Starting over?

[Hypno KK]

I'm not the type of player who regularly resets. I had my first NL town for YEARSi.

I've had the same NH island since I started playing back in 2020. I feel kind of stuck with decorating/terraforming and kind of stagnant overall. I've been thinking about restarting but I'm worried I'll regret it. I'll also miss my villagers but I'm sure I could get them again.

is there anything to keep in mind? Any early game hassles I'm not remembering? Alternatively, how would YOU shake things up?

 

[BobRocks20]

Well, first off when you start a new island you have to go through the whole beginning again, obviously. Your native fruit and airport color may also be different too if you're worried about that.

If you have some things you value like Bells or certain clothes and furniture, there's a service in the Nook's Cranny forum where you can let someone hold them for you while you reset, at the cost of TBT. You can also have people hold your villagers but I don't know anyone who still does that.

If you have an online subscription, you can upload a Dream Address of your island and I'm pretty sure it won't be deleted if you reset it, so you can look back at your island. The same could apply to custom designs you made, if any. And... that's all I can think of.

To answer your last question, if I wanted to shake things up I'd do so on another island in another Switch. My first island holds sentimental value and I can't imagine throwing away something I put my love and effort into. I plan on my second island to include a specific theme and a lot more terraforming than in my first island.

 

[g u a v a]

I'm not the type of player who regularly resets. I had my first NL town for YEARSi.

I've had the same NH island since I started playing back in 2020. I feel kind of stuck with decorating/terraforming and kind of stagnant overall. I've been thinking about restarting but I'm worried I'll regret it. I'll also miss my villagers but I'm sure I could get them again.

is there anything to keep in mind? Any early game hassles I'm not remembering? Alternatively, how would YOU shake things up?

i think new horizons is a really unique game because a majority of things on your island can be changed without resetting. i would recommend not resetting unless there's something that is 100% unchangeable that you can't get over. for example, i reset my island to change my character's name because it made me uncomfortable. i regret losing the progress i had on the island but the change in name was worth it for me.

restarting and gathering all the DIYs/furniture/etc you had takes a considerable amount of time, which i would consider carefully.

if the things that you're dissatisfied with are changeable, i would try to focus on that. if it's trying to redecorate/spruce up areas on your island, i would recommend picking a tile from the map view and focusing on that area for a lil bit. i found it makes it easier to redecorate your island if you focus on small portions at a time.

 

[himekirako]

honestly i’ve thought about having a brand new slate to work with, but then i dread getting all the recipes and truly restarting my island so i’ve always just stuck to flattening.

if the option is available, i’d suggest making a dream address before starting over so that you can still revisit and look back on your previous island C:

if it’s the feeling of being unmotivated and being stuck, echoing the same sentiment of working in smaller sections rather than larger ones to make things easier. i find that even just doing one small build/working on one section then leaving it at that makes things less overwhelming.

 

[Aznoth]

I feel like the issue with restarting is that you're probably going to end up in the same situation where you need to terraform again and you'll basically be back at square one, except the only problem is that you'll probably be missing things that you've already collected (DIYs, collectables, etc.) which may cause more heartache overall versus just remodeling on your current file. If the thought of redoing everything bothers you though, maybe it's best if you try to plan it out in phases so that it's smaller and much more bearable tasks that you can complete over a period of time.

 

[ShawnFuzz]

To answer your last question, if I wanted to shake things up I'd do so on another island in another Switch. My first island holds sentimental value and I can't imagine throwing away something I put my love and effort into.

This is what I just recently did, and I have really enjoyed the process of meeting new villagers, and even starting fresh with just a tent and moving forward again.

However, I can appreciate that not everyone can afford a second switch, and this may not be a good plan. There is some good advice above about making slight changes to your current island gradually to make it feel new again, as long as you aren't too attached to the way things are.

 

[KittenNoir]

I didn't want to completely start over I only wanted to change certain parts of my island while still keeping everything I had unlocked and so on. I just ended up collecting all the items I no longer wanted sold them for bells and redesigned those areas. Instead of starting a whole new island.

 

[Hypno KK]

Yeah, no way I'm getting a second Switch just for NH.

I've often tried to do the "redo my island in small increments" thing but even so it just feels kind of off. I'm not a huge fan of cluttered islands so while I've made some special areas in my town, I mostly struggle with making natural-looking areas look good. There's only so much space I can fill with flowers and such. Any tips about that?

As for terraforming, I barely did any in my town... I just don't like it tbh.