I bought the original Animal Crossing for the GameCube a couple of years ago for one of the kids as a gift. While they would play it every so often, there didn’t seem like much was going on in the game. This past summer, I finally sat down, created my own character and played it. And then…I got hooked. Just like Mario Bros. and Zelda in the past, another Nintendo game had me coming back every day to check on my town, buy and sell items, and improve my house. With the DS, there are changes and improvements to the original Animal Crossing, but it is still basically the same game. It’s familiar enough, but has some new features that make it a better game in some respects.

When you begin the game with a new character, you now arrive by cab, instead of by train. The questions you answer in the cab determine what you look like, and how your town is laid out, when your town and character are set up.

For your house, you no longer get a basement as an upgrade, but you get three rooms off of your main room. (I have a music room, a kitchen and a game room.) They cost a lot, but I planted enough fruit trees to get almost 300,000 bells with each crop (which grows every four days). Like the original AC, native fruit (mine were oranges) are 100 bells, where foreign fruit (even coconuts) get you 500 bells from Nook. You get a total of six house expansions: your main room is enlarged twice, then a second story added, and three additional wings on your main floor. It’s neat to be able to create five different themed rooms in your house!

The only drawback to the new house is that if you play with more than one player, you all share the same house–the attic is a bedroom, where you start and end your daily adventure (it’s basically the “save” screen). Better yet, if you want to end the game anywhere, you just hit the start button and save. No trekking across your entire landscape if you want to save.

Copper and Booker now are stationed at the town gate. Booker still handles the lost and found, and Copper now handles the wireless communications. You can play with someone else within range from DS to DS, or you can choose the Nintendo Wi-Fi connection to either invite friends over to your town (aka opening the gates), or you can go out to other towns. Your individual DS and AC:WW game card generate a unique friend code that you give to others, and they have to put you on your roster before you can visit their town. (This is so no random person can come in and wreak havoc.)

The museum is about the same. It now has an observatory on the top floor, where you can create your own constellations (which are visible when you are outdoors…and even the phases of the moon are accurate to our own real-world time). In the basement is Brewster the pigeon, who runs the coffee shop. He doesn’t talk much until you’ve enjoyed his coffee brews several times. The coffee shop is also now home to K.K. Slider on Saturday nights. You can let him play a random tune for you, but if you know the song titles, and can type them in exactly, he will play your requests. We got a kick out of his rendition of “K.K. Rockabilly”!

Tom Nook is still the same shopkeeper he’s always been. He and the nephews run the biggest store, Nookington’s, but you can only get this store after someone has visited your town via wireless. You buy all your clothing from the Able Sisters now, and you now have a choice of hats and accessories in addition to shirts. I recently bought a King Tut Wig for 12,000 bells, and a couple of weeks ago, I bought a halo and a (hehehe) pacifier. Believe it or not, I saw a Royal Crown that sold for a paltry 1,200,000 bells. I also have a Big Bro Shirt, Hat and Mustache. (Think “Mario Brothers” here…the shirt and hat are red with a large “M” on them.) You typically get different hats, sunglasses, and helmets to wear with your clothing, and you can get complete sets over time (like the Mario “Big Bro” set).

When you get Nookington’s, you also gain a little beauty shop in the back of the store called Shampoodle, run by a poodle named Harriet. (Hair-iet…get it? ) You pay 3,000 bells to get a new “do”, and the look of your “do” is based on how you answer questions. Some of the results are hilarious. I had blue spiked hair for awhile.

With the good comes the bad. There’s now an insurance agent, Lyle, who sells two kinds of insurance. Crazy Redd seems to be in cahoots with him. There’s a doctor (psychiatrist) who shows up randomly called Doctor Shrunk–supposedly you can get different “emotions” from him if you let him give you an evaluation. (Emotions can be used during two-way chat between other players on your wireless connection.) Katrina the palm reader also makes an appearance. There is also a “mysterious cat” which is named Blanca. She has no face…but, if you play in WiFi mode, you will see her with a random face from thousands around the country…and you get to design her a new face with the drawing tools if you wish.

You’re not running errands as much for other citizens in this game, but you can gain valuable items if you send mail to all your fellow citizens with presents attached, and they’ll send you something back most of the time.

The interface with the DS beats the GameCube handily. It’s much easier to drag items from your “pockets” into, say, the “sell” screen at Nook’s. And now, when you buy something like a refrigerator, wardrobe, closet, etc., this is like a portal to where you can store up to 90 items, which is far better than the original AC.

The view is also different. The original AC has sort of a top-down view to it. The AC:WW kind of “rolls”, almost like the curvature of the earth, so you see more of a front view of everything. You still get the seasons, and like I mentioned before, the moon phases are accurate to our actual calendar in the real world.

The mail’s about the same, but easier to manage with the touchscreen. If you use the Wi-Fi, Nintendo will actually mail you items. For the house, I got an Arwing (from Starfox) and the Master Sword. On Dec. 1, I got a pom-pom hat from Nintendo. It goes with the winter sweater I bought from Mable a day earlier.

As mentioned earlier, you can invite others to your town, or go out and visit other towns, via the wireless connection built into the DS. Using your own wireless internet router, or a Nintendo USB port networking adapter, you can actually connect to Nintendo’s gaming server and play with anyone around the world. Thankfully, there is a two-way “friend code” that ensures only someone you know will visit your town.

This is a great addition to Nintendo’s roster of DS titles! Highly recommended.