Many of the new features to the game were unfortunately not on demo during the summit. The game was recently reset, so while I could move my character through the slightly hilly landscape with the Wii Remote, I was unable to purchase a fishing pole for my character, and couldn’t test the gesture controls for catching fish by flicking the remote. The remote did make interacting with animals and objects more intuative: you point and click on them to trigger an action. Otherwise, there didn’t seem to be much specialized use.

The additional customizability of your character is a nice feature. The front, back, and sleeves of outfits can be altered separately. Shoes can be made to match or clash. You can even go to the stylist to get a makeover and replace your character’s head and hairdo with that of a Mii. These additions seem perfect for expressing holiday spirit. You can literally visit your friends’ towns as a Halloween trick-or-treater donning a Darth Vader costume. However, there is still the limit of 4 friends, including yourself, in a town at a given time.

For excited Animal Crossing gamers ready to become city folk, your collected items in the catalog and clothes transfer over from the DS version. However, your money (bells) does not.

I was hoping to see demonstrations of the chat feature, which enables you to talk to your friends over the Wi-Fi Connection, as well as a visit to the theater, where the characters learn emotions. Since those were unavailable, the game seemed strikingly similar to the others in the series.

From the title, I expected more city bustle from this version. The landscape sure didn’t reflect that of a city. In terms of game play, I expected something more like the Sims with more social interactions and urban life. Naturally, I was rather disappointed to interact with so few animals while wondering through the Animal Crossing city. The low cap on the number of friends allowed to visit simultaneously was also dissatisfying.