Going to be a bit long: My 6-year old daughter just had Marcie move in to her island, and noticed that her wallpaper has strawberries on it. This is significant because my mom (my kids called her Punkin), whom we suddenly lost to cancer last year, collected strawberry stuff. I checked my catalog to see if I had the wallpaper (pink quilt), but I didn't. I asked a couple friends if they had it, in hopes they'd send to me, and me to her. Immediately after, I went to Nook's to check store stock, thinking it wouldn't be there...but what do you know, today's selection included the Pink Quilt Wallpaper. I snatched it up, sent one to my daughter, and now have it hanging in one of the rooms of my house. I figure I can try to locate as many strawberry-related items as possible to use in decorating "Punkin's Room."
Additionally, last night, I entered into a giveaway being run by Darcy94x, I requested a chance to win the Mom's set...and this morning, she notified me that I had won.
I'm a 38-year old father of 4 that constantly finds himself in awe of the majesty and wholesomeness of a game centered around talking animals.
I can’t think of anything extremely sentimental like you just brought up, but I do have a moment that got to me: I didn’t know that you could have the full ten villagers even if you have multiple profiles at first. As such, I stuck at 9 villagers for the longest time. When I figured out that I could have 10, I got ahold of 8 NMT (I wasn’t a part of the community until like 2 months ago) and texted my brother who lives an hour and a bit away from the rest of us that I was looking for someone cool for my island. Not two tickets in do I find I find my absolute favorite villager Sterling. So, five minutes later do I text my bro again that I found someone!
Another villager hunt that got me was when I got my parent’s favorite villager: Wolfgang. Originally, I was going to settle for Sprocket but when I heard the mild disappointment in my parents, I decided against it. Once again, two tickets later I find Wolfgang (don’t worry too much, I love Wolfgang way more than sprocket so I was elated too).
One more thing was my last hunt. This one took way longer than the above two, but 20 minutes after finding my favorite lazy villager Lucky, my sister comes down saying that she got a job in our hometown. I know the events aren’t connected in any way of course, but I have all the more reason to like Lucky.
I can't say this about New Horizons specifically, but the first game definitely got me. I was put in a private religious school with only about 20 students, so I was robbed of a real high school experience. The handful of friends I had from my time in the public system lived too far for me to see on a regular basis. During high school I played Animal Crossing incessantly, even when I was into another game, I always had time for it. The villager dialogues were a lot longer and more diverse in that game, so you could really get the sense you were having a conversation with these little animal people. Even the ones with the same personality types seemed a little different because dialogue was less likely to repeat. The game felt massive even if it wasn't really that big and there was something almost magical about it that I still haven't quite put my finger on. All I know is that game made me feel safe, and gave me an escape from more than I can even talk about here.
I had a similar experience to @ReanimatedSorceress with Wild World. I was a pretty lonely kid when that came out/when I got it. I moved to a new school that year, hadn't made friends, and had pretty strained relationships with my family at that point. I would play WW for hours to fill that gap. It made me feel less alone (and as somebody with a boatload of pets as an adult, I still prefer animal to human company most of the time).
I've been having a very hard time recently with my job, relatively new position. My anxiety and depression has soared. My peppy villager compliments me a lot and... the last time she did, I teared up a little. I havent heard much positivity recently and the short moment just got to me. I have other examples from past games but, that's a recent one.
Come to think of it, NL came out when I was living alone for the first time. Classes were out for summer and my partner was moving from another state to be with me in September. I worked a couple hours a week, but not much. NL was definitely keeping me sane and feeling socialized at that time too. (And I was pretty young compared to most people living alone the first time)
Welcome Amiibo arrived when I had graduated and was interning a few days a week, but otherwise not working or anything. My sweet partner would buy me a pack or two of cards most weekends, and trading with people on the forum was really fun. I had something to occupy time and new surprises came all the time in the mail, when we didn't have much money for anything else.
And now NH with coronavirus and all the loneliness and isolation it's brought. Animal Crossing has always been there when I needed it
this might not count but i also won @Darcy94x ’s giveaway - i won the gulliver prize. the last few days, i haven’t been doing well mentally at all and still am not. i mean, i haven’t really been active on here since almost 48 hours ago and am now struggling to catch up to all the posts i’ve missed and i just.. do not have the energy lmao. but i randomly checked the forums yesterday and had received a pm from darcy saying that i had won. the main reason i entered for that prize is because i really wanted the tam-o-shanter - i only had the green one and so when i saw that the red one was one of the prizes, i immediately entered the giveaway. yesterday when i went to pick up the prizes, i noticed that i didn’t just have one tam-o-shanter in my pockets, but two. when i got back to my own island, i discovered that darcy had given me both of the variants that i was missing. it’s such a little thing and might not count and i’m still not doing good and likely won’t be for a while, but it really helped with how overwhelmed i had felt in that moment and helped to remind me that even when things really suck and i don’t even have the energy to play, there’s always some good that can happen ;;
Aw you guys I honestly loved reading this thread. So much love has filled my heart reading these posts!
Mine mostly relates to my grandad, since we lost him in November I completely went off all gaming, stopped playing my xbox which was strange for me as I’ve always played almost everyday. When I heard about the new AC something in my mind clicked, I just had to get a switch so I literally went through tears trying to find one as it was the start of lockdown and they were selling out everywhere (I had to settle for a switchlite) and since then I’ve almost clocked 700 hours played, I have a little memorial spot for him by my house decorated with celeste items and ultimately I’d like to decorate a fishing spot somewhere for him with a bicycle as those are my fondest memories of him.
Animal crossing is amazing cause you make everything to what suits you, other people may not like or think it’s anything special but to us to it really is. A lot of people on the forum have spent many many hours trying to get their dreamies, their favourite island decorations, hybrids etc. We’ve all put so much work into our islands and our houses and we should all be proud of ourselves for sure
(I had to settle for a switchlite) and since then I’ve almost clocked 700 hours played, I have a little memorial spot for him by my house decorated with celeste items and ultimately I’d like to decorate a fishing spot somewhere for him with a bicycle as those are my fondest memories of him.
