Why Bother With Popular Villager Hype?

[kasane]

i feel guilty
New Leaf was my second AC game with CF being my first. I played it for 3 weeks or so then I got NL.
My starter villagers weren't that bad (Bam, Static, Phoebe, Bluebear, Gala, Kyle) but back then I thought when they wanted to leave, I should go with some new villagers. Then I got my campsite with Diana and Rosie. I knew nothing of the 'villager popularity' and only let them move in due to me wanting to have more villagers.
Then I joined TBT and saw these villagers (Marshal, Merengue, Zucker, Ankha etc) and saw their prices up to 40mil or even more. I thought it was a bit ridiculous at first since people would actually do all of that for just a NPC.
Yes, my villagers in my sig are all 'popular' but...
1. I thought Francine and Chrissy made a good sister-like pair and they're bright vivid colors which caught my attention (same went for Pietro)
2. I wanted to at least have ONE villager who is 'traditional' as in having a Japanese theme to their house/name. Genji has the catchphrase 'otaku' as well ;A;
3. Food-related villagers are awesome to me (Zucker, Merengue. Frita also kind of counts towards that, but the game kind of gave me her since I had 8 villagers. Same goes for Bud and Rocco. Lost Phoebe due to a TT'ing accident)
4. When I saw Marshal, I didn't think he was all that good. Then I saw his fanart of his human form and he did kind of look like Akise Aru (who is in my avatar and MY FAVOURITE CHARACTER EVER omfg Akise-kun~~ <3) and he kind of reminded me of him

But the auctions for these popular villagers are outrageous.
Especially the buy-outs. If they needed the Bells for something like PWP's, buying hybrids/items or house expansions that's understandable.
I think some people use these popular villagers and sell them out of greed (this is not 100% true, and I know this), but I've seen some people crying over not getting the auctioned villager.

And I'm a fan of rabbits and squirrels ( Static I'm sorry D: )
Then it came down to my own taste.

 

[Dewy]

People tend to want villagers that they think are cute, and a lot of people think the same villagers are cute (Stitches, Marshal, Julian, etc.). So those villagers become the most desirable and are considered the "popular" villagers. People don't want villagers because they're popular, they just want the ones that they consider cute. And a lot of people want to get all their dream villagers no matter the cost, so they'll go to great lengths to get them. At least that's the way I see it. ... Did that make sense? XD

I really want Stitches because I think he's adorable and he was by far my favorite villager in Wild World. I have happy memories with him :3

 

[Shattersnap]

I have only ever paid for one villager and that was Sly, who I probably could have gotten for free but I didn't want to wait for him. I would never be willing to pay more than around 5mil for a villager. Auctions and sale threads for npcs like Marshal that are set in the 40mil range just blow my mind. I guess people can spend their game money however they want but I can't imagine getting upset about losing out on an auction or raffle.

In this game all things come with time. I feel like people get caught up with the immediate aspect of the game with TTing and forget the game is designed to be played for the long run. Obviously it's your game and you can play however you want, but if you are trying to play for instant gratification you are working against the design of the game and you'll probably get frustrated.

 

[Bowie]

A lot of people shamelessly want to be popular. As tragic as that is, that's all there is to it. Occasionally someone will actually be interested in obtaining the villager, but most of the time it's just to have the most popular so they themselves become the most popular. I myself have no interest in obtaining specific villagers in general. That's not a form of protest, though. I just don't see any reason why you should go looking for specific villagers. I think it's an obsession, and I will not be involved. That's seemingly the only thing people are interested in now, though.

 

[kasane]

Not to criticise anyone, but I guess it is their game, therefore it is in their control to who they want in their town; popular or not. Yes, this may be called obsession with Animal Crossing: New Leaf, since you would do anything to get them. I don't think they are to show off since a lot of people would have them in their copy.

 

[pocky]

I don't think that it has anything to do with popularity, but with choosing the villagers that you find the most aesthetically pleasing. It so happens that a lot of people like the same villagers.

To me its like... if my closet can only hold 10 dresses, of course I'll try my best to fill it up with 10 dresses that I absolutely love. If somebody finds those particular dresses ugly or overrated then it doesn't really matter to me, as I'm doing it for myself and not for them. It'd be stupid of me to wear a dress that I hate just because a bunch of other girls that I'll probably never even meet in my life own the exact the dress.

I didn't really buy any of my own villagers though, I got all of them on my own. Some moved in on by themselves, others I reset for. The only one that I got from a trade was Merengue. I have two towns and Marshal had moved into my 2nd town without warning, but I already had him in my 1st town so I decided to trade him. I made a post saying that I wanted him out and gave a list of 5-10 villagers that I wanted in exchange, it so happened that the first person to message me had offered to give me Merengue and that she is one of the most popular villagers.

Looking back, I think that it would have been better if I had bought them off someone in an auction. I have hundreds of millions of bells in my bank that I'll never use. And it would have only taken me a few days to get them all from auctions as opposed to the months that I spent trying to find them on my own in game.*

* = I say this because my friend reset his town recently and thanks to tumblr, tbt, and reddit I was able to get 5 of his dreamies in 2 days; he other 5 he got on his own. he was lucky enough to have two of them as his starters and to have stitches, julian and renee (who he loves) move in on their own without needing to reset.

 

[Starlightz]

I think it's more of the reason that almost everyone find these 'popular' animals very cute. Since they are viewed as cute, a lot of people create hype about them and then they become more popular.
While I do agree that they are cute, such as Lolly, Marshal, Stitches, ect. I think some of the other animal (that aren't as popular, yet still cute (to me)) are underrated. Animals like Poncho, Apple, Bones, Pinky and Cube.

 

[Nzerozoro]

The only reason I want Ankha(dreamie) is her design and that's it!

 

[Aesthetic]

Well, they're popular for a reason I guess.

 

[Candy83]

Although this thread was created more than a month ago, I think the curiosity thing weighs in.

It was a priority for me to get Julian. There were two times I came close. My third try was a success. In a short time, I was able get Tia and Erik separately. (In all this, I'm referring to Top Tier of Dreamies. As of 02.22.2014, Julian ranks No. 5; Tia is at No. 12; Erik is at No. 15.)

I'm not wanting to take my two towns and load them with top-of-the-line Dreamies. I'm not aiming for Showcase Villagers. I have lots of Bottom of the Barrels whom I appreciate. But I'm making choices on which ones to let go. And I'm intuitively figuring out who to keep along with what Dreamies I can get and, if I can work it out, which of the towns to assign them.

I think I'm striving for some balance. Combined number of villagers for full capacity between two towns is 20. I am aiming to have an equal number of males and females. Since the personality types number eight categories?four types each for the males and females?I want them all covered. And a repeat of a personality type cannot be present in more than two males or in two females. I'm very certain that my personal favorite personality type is the Normal. So, for the female side, I want two normals in Applewin and two normals in Progress. On the male side, I find I like the Lazy and the Smug types almost equally.

It is from this perspective that helps inform me of who I should pursue among the Top Tier Dreamies. And, already with a mix of very pleasant villagers (Drago, Jambette, and Scoot in Applewin; Cookie, to name one from my second town, in Progress), I probably can cap this at six Top Tier Dreamies. I have Julian in Applewin. I have both Tia and Erik in Progress. That's the order in which I was able to get them. Though it's not realistic to be in control of an "order," my wish is to get Fauna next. She would be my ideal second Normal in Applewin.

This is an excellent topic.

 

[Thelegendofemmy]

People can't help who they like, I mean marshal moved into to my town randomly, and I fell in love with him pretty much right away, which I didn't think I would. :') but I guess eh people like cute villagers, personally I go for personality over looks, I don't really like the super popular deer. But I love Deirdre, who is underrated IMO, she's probably my favourite out of all villagers tbh, but eh whatever, tbh I don't care what people have in their town.. If they like the popular ones then.. Well they do, it's their game you can have who they want in their town

 

[Milano]

I like most of the popular dreamies because of obvious reasons.
1. They're adorable.
2. After seeing pictures of them on tumblr etc, I realized how much I wanted to experience that villager and have them in my town.
As much as I'd love to have all my dreamies in my town, I am not willing to pay 40 million bells for them, partially due to the fact that I don't even have 1 million to spend, lol.

 

[Cudon]

I'm satisfied to naturally adore the more ''unpopular'' villagers over the overrated ones. But I spose people just like pink and adorable things. So that's why Diana and Merengue are appealing.

 

[Angerfish]

Looking through this thread, I'm seeing a few people saying that people want popular villagers just to be popular. That's sort of selling people short, I think.

Most people gravitate towards the cute popular villagers because they're, well, cute! And who can blame someone for wanting to stuff cute characters into such a cute game? That and a lot of popular villagers have some sort of gimmick that makes them seem like more of an individual than the others, such as Merengue or Stitches. I'm not saying that's wrong. I've got Mira in my town, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't charmed by her unique mask. Is this a little shallow? Maybe. But although some of my dreamies aren't exactly popular, I've still got my own biases, and nostalgia isn't the only factor.

It's a shame that there are people that are complete brats about getting X popular dreamy, though. Ugh. That's just embarrassing. Though--to a lesser extant--I also don't appreciate when people act superior for disliking a popular villager.

 

[JellyDitto]

Y'know, the funny thing is that half the villagers in my town are popular. But I idnt get them through auctions or anything like that. I got them through the campsite or they just randomly moved into my town. I have marina which i got from a friend. Beau, merengue, and Agent S I got through the campsite. My marshal just randomly plopped himself into my town. Pietro I got from a cycling thread.

 

[Pyonkotchi]

usually people dont like a villager because they are popular, the villager is popular because they are well liked
its as simple as that.

 

[CR33P]

Well, villagers are popular for a reason. Why? I don't know, they could be cute/cool.
For example, Julian. He's a unicorn.. the only one in the game. People like unicorns.
of course.. there are a lot of overrated popular villagers too.

 

[Orieii]

All of my villagers are 'popular' but I honestly didn't do it on purpose :c Before I even knew about trading villagers or TBT and whatnot, I've always wanted Marshal! It was like love at first sight. Luckily he moved in as my 2nd smug ; v ; No resetting either. Yay~! <3 As for Kid Cat, he was my BFF on GC and WW. I'd still love the two even if they weren't popular and same goes for my other villagers <3 If any of them moved out I'd cry, because I spent hours resetting for their house plot locations

I didn't want them because they're 'popular' or 'cute', I wanted them because they're unique to me ^ u ^ I don't care what anyone else thinks. Everyone has their own special taste.

..Also, I do get a little annoyed seeing my villagers in other's dreams xD There are so many Mashal, Fang, Merengue, Francine and Chrissys @w@