when I push to arrange a specific time to trade, but I think most players forget that there's a southern hemisphere too! Because of this, I've kinda given up on trades, social visits, etc.

By the way, Tiny Tree is one of my all time favourite towns! Absolutely inspiring.


Hi, fellow Aussie (Melbourne!) here *waves*

The timezone thing is the biggest reason I stopped using the Train Station board much. It's hard enough for me to get times sorted for trades. Trying to find a mutually suitable time to play with someone for an hour or two to just hang out in-game has become something of a pipe-dream for me. Aside from RL friends and trades I can't even recall when the last time I was in someone else's town or they in mine. Maybe the Fair last year for an event?

I'd like to visit more towns and I've got no problem with having visitors to mine at a later date. I think I'll try and get that happening once I've sorted my towns out to make them less overwhelming for visitors.

Looking at your signature I thought you might be in Melbourne too :D

Yep, I'm trying to arrange some trades right now and it's taking a fair bit of planning and effort to work out times. I would love to have friends over for social visits, trades and the like once I reset my town and build something worth spending time in... I just don't want to stay up 'til 3:30am to make it happen!

I'm trying to convince some of my RL friends to play too, although I think ACNL is a little too slow paced for most of them. I dream of leisurely hours spent laying on the grass, playing side by side....

... who knew my friendship goals would be so basic in my 30's :lemon:
 
I agree with the age group and that chat system. Last summer, we had an adults gathering thread and a couple of us visited each other. My town was super wip at the time so I didn't want anyone over in embarrassment as did a few others in the thread. I visited someone's town but then that's it which is a problem. I wish there was more of a reason to go to others' towns. In MMOs a lot of times you need to group up or you won't get anywhere in the game. You have to interact with others- it's fun, too. This game, you're fine being a hermit. You go to someone's town, go "ooh-ah", talk to a villager or two, take a few little staged photo-op screenshots, go pretend to drink coffee? That's it and it's awkward as adults. Maybe fish or something but you can do that in your own little stream with the 4 spawns you don't have to fight over. So we all just keep trading and seeing a tiny glimpse of a gorgeous town. I give a compliment to the tiny bit I can see of the town as I stand at the train station for the trade. ;-/

They should've added something like that to the game but maybe there's less reason to with the age group. So I am always eager to help others get signatures- it helps them with their villager friendships and then they get to visit/see my town as I continue to work on it before it's DA-ready and gives my villagers something new to talk about. Some of the users collecting sigs have half expected me to lead them or tail them to keep an eye on them. No, I trust a lot of you here and don't need to babysit you. Go have fun and explore I always say! :) I've learned to just let go and have faith in my fellow players as it looks like a lot of us are trustworthy.<3 You're not some random off the island. I see and know you from TBT.

Anyhoo this thread seems like a good opportunity to organize something! ;D
 
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... But everyone on the bell tree seems so nice, it's hard to believe people are worried about psychos ruining everything

I always assumed if something ever happened you could quickly hit the off button or end session
How much damage could even happen?

I try to keep this mindset too! Fortunately everyone has been super respectful and fun so far, as well as exceedingly generous.

Reading through this thread I do see that a lot of players have different expectations for visiting etiquette, and this is something that makes me feel a bit awkward on the rare occasions I do visit other towns. Like, I think we all get the obvious stuff... no running, don't steal stuff, etc. But what about more personal preferences?

I'm very casual, so I love the idea of my "Best Friends" popping by for a visit if my gates are open (this is such a good feature!). If my visitor is chatty, I prefer to use an app such as Line rather than the in game chat, because it's not very user friendly. I'd be happy to let them wander around on their own to explore, speak to my villagers, do a spot of fishing, etc. However I can see this is someone else's idea of a freaking NIGHTMARE. Maybe expectations for friendship should be made clear when posting in the Train Station?
 
Personally for me, I am just very busy. I am married with a daughter and am a full time care giver for my mother with Alzheimer's. So my schedule is 100% unpredictable. If I need to visit a town, I always just visit one of my daughter's towns or one of my multiple towns using our other DS. That is why I don't actively pursue other player interaction. My schedule is simply too unreliable.
 
My anxiety and general awkwardness pretty much guarantees I won't be actively seeking out anyone to have visit my town(s). If I need to trade or do anything, it'll usually be amongst myself since I have four towns and multiple systems.
 
I have horrible anxiety and am extremely awkward as well, not to mention I've had a very difficult time trusting people. Moreover, I'm a bit of a perfectionist with my towns, worried that some of the hybrid flowers could accidentally get ran over.
 
I'm actually extremely anxious about having people over in case they trash my town and I'm anxious about meeting and playing wit new people online so I generally don't where I can. I've had hybrids ruined and things stolen before and it's a horrible feeling, especially when you've put so much time into making your town as near to perfect as possible. I'm anxious about travelling to other people's towns, too, in case I make a mistake or do something wrong.

When I do have people over, I have strict rules to save myself the stress and tears.
 
A lot of people are cautious because they DO work on their towns and put out nice things and have hybrids, and it's hard to find trustworthy people because if you just add in everyone and let people in people can really abuse your trust and then you're down several hybrids, and the gold tools you dropped cause your pocket was full is missing... it's really crappy, but I do wish I could find nice trustworthy people, that's why when I DO look I look for older people who seem more trustworthy, check their WiFi/Trade ratings so I can see if they are indeed trustworthy, it's not so easy to trust after it's been abused to many times...
 
Sadly for Animal Crossing New Leaf online gaming, it's not like City Folk online. That days playing online was so cool and great because it was just fun, even with trading.

Why i say sadly? Well, sometimes you found yourself playing with casual people. This players just don't care about how much effort you put in your town, so they just run, stole and break some rules cause in some days, they're going to leave the game.

This days is hard to find someone who come and tell you: "Hey! Wanna play Animal Crossing New Leaf a little?" like in the old days with City Folk.

I still can remember myself playing CF with that friends i met in the Internet. I never talk to any of them again...
 
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to be honest i'm not entirely sure WHAT to do other than tour around someone else's town (never my own bc i dont rly have anything interesting to show). I only visit my friends' towns because its easier to talk to them/the awkwardness isnt so bad. When i have strangers visiting my town simply for fun i'm like always so on edge to flick the wifi switch off bc of the thought of them ruining my town ;;;
 
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it was probably used a lot more when NL first came out. i feel like if nintendo makes the next game easier as in being able to obtain things and edit your town as well as adding moar stuff to do with friends then i think maybe we'll see a more active train station. also this is personal but i hope they dont keep the train station music from new leaf it sounds depressing lol
 
I don't really use it because of the fact that I'm in Australia and most of the users seem to be from the USA or UK.
 
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Hmm.. I guess it's the sheer awkwardness of someone coming over to my town and having nothing to do. Like, we could go play Island Tours, meet my villagers, help me pay off my PWP, but that's about it (my house is a mess).
 
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