Haaah, I kinda went a bit inactive on here, huh? Uh, well... yeah. Anyways, since my inactivity... I have kind of grown bored of New Horizons and my save file had been deleted on January 1st, since I had planned on starting 'fresh' for 2021... but that sort of never happened.
I've sort of been wanting to make a new island, but I don't really have the time to dedicate (nor the motivation) to do everything day by day, so I thought about time-traveling and just not giving a darn. The problem is I've no idea where to start. All I know is my goal is to make a super nice island with a bunch of villagers I want.
On that note, I may not be able to respond to much, if anything at all. Between real-life kicking me to the curb randomly and the Monster Hunter Rise addiction going strong, my attention is very much distracted today.
P.S. For the love of Tom Nook, please don't turn this thread into one of those.
Personally, the way I like TTing is to do one day at a time. So, like you could start the date on January 1st, play an hour or so, and then TT forward a day when you feel like you want to. It's a great way to play if you don't wanna dedicate yourself to playing every single day- if you keep track of what day you left off on, you could put the game down for weeks and just TT to the day after you stopped and you won't miss a day at all! But, if you don't wanna do every day, you can still skip as many as you want, when you want. Maybe keep an eye on different holidays/events and/or focus on TTing to dates when the most fish/bugs would be available? Or maybe you could look up your favorite villagers' (whoever moves in, I mean) birthdays and you can TT so you never miss those?
Nothing particularly important you need to know other than to go into the Switch settings and turn off the option for the clock to synchronize with the Internet and then you're free to set the clock to whatever day and time you desire. There's no longer an option to change the time from within the game itself like in the previous games, so you change the Switch clock itself.
System Settings -> System -> Date and Time
Unlike New Leaf and previous games, you don't have to worry about villagers leaving without permission. You also don't need to worry about the flowers wilting and dying, heck, you actually just end up with more of them.
I very much agree with Serabee! I constantly TT, but I basically always do it day by day (unless I'm trying to cycle out a villager to either sell, give away, or island hunt.) What Halloqueen said is an absolute must though, making sure the switch clock isn't synchronized with the internet.
As for TT'ing I'd recommend either starting from present day, and TT'ing forward from there, 1 day at a time. You can then either stay in a particular season to get seasonal DIYs/Materials, or focus on speeding to end game and getting terraforming unlocked and focus on developing your island. The best thing about TT'ing is that it allows people who are busy to fully enjoy the game without having to worry about missing things. Plus the fact that you HAVE to confirm when a villager moves out is extra amazing. Nothing worse in NL than when your favorite villager has moved on because you didn't play for a few months.
As most other people have said - When I tt I will do one day at a time while I play. Whenever I’m done playing for the day I always set the date back to the current time though. I’m not sure if other people do that too but that’s a habit I have
As most other people have said - When I tt I will do one day at a time while I play. Whenever I’m done playing for the day I always set the date back to the current time though. I’m not sure if other people do that too but that’s a habit I have
I don't always do that, but it can be helpful, particularly if you play some other games that the date might matter in. Like in Pokemon Sword/Shield, TTing messes with when new Pokemon come into dens. But it varies by game, and doesn't affect most of them!
As most other people have said - When I tt I will do one day at a time while I play. Whenever I’m done playing for the day I always set the date back to the current time though. I’m not sure if other people do that too but that’s a habit I have
That's more of a personal taste and individual circumstance sort of thing. I personally don't bother to ever set the date back to the current date or resynchronize with the Internet, but if someone uses their Switch to watch YouTube then it might be something worth doing because the clock not being synchronized with the Internet renders the YouTube app unusable for the duration.
Also while I'm posting here, I would also second what Serabee said about keeping track of the last time and date you played once you're finished with a play session. You can travel back to the same exact day no matter how long of a break you take if you're ever just busy or simply don't feel like playing for a while.
I think I always go back to the current date because usually when I am tt’ing it’s to do specific things like get items I ordered from the mailbox, move a villager out, have buildings moved, etc. So once I’m done doing all that I just go back to current time. I should’ve explained that more in my original response lol. I’ve tried to tt without going back to current time and I did it for a while but for some reason I always go back to current time once I’m done playing for the day.
As as time traveler myself I would suggest only time travel to when you want to build bridges and inclines faster. Of course whenever you buy items from the Nook Shopping you always have to wait a day because of the 5 item limit. I know thats annoying, but you can time travel to speed up the process of getting items so it doesn't become too much of a hassle.
As for villagers I have to give you heads up because the way the game picks whatever villager wants to move out is random. It takes 15 days for a move out thought bubble to appear on a certain villager. If its not the villager you want, then don't talk to them, and time travel the next day so that the thought bubble goes on the villager you want to move out. It sounds a little confusing, but once you understand it, it can be helpful.
One last advice is that if you feel like you cannot play events because you have irl stuff going on you can just time travel ahead to the event just to play it, although last year Nintendo decided to time lock events so its going to bit harder this year. What I do is usually set the region to like Tokyo our Australia depending on where you live where the timezone is different. See when a new update comes it unlocks the event, but it doesn't unlock for other places. So if you was in America where it was still time locked, but its open in a different country, just change the region from "America" to "Australia" and set the timzone to "Sydney". Once you do that you will be able to play the event that way. Keep that in mind whenever there is a new event happening in the future but its time locked.
Hope this helps you out and another thing is that don't time travel too much. I know I learned my lesson when I over did it and I got burned out on the game so easily. Take your time and time travel when you feel like you want to do more. If you feel like you are going too fast, its best to slow down until you feel more relaxed and have more energy to keep playing. Of course I cannot tell you how to play the game, since its all up to you. You do whatever you feel works for you.
