Animal Crossing: Part 4 - Welcome To New Leaf City!

Hi All!
This week's entry I'm going to be talking about Animal Crossing: New Leaf City.

Now as you already know I am a big fan of this series! This is the latest game in the series and in my opinion the best. It has all sorts of new features and visually new things so let's get into it!

The beginning of this game is just like any other. You are asked a bunch of questions, arrive in town, but wait- you're the mayor! A cool and interesting new way to play is you control the fate of your town. You character is given duties that involve keeping the town beautiful, adding new buildings and decorations to your town (which...I mean... thank god), and hosting major holidays. The whole town is your oyster!

Another great aspect that I love is the dream suite. The Dream Suite allows you to venture to another persons town in your dreams - therefore you can't muck up anything. This feature is useful because if your friend wants you to see something of there's (ie: the way their house is set up, a new project, or a special flower/fruit) you can go view it while they aren't playing. The Dream Suite is also useful in that you can get ideas, see strangers towns without having to be their friend (the Dream Suite uses a "Dream Code" that is still specific to a town but makes the player anonymous).

Something interesting that's come out of the Dream Suite are these "Horror Towns". I started reading about them a couple of weeks ago and it's really interesting. It started in Japan as just a way to set up your town so that it's spooky. Usually the bulletin board will have some message or story about what happened and then you get to explore the town and see scenes from whatever horrible story it is. I ventured into a couple (I'm very prone to being spooked..) thinking, oh how scary could they really be? TURNS OUT PRETTY SCARY! I mean, I never jumped or anything, but I definitely on more than one occasion walked into a room in one of the houses and went, NOPE. Also, you can make your character have a greeting and I ran into a lot that were something like, "I was just so lonely..." and in the Dream Suite the voices of people kind of echo and sound very eery. Overall this is a really really cool idea that people have adopted in their towns and I urge you to check it out. 

The animation in this game does change a tiny bit. Your character's body is a little longer now, which doesn't seem very important but after being so short and squat for all these years it's definitely refreshing. Nintendo is very much of the mindset that if it's not broken don't fix it, well Animal Crossing is definitely one of those titles where you see that. Minor changes are expected and the look of the game is so great that there's no reason for them to have to change much. I think that mentality hurts and helps Nintendo.. but I digress. 

This game is great because it's suitable for all ages (as were the last 3) and I wouldn't say it improves the series necessarily but it's definitely the best game out of them. The game has morphed little by little through each game and I love how it turned out. I play this game religiously and definitely addicting. 

If you haven't tried this game yet- do it. It's totally worth your money and has given me just about a year of enjoyment. 

Look out for next week's post where I talk about WOMEN IN VIDEO GAMES!

And don't forget to subscribe and leave comments below. 

Video Game Characters: Part One!

Hello all!
I want to start an ongoing topic that I will cover over time. So this is Part One of my Characters segment where I talk about characters that I love and some that I hate. I won't get too philosophical with them because if I am being honest - I could talk about character personas for days. So I will keep these short and sweet! Hope you enjoy.

I am going to start with Mario!!!!  Let's-a-go!

So, Mario is an amazing character. His plot is simple. He needs to save the princess - so he does. It's a great goal because it's easy to understand for kids and the game itself is complicated enough that it won't bore an adult. As Mario evolves throughout the games his story changes. In Super Mario Sunshine (which I feel is one of the more underrated games) he has to clean up Delphino because baby bowser impersonated him and destroyed the town. You do have to save the princess in the beginning but once you save her the game continues. Mario's constantly chasing Princess Peach gives the player a mission without burdening them with layers and layers of back story.

A character in the Mario series that I cannot stand is Toad. He's constantly getting into trouble and then Mario mistakes him for the princess all the time. The only series where he is actually useful is in Luigi's Mansion where, when you find him - he is a save point. Then you're thankful to have found Toad because that means that you can continue on and worry less about dying and losing data.

Link: Protector of Hyrule!

Link is a fantastic character because he demonstrates the wise hero. Link doesn't speak much in his series (I don't know if you've noticed..) and his tacit heroism is something that I greatly appreciate.
Frankly, I don't like the American dubbed voices as much as I like the Japanese ones. Titus? Sucked. Ichigo? Lame. I feel that Link wouldn't be as successful a character if he had some wacky American voice.
Link's silence also gives off a sense of mystery. All the characters in the series find him very mysterious and I think this mystery is the reason Link and Zelda still aren't a couple. If we imagine for a moment that Link is a real person - he is obviously very thoughtful and probably very timid or shy. This makes me think that he would have a difficult time with women because he wouldn't want to make her uncomfortable. So Link stays forever friend-zoned because he's too passive and willing to serve princess Zelda (even if it means life or death).

Paarthunax

This is a totally random character that I want to write about because - I feel this weird bond with him. So at the end of Skyrim you're supposed to kill Paarthunax for aiding in Alduin's regime. For whatever reason when I reached this mission I moved on and ignored it. I went back later - hoping to 100% the game and found myself with my bowstring drawn and unable to release the trigger. Why? I still don't know. This is what I think about the character.
For one, I don't trust The Blades. While I really want Max Von Sydow (Esbern) to like me (or he might exorcise me -- get it?) I don't feel connected to that group. Paarthunax's character to me seems resentful. He's the tragedy of Lucius Malfoy. He would do anything for his master, but when his master is gone he is left to face the crimes he committed. I feel like Paarthunax has redeeming qualities that make me like him. Also, I like talking to him because he has an awesome voice actor (who, oddly enough, is the voice of many many many Nintendo characters).

Do you have any characters that you love? Leave them in the comments below!
Also, tell me whether I should kill Paarthunax or not. I still can't decide.

See you next week and thanks for reading!!