Wednesday, May 5, 2021: May Play

It's been a while, but this evening I finally got to return to this game - I played it for much longer than I was expecting! Isabelle let me know about the new May Day maze. I got a nice letter about springtime (maybe just because I watched a video on the topic and am listening to the Skyward Sword soundtrack, but thinking of exploring the forest like Link in the Zelda series...!) from Mom, and an alola-themed carrying case (for the Nintendo Switch) from redeeming Nook Miles on the Nintendo Switch Online app on my phone.

I had to start speaking to villagers at some point! They weren't too upset at my absence (maybe Sylvana...) I don't think. The world of Animal Crossing goes ever on, even when I'm busy in real-life!

Diana said she was thinking about moving. I wanted to keep her on for a while - I haven't really gotten to know her well enough yet. There were also plenty of weeds to pick around the island.

I got the final milestone for accessing fossils today. I also ordered my real-life mom's character a mug from the special items. I had seen Isabelle's Tweet on that. :P

There are a lot more bugs starting to appear, especially on these tree stumps where I always keep my money trees.

Sable too noticed the change in season. I'm getting excited to try and build something summery with tropical vibes for another potential party with a bunch of friends to celebrate.

Speaking of, at the Able Sister's, they had a graduation gown for sale! I ordered it as said party could be combined into a graduation celebration for me. Also, I couldn't resist picking up this cat nose. Not sure what I'll do with it yet, but cats are my favorite animal, and I was thinking of Cat Mario, so...

Finally, I noticed Diana reading by my sumo ring, before I headed off to do this year's May Day maze!

Wow, this year's maze was much harder than last year! Typical of Nintendo level design, they seemed to have a theme going with it. (I don't really remember much of the one last year - maybe they will cycle through these mazes in the future?) The concept for this one seemed to be on preserving your power to dig up trees and break rocks, and doing everything with the correct order of operations.

The goal of the maze was not to get out, but to build a ladder to climb up to where Rover the cat was. (Another cat! Meow.) They hid all the required wood you need to build it, but it took me several tries and Rescue Service calls to reset the maze to work out the correct way to use your limited amount of peaches effectively.

I think here is when I'd finally made progress enough to climb up and solve the maze. Rover told me he'd write me a letter; I wonder what my prize is! Because I had extra points left over at the end, I explored the maze a bit further to pick up the secrets, so I 100% cleared the maze. As I said last year, very much like a Zelda dungeon! Just without enemies or keys... Really well-designed, too. Wilbur was quite impressed with my success.

After that adventure, I took a little break and returned to the game a bit later. Sherb wanted me to come up with a greeting for him, but he had an interesting way of introducing me to his idea - I had no idea where was going with it until he clarified.

I decided to get started on some small island decorating things - still don't have any massive plans, although I am a bit inspired to try and make a Zelda maze like Nintendo did. I build a track to race around on my "mini-game plateau," for starters. I used my shovel to count out squares to space out the street-lamps.

Diana was telling me about a rumor of why she moved to the island. Animal Crossing has always been a wonderful escape from life.

I also saw the inside of Bam's house for the first time. As expected, it's quite sporty.

Randomly, I spoke with Sylvana, and she told me I made her forget her worries. I also liked her idea of setting recipes to music. Hmm, maybe I'll give that a go actually!

I decided to go and visit the updated Nintendo dream island, as I'd read they made changes. Here, I'm just showing I moved the Switch case to the table at the foot of my bed, which made way more sense than plopping it on the floor...

I liked the Isabelle standee with the Tom Nook flag on the town hall right at the entrance. I've been here enough times to remember the general layout. They had these fossil umbrellas outside the museum, which they may had shown during the reveal trailer for the customization update...?

They placed some of the Sanrio items on their beach, as well as in the house (I liked the doorplate, reminding me of the original Animal Crossing). I know my friend Caitlin has access to them on her island, and said I'm welcome to take anything I want the next time I go visit - I don't think I've been since she first got the game several months ago!

I just thought it was interesting to see a rock that I couldn't stand on stuck out from the ocean. I also briefly went to the Pace Haven maze island I was exploring on Toy Day Eve, and noticed when I instinctively pressed minus, there was an option to wake up from wherever you were - how convenient!

I was playing for a while late tonight, running around aimlessly as well as getting multiple balloon presents and villager pings. I thought Bam's dialogue was appropriate for the eggshell he gave me, saying I could boil it. Well, not sure about that, but...

Here's where the weeds kept piling up, in the back where the camera usually doesn't pan to show. Also, I was playing on the TV, and my family were chatting about the vastness of the universe and the stars, and I kept looking up at the night sky in Animal Crossing.

Above, you can see some of the sand path I put by the beach to lead to the entrance of the minigame plateau. I also made a couple of streets, reviving the one leading from the airport to the bridges, and added one going through where the zen rock garden used to be to connect to the shops from the east side of the island. Finally, I could've sworn this pier went further out... I was trying to look back through my live-streams to see if I had any footage of it, but I'm not sure.

Anywho! There's my big return to the world of Animal Crossing. Again, we'll see how things go, but I might start opting for blog posts when I have longer play-sessions, and when I just log in for a brief moment and nothing exciting happens I'll skip. I think what's made this game last for so much longer than the others in the series for me is the fact I've taken lots of breaks from it. That doesn't mean I enjoy it any less, but it's nice to step away and know the world will always be there whenever I return - as the original box says:

See you next time! Never Stop Crossing! :)