Everyday this last week I’ve been waking up and tending to the chores of life; watering some plants, gathering resources, chatting to neighbours. Then I get out of bed… I’ve been playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons for almost an hour… again.
The reason my mornings have been like this is because Animal Crossing: New Horizons has a lot of pleasant chores and tasks that you can do. I, like many other players, have been enjoying the deserted island getaway package and slowly making progression in my life-away-from-life. However just like with real life, there’s a lot I didn’t know, a lot left ambiguous. Even though the game has very little in the way of consequences – minus being stung by wasps – there’s a lot left up to the players understanding and experimentation.
So today I’m going to break down just how you can get the most out of your time in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, so you can get back to the important stuff, like getting K. K. Slider to visit.
Accomplish things Quickly
During your first week or so on your new island, what you’ll want is for Tom Nook to say that you’ve done enough once a day. In the Resident Services tent you’ll find him just milling about. Everyday he’ll give you a new task to do. So all you need to do is complete said task, and then the next day he’ll give you another.
This goes on until the Resident Services tent becomes a building. A lot of the games early progression and items are locked behind this system. So just keep completing his tasks to gain equipment and expand your island. Do all you can each day for this to go as fast as possible and for you to make the most amount of progress. Try not to leave anything forgotten, or you could be waiting a lot longer to get going in the game.
Inventory Upgrades and Tool Ring
So you’re in the Resident Services tent, there’s another thing you can do. Throughout Animal Crossing: New Horizons you’ll be awarded the new ‘Nook Miles’ for doing almost anything, make sure you don’t spend these frivolously as there are a few almost essential upgrades available.
Go to the corner of the tent and use the ABD machine, the games version of an ATM, you can’t miss it. Select ‘redeem nook miles’ and if/when you see the items ‘Tool Ring: It’s Essential” and “Pocket Organisation Guide” buy them. It’ll cost you a total of 5,800 Nook Miles, but trust me, it’s worth it.
These items allow for 10 extra inventory spaces, and the equivalent of a weapon wheel for all your tools. Both of which come in incredibly useful for the farming of crafting tools and getting around your island with pace.
On top of that when Resident Services becomes a building you’ll be able to spend 8,000 Bells on ‘Ultimate Pocket Stuffing’ – where you’ll get another 10 inventory spaces. So keep that in mind.
Plant Money Trees
Bells, Animal Crossing: New Horizons money equivalent, are used for a lot of things. Buying from Timmy and Tommy, buying from the ABD machine, and most importantly paying off loans. These loans become exponentially more expensive, so you’ll want to be saving that money! But don’t worry, not only is there 0% interest, but there’s a great way to make extra cash too.
You can sell ‘hot items of the day’ to the two T’s for some bells, but on some days what you need to get those items can be as equally expensive.
So on you morning rounds of your island make sure to look out for a little golden light coming out of the ground.
You’ll only get one of these a day, so make sure you get this next bit right. Dig up the light with your trusty shovel.
Wow! You’ve been given 1,000 Bells! Now don’t get too excited. You’ll see that the hole is now filled with this light, plant up to 10,00 Bells. No more, but less if that’s all you’ve got. If you plant more odds are you’ll be getting diminishing returns because up to now players have seen that 10,000 Bells is the max yield.
There will now be a sapling (even though you planted a bag of money), wait a few days until the tree is fully grown and there are three bags of money, shake them down. They should all be the same value of what you buried, meaning you’ve tripled your investment.
If you find each glowing spot from each day you should be netting 20,000 Bells a day. On top of any turnip profits of course!
Getting more House Storage
This ones pretty quick and simple to explain, but may take a while. So you keep storing stuff at your home and you’ve come across the fact that your storage, in atypical video game fashion, isn’t infinite. All you need to do is make sure that you upgrade your house size by talking to Tom Nook and you’ll get more of it.
Just remember what I said before. The cost keeps going up. Time to make some Bells!
Getting rid of Villagers
Honestly it’s nothing new to hate your neighbours, and in Animal Crossing: New Horizons you can kick them off your island without committing a single crime… living the dream!
I absolutely despise the gym rat that is Coach. Just saying his name makes my blood BOIL! Don’t worry though, he’s easy to get rid of.
There are two ways to do this. First, just shun ’em. Don’t talk to them at all. Eventually you’ll see them wandering about all sad with a cloud over their head. Don’t fall for it. Go over and talk to them, and convince them to leave! What do you know? They’ll actually leave. Secondly you can do what any good neighbour would do, complain about them. Talk to Isabelle at Resident Services (when it’s a building) and eventually they’ll just… leave.
Simple as.
The Valuable Resources – and How to Get Them
Crafting is new to Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and you’ll need to a whole lot of it for equipment and furniture. So what are the best resources to have and how do you get shed loads of them?
So mainly you’ll need the three types of wood, stone, clay, and iron ore. Luckily these come from two places. Trees and rocks.
When farming trees be sure to use a stone/flimsy axe, unless you want to chop a tree down and dig it up to be rid of it. As these forms of axe’s just give you three drops of the three types of wood. Every tree drops three at random and does so once a day. So keep those trees around or create your own orchard by planting saplings.
For clay, stone and iron ore you’ll need a shovel and a rock. You’ll only have a handful of rocks on your island. Go up to them and hit them ad nauseam until they stop dropping resources. It’s worth note here that again what you get is random (you could even got gold ore that sells at a high price) and if you stop for too long the drops also stop. So make sure you hit the rock as many times in a row.
To do this you can create holes behind you, but I’ve found you can save all that trouble simply by standing under the rock and constantly moving forward. It ensures you’ll never miss, and you don’t have to keep trying to get those holes in the right place.
If you run out of trees and rocks to whack in a day don’t fret. Just buy a ‘Nook Miles Ticket’ from the ABD machine and go to Dodo Airlines, and book a flight using it and you’ll find yourself on a smaller island. What do you know, there’s loads of rocks and trees! These tickets only cost 2,000 Nook Miles and you can use as many in a day as you’d like. So get those flights in.
Talk to Your Villagers
Of course this next one only applies to villagers you like.
If you talk to your villagers, especially when they actively approach you, they can actually be quite surprising. If you’ve been stung by a wasp one might give you medicine. Sometimes they just decide they like you and want to give you a gift. What’s not to love, free stuff!
Sometimes you’ll even be given the option to give them something. Don’t worry though, you won’t be out of pocket, as the villagers will give you Bells in return.
Social interactions never felt so rewarding.
Have a Morning Routine
In real life no-one wants to get up in the morning, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the exception. When you start each day there are a plethora of things you’ll want to accomplish before you start your in game day.
Make sure to water any flowers you’ve planted, that is unless it’s raining. You’ll know when you have as each flower will be glistening in the sun. This allows them to actually grow and fully flower.
As you make your way around the island you can then get wood from trees, sell some stuff, and bash rocks for resources. Essentially if you make an effort to do a scan of your entire island you’ll find new daily events and even those globing holes to plant money trees.
Everyone’s in game routine when they start a day will be slightly different. But if you stick to it as best you can you’ll start to see improvement over time… just like real life!
Be a Creep
Once everyone’s favourite resident Blathers has moved in to the museum, you’ll be able to give him any new bugs, fish, and fossils you find. You may have noticed that catching bugs can be quite challenging. There’s a way around this the game doesn’t tell you about.
All you’ve got to do is hold A, that’s it. Then you’ll do a very slow sneak, and as soon as you let go of A you swing your net. Bugs won’t run away when you do this making them miles easier to catch. Although the same can’t be said for Tarantulas.
Pay your Debts
This one goes for real life too by the way. In Animal Crossing: New Horizons every time you upgrade your house Tom Nook gives you a debt. You might think you can sit idly by and nothing will happen. And you’d be right… literally nothing will happen. When you pay off a debt the more you can upgrade your home.
Then you can get more storage space and finally find a place to store all those Wii U amiibo you bought! Good on you!
So that’s our guide to the things Animal Crossing: New Horizons doesn’t tell you. Did we miss anything? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter @thecognetwork. And as always, thanks for reading COG!
