(no subject)

[fadeaccompli]

There are all sorts of important and complicated and infuriating/depressing/hopeful things going on around me lately. To the point that it's sort of exhausting to contemplate most of them. (And I'm always exhausted after conventions. Fourth Street did a real number on me, this year. It was lovely, and I spoke with people so much, and...that's why. Used up all my social energy, need to recharge.) So instead of talking about any of that, let me talk about...

Animal Crossing!

Yeah, I'm playing a lot of Animal Crossing: New Leaf. I was a little worried that I'd stop playing once the first few days of novelty wore off, but they've done a damn good job with this game. It's amazingly forgiving, so it never feels like a chore, which is important. I can get things done faster if I play a lot, but if I just poke at it for a few minutes on a given day? That's fine too. It's not going to hassle me.

Lots of cuteness. Lots of unexpected little jokes. (I did not realize the sea captain would sing wacky little songs to me every time I take a boat to the island.) And the real time aspect, which I sort of thought would be annoying, is...I don't know. Inspiring, yet soothing.

Take tonight for an example. I finally got Club LOL opened up, so now I can go groove to music at night in said club. DJ ZZ spins the discs most nights, and there are dance moves to do. Very cute. But on Saturday nights, he plays live acoustic music. So right now I'm sitting in the club, listening to him play the "ZZ Dirge", because he asked for requests, and I gave him a mood of "kinda sad." It's good music.

And if I want to do this again, I need to wait until next Saturday. No rushing. So it feels a bit more like it matters; this isn't something I can cue up any time I want. But it's every Saturday, so if I miss it one week or two, that's fine too. He'll be back!

And it's like that for pretty much everything. If I want to catch certain rare fish, they're only available in the ocean while it's raining in the afternoon for a few months of the year... But I have those months in which to catch them. I can obsessively breed new, rare flower colors by arranging them carefully and watering them, or just buy new seed packets from the store to slap down where I accidentally trampled the existing flowers. Flexibility!

Anyway. There's a lot more cute stuff in there, but I think I'm going to leave Club LOL and go visit someone else's town online. It's more fun to sit and listen to this guy's songs when in company of friends...

Comments

[neogrammarian]

The Lodger and I were discussing the fact that Nintendo seems to be the one console outfit that still holds strongly to the notion that games can/should be -fun-. I read that and said, "that sounds like fun"- it's sad how infrequently that's used as a metric in gaming these days. (I say that as an old Square Enix fiend, but I doubt I'd play through another one. They got..unfun.)

[fadeaccompli]

I still love the new Final Fantasy stuff, but the type of fun definitely changed. (With Final Fantasy 13 and sequels, I look at it as watching an anime series with interactive segments and a handy guide to setting stuff available whenever I pause.) But the more I like the super narrative stuff that barely gives me input, the more I also like the super casual stuff that's all about letting me do whatever the hell I want. As opposed to the "casual" stuff like Farmville that's all micromanaging and micropayments and other annoying things that start with micro.

One of the very good things they've done with this version of Animal Crossing is to lower the penalties for not playing. I think a lot more people are going to stick with it long-term, and dabble even as the shiny newness wears off, because if you neglect it for a while and come back, the game doesn't go "You monster! Everything is DEAD and RUINED and we HATE YOU!" It just goes, "Well, here are a few more weeds than usual, and neighbors mention it's been a while since they saw you. On to the same fun as before!" Which is...nice. I don't like my games to feel like chores.

(And I keep being surprised at how many people are playing. With a fairly even gender split, too, which I find especially interesting. Apparently one of the two main producers was a woman this time through; Nintendo noticed that a lot of women were playing the earlier iterations of the game, and, according to an interview, went out and tried to get more women working on the design process with each subsequent release, to make sure they were keeping up the appeal.)

...at this point a power flicker hit, and I lost the rest of my comment, which is probably for the best, as I'm rather going on. Something about my quibbles with their interesting but problematic handling of appearance customization at the beginning. Anyway! Good game. I do recommend it.

[neogrammarian]

Yeah the job-like aspect of so many of the MORGS (and their ilk) is un-fun. Someday I will have the time to play fun games again, and not just try to keep my job!

[fadeaccompli]

Some glorious, glorious day!