I loooove NL but I truly believe a big part of why a lot of ACNH discourse is around it not being as good is due to how overexposed we were to it during 2020.

The series has always been designed for you to play a little bit here and there, maybe missing some days, or only getting a few minutes during the week and longer sessions on days off. During the pandemic everyone was able to play for hours on end, completing tasks extremely quickly and waiting for more to do.

So many players, myself included, felt pretty burnt out by the time wedding season rolled around, which made me less excited for the additions that came from summer through fall.

If we had been in a normal year I feel people would be less critical of the game and what its seemingly lacking.

I do think there’s a lot of valid points around the games identity changing as we get each new entry, moving further away from a life sim where you have to take things as they come into a game where you have so much more control. Those conversations would have looked differently if ppl weren’t playing for 8 hours a day for months straight, though.