Sunday 17 Sep 2006

When you decide to settle down in Red Hill Town you will be welcomed into a community of furry, fun animals. You will meet Tom Nook, the owner of the only shop, the town mayor (who happens to be a tortoise) and many more weird and wonderful animals. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Animal Crossing is a delightful game which will appeal to people of all ages, from 3 to 93. Once you have settled into your new home you will need to start earning Bells, that’s money to those not yet familiar with Red Hill Town lingo. Tom Nook will give you a job at his shop and the tasks which he assigns to you will basically teach you the fundamentals of how to actually play the game.

You will learn how to use the map to navigate your way around town, and will use this knowledge to help you to introduce yourself to the town residents. Next you will learn how to post messages on the bulletin board outside the city hall and how to send letters. Tom Nook holds the mortgage on your house, so you will learn the various ways in which you can earn money to pay him off so you can remodel and…buy a bigger house of course! You can collect pears or shells and sell them to Tom Nook or deliver letters for various townsfolk. Of course, there is another way of collecting Bells because in Red Hill Town money really does grow on trees! You can shake the trees and sometimes you might just be lucky enough to secure a bundle of 100 Bells, but beware because you could also secure yourself some nasty bumps on the face if a bee hive falls down and you get stung!

Read the bulletin board to find out about the many going-ons in town. Let me give you an example, this past week there was a fireworks display on Saturday night, on Sunday all residents were invited to “get buggy with it” at the Bug-Off, where the person who caught the biggest bug won a trophy, and on Monday I attended the birthday party of one of the residents. Between excavating fossils, creating a town tune, finding a four leaf clover, planting flowers, pulling out weeds, collecting shells on the beach and designing your house to be rated by the Happy Room Academy there is never a dull moment!

The graphics in the game are amazing – from leaving footprints in the wet sand when you walk on the beach to designing your own constellation in the sky, the planning that has gone into this game is remarkable. The sound is also very well done, you can hear the waves lapping, the bees buzzing and the fireworks exploding in the sky. What makes it even more remarkable is the multiplayer support which the game displays. The WiFi functionality allows as many as four players to play together in the same village. If you want someone to visit from another town you can ask the guards to open the gate and they will let you friends in to visit.

This game will keep you entertained not just for mere hours, or even weeks, but for months and possibly even years! You will find yourself wanting to pop into Red Hill just to see what is on the go, to catch up with the latest gossip or to check that the weeds have not taken over.

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Contributor:	Lisa

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