Animal Crossing: City Folk Speculation Thread

You know, if this turns out to actually be a grand sequel, the Wii's going to see an amazing trio of life sims; Little King's Story, Rune Factory Frontier and Animal Crossing.

I hope their release dates would be spread out, because if they all turn out as great as we hope, I won't be able to play two at a time given their size.

^ Yes.
So, how about it, guys? Can we expect some info for this in a few hours?
Seeing as how we don't really know what else Nintendo is planning, I'd assume we'll hear something about ACWii.

Originally Posted by Tonchiki

^ Yes.
So, how about it, guys? Can we expect some info for this in a few hours?
Seeing as how we don't really know what else Nintendo is planning, I'd assume we'll hear something about ACWii.

I think it's all but confirmed that ACWii will be at E3.

Alright! So we know some features now, but we can still speculate a bit until they tell us more about it!

The best features I noticed:
--VOICE CHAT!!
--Towns are more grass than dirt (unlike AC:WW)
--Better holdiays come back! ("Bunny Day" = Easter, Halloween showed up)
--Towns seem bigger (there were cliffs, suggesting multi-layered towns)
--Wi-Fi messages, to others' towns, Wii boards, and even phones
--At least four people can be in your town, and all of them can come inside the house now
--The addition of the city is pretty cool! Within the city, you can:
--Go to an auction!
--Change your hairstyle or even look like your Mii (which is optional!)
--Check the HRA
--Visit Gracie's shop
--Probably other stuff I already forgot

What I found most interesting was the part where Katsuya Eguchi said "It's also fun to see how they have set up their town, because it tells you what kind of person they are, and I think that's really fun."

It could just be semantics from having to translate from Japanese, but do I get the impression that we may be able to customize our town a bit more, perhaps even design it before we first move there?

Originally Posted by Ichabod_L

What I found most interesting was the part where Katsuya Eguchi said "It's also fun to see how they have set up their town, because it tells you what kind of person they are, and I think that's really fun."

It could just be semantics from having to translate from Japanese, but do I get the impression that we may be able to customize our town a bit more, perhaps even design it before we first move there?

I wouldn't get my hopes up... He's probably just referring to the animals' catchphrases, what shirts they wear, etc. The towns didn't look all that different from what they've always been.

But you never know, it would certainly be a nice surprise. And AC:CF Should be able to handle more than either of the previous games, so I hope they stuff it with content like that.

There's not a big graphic improvement, but that's the charm of AC. I just hope there's more to the town that what we saw. Other than that, who can't wait to cuss over Wii Speak ?

Oh man... Wii Speak for $29.99, and not packaged with AC:CF? Bullcrap!

But anyway, I also found out that the fronts and backs of shirts are different. Check out a video and see.

I also hope the island comes back... But Kapp'n drives the bus, so it may not, unless someone else rows you to the island. Or he decides to do it anyway.

EDIT: Apparently there's also a theater in the city. Wonder what significance it'll have. If it's like standing in front of the TV in your own house, I will officially declare it the most pointless addition ever.

EDIT AGAIN: There's also a camera icon on the menu. Coupled with the fact that they said you could send messages or pictures to friends, I guess you can take pictures. Not sure if it's just a snapshot or if you can aim it somehow, but whatever.

RETURN OF THE EDIT: The skunk is a shoe shiner. He can make your shoes match the color of your outfit (as opposed to being stuck with one color like the last ones). Also, Gracie's furniture is ludicrously expensive.
Taken from Zentendo's impressions:
Animal Crossing City Folk First Impressions

Originally Posted by Tonchiki

Oh man... Wii Speak for $29.99, and not packaged with AC:CF? Bullcrap!

But anyway, I also found out that the fronts and backs of shirts are different. Check out a video and see.

I also hope the island comes back... But Kapp'n drives the bus, so it may not, unless someone else rows you to the island. Or he decides to do it anyway.

EDIT: Apparently there's also a theater in the city. Wonder what significance it'll have. If it's like standing in front of the TV in your own house, I will officially declare it the most pointless addition ever.

EDIT AGAIN: There's also a camera icon on the menu. Coupled with the fact that they said you could send messages or pictures to friends, I guess you can take pictures. Not sure if it's just a snapshot or if you can aim it somehow, but whatever.

RETURN OF THE EDIT: The skunk is a shoe shiner. He can make your shoes match the color of your outfit (as opposed to being stuck with one color like the last ones). Also, Gracie's furniture is ludicrously expensive.
Taken from Zentendo's impressions:
Animal Crossing City Folk First Impressions

Don't worry, it will be both available separately and with Animal Crossing.

IGN: E3 2008: Nintendo Announces WiiSpeak

this is the ONLY game that i had any good feelings for from the press conference. i was really not so happy with the graphics of the game.

before you start, i love the graphics of animal crossing. my problems are:

- able sister's store is IDENTICAL to AC:WW
- hairdressers almost? if not, identical to AC:WW
- post office IDENTICAL to AC:WW
- lots and lots of the furniture looked the same as AC:WW

i hope there's more variety than what was shown in this trailer.

I was hoping for a serious graphical face lift. With the Wii's power it's not too much too ask for.

But it is Nintendo. So any effort is a lot to ask for. :/

****, I was wrong about WiiSpeak being packaged with AC.

E3 2008: Miyamoto Talks WiiSpeak

am i right to think this game is fully finished or is it still in the last stages?

It's coming out this year, so I can't see how there'd be too much left to do. At this point, I'd say it's polish and tweaking the online stuff until release. Maybe a few more activities, but nothing major.

Seems good enough. I'm content with it.

We haven't seen a major deal of stuff in the game, so I'm sure there are some other additions worth noting.
We did see a glimpse of returning (better) holidays, but there were only three. There are sure to be more. Probably the same deal with furniture. I'm guessing they didn't want to give some new ones away.

As for the graphics, I'm pleased they kept it about the same polygon level as they have before; that means they can do more with the game in other areas. The graphics are imporved, too, just not to a ridiculous level.

After doing a little research, the release date seems to be November 16th (has this already been mentioned?) and according to NGamer, the game's been finished for a while, so apparently they are performing a lot of polish.

November 16th is always the magic day for no known release games. Also, does the possibility of Wii Speak not being mainly packaged with AC mean it may be implemented in other titles?

I would think so. High Voltage said like a week ago that they really wanted to try Voice Chat in the Conduit, and I'm sure other games like World at War would use it.

So I just finished reading this article, and I have to say, despite the overall negative tone of the article, it did get me a bit more excited. Though there of course was one small falsehood there, but of course you could just chalk it up to the fact that he only played a demo:

Originally Posted by Mark Bozon

By pointing at the bottom of the screen, a small tab system will appear, allowing you to open your pocket, ... a keyboard (and no, you can't use a USB keyboard here) and town map.

If I may direct you to a quote from Shigeru Miyamoto:

Originally Posted by Shigeru Miyamoto

I’m sure there are plenty of people out there who want to play Animal Crossing over Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. Maybe just as it is. There may be some people who want to use a USB keyboard to chat and we’re fine with that. And there may be others who want to use something like WiiSpeak.

Or perhaps for some crazy reason they'll only let you use the keyboard during chat. I shudder at the thought.

Secondly, I'm sure at least a couple of you will remember this quote from back in 2006:

Originally Posted by Katsuya Eguch

With regard to the controller, basically it could become potentially your axe, your shovel and your fishing rod. You can imagine what can happen there. Again, we don't know if this will happen for sure because it's kind of a trial and error process.

However, it seems that (unless the demo was really limited), the Wii Remote being used for tools isn't going to happen. I'm not too broken up about it, and, in actuality, considering the controls of the game and the viewpoint its from, I think it would work out better this way.

Originally Posted by Mark Bozon

One of the oddest moves so far though -- and one we're curious to see evolve as development continues, if at all -- is the lack of any motion control. For good or for bad, ... there's no swing motions for chopping trees, no fishing motion control for setting the hook or casting the lure, and no swipe actions for catching bugs or digging with the shovel. Instead, it's all classic button control, which does make it more about the sim action, and less about knowing what motions you need to know.

Another slightly disappointing, but not really unexpected piece of data:

Originally Posted by Mark Bozon

As another quick note, the maps again are generated randomly, though they're the same size as previous games. You can select from one of four houses when you move in though, each being positioned around various regions of town, but you won't see a larger world than previous Animal Crossing games.

Of course this makes me wonder how long this guy played it for. Did he really have enough time start up his own city, and even so, why would he, if he had time enough to check out all of the features?

As a last note, the control scheme does sound interesting with its two-pronged approach, though realistically I think I'll mostly just end up using the the Wiimote with the Nunchuck attached:

Originally Posted by Mark Bozon

Control was limited to the Wii-mote-only for our demo, but we did confirm that the nunchuk controller can be plugged in for a more traditional experience. ... IR movement wasn't exactly the best feeling control scheme on Wii. Point to have the player walk in any direction, and point farther away to have them walk faster. When holding B, your player will run, and between those two buttons everything can be done with little effort, but also less overall precision. Walking up to talk with computer players or interact with objects is a bit finicky...

I don't think we've seen enough of the game to judge how much content it has. Can you really get an idea of its scale from playing it for a few minutes? This game's supposed to last a while. Also:

Originally Posted by Mark Bozon

As another quick note, the maps again are generated randomly, though they're the same size as previous games. You can select from one of four houses when you move in though, each being positioned around various regions of town, but you won't see a larger world than previous Animal Crossing games.

He doesn't specify which game. Wild World's towns were significantly smaller than DnM's (or ACGC, whichever) towns.
As long as it's at least as big as the first game's towns, I don't mind. WW's were too small.