Tears of Themis – ~6 month Review of the Global version!

I had a few people suggest I do one of these and at this point, I’ve played Tears of Themis every day since its Global release. I also played it every single day of the Closed Beta. To say I like the game a lot would be a bit of an understatement, but I will say what I like most about the game is also possibly its biggest flaw: Where’s the story content?

Ironically, while in the middle of writing this, my question kind of got answered in a way— Covid has made it a bit harder to record voice actors. Apparently, Artem’s Japanese voice also actually caught it so here’s hoping he recovers okay. It’s possible this may just have to do with future content and not the story, but I feel like there’s a good chance this is still part of it as events and card stories generally have a lot less dialogue. Stories also have voices for EVERY character in them and Chapter 6 has a large cast and is one of the darker cases.

I do wish they still kept things in order though– I would have preferred them to just say “some voices won’t be ready yet” and still keep the timeline intact over us getting Events at a much different order and also many much sooner before the story content. Chapter 6, while announced for the first half of March, is now roughly 2-3 months later than when it released on the original server (January 2021). And personal story 3, which had released after the Skadi Event on the original server in late February 2021, will now be releasing in early May… That is a huge gap in what was originally only a month. The Romantic Rail Getaway Events were originally after Skadi, yet we got one half already and will likely get the other half before the new story content and just… as someone primarily playing for the story content, I’d rather have it, voice acting or not.

When I first spoke about Tears of Themis, I said my only complaint at the time was the entire Card System exists only to force a gachapon system in the game and to be honest, that is still my biggest complaint with the only other thing coming close is the timeline destroyingness of the Event schedule. I think my biggest issue is that events from those cards can be brought up in other card stories so if you never managed to play them, you have no idea what they’re talking about. I don’t really like Character information locked behind a gachapon and I do wish there was a way to access the story even outside the cards. You’d still need the cards for the debates, which I do still feel are often really awkward interruptions of the story content (Having a stronger deck though, I often get through them so fast, I no longer even notice), so it’s not like they’d be worthless without the story, but I suppose some cards would get less love.

Going back to the story stuff, I do hope they may give more information on what voice acting will be missing as they do say just “some” of the Japanese voice content will be gone and as you can pick things separately (Each character can have a different language voice plus a category for all other characters).

As mentioned, I love the story stuff. I love learning about the characters. I think all the characters are neat in their own way, even side ones. I love the mysteries. I love how even Events have a mystery aspect (Though, they are brutal for newer players to catch up– it’s too bad there isn’t an “easier” version for people who join later). It’s made it so every piece of content is really interesting, though, it’s another reason I wish the timeline wasn’t such a mess right now.

I still think if you enjoy mystery content, it’s worth a playthrough even if you’re not big into Otome stuff. You can always skip the card stories (which are essentially “dates”) and only the last part of the personal story ends romantically. I wouldn’t really call myself an otome game fan (I am… notoriously picky and a game that just focuses on romance is not my thing), but I still find everything just… really fun? I think all the characters are interesting even outside of a romance-aspect.

And well, considering most people play for the Otome game aspect, clearly that’s pretty good as well.

As a quick pros and cons list though to finish this off at this point:

PROS:

  • Mysteries!!
  • Intriguing overarching story
  • Neat Events
  • All characters have merits and there’s always more beneath the surface
  • Art is very pretty
  • Really lovely music
  • Dailies can be very quick to get through as you level up more.
  • Voice acting is great in every language
  • VERY Forgiving even if you’re not great at mysteries or still under-leveled– you have unlimited Hints, are not penalized for trying/guessing incorrectly, and if you fail a debate/trial, you get your stamina back.

CONS:

  • Timeline is a mess on the Global server
  • Story disputes feel weirdly placed more often than not
  • Events can be brutal if you’re a newer player
  • Odd friends list limit (It goes up as you level, but…)
  • Some lines are only voiced in Simplified Chinese (This is something that has been happening since the beginning of global launch, long before the recent announcement)
  • While not Pay to Win, if you want to collect everything, there are literal Charge-up events (and a permanent one that requires a lot of money to get through) for cards and furniture which kind of stinks. Similarly, many invitations are only available through paying (they change the background of your home screen in the game), and you can also get more rewards through special passes during Events
  • The expeditedness of the Event schedule gives less time to prepare in general and while difficulties have been lowered, we do not get more rewards to make up for the skewed balancing.
  • Every single dub changes the names of the characters. This is a really weird choice and when there’s no English dub, you don’t even hear any of the English names with whichever voice dub you pick. But honestly, even if there was an English dub, I’d be listing this here because… it’s just really strange? I feel like we’ve long since left the days of needing to “localize” names to such a degree and especially looking at Genshin Impact which has most names kept entirely intact, I’m really curious about why that was needed. The only things that stay the same are the character’s codenames.

Generally, if you enjoy Ace Attorney or Mystery-styled investigation games, I’d suggest giving the game a try despite the Otome Game elements. It really feels like just two different types of games, and you can more or less ignore the one you don’t care as much for (You can just tap through or keep using hints).

I will say I do have some concerns though with the way content is releasing. With Chapter 6’s and Personal Story Chapter 3’s delay, I’m concerned how it could affect Personal Story Chapter 4 as those directly tie into the 1st Anniversary Cards. I also originally thought the speed-up was to somehow get us caught up with the original server doubling up on maybe the 2nd and 3rd anniversary content and birthdays, but with the timeline so scatted, it just feels… odd? I don’t really see the point in rushing content if there’s no way we’ll ever get on the same schedule. And when you have such a huge overarching story and actually have these character growth where you SEE the characters become closer, mixing the timeline up like this to just pump out events makes it kind of confusing as that closeness goes back and forth.

I’m hoping maybe they plan to at least release story content altogether even if the Event schedule continues to be a little borked, but despite my concerns, I’m still really enjoying the game and Mysteries getting a role even in many of the Events makes it so even those are a lot of fun for me.

Overall, I don’t see any reason I’d stop playing anytime soon (Unless they like… ended the main story and it somehow became solely romance-focused) and I’m endlessly curious just where the overarching story is going to go– I have many theories, but I’ll save those for another day.

Cats vs Pickles: The Snowball Situation

Edit as of November 2022: Snowball is back up for sale! The only difference is the hang-tag colors.

If you saw my post about my favorite soft plushies or Cats vs Pickles Condo set-up video, you may at least have some inkling already about what I’m talking about, especially considering I went into a tiny bit of a tirade early in the video where I briefly address something that every single piece of merchandise hits at some point in their life: Price-gouging.

This is Snowball, a pure white cat besides the usual Screenprinted logo on the back:

It was announced as exclusive and very limited along with how it likely would not be restocked about a day before it went up for sale on December 3rd. Snowball officially sold out in about 10 minutes, though people started seeing it saying it was sold out within 2-3 minutes due to the amount of traffic, besides just people who wanted Snowball for whatever reason whether it be personal, really liking the design, or due to collecting all Cats and Pickles (or just all the Cats), there were also those who wanted it solely because it was a limited release.

And since then, it’s been rough as, unsurprisingly, some people were quickly selling them for $20-$40+, quickly hitting $50-$70, and most recently, over $100.

As for my reason for wanting to buy Snowball– it was a personal one, due to the nostalgia of me being a kid and often naming anything pure white “Snowball”, the first horse I ever rode on being named Snowball, and the very first “perfect Snowball” I made that I kept in the freezer. It’s a bunch of silly, but sweet, memories that upon seeing a pure white little Cat named Snowball, it was no question that I really wanted it and so as soon as it was up, I grabbed mine (pictured above).

I had considered maybe getting a second one (as there was originally a limit of three) for a personal project but decided to stick to just one so as many people could get one as possible.

Besides the initial shop stock, some were distributed to Learning Express stores which occasionally have exclusivity deals with Cats vs Pickles and another 100 were raffled off in the official Facebook Group where if your name was pulled, you’d get the option to buy one.

And of course, this brought up people asking if Snowball could ever return which always has the same usual argument: People who bought them for their “Limited Edition” moniker and/or had spent a lot to get them versus People who just wanted to see them return so others could get them (Usually those who missed out, but personally, I was also part of this group despite having one– I just like seeing more people happy).

Generally, the former is almost always catered to. I can think of one exception up to this point where, as someone who spent a lot for something, I was actually contacted if I’d be upset if the item in question was re-released and I was okay with it. And I still recall how surprised they were because they didn’t expect me to be.

The official CvP account had mentioned a few times now that Snowball would come back in some way with various people discussing if it should come back with some changes (whether it be a different “form” such as a figure, chonk, jumbo, hugger, or even a reversible or a slight adjustment to expression or an addition) while others wanted it to come back exactly as is.

So, imagine my surprise when the official Cats vs Pickles account posts a statement essentially agreeing with that latter opinion– for Snowball to return due to their focus on “Inclusivity”.

Transcript:

Hi everyone,
I am going to post this to address the Snowball matter and then am going to start taking down the fan posts if they become too much. I hope you understand.
The truth is that we did not anticipate the demand for this simple white cat. That is why the website was overwhelmed and there was a delay or people’s carts didn’t work.
Now that we know how many people want Snowball, it changes things – for the simple reason alone that CVP was founded on the premise of inclusivity.
Our company makes toys for kids and for people who want to feel/act like a kid – and hopefully that makes you want to collect us. Bottom line, we are in the business of bringing joy to people.
So with all due respect to the serious collector, we are trying to build a different collectible model. We don’t subscribe to false valuation or unattainable chase items. Most of you noticed that right away when there were even amounts of characters in our assortments.
I’ve been that parent who overpaid for a toy because my child wanted it. And we know that many of our little fans just simply don’t understand so we have to think of them, too. There will be beans that are seasonal or limited to certain retailers, but we do try to be accessible and affordable.
And, with all the weirdlings and silly typos the pickles make on our hang tags and bios, that should give you plenty of rarities for your collections! 😻⚡️🥒❤️🤦🏻‍♀️
So please hang in there with us as we decide what we will do next with Snowball. We have heard you but it will take some time before we do anything else with this bean.
Why? Because we have SO MANY cool new things that are coming your way, all of which will be announced in February. (We will have another zoom meeting or Facebook live event to announce to everyone).
Thanks for listening, and now hopefully we can move on.
Peace, Love and Beans!

In a world where the common thing to see is limited time stuff, whether limited in number or being a new thing every month, it’s essentially a constant at this point. Even Kickstarters are often filled with some kind of Exclusive item (or several) that are only for those who backed or Patreons with monthly clubs and it’s rare to not see that anymore.

And yet here is a toy company flat out saying how seeing how so many people want it, the limited moniker isn’t worth it. It’s so refreshing to see and such a rare stance that I REALLY hope other places look at this and realize you can make a difference and still be profitable. Seasonals are still a good compromise (and it sounds like those could return as well so those who don’t want to wait can pay more, but others can hope to catch them when they come back around) and even Store Exclusives aren’t awful when people work together and help one another.

Even the blind bags are confirmed to just be stocked evenly (though, only so much can be done about how the batches get produced… That’s all on where they are made) there’s not a single one that is rarer than the other. They are all produced in the same numbers. And it’s really nice! Obviously, some will always be more popular than others, but this feels like such a nice stance to take and I really hope it could encourage other things to follow along in the future.

And it definitely encourages me to want to continue to keep an eye on the product in the future. With Toy Fair 2022 next month, I’m sure we’ll see some new announcements soon and I’m looking forward to seeing who I may want next.

(This is maybe about a third of my actual full collection, but I love them all)

Edit as of July 14th, 2022: Cepia LLC has officially announced that Snowball truly will be back this year, just with a different tag. You’ll be able to buy it at MSRP and it will be out alongside a special story on Santa.com called “How the Gherkins Stole Christmas”. I am SO happy for those who initially missed out.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Random things, Goodbye to 2021, & 6 new Vacation Houses!

In general, things should be a bit slower with not too much happening. Regardless, I figure posting after a good ammount of houses may be the usual post schedule for ACNH right now with just a few exceptions.

Before we get started, some stuff before I felt up to doing new houses.

Some nice mail.

I made some more adjustments to rooms. I’m still not 100% satisfied with the Basement room, but I’m not sure I ever will be. I just don’t work well with less than 8 squares on each side and I felt no real inspiration for what I wanted beyond I have more items I like that I would like to put somewhere and really like the new Gyroid designs.

I also finally started actually running into characters at Brewster’s.

Something new I was surprised to see were Black Friday sales. Which while nice, honestly, they stock so few items that it’s underwhelming.

Regardless, it’s now time for the first few houses I did.

Drago – My Lucky Lodgings

Megan – A Place for Dreamy Thrills

Sprinkle – Castle of Cold

If only I could actually have a Castle option for the house exterior… Regardless, I also updated my little HHP Design thing:

Back to usual antics, a neat thing I found was if you run into a character again, they do greet you aware of that.

I then made various adjustments to the “Secret Grove” area making it a bit more open. It was impossible for me to do everything I wanted with it due to limits, but I think this made it a little nicer.


I also added a bit more glow moss to the Camp area.

I’ve also been doing my best with the Group Stretching to try and hit 50, but the fact that I can’t have it count all in one go bums me out.

I also ran into Isabelle again at the Cafe and got to see more of my villagers in there for once too.

They ended up dropping all the Zodiac symbols which in addition to getting from the Nook Shopping Seasonals (which at least finally show up in the catalog all year even if you can’t always order them), you can also get from Katrina which is neat. I ended up keeping just a few still out in the Gyroid Room.

Villager Mail still tends to make me emotional.

And then of course, New Year’s Eve arrived… But before we got closer to midnight, I went to do a few more houses.

Julian – Cloud-Nine Chalet

Sherb – My Fantasy Theme Park

Nibbles – Nibbles’ Study Space

And finally, it was countdown time.

We’re officially in 2022. I just hope it goes better.

In general, I hate how long it took me to get even just 6 houses done and the fact that I couldn’t make it to 10. As much as I don’t want to say it, it feels like maybe I just need to pack New Horizons away for a while and to be honest, I think I would’ve taken that break until April if I wasn’t stuck still trying to get coffee and do group stretching 50 total times. I only have 3 more times to go for Brewster, but I still have 31 left for the Stretches and I just… New Horizon’s repeated pace control drives me crazy. I miss when I could just sit with a bunch of friends and listen to K.K. songs for hours to knock out a badge over having to listen to him every week for nearly 2 years just in my own town.

Brewster’s I don’t even think would bother me as much if he was just around from the start when I actually was playing every day, but now that I have no real reason to play much each day, it’s harder to keep up with. Group Stretches is also just something I’d rather knock out in one go– not take nearly 2 months to do. Honestly, I hate how Reactions were handled in this game. I don’t know why they had to remove Shrunk entirely (I would’ve at least forgiven it if he was added as part of Harvey’s thing) and make it so Villagers would teach you reactions. Even if maybe I could’ve gotten all the Smug and Lazy ones if I kept those villagers longer, I never actually got a Cranky villager so I would’ve been short some no matter what unless I moved out one of my villagers that I didn’t want to move.
And it’s like, if I’m going to always be missing reactions, why bother? And I hate feeling that way.

There are things I like about New Horizons, of course, but it feels so far and few between– I like many of the new items, I like that we have more color options for items, I like Happy Home Paradise, I like the new Museum and how it’s laid out so much, I love the new villagers (especially Judy), I think the pathing tool is neat, I like Harvey’s little area, I like that Villagers can’t move without asking… and that may be it.
Terraforming wasn’t fun for me in the long run, I hate crafting, I hate cooking, I hate farming… I can’t stand that they gave us smaller side rooms (and while one side of the longer rooms is bigger, it’s still smaller the other way). I miss being able to have more exterior customization. I think the Nook Miles are a poor replacement for what the Badges were for. There’s so many quality life features missing like actually telling you if you’ve bought something before. It just all added up to quickly make New Horizons not much fun for me and I’m not in a place right now where I can easily do the things I do enjoy like decorating houses.

So I guess this is a way to say a bit of a proper break from ACNH. I’ll still be trying to finish up with Brewster and the Group Stretches (and will have videos for those respectively) and I should have a final island tour in April, but otherwise, everything else will just be kind of on hold or more random and I’m not entirely sure when I can say they’ll be back.

I still plan to have posts for some other things, but I apologize that there won’t be much AC content for a long while.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Renovations & Giving my Villagers Vacation Homes (plus some others too)

After the DJ K.K. Concert, I had unlocked one special thing back at Resident Services: House Renovations for my Villagers.

While I know a lot of people have used this for full redesigns, my only goal was to make their houses look nice again (or for them to have a proper house in the case of starting villagers) so I mainly just added onto their existing layouts or tried doing a combination of their past game houses and newer ones. The biggest exception was with Judy’s house though as while I kept the layout the same, I changed out the furniture for ones more fitting to her as the Pastel Kiddie set made… no sense for her at all and I feel like it was only used because a fancier set didn’t exist yet.

For exteriors, I mainly did a few color swaps, but many I left the same. Marina’s was one of the biggest changes as her house made no sense to me based on everything else she had.

I decided to go in the order I got the villagers so Teddy, Mira, Merengue, Cookie, Flurry, Judy, Diana, Marina, Maple, and Peanut.



I received another letter from Wardell after hitting 30. I think it’s really sweet how he addresses us kinder each time– first it was just “My Friend” then “My Good Friend” and now “My Dear Friend”. I also got a letter from Tom Nook about the changes.

I decided to check out the Exterior adjustments and while most I was okay with, I did decide to change Diana’s back as the small adjustments made it too similar to Judy’s.

With the Renovations done, it was then time for Vacation Houses. While I had done Merengue’s Vacation House pretty early on as I didn’t realize it would happen immediately, I genuinely wanted to do Vacation Houses for ALL of my villagers, but I wanted to wait until I unlocked everything first. It was finally time though so I am doing my best to do them as I go! While you may have seen the videos already, I wanted to post this after I finished the other nine houses first.

Unlike the Renovations, I decided to do these in house order (Though, skipping Merengue’s as her Vacation Home is already done) so Teddy, Mira, Diana, Maple, Cookie, Judy, Flurry, Marina, and Peanut.

All the editing I did of their houses also finished up. While most I am happy with, I did change Diana’s exterior back to how it was originally as the adjustments made hers too similar to Judy’s.

One of the things I found really cute were the villagers’ reactions to you redoing their house.

Anyway, first up for a Vacation House was Teddy!

I then noticed Nat on the Beach who was trying to find the School so I took a moment to help him out first.

He gave us the ability to let bugs fly around a house which is nice, but… I wouldn’t want to catch bugs just to do this and I’m disappointed we couldn’t just get an option to add some like this if we caught them before like most of the things work in this.

With that done, I headed over to Teddy and… immediately had questions.

Teddy – Always on the Move

Teddy!! I am making you a nice vacation house!! Why do you immediately want to move out of it?? (I’m guessing it’s some reference tied to the “Moving Company” logo on the trucks, but it still made me sad)

Mira – My Cutting-Edge Keep

I liked that this was closer to her old home style.

Diana – A Place to Meditate

This was also an option and just, this would’ve been more a summoning than a meditation I think…

I was going to pause after doing one more house– Celia’s. I had wanted to last time I saw her, but wasn’t feeling well and had to stop early as I wasn’t feeling well and of course, the characters rotate each day so, I started looking around for her… In the meantime, I saw more villagers hanging out.

And even got more soundscapes with Wardell.

But I wasn’t having much luck and suddenly, Gruff pinged me so I felt obligated…

Gruff – House of Horrors

One thing I didn’t expect was to get a bonus for doing it. I tried looking around for Celia again, but she was gone again so I’ll have to try and do her house next time…

Either way, I still have 6 houses to go for all my Villagers to be done. I had to take another break though for the day.

I wasn’t able to play until late tonight. I’m not sure if that actually had an effect on Brewster’s dialogue or if it’s just as I’ve stopped in more, but I found it nice anyway.

It was back to handing out Souvenir Chocolate now though and Maple was up next. Upon getting to the island though, Niko let me know that Lottie was looking for me apparently.

She gave me a new app for the Nook Phone– the “Room Sketch” app which essentially just… lets you test out room layouts wherever and even immediately implement them into a villager’s house. I’m guessing we can’t do the latter part in our own house, but it’s still helpful for trying to figure out things for my Basement… I’d love a version for terraforming too.

Maple – A Bountiful Bear Bungalow

Maple gets me.

Next up was Cookie… And I was not prepared for this line. (Side note from the future: Peanut said it too, but it still hit just as hard)

Cookie – The Ultimate Pop-Star Cafe

Considering the amount of overlap from Happy Home Designer, I’m surprised Cookie’s changed.

Judy – Judy’s Recital Hall

Flurry – Flurry’s House of FLurries

Marina – Marina’s Underwater Palace

Peanut – Peanut’s Americana Museum

I never would’ve guessed Peanut wanted a house full of American things…

Peanut’s house actually made us hit 40 total Vacation Houses done now so it was time for another celebration. I picked the Restaurant this time as we haven’t celebrated there yet.



Now it’s just a matter of what to do next… I definitely want to do a house for every villager… Plus, I’ll be continuing to visit Brewster’s each day, but I still feel so overwhelmed with New Horizons right now and even a bit burnt out as a bunch of new items didn’t really fix most of my issues with the game.

I wish I could come up with an idea I’m happy with for the basement at least, even if I don’t end up overhauling the grove area after all (though, I still feel like I should in some way…).

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Slow Progression to the Big Event

I will say one thing that can always be a bit hard is when you keep hearing about all this stuff that unlocks after doing certain things a number of times when you don’t time travel so you’re just… sitting back and waiting. It’s something I found especially polarizing when New Horizons first came out due to that slow first week trek and it’s not really a great feeling to be back to. Making things more frustrating is my lagging behind with Happy Home Paradise where despite trying multiple times to sit and sink some time in, something keeps coming up.

Thus this is a collection of days until I manage to hit 30 total homes done, as it’d be relatively short otherwise.

As per usual, I’ve still been doing small changes around the island.

I also ended up seeing Daisy Mae while over at Brewster’s. I really should try and check in more.

Brewster also let me know I could get Coffee to go from now on.

Over at Harvey’s, our next Shop had arrived– Redd!

Cornimer also returned which I did not expect, but I appreciate the acorns.

Regardless, now it was time to get back to work.

Dobie – The Author’s Retreat

Surprisingly, this also ended up being the 10th Vacation House I’ve done so Lottie wanted to celebrate. It was a very cute party.



With the party over, I continued to get a few more houses done.

Marcie – A Homey Daycare Dwelling

After finishing, I got a new Job Title and a Pay Increase.

There were also more options for the Work Uniform so I played around with it a bit.

It was then time for another job.

Coco – Coco-Style Retro Living

I spent some time walking around and it was a nice surprise to see those who we’ve made houses for hanging out. Marcie even gave me a gift.

While doing Coco’s house, I unlocked more “cleaning effects” so I headed back to my place to check them out a bit. I also put some Gyroids out, but still can’t decide what to do with that basement room really…

I had gotten a lot of the DIYs too so I spent some time cooking to finish off the day. Due to the amount, I’ve just included some of my favorites.


I also realized I could put one of the dishes on the Stove too which I think looked nice.

To my surprise, I had mail today. A nice one from Wardell for hitting 10 Vacation Houses and also one for having participated in the Group Stretching three times.

I also stopped by Brewster’s as usual now and after my usual coffee (even though I hate coffee), I also got one to go for fun.

Heading to Harvey’s to see the next completed shop, Saharah was actually not here due to being at my town today so there was no introduction with Harvey. It was still set-up though at least.

Making my way out to work once more, I was surprised to get a Plumeria Start from Olivia at the school.

At the Agency, Lottie asked me to choose between setting up a Cafe or Restaurant first. I decided to start with the Cafe.

Facility: Cafe

I had unlocked a feature to pay for items later and with that, I had enough to pay it off. Wardell referring to us as a friend is very touching.

I then stopped back by the Cafe to check it out more and was surprised they actually sold food items we could buy.

After buying some things, I accidentally picked up a new job assignment and thus, we continue!

Olaf – A Stellar Estate

Heading back to the Agency, I unlocked finally unlocked the Happy Home Network!

My Happy Home Network ID: RA-5367-6995-4315

With the Cafe done, it was time to work on the Restaurant!

Facility: Restaurant

With the facilities done, it was back to the Vacation Houses.

Tucker – Armchair Archaeology Dig

It was at this point things that were different or not included in HHP that HHD did/had really hit me– like the lack of being able to change the entry way appearances (we can change the flooring, but not do doors or anything), no flexibility on where another room is (Upstairs only), and one especially odd thing to me: How the Clip Show and photos work. Even if a Villager wants you to decorate both outside and inside, they will only have the little montage where you are in the room. Happy Home Designer would have each room you decorated be shown at some point. Similarly, HHD would always save the final “scene” for a photo, but HHP requires you to take your own and it’s… super annoying filling up my storage with random pictures because it won’t take any automatically.

Regardless, I have done my best to trudge on and decided to just start taking pictures of both even if the game refuses to include everything.

Deirdre – A Little Slice of Fall

After finishing Deidre’s Vacation House, we had a little interlude as Niko had been getting very into DIY and now anything we’ve crafted could be used in houses. It’s a good thing I craft everything at least once.

Of course, right after it was back to Vacation House Planning.

Penelope – My Ever After Home

I decided to stop there for today. I also had managed to get a few other items I’ve been wanting so I made a few more improvements to the Kitchen.

Another day means another Shop opening over at Harvey’s– this time, Katrina’s!

Of course, I had to try each of the fortunes…

The friendship one was so sweet T~T

Saharah also gave me a small introduction now that they were actually here today.

Back on the Island, my vegetables finally fully grown. Now to never actually harvest them.

I also added a few adjustments over by the Museum. It’s subtle, but I think it looks nice.

Heading off to work, Niko wanted to teach a class.

After getting back to the Agency, Tank showed up to bring up an idea he had: Roommates. He wanted to have one and to be honest, I’m not super fond of it. I don’t mind it for NPCs where they never actually give a theme really, but doing this means now I’ll never be able to make Moose a vacation home and that makes me really sad as I’d really like to make everyone one.

It was then back to the usual Vacation Home business… Unfortunately, I didn’t feel up to doing much.

Sylvia – A Family-Friendly Pool

After finishing, I was told Wardell had gone to take a break and to go find him, so I quickly headed over to the North side of the beach. This unlocked the Soundscapes feature.

Today was pretty much an off-day. Maple visited though.

And Brewster gave me his Cookie recipe.

I also finally did a Kapp’n Island again, despite not needing anything from them, and got a really pretty one.

Over at Harvey’s, the final shop had opened: Kicks’!

While I didn’t feel up to doing any houses today, I still stopped by the HHP Agency to buy things. To my surprise though, I had a new task. Niko had been working on DIYs and Wardell wanted my help with gathering materials for him.

Besides that, we finally finished off the new seasonal items added in 1.11 with the Chitose Ame for Shichi-Go-San:

I also learned you could use custom designs as well for the Cleaning effects so I tried putting in some cherry blossom ones.

Brewster offered me pigeon milk for the first time. I need way too much milk and sugar to make coffee drinkable for me. I really wish Brewster had more items on the menu… or at least that we had the option to pick other ones.

Over at Harvey’s, with the shops done and having gotten all of the hairstyles Harriet offered, I’ve usually found her hanging out with Harvey which is cute.

With nothing really to do at Harvey’s now, it was back to working on Vacation Houses.

Vesta – Home with a Fireplace

After finishing, I unlocked another new feature: Two-Story Vacation Houses. Honestly though, I don’t plan to use it much. I wish villagers could decide if they wanted it over having you pick– I rather just work more closely on what they want than taking tons of liberties.

Naomi – The Art Cafe

And after finishing that house, I also received another Title and Pay Upgrade.

O’Hare – Tropical Paradise

And that brought us to the 20 Vacation Houses mark which meant it was time for another party.

Lottie then revealed her next plan for us: A Music Festival.

The next day, I had another really sweet letter from Wardell.

Back at our Paradise Island job, Niko started giving more recipes he came up with. I also ended up changing my outfit back to something closer than my initial outfit. I do wish there were actual white tights as an option though.

I did my best to at least do one vacation house today too.

Dizzy – A Fun Yard for Playing

At Brewster’s, Isabelle actually stopped by too which was a nice surprise.

I also finally noticed that Judy had put out Glowing Moss Wreath plus I put out some Nova Lights on the Castle Towers.

As for our progress, Niko let us know the Decorating had been going well, but Lottie felt sick and had to be flown off the island to see a Dcotor…

Niko was a bit nervous taking over for now, but he did well.

Rod – A Pirate’s Secret Hideaway

Lottie returned shortly after and even brought a gift back with her.

Beardo – A Proper English Garden

Bettina – A Peerless Patisserie

After what happened, Lottie decided our next Facility should be the Hospital.

I stopped by the Hospital for a check-in after and not only got a quick check-up, but also paid off for an expansion to add a Patient Ward which I’d be able to take care of tomorrow.

Del – A Cabin for My Sea Voyage

There’s a lot of things I think I would’ve done differently, but I got really caught up in a concept and didn’t execute it like I imagined.

Wardell then took another break and we learned more soundscapes.

It’s honestly really nice sitting here.

Spike – Heart of the City

Niko also gave us an update as he set up more things.

I didn’t expect to see another NPC so soon, but Blathers showed up at Brewster’s today which was nice.

Brewster also ended up having a gift for me.

Back at Happy Home Paradise, Niko learned about my own involvement with the Materials. I can’t really take all the credit though– Wardell was the one doing so at first at least. And maybe he put some stuff in there inbetween, who knows.


Niko then told me to make sure I headed to the Office first as Lottie needed to talk to me. We had gotten an AB&PD essentially– it could deposit Poki (though, as I have not hit a limit on how much I can hold yet, I don’t see any reason to) and exchange Bells for Poki and vice versa.

Next up was expanding the Hospital.

Hospital Patient Ward

I also took the time to adjust the Exam Room a bit as it really didn’t need to be that big. The Hospital probably has my favorite colors. I feel like most of the other buildings had really awful shades of pink for options :/

We had to be close to that 30 milestone now so I decided to really focus on getting some more Vacation Houses done today.

Yuka – My Forested Jungle

Tom Nook than showed up letting us now use any item I’ve cataloged… In which having every item cataloged already has sure come in handy.

At the Hospital, I ran into Joan. It’s nice to see her.

Norma – A Place Packed with Plants

Zucker – Festival Grounds

Niko then let us know he finished decorating. I appreciate the color scheme.

Maddie – Stylish Streamer Estate

And thus, I officially hit 30 Vacation Houses done!

We also apparently got permission to set up our last facility…

And thus, it was time… An Apparel Shop.

While it’s neat that it’ll actually have clothing you can buy each day, I am a bit disappointed about the lack of a Concert Hall which was one of my favorites in Happy Home Designer. In general, the exterior designs felt relatively uninspired and limited with options unfortunately.

Regardless, it was finally time for the special event…

…A DJ K.K. Concert!! I honestly love DJ K.K.’s remixes so I really hope he may appear again here too like how K.K. continues to show up on our Island.


After we finished dancing, we also got some Dance Reactions to go with it which was nice. Though, no Shrunk Shuffle… And still no way to get Personality-specific Reactions :(

I love the decorations for it so much. If the concert never ended, I’d be okay with it.

I miss Club LOL.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – And here comes Happy Home Paradise

Even though I was mainly just stuck waiting around on Thursday, some stuff did still pop up before the DLC released. For one, I got a new recipe from Merengue.

I also started fishing to try and get more DIYs after learning you could get some that way as well.

That facial expression is the one bad thing about this eye style.

Judy ended up inviting me over to visit her House so she could practice her hosting. For the most part, it wasn’t too different than how it’s been in the past with a slight exception of bringing up a game to the biggest surprise: A gift when I left.

I then did my best to cook the recipes I could for the moment.

Meg also invited me over to her town as her museum was done already so we could have coffee at Brewster’s and watch K.K.’s Concert.

Regardless, Happy Home Paradise ended up releasing at midnight! After downloading, immediately upon loading in, I had a call from Tom Nook.

I had hoped to do a few things first, but got immediately whisked away to the airport.

Before immediately rushing to work, I decided to take care of the few things I had hoped to and I also had quite a bit of mail to go through, including a specially marked Nintendo one that came with this lovely photo of Lottie, Niko, and Wardell.

With my own little to-do list done and new recipes crafted, I was finally time to head off for work.

Immediately upon landing, we met Niko who showed us the way to the main headquarters.

After getting introduced to everyone, Lottie told us to head upstairs to change into my Work Uniform.

After heading down and a short conversation, our very first customer walked right in: Eloise!

Eloise – My Relaxing Reading Room

We were then told to head out to the Beach to find more possible customers. I generally just picked whoever’s theme sounded most interesting, whoever I saw first, and/or based off a friend’s or chatter’s suggestion during the stream.

Tank – Tabletop-Games Ground

Besides buying stuff in the store, I also made sure to buy enough Souvenir Chocolate for all my villagers.

Azalea – A House of Green Furniture

We learned the whole shining things up pretty early, but I constantly forget about it. Even when I say to myself “I’ll make sure to do so this time!”, I get so caught up in the actual decorating and completely forget. I lost track how many times the characters told me to take a break though.

Bertha – Bungalow of Cozy Blankets

Continuing to be yelled at to take a break, Lottie told us next and ended up checking out a building that would soon be a facility we could work on. She also recommended us look around the island and it is quite pretty.

Pudge – My Pretentious Palace

Niko found a letter in the bottle and gave us the DIY.

I also see we still have some unique names for these houses.

Olivia – Portal to the Land of Nod

Upon getting back, we were promoted and got new outfit choices.

Lottie then asked us to help work on the very first Facility: The School!

Rio – Workout Workshop

Because every member of this team needs to tell me to take a break apparently.

We do agree on one thing though: Yes, Island Life should be relaxing!! Too bad the game mechanics took tons of unrelaxing mechanics v-v Regardless, after this, Lottie had the Amiibo device installed. It’ll be a long while before I get to that.

And then, of course, we continue to have some… incredibly weird ones.

Lionel – Restroom Refuge

Let me just say I was very thankful I unlocked partitions with this house because I don’t know if it would’ve gone nearly as well otherwise.

And at this point, it had passed 5AM so the time rolled over while on the island.

To my surprise, I saw Leif wandering around on the Beach. He was looking for the School and ended up making it so we could use Hybrid Flowers during decorating now.

Since it hit 5AM though, that meant the Museum’s construction would be done and the Cafe would be opened so I decided to truly take a break and head back to Pink Sea.

I had gotten some nice mail and even got a lovely pink chandelier which I put in the bedroom.

It was then off to the museum!


While on one of Kapp’n’s islands, I actually found a already grown Gyroid in addition to a fragment which was surprising.

I then headed over to Harvey’s as the next shop should be opened.

I noticed Merengue walking around early so I decided to hand out one of the Souvenir Chocolates. What I was not prepared for was to immediately end up heading back to the Island to have an option to make her a Vacation Home.

And of course that meant I had to… I think I’ll wait until I unlock everything before handing out anymore chocolate.

Merengue – Dessert R & D Dept.

Heading back, it was time to get started placing some of the items I got in the mail.

I also got to learn that apparently new seasonal recipes are dropping from balloons which isn’t fun.

I also decided to try burying the Gyroid Fragment on the beach as it’s the only place I really had and thankfully, it worked out.

It was then time for the ceremony in honor of the Cafe opening! It’s been a long time since we last had one… And thinking about it, this may actually be the last ever one for Pink Sea. I have no where to put any new ramps or bridges nor any plans to add any and there will be no other major updates so…

I also started playing around with trying to use the new sparkle effect in my own house, but I can’t really get any of it to look that great…

Meanwhile, Zed had gotten a recipe for a Cherry Blossom Rug and kindly sent me one. It’s so cute.

I also want to just mention that while going back home and learning how I could do stuff I learned in HHD, it did outright confirm how changing room sizes was not one of them and while I’m not surprised, I’m still annoyed. I get not having it available from the get-go if someone is still expanding their house, but if they fully expanded it and their storage to 5,000, WHY can’t that be an option? I can do so much more with 10×10, 8×10, and 8×8 rooms than 6x anything and I’m so frustrated at the lost potential, especially as we couldn’t even get all rooms as big as New Leaf’s.

Regardless, another day had come and thanks to surprises from nice people and friends, I managed to zoom through DIY collecting T~T So now I can pretty much solely focus on my catalog. I also finally managed to catch the Seal Fountain’s special hour moment. It’s really cute.

And I managed to get one of each sprout for my little farm. Nice for aestheticness, but pointless in terms of how many I’ll need from crafting so shout out to all my friends who offered to help because they know how much I can’t stand farming in games.

Finishing up with Gyroids thanks to some kind people, I also decided to just drop one here as an ode to the old days.

I then stopped by Resident Services as my loan was now complete.

I also found out that the gift boxes you can deliver to villagers also can “timeout” like the lost items so I was able to finally have a gift box where I always imagined one since Balloon Gifts don’t spawn high enough.

Over at Harvey’s, Tortimer was now here!

I get that we’re always essentially a different person and not somehow the same character still around as everyone else gets older, but I have mixed feelings on it. I wonder if they ever think of us. I suppose more accurately I could just think of each game as its own reboot, but…

Regardless, the main theme of today was just… Little updates as I got new items to use around town. I’m not sure if all of them are permanent fixtures or not, but I think they look nice… Hopefully anyway.









I really want to figure out how to rework two areas in specific plus figure out a couple of other things, but I have no idea where to start on those… Maybe I’ll get some inspiration as I work on HHP. I mainly just keep thinking of how different my island may have been if so many items were in at the start for me to plan with. I don’t really like tearing things down and starting over so it’s just me trying to make things work and it’s so frustrating.

In the meantime, this is essentially my quick craft set-up I carry around with me:

After that, it was a lot of just crafting and working on getting recipes done.

While I didn’t manage to do anymore houses, I did at least stop by to do some shopping.

To finish off the day, K.K.’s concert! I had fun to all the new songs— I would say K.K. Bashment’s is my favorite of the new batch.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – The update arrived early?!

I don’t think I can accurately describe the emotions I felt when, after an especially rough day where going to bed early seemed to be on the table, I suddenly caught wind that the big 2.0 update dropped about 24 hours early. I guess for most people, this would be something exciting to make up for the day, but for me, it was really the last thing I needed. I’ve been incredibly anxious about the update since the Direct and while there were a few features I am genuinely excited for; for the most part I’m just… stressed.

I don’t mind new features (minus cooking, but it’s an expansion of the DIY system which I just don’t care for so), but I just… did not want more items. Between the lack of space (due to terraforming restrictions and lack of room expansions) and just it being so late at this point, if there HAD to be new items, I just wanted it to be small… and nothing about this update has been small. This update practically doubles the amount of items in the game and while sure, a lot of those items are variants (many have 8 color options), it’s still overwhelming.

I think what really is getting to me most with it right now is I generally categorize things into multiple sections– For example, DIYs goes to Random DIYs, Villager DIYs, Celeste DIYs, Event DIYs, Nook Miles Redemption DIYs, etc. But this update resets almost everything. Villagers have new DIYs and Cooking DIYs, there’s new Nook Miles things, you can get recipes from Leif, Celeste has new DIYs, Fence colors count towards the catalog, K.K. has new songs, and just every single checkmark I had has not only quickly come undone, but with a list that feels as long as when I first started playing. And while clearly I must be in the minority with the amount of people who reset their islands for fun, I have never cared for that kind of thing. I was thrilled when I was done and I could relax and just work on decorating or whatever I felt like and not constantly worry if I didn’t have the game going 24/7, I could miss something. Because with the randomness, it’ll take even longer all on your own.

Maybe I’ll feel better when I can find a surefire list of everything (I know there’s some, but they’re either just images which doesn’t help with keeping track or saying which are DIYs or the actual names, have all the variants mixed in including ones that don’t actually matter to the catalog, and/or they also have old items mixed in) and can cross things off and prioritize stuff, but right now, it’s just kind of a bundle of questions and stress about missing out on everything.

While I’m sure there’s some new items I’ll absolutely adore; for now, it just feels like too much. And as someone who is very much a “dump everything out and work from there” type of person over a little bit at a time, each step feels incredibly daunting. And there’s still so many weird limits that just makes it worse. Regardless, we’ll move into my actual play sessions now and as always, you can find the recordings up on my Youtube channel.

Immediately upon booting up, Isabelle started talking about everything happening and explaining about the ordinance system.

I also had plenty of mail letting me know about the latest additions.

I decided to head to Blathers first as besides it being the closest stop of all the places I wanted to go, I figured that we would once again need to upgrade the Museum for Brewster’s Cafe so it was best to get that knocked out ASAP. What I was not prepared for was how apparently Brewster’s Cafe closed and he was missing.

I have so many questions about how this happened. Did something go wrong? Did Brewster want to retire? If it’s the latter, do we really want to ask him about working at a cafe again?? This entire scenario is resolved way too quickly, but maybe we’ll get to learn more about it from Brewster eventually. Regardless, for our search, Blathers gave us a photo of Brewster so we know what he looks like.

The update also introduced the whole Morning Exercise/Stretching stuff which honestly the Button Controls were harder than I expected? The timing was really odd. Maybe one day I’ll try it with motion controls.

At Resident Services, I immediately bought the Storage Upgrade and ended up selecting Beautiful Ordinance again. With my weird sleep schedule I can have really late hours and really early hours so Early Bird vs Late Owl doesn’t work enough for me. Bell Boom has always seemed worthless. I then picked up soe of the various new gadgets and things for Nook Miles (and also stopped back at the Nookling shop for stuff as well before they closed). It was… a lot to say the least. This is just some of them:

I then decided to recolor the Fences around the Outer Cafe area as the weird orange-y brown of the Lattice fence has bugged me for AGES.

It was then off to meet Kapp’n.

Right away on the island he brought us to, we ran into Brewster.

I’m glad he’s okay because Blathers did not make it seem that way. Regardless, I headed back to Blathers and let him know.

Upon talking to him again though, he ended up giving me some neat posters. I temporarily placed them along that wall just to see them as it had the most clear wall space. They’re pretty neat.

You may also have noticed that I set my first (and possibly only) Accent Wall there– fully making this room feel more like a backyard.

During all this, Cookie actually came to visit. I was probably one of the few people who didn’t miss Villagers visiting us or inviting us over. It’s not that I don’t enjoy seeing them, but they have always come over while I was in the middle of decorating and this was no different.

She actually left pretty quickly though which I am not sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

After that, I worked on crafting a lot of the DIYs I had gotten so far– essentially, if I had the items to craft it, I did. I will say my issues with Cooking aside, the stove is pretty nice.

I also made some adjustments over here to add the Donation Box and eventually, the Balloon Cart as well.

I finally headed out to Harvey’s next.

It’s a good thing this was in the Direct or I would be very concerned.

I’m pretty excited for this area, even though I have most things done at this point. At the very least, having Reese & Cyrus and Leif around permanently will be pretty helpful.

I ended up giving each Lloid 99,999 Bells as getting one to 100K would make it so you can’t donate anymore. I know it’s unlikely they’ll get finished off by Harvey or Harriett, but just incase…

I ended up doing Reese & Cyrus’ shop first and then followed up with Leif’s today. I’ll likely do Tortimer’s next.

Back in town, as it was passed midnight at this point, I was able to order more Nook Miles Items. These are probably my two favorites of the new batch.

I also planted the Gyroids I had gotten from finding Brewster. The… stream rising is unsettling.

The Pastel Plaza stuff is right up my alley. I ended up putting the bench here, but I’m not sure if I like it more than what I had before so maybe I’ll put this somewhere else…

I tried playing around with the Clock and Arch as well, but they just didn’t mesh well with everything else.

Thanks to some kind people, I was able to get a potato seed and at least get one new crop in my little plot of land.

I also got some of the cute Glow Moss and Vines which I had fun decorating a bit. Regardless of what happens to that middle area, the Glow Moss and Vines will stick around.

The new reactions are also pretty cute. My only complaint is several are quick different poses (Much quicker than like the Yoga/Exercise ones) and I think it would’ve been better if they switched when we pressed A or something because they also only loop once so I feel like it’d be hard to stay in the pose you want for long.

I do appreciate that we can do the Closet poses just out and about now though.

I then learned, thanks to a friend, that in addition to the whole way DIYs can work, sometimes your Villagers will cook at their stove and you can talk to them for them to teach you a recipe.

I had wanted to do more Kapp’n Islands, but unfortunately, you can only do one a day -_- Because everything has to be overly restricted in this game.

Anyway, the clock rolled over to 5AM and I got to unearth my first two Gyroids.

I really want to find a nice place for them, but I’m at a complete loss.

In addition to all the furniture, there’s also new clothing items as well and already multiple cute things. I’m not sure if anything will fully beat my current outfit though.

I also managed to get another seed– a Tomato this time! Just Squash, Carrots, Sugarcane, and Wheat to go…

I made sure to check out the House Exterior additions this time as I was too focused on the Storage yesterday, but… it really was just the four shown in the Direct. It was really disappointing… I’m sad my castle isn’t back. So I ended up just doing the next Storage Expansion.

Meanwhile, the Museum was now under construction to set up the Cafe (so I won’t be able to see Brewster until tomorrow).

Heading back to Harvey’s to see Reese & Cyrus and pay of the Lloid raising funds for Leif’s shop, I noticed Harriet was set up. One nice thing was that she actually will set your hair back if you don’t like it so you can get the new hairstyles (I’m guessing it’s one a day– it only let me get one haircut today anyway) without having to go and switch yours back later.

The first hairstyle I got was the one I was debating on too, but as I thought, it’s just a bun with some hair down. The search for a better ponytail to actually happen in this game continues.

Harvey was talking to Reese & Cyrus and the dialogue was really cute.

I tried really hard to get all the Nook Miles stuff and other new items I had gotten customized that I could not for cataloging purposes, but it was… so draining. With so many of the items having large amounts of customization, the cost (About 5K on average, but some items can be closer to 10K or 1K), and how long each dialogue prompt you had to go through took, it was really unfun. I’m glad there’s no limit to how often you can, but I just got bored. I couldn’t even get through customizing all the [customizeable] fences (as they’re now in the catalog). With so many colors, it was just driving me nuts… I still have four more to finish later.

In the meantime, one item I was surprised had no customization was the new Park Fountain. I initially tried putting it in front of Resident Services, but it didn’t look that great, so I tried near the playground. I’m not sure if I like it or not in either place. Somehow it feels small? Even though it’s the same size? It’s a shame as I love the Seals, but something about it is throwing me off and I don’t know why.

Finishing up some morning stuff, I took another Kapp’n trip and clapped along to the song. Unfortunately, there was nothing good on the island besides another Gyroid fragment which I decided to just keep as is.

My town got enveloped in fog which was kind on unsettling.

I also surprisingly had one of the new Villagers in my Campsite today– Petri.

The Elegant set, while it has some things in common with the Rococo set, is not entirely the same. The beds especially are very different, but I still am glad I managed to get the couch:

I also got some new bags, but I wish they worked better with my outfit… I also want the Dreamy Pochette as a backpack.

For now though, I think I’m going to take a break. It’s just so incredibly overwhelming and until I can figure out a way to organize it all, that feeling just gets heavier. Maybe I’ll feel better when I can focus solely on the expansion… I can at least hope it’ll make cataloging a lot less overwhelming.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – The update is almost here…

Originally, I expected I wouldn’t have much to say until the update hit, but in the end, I do have a handful of things I did end up doing before the update hits on Thursday. For one, we have the last seasonal item for October (though, it is also part of November): Our final item for last month– Marigolds were also added for Day of the Dead. I wish I had a nicer place to put it though…

Maybe if this area gets redone?

That evening after the Direct, in an effort for some control, I took the time to work on my little side Waterfall area again. I had always wanted it to feel more like a Shrine, but room was such an issue… But you were never actually meant to walk into it which made me realize there was a way to make it work after all:

I would’ve liked to fit in some Shell Fountains too, but their awkward size unfortunately made it impossible. Maybe a new item could work, though, unless they gave us some overview mode for exterior editing, it’ll be a huge pain to do. It’ll be interesting to see just how many features from the Expansion are possible and when as I’m sure you’ll have to build your rank up like in Happy Home Designer. I just REALLY hope it’s not real time only. Normally, I don’t mind waiting, but it’s nice to just zone out and decorate houses for villagers and can’t really zone out if I can only do three before the game tells me to come back tomorrow.

In the meantime, I had been popping in more, constantly wanting to work on things and generally choosing not to as I should wait, as it’s been really hard. Even though there’s only so much dialogue, sometimes I still get some nice new things.

Thinking all of it over more though, I figure if I do try to change up any area in full, it may be the pond area– cleaning it up a bit and making it less wild/cluttered while still giving a kind of fantasy vibe. Maybe it can still turn into a big old shrine in and of itself, but I should wait to see what new items appear first. The other area I’m considering making some adjustments too is the large waterfall before near the bridge to the Grove area– I am considering making the mouth of it a bit smaller instead of just this gigantic rectangular river/pond.

As it is, Mira had lost an item and for the first time, I couldn’t find it anywhere? I usually find it long before a Villager asks, but even after multiple loops around the island and even having Meg check as well, we couldn’t find her notebook! Maybe it’ll show up while doing some renovating? But I’m just… beyond baffled. She did draw a very cute Mega Audino on my Bulletin Board though :D

We also had another new seasonal item today and honestly, probably my favorite of the newest items from 1.11– these adorable handheld lanterns:

They’re both fun to hold and honestly look really cute around. I almost wish they were customizable too. I’d say maybe one day, but with this update supposedly being the last big one, I wouldn’t expect any new custom design items.

My Top Tips for Sunshine Days

If you are subscribed to my Youtube channel, you’ve likely already seen at least one of my Sunshine Days videos since I started playing at the end of June. It’s easily been one of the games I’ve most frequented been asked about so I wanted to list some of my top general tips when playing the game.

Keep in mind the game is in Early Access and thus, ALL of these tips are subject to change or no longer be applicable. Also as changes have happened, things have changed since I originally did them, but these are at least the tips I’ve personally followed as I play.

  • If you plan to do any of Noor’s Gossip (aka, the Daily Quests) that day, before you do anything else, you should head there to pick them up. – Generally, my first thought is often gardening or maybe wanting to hurry to harvest things so I can work on quests during the 1-2 hours of respawn time, but MANY of the dailies require harvesting items, some literally will be all you can find per respawn session (like one of Bilet’s quests asks for 6 lemons and there’s only 6 lemons available at a time). While you may occasionally run into a situation where you just don’t get lucky with spawn rates (I had a quest where I needed 5 Mushrooms, but only 3 were available to harvest at a time), I’ve found this generally is the best way to do it so I can kill two birds with one stone instead of having to wait around for things to respawn or possibly multiple hours for plants to grow.
  • Don’t be afraid to just leave some crops growing in the Greenhouse until you HAVE to harvest them. You may only be able to buy 5 seeds per crop a day, but there’s no limit to how many you can have. You can also earn more from Percival’s Mystery Boxes and Bilet’s Crane Game, in addition to through the current Season Pass. The main reason I suggest this is that some items that frequently come up for harvesting are Pumpkins, Aloe, and certain flowers so I always keep some onhand just to finish quickly before immediately replanting them.
  • Always get the Premium Pass on the Season Pass during Early Access. – During Early Access, it’s completely free! So there’s no reason to not grab it for the extra rewards.
  • If you’re focused more on leveling the season pass and don’t care too much about getting more Stone, save your Acorns for Rubberwood Grove (the one with Iron). – Iron and Stone are currently only forageable through their respective Hiking Trips. You essentially spend 500 Coins for an Acorn which can be used to go Hiking on Ace’s Balloon. It’s definitely worth the price as you get more than if you bought and honestly, you do need a lot of Stone if you want to make all the different exterior customization options (which will take over 1,000 Stone to craft enough Cement and Brick or if you want to buy it, over 20K– the glue alone would be over 20,000…), but over twice as much forageables are available through Rubberwood Grove so it’s more bang for your Acorns if leveling is your biggest objective. Keep in mind you can just stay on a hiking trip until things respawn as well. That said, if you’re feeling impatient and have the money and acorns to burn, leaving a hiking trip and going back will immediately re-spawn everything.
  • If you don’t have time to play much, but can at least find time to stop in briefly, I’d recommend picking up a 5 Coin Ticket from Bilet and a Honey Jar from Jamal each day you can. – The reason I suggest these two specifically is every day, Bilet has a Carnival Ticket for 10% of the usual price. Bilet’s Crane Game is not just great for getting generally coins and gems, but actually contains old Season Pass items if you missed out on some. Also you’re pretty much guaranteed to always get more back than what you paid for if you just stick to those cheaper tickets. As for the Honey Jar, you can actually get Honey up to 3 times a day for one, but you also will get level up experience for each Honey Jar you fill. Once you’ve finished, stocking up on these jars helps get you a bonus start when the next season arrives.
  • If you don’t always have a lot of time to level or find yourself cutting it close, I strongly recommend getting the Water Pump from Byron’s shop ASAP. Putting one near your greenhouse saves you A LOT of time from going back and forth from there to the center of Town Square and back to fill up your Watering Can. As it can only hold 10 at a time and with a maximum of 48 slots (and even more than 10 from the get-go), you will be doing that… a lot. That said, watering your plants is completely optional— they do not die if you don’t water them, it doesn’t even speed up growth. The pros for watering are that watering will give you experience per water, even if that plant is already watered This has been changed in a recent patch and now you can only water a plant if it is unwatered. This is still recommended though as you can only hold 10 and the fully upgraded plot has 48 spots so it still saves time. Keep in mind that planting does not give you any leveling experience– only watering!
  • If you haven’t finished Jamal’s Garden Quest, you can actually keep picking weeds to gather up more flowers beyond what he asks for. It’s a good way to stock up for future or to have some to sell too.
  • You can tell if you have a new quest either by opening your map and looking on the right side or if an NPC has something to say to you if they start waving when you get close. That said, characters like Rowan and Emile should be spoken to each day until they run out of crafting recipes for you. Rowan will just give you them while Emile has some in his shop.
  • If a quest says to wait or come back later, it always means the next day— either after the day rolls over or 24 hours after you finished. If it doesn’t update after 24 hours, send in a Bug Report!
  • I often get a lot of questions on earning coins, so offhand, a quick list of suggestions:
    • Flowers bought from Jamal give the best average for earning Coins– you will always earn twice what you paid. Every crop from Sada, minus Grapes which cost Gems instead of Coins, will not earn as much unless you get the silver rank of them which you can’t guarantee. Unless you have tons of Gems to spare, I would not recommend Grapes beyond completing quests as they only give you Coins.
    • There are 4 chests you can find every day (3 in Shuggle Woods, 1 in Primavera Forest in Jamal’s Garden) that will give you coins. Similarly, Daily Quests also give you coins and most don’t require you to spend anything to finish them.
    • Fishing costs nothing to do so it’s essentially a free source of revenue.
    • Percival’s Mystery Boxes will often give you items you can sell for a good amount while also giving you a decent amount of coins for the items as well so if you’re someone who has TONS of forageables and is really great at keeping those counts up, this is highly encouraged. * The small knock you may get for giving Percival the items instead of selling directly is more than worth a lot of what you can pull for his boxes. That said always go for the 5 Item exchanges over the 10 if possible as you only get one ticket either way.
    • If there’s nothing you’re really saving for from Bilet’s Crane Game, playing that with the 5 Coin ticket is always guaranteed to get you something worth more.
    • Near the fishing spot is a cute yellow computer you can use daily to answer a small poll about how you’re enjoying playing the game! It’ll give you 20 Coins just for answering.
    • And of course, there’s the Computer at the Cafe you can put codes into. You can put one in every hour so you can even try finding new codes out yourself as well.

* This is unfortunately very much not me and is something I struggle with a lot. I yearn for the day we can just buy tickets or literally get them any other way because I only have so much time I can earn a bunch of things and my mystery box luck is terrible ;~;

I hope these tips help make the game more enjoyable for you! If you haven’t heard of Sunshine Days, you can play the game on Android or iOS or on PC through their Discord :) And if you want to add me, my friend code is 710942523939 !

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – September, October, and the Direct

It’s October which brings us both the brand new Direct that was announced last month and Halloween. The latter was included in the 1.1 Item Additions with a few new recipes and items which I honestly like for the most part. I didn’t particularly like these at first until I realized they opened up with little dioramas.

And this Pumpkin Bucket is so cute.

Besides those, back in September we got a few more additions as well with Dango and Moon Cakes for Obon and Songpyeon for Chuseok.

In which I continue to lament the lack of room especially the smaller side rooms… There is one other item coming out for the season with a Day of the Dead item, but that won’t be until later this month…

Regardless, we also got Direct News! Besides Brewster’s return (with his cafe back in the museum), we also had some other news, so time for my general thoughts!

Being able to invite characters to the Cafe is cute. I’ll definitely want to just… scan everyone to see what happens. I’m sure there’s a limit.

Kapp’n is back, but I’m not super happy about more flowers/materials honestly? Crafting is my least favorite part plus storage issues…

Excited to see Harvey’s island get expanded. Making RNG Characters be around permanently is great and having Reese & Cyrus help with recoloring items you can’t. And NEW HAIR! I hope for a better ponytail.

We have the group exercises back. Didn’t expect that. The exercise music is cute.

Nice to see Island Ordinances back, but Beautiful seems a bit pointless. I may consider Early Bird or Night Owl depending if it adjusts the shop again.

FINALLY new House Exterior options… And thank god for more Storage Expansion. I hope I have enough Bells for this.

Disappointed to see Cooking, but I know I’m the only one. I have no room for tons of different crops honestly. I don’t even think I have room for the 5 they showed. And my Kitchen is too small.

Thank god Ceiling decor is back. Accent Walls are also really cool?

THE WHITE LATTICE FENCE. FINALLY. Switching out all the yellow ones I’ve using for that so quickly. Nice to see customizing options too.

My husband will be excited about one of the new hairstyles, but it seems still no better ponytail :(

More Nook Miles furniture… I see some items I really like, but again… no room so I just feel sad. I hope I can fit that new fountain somewhere? Would be nice to do something nice with both types of fountains, but no room…

Did not expect new songs from K.K., but I guess I have to wait 12 more weeks… to get them all.

I loved the Music Boxes so happy to see them back, but again, no space… And that’s my feeling with Gyroids too. Not… particularly happy about the planting and watering? I don’t even have anywhere to bury them. I love how different they look this time too? I want so many colors… God, I don’t know what I’m going to do.

The permanent Ladder kit is really nice. I can think of a few places I’ll want it.

Glad to see the Narrow space mover back. I know a lot of people wanted Animals inviting you over and visiting back, but I was always so bad keeping up with those or busy working on things just for them to come back.

Also new Villagers?? This Bunny was kind of cute. Though, I have all my favorites so… I can’t believe all of this is coming in less than 3 weeks.

And essentially a Happy Home Designer thing with New Horizons getting “Happy Home Paradise”. I’d pay for it, definitely. The new character designs look great. And I see a lot of nice new items.

My dream too, Maple. My dream too. That one Cherry Blossom area with the waterfalls is essentially everything I wanted for my own home :(

There’s so many cute new items… Like new Teddy Bears and a little Rubber Ducky. Plus room dividers and smaller walls?? I hope this means we can get bigger rooms for ourselves and not just for villagers here?

Happy to see the Piggy Bank back. Not happy about yet another different currency.

Happy to have Exterior customization for facilities too on the island. Would be neat if we could on our regular island too. it really feels like they just took Happy Home Designer and put it into New Horizons to an extent.

I guess I have lots of reasons to stream some more? And confirmation we can do all these things in our own home… Hopefully that does mean bigger rooms. I’ll definitely be using all my Amiibo…

FINALLY. Remodeling our villagers’ houses! I can finally fix everyone’s houses after all the gifts…

So many more plushies too T~T

DLC will be $25 and ALSO launching on the 5th?? SERIOUSLY? Preorders begin the 29th and I will be preordering it immediately. Apparently it’ll be free with the expansion pack? But I don’t think we were getting that.

Series 5 of the Amiibo Cards is November 5th too?? Seriously? Smaller set but oh my god. Time to hope somewhere opens up box preorders… I want to get two boxes.

Anyway, I just… I guess speechless is one way to put it, but overwhelmed is probably more accurate. Part of me is happy, some of these things I’ve wanted for so long, but the other part of me is like “it’s too late”. I have no where for these items. No where for these new things. I don’t know what to do.

I’ll show off some of my favorite items over on Twitter and include a link here soon but for now I just… I’m crying and probably not for the right reasons.

Edit: So, as I said, you can see my full Twitter interesting item round-up here and my summarized thoughts here, but the short version is it really feels too late for so many new items and I genuinely won’t be able to fit most things without scrapping a lot of stuff which makes me really sad. Similarly, it’s ALL dropping at once. The Amiibo Cards, the Expansion Pack, Brewster, Harvey’s Island update, EVERYTHING and for once, I wish they spaced it out more.