It's official for me - I HATE my main town!

[Twisk]

I really like the stained glass path you used!
My advice is:
- to not stick too many differently-colored path tiles close together. Either have different tiles depending on the area in town (like in various "themed areas"), or have matching tiles throughout the whole town to give a unified feel.
- to use paths and patterns more sparingly, and in an organized/purposeful way. Like think about every single tile you put down: if it's necessary, if it leads somewhere, or if it adds to the aesthetics of the area.
- to use flowers to color-compliment buildings, PWPs, and different areas in town. Try to have "themes" for gardens, like a garden of a certain color scheme of flowers, a certain breed of flowers, or flowers that simply look nice together. Flowers are so easy to get and grow in AC, so it's easy to just sprawl them everywhere. But think about if it were real life, and you had to thoughtfully pick out flowers from the store (and plant them and care for them and wait for them to grow) to compliment a garden or a building. Applying this more careful way of thinking about flowers to AC might help your gardens become more effective!

I hope that doesn't come across as mean or anything; I actually think your town is very charming and has a nice feel to it! But that's the advice I came up with.

 

[boorah]

I started my town way back in June, and like you guys I was mostly happy with how it was turning out until one day recently I decided that it was NOT WORKING. I basically convinced myself the only way to fix it was to erase the town and start from scratch with a totally new map that would better work for my needs. I learned a whole bunch about how I would like things to be from these past 7 months in the town of Lost. I was going to reset but decided I had WAY to much stuff acquired, too many of my favorite villagers, and way too many bells in the bank.

So I just went and bought a new copy instead. Best of both worlds. It's too bad I don't have 2 3ds's though.

 

[dizzy bone]

I think this too sometimes... I just think my town layout is too boring (it's almost cut in half with no winding rivers, which I think I would have liked now that I played the game and saw other Dream Towns). My Re-tail is perfect but I HATE how my event plaza is right in the corner of the map. I want to re-do my roads because they are too long and straight, just small things haha. But I love my villagers and I worked too hard T_T At one point I re-did all my paths and cut down all my trees. I think I'll do that again at some point lol.

 

[oath2order]

Try removing some paths and flowers! Half my town is wilderness and the other half is settled, with lots (LOTS) of flowers and PwPs and paths. Another part of it is half wilderness and half settled c:

Half and half equals a full.

How is there "another part".

 

[songoftheskies]

Aah this is exactly how I felt a few days ago !!
I hated everything about my town, but I would never delete it because
I love my villagers, flowers, and clothes too much ; A ;

What I did to get out of my stupor is basically visit dream towns ~
like a TON of dream towns, the really really pretty ones ( and the really hardcore japanese ones XD )
I got a bunch of new ideas and started working on doing whatever I could to make my toen more neat !
Cut and replant trees, bushes, and even redid all of my paths xD

It doesn't look nearly complete yet, but it's so satisfying to just chop down trees and delete paths xD
It's a lot of work, but in the end, it's worth it !!
And ANY town can look beautiful, I've seen ones with absolutely HORRIBLE layouts,
but the placement of the paths, flowers, and trees really make it all work !!

It also helps to kind of try picking a theme for your village ! But yeah, dream towns for inspiration * U *

 

[Mandarama]

Try removing some paths and flowers! Half my town is wilderness and the other half is settled, with lots (LOTS) of flowers and PwPs and paths. Another part of it is half wilderness and half settled c:

Gummysaur, you're a genius. I don't know why this never occurred to me… I like my town, but it is completely developed. I can't play with snowmen at all. Now I want to try to pick a region and just knock everything in it down. Back to nature!

- - - Post Merge - - -

Ankhes, I'll check out your town! A few principles I have followed are to only use two types of paths that coordinate, match flowers to building exteriors, and limit the PWP's so they don't end up taking up all the floorspace. No, Rod, we do not need a traffic light. No one here drives! And since we aren't using fossil fuels, we're not putting up the wind turbine either.

<---environmentally irresponsible mayor

 

[Le Ham]

Well, I've visited your dream town. My advice/criticism to you:

-Paths are meant to be paths. If you're going to path, make it simple and straightforward, and of a certain width (2-3 tiles wide is a good size) all around. A lot of your paths are randomly placed, around PWPs, and all over; try to simplify it to the basic places you need a path to be, like ones that lead to town hall, Retail, your houses, gardens, etc. Also, you have a ton of different types of path used randomly. I understand you like them all, but try to limit your number and placement of paths. Like Twisk said, try and make it so there's different paths being used in different places, like themes. Paths help very much with placement of your town and how you want it to look. They should be the first thing you think about in the making of a town.

-Ever thought of what your town's theme is? Like is it fairy-tale, modern, oriental, normal-looking? If so, you might want to use PWPs that carry out the desired theme. For instance, illuminated stuff wouldn't go well in a small foresty town, or that wind turbine at the south-east of town would not fit in a fairy-tale theme. Try to stick with the theme. PWPs should be what you worry about after paths and before the flora and fauna.

-Organize your nature a little better. Your bushes and trees work best with making forests and lining paths. Put roses with roses and pansies with pansies. Or, if you're going for a more natural, wild look, have the flowers randomly line your paths as well as stretch out a little bit. Have them random, but not too random; organized, but only if you want them to be organized. Theming trees and bushes is also fun to do. Remember also that if you want to be able to play with snowmen and such, have a portion of your town purposely empty and away from all the action. (In this case, the entire northern area of your town would be good.) Nature is the last thing to worry about, as we don't want PWPs destroying our well-earned hybrids.

For something natural but still structured, you should visit my dream town. (The grassy paths indicate where bushes will be placed; it's not done yet) For more organized, modern-ish things, visit about everyone else's dream town. XD

Hope this helps!

 

[Elphy]

I feel you. I was somewhat satisfied with my town until one fateful morning (two weeks ago) when Bruce moved right in the middle of my hybrid/bush garden and pretty much killed all my black tulips... I just lost it. I got a new cartridge game and kept the old one (download) just to cycle and get stuff since I'm so advanced in that town. I don't regret it at all. After playing for half a year, now I know what kind of projects I want, where to place everything, and how to landscape. I decided I wanted a town with a small piece of land where I can be by myself with no neighbors around and my hybrids can grow freely with a few benches and lamp posts to make sure no neighbor moves on top of them. I love that all of my town's flowers are actual hybrids I brought back from my old town (using another 3ds). If you decide to restart and need someone to hold items for you, I'm more than glad to do it. I've not been using this forum for long but you can check my scores on ACC.

 

[Minties]

Okay so! I went through your dream town and noted down a couple of things in my notebook.

Firstly, the pathing.

Paths you have:

Spoiler

Reddish Brick
Single Rose Stained Glass
3 Rose Stained Glass
Orange and Blue Stained Glass
Multi-Color Stained Glass
Pastel Stained Glass
White tile with purple flower
White tile with pink flower
Pink Flower Tile
Pink Flower with Blue Background Tile
Blue Cracked Glass
Blue and Purple Grid Tile
Ice Tile
Butterfly Tile
Pink and Yellow Tile
Blue and Purple Tile
Multi-colored Square Tile

There are 17 (that I saw at least) different paths making up your town in various areas. I tend to stick to one central pathing (with multiple corners, etc) and then have other patterns around it to compliment it. In my town, I chose a brick pattern and my compliments were a small waterway pattern collection and grass/flowers/greenery patterns. I think that if you want a town that is visually appealing, the paths will make a HUGE part of it. The reason it looks chaotic is because there's so many different colors and styles that all merge into one.

Paths that I thought looked nice and could be central:


Picture that scared me:


A good source for paths is this tumblr: http://acpath.tumblr.com/

You can scan through as many pages as you need and draw inspiration or grab the QR codes for yourself.

Secondly, the greenery.

I think you have the right idea with the bushes, placing them next to path to create borders. I tend to group my trees into orchards because I enjoy structure, but that's not always everyone's cup of tea. As far as flowers go, they're scattered everywhere. If you don't want to have them grouped by solo color, you could grab all flowers of the same type and stick them in an area. That way, you'll still have color variation, but it will look intentional.

Lastly, PWPs.

I did notice that you have quite a lot of doubles of the same works, like the statue fountain. I don't know if this is intentional, but I felt like there was a lot of the same works around, which count towards your 30 that you could put towards other unique projects. I do like the start of the fairytale theme, but I think you need to decide what theme you want to make your town. There's a bit of everything in it at the moment and that's what makes it feel so confusing to follow.

With streetlamps, I think that they really belong next to paths, as if they would light the way for people walking along them. You need to try to incorporate your PWPs with your pathing to create a nice flow. Imagine that you were strolling in your town, you'd want a path to walk along to go and visit the geyser for example.

With the empty space that's up in the top left corner, you could create like a campfire type area or a hidden wood area. If you have any uchis, you can get the log bench. You could put a campfire up there, along with a log bench or two, connect them with dirt path patterns or create your own dirt path by running. I think that there's a lot of space that you can be creative with and your town has a lot of potential.

One thing I did note was that some of the PWPs are a bit close to each other


This could be intentional, but it does make connecting them and giving them "space" harder.

This was in no way meant to hurt your feelings, I just want to give you some advice on how to improve your town! I hope that I didn't come across rude <3

Also if you're looking for inspiration of a structured town, feel free to visit my dream town (code is in my signature)!

Minties :3

 

[Ankhes]

OMG...you guys/gals are fantastic!

Twisk - you are absolutely RIGHT. And it's not mean at all! This is the sort of feedback I need to put things into perspective. Thank you!

PotatoMuffin717 - Very solid advice and I really have to stop being squeamish about destroying PWP's. That Wind Turbine was put there because there was actually room for it and I was shooting for Perfect Town Status at the time. It really has to go. >_< It's not the "feeling" I want in my town at all. And I really have to re-evaluate my paths. I need to just ignore everything else for awhile (even if a villager does the "potty dance") and just WALK. Can I get where I want to go without weaving and worrying about stepping on flowers? Not many places, I'm afraid. I am copy-pasting your post and some others for reference when I begin fixing my messed up town. I did begin a bit tonight with some trees. After all, I can always plant more, and do I really NEED every fruit? Or multiples of every fruit? If anything, just multiples of perfect ones to sell. I've been held back by the fear that I'd just make things worse; but that's ridiculous. There isn't anything I can cut down or rip out that can't be replaced.

Minties - your walkthru is amazing and I appreciate it more than I can say. The paths you like best and think should be central - I AGREE 100%! I got those just recently when I began to try and fix this mess. Sorry about the scary picture! I am grieving several close family deaths this past year and it fits my depressed mood sometimes and so I had the bad judgement to place it. Your pic of it is priceless, tho! Lol! *wiping away a tear of laughter*
You are not rude at all and I'm not hurt at all! I NEED this and WANT this! If I am to ever love my town again, this is the sort of stuff I need to fix it. I want to feel the love again, and not dread booting it up.
I love the campfire idea! I don't see why I can't have a fairy-tale feel to most of my town and also have some woodsy stuff, too.
And the "close" PWP's...yeah. Ugh. I needed to make them and Isabelle wouldn't let me place them anywhere else and I had previous villagers houses in bad spots and I have 3 mules. One thing I should do is kill a mule and reduce my patterns and storage. How much do I really need? Yes, I like all the patterns, but too many are just overkill, even for me - and I'm known to love gaudy. But my town is even gaudy to me, and I hadn't thought that possible until recently.

I'm gonna boot up my town and visit yours in a dream.

I'll do the same with some of the others - all of you. Thank you! <3 (((HUGS))) I have hope for the first time in weeks.

 

[Ankhes]

I feel you. I was somewhat satisfied with my town until one fateful morning (two weeks ago) when Bruce moved right in the middle of my hybrid/bush garden and pretty much killed all my black tulips... I just lost it. I got a new cartridge game and kept the old one (download) just to cycle and get stuff since I'm so advanced in that town. I don't regret it at all. After playing for half a year, now I know what kind of projects I want, where to place everything, and how to landscape. I decided I wanted a town with a small piece of land where I can be by myself with no neighbors around and my hybrids can grow freely with a few benches and lamp posts to make sure no neighbor moves on top of them. I love that all of my town's flowers are actual hybrids I brought back from my old town (using another 3ds). If you decide to restart and need someone to hold items for you, I'm more than glad to do it. I've not been using this forum for long but you can check my scores on ACC.

No need to check your score, Elphy! You are so sweet to offer! I don't need space at the moment...but that may change. If I do you'll be the one I PM. Thank you. I can feel that you know exactly where I'm coming from. If I do decide to reset I have A LOT of stuff! I also have a guilty secret - I am a packrat. >_< *whispers* (That is one reason I made THREE mules.)

 

[Blizzard]

Yeah, I'm pretty disgusted with my main town. My second town was to be just for storage but my compulsion to complete things caused me to expand, put down paths etc. I totally stink at planning and after visiting some dream towns during the Bell Tree holiday events I realized I have no imagination.

Totally feeling inept. Plus I messed up and have to wait six months for one stupid deep sea creature. Does not go well with my need to get things done.

I'm going to visit more towns and those that I have street passed and flat out copy their design techniques. Hey, some people got it and some don't. Is there a 3rd DS in my future????

You're being too hard on yourself. This game has quirks that should be addressed. If you need any kind of help, PM me!!

For what it's worth I nominated you for a People's Choice award but mostly all winners were mods. You're awesome.

 

[Minties]

Minties - your walkthru is amazing and I appreciate it more than I can say. The paths you like best and think should be central - I AGREE 100%! I got those just recently when I began to try and fix this mess. Sorry about the scary picture! I am grieving several close family deaths this past year and it fits my depressed mood sometimes and so I had the bad judgement to place it. Your pic of it is priceless, tho! Lol! *wiping away a tear of laughter*
You are not rude at all and I'm not hurt at all! I NEED this and WANT this! If I am to ever love my town again, this is the sort of stuff I need to fix it. I want to feel the love again, and not dread booting it up.
I love the campfire idea! I don't see why I can't have a fairy-tale feel to most of my town and also have some woodsy stuff, too.
And the "close" PWP's...yeah. Ugh. I needed to make them and Isabelle wouldn't let me place them anywhere else and I had previous villagers houses in bad spots and I have 3 mules. One thing I should do is kill a mule and reduce my patterns and storage. How much do I really need? Yes, I like all the patterns, but too many are just overkill, even for me - and I'm known to love gaudy. But my town is even gaudy to me, and I hadn't thought that possible until recently.

I'm gonna boot up my town and visit yours in a dream.

I'll do the same with some of the others - all of you. Thank you! <3 (((HUGS))) I have hope for the first time in weeks.

xD I'm happy to help in any way I can! I'm sorry about your family, I was just running along and saw the image and went O_O.

I've been so frustrated with Isabelle before about PWPs that I have said forget it and cancelled the project haha.

As far as having too many mules, I have all of my character slots full xD so sad I know. My grounds are actually made up of 26 patterns! I used to have 29, but I downsized because I had to make patterns for inside houses and wanted to use QR clothing again. I think that you can have 3 other mules if you need them, it's just about putting their houses in unused spaces!

 

[Ankhes]

From Blizzard;2142539

***I am replying to her and don't want this post to look too weird, so I'm removing the Quote Bars.***

Yeah, I'm pretty disgusted with my main town. My second town was to be just for storage but my compulsion to complete things caused me to expand, put down paths etc. I totally stink at planning and after visiting some dream towns during the Bell Tree holiday events I realized I have no imagination.

***Oh, Blizzard! (((HUG))) I think you and I BOTH have imagination; it's just that we don't know how to implement our ideas as well as some people do. We go along and try and when it ends up messy we blame ourselves. I think there is a reason that some people are designers and others are builders. Not too many are both. ***

Totally feeling inept. Plus I messed up and have to wait six months for one stupid deep sea creature. Does not go well with my need to get things done.

***I feel you there, except that I'm not that far along. I understand how you feel about it, tho. The need to get that last little thing would be something that would literally keep me up all night. I think we are kindred spirits!***

I'm going to visit more towns and those that I have street passed and flat out copy their design techniques. Hey, some people got it and some don't. Is there a 3rd DS in my future????

***I am lucky that I have a hubby who GAVE me his 3DS and bought me 3 of them! I cannot believe it. I now have multiple towns to mess up, but I'm not far along on the rest because I'm making them to be mainly cycling towns and towns I can sell to from my other mayors to get a few bells in the pockets. I hope you get your 3rd DS! I dreamed of Stardust and Hyrule last night and took lots of pics. I think I'll be the shining example of absolutely shameless copying because their designs and paths are just THAT cool and beautiful! Oh, and one town had the most amazing beach display EVER! ***

You're being too hard on yourself. This game has quirks that should be addressed. If you need any kind of help, PM me!!

*** Will do! I think I'll be ready within a week to have someone's opinion on what I've demolished and the beginning of new flower and path placements. Also, I'll write down the PWP's on my list that will best compliment my town. Thank you for being so nice and understanding! Every time I see you I just KNOW that you know exactly what I mean by something. I mean, how many of us panick about Events??? I'm NOT glad that you share that sort of fear with me, but yet I am happy to not be alone in it. ***

For what it's worth I nominated you for a People's Choice award but mostly all winners were mods. You're awesome.

***I don't know what a People's Choice award is here, but I am wiping away a tear now! (((HUG))) Thank you! But really, I'm NOT so awesome. I haven't given away many dreamies yet because I'm so darned slow and now I'm afraid that by the time I get good at it there will have been so many cyclers that I'll be redundant by then. Still, who knows? New people are probably coming to ACNL all the time. And for what it's worth, even if my dreamie-giving is slow, it will always be FREE. As well as any help and items I have that someone may need.

And hells bells, YOU are pretty darned awesome yourself! You short-change yourself. Really, you do! <3

And...now I've probably made a VERY awkward looking post because I don't know if there is a quote-wrap function here and if there is I'd probably make a hash of it anyway! Still, I hope that my asterisks make it clear where I am responding to you. ***

- - - Post Merge - - -

xD I'm happy to help in any way I can! I'm sorry about your family, I was just running along and saw the image and went O_O.

I've been so frustrated with Isabelle before about PWPs that I have said forget it and cancelled the project haha.

As far as having too many mules, I have all of my character slots full xD so sad I know. My grounds are actually made up of 26 patterns! I used to have 29, but I downsized because I had to make patterns for inside houses and wanted to use QR clothing again. I think that you can have 3 other mules if you need them, it's just about putting their houses in unused spaces!

No problem about that pic. It IS weird! I LOVE your pic of your reaction to it so much that I copied it into my art-clip folder. It makes me smile every time I look at it!

But you know, if there wasn't a genuine need for mules, why would we have them? If this game had a reasonable amount of storage it wouldn't be a need, would it? Yes, I may sound like I'm justifying pack-ratedness, but STILL...would more storage really be that difficult to give us? It's not OUR fault that there are so many cool things in this lovely virtual world! *little mayor stomps her foot in frustration at not having room for a really nice Gracie Grace umbrella...*

And...yeah...um...unused spaces... I'm not sure what that means... *looks guilty*

 

[StaticTheSquirrel]

ugh i know how you feel, there are flowers everywhere and ugly PWPs. I hate my paths because i chose a 9 tile one thats missing corners and i have no room to make another character to save the tiles so i can fill the corners in. The bush placement in my town sucks too.

 

[Ankhes]

ugh i know how you feel, there are flowers everywhere and ugly PWPs. I hate my paths because i chose a 9 tile one thats missing corners and i have no room to make another character to save the tiles so i can fill the corners in. The bush placement in my town sucks too.

StaticThe Squirrel...you are officially as crazy as Blizzard and me. Hmmm...we really need some sort of support group! Lol! I don't think I'll get over my love for paths, but I do know I need to keep my mules so I can hold a couple of more complex ones. That way my tiles won't clash in such an eye-sore sort of way. I've now had them store some that are more than one or two tiles wide and that should help focus me on making my town lovely and in a less disorganized way. I'll HAVE to lay out in a more orderly fashion and I can use more flowers to surround my villagers houses and not always patterns. That will depend on the dirt issues, tho. If an area is too horrendous I'll slap tiles on it.

Ah..bushes! They would be better if they were hardier, wouldn't they? I am so darned limited in where to place them because if there is a dirt spot they die. ARGH!!! >_< Plus, I do have to write down which I plant where. I hate seeing that a day or so later when the green sprouts that ones right next to each other are different shades when I thought I had planted the same type.

Maybe someone can chime in with where they think bush placement works best and worst. I'm thinking a few PWP's, my main house, and maybe the Police Station and Town Hall?

 

[Elphy]

No need to check your score, Elphy! You are so sweet to offer! I don't need space at the moment...but that may change. If I do you'll be the one I PM. Thank you. I can feel that you know exactly where I'm coming from. If I do decide to reset I have A LOT of stuff! I also have a guilty secret - I am a packrat. >_< *whispers* (That is one reason I made THREE mules.)

Hey no problem! I got nothing besides turnips in my storage cause I'm keeping my old town as storage as well . Anywoo, I'm sure you'll find all you need is some landscaping.

 

[Ankhes]

Okay, I'm updating my thread on my awful town. For those brave souls willing to spend 500 bells on my *ugh* town, it is 4200-3022-7056.

I need anyone brave enough and who has the time to see if the improvements I've been making are on the right track. I know that that is an individual thing, how a town looks, I mean, but since I was so disgusted by too many path colours and too many trees, I've removed a bunch of trees, reduced my paths, and a couple of PWP's. I want the Fairy Tale feel, but before I go on, do any of you feel I'm on the right track?

I do want to repave my main plaza, but I'm not sure which pattern to use. And I just realised that I updated my Dream to a night version. Will that make it hard to see, or will someone viewing it during the day see it during the day? >_< I don't know. Anyway, I hope to have some suggestions before heading into my final "repairs!"

Oh, and I've tried to sort flowers and I also have a crap-load on the beach. Do I have too many down there? Can they be organised better?

Nevermind...I'm driving myself crazy. I'm sorry it took me so long to update this. Some of you wonderful souls have offered to help me, so if you have time, take a look-see and see what you think! Thanks in advance.

Gratefully yours,

a worn-out Ankhes!

 

[Ras]

Maybe you should wait for spring and see how it looks. I was feeling bad about my town and it looked a lot better when I happened to TT into spring trying to cycle someone out. My other town, I like it in snow. Anyway, even with the snow, I hated my town but I spent a lot of time ripping out PWPs, putting down new paths, replanting, and I like it again. Not as much as my second town, but I don't hate it any more. I'll look at your town later, but I doubt I'd be good at giving advice.

 

[AngelValentina]

I'm not sure what your town looks like, but my advice to you would be to really put the effort into making it look better.

- Try using desaturated single tiles for your town paths. Like very desaturated pastel colours (since you want a fairy tail vibe).
- Use pink white and purple flowers
- If you're unsure of path placement, try first creating a path from your house to the train station. From there, connect all the other buildings in your town to your original path.

Hope this helps

(I'm really organized and colour coordinated so you can trust my judgement~!)