Why I'm Terrified of Animal Crossing | Psych of Play

there are a couple of questions that keep me up at night how come we're always out of salsa who designed the ghost and Paper Mario to have such gigantic hair why do four of my last five videos all start with the word how as a penguin ever looked at a man in a suit and thought my god I didn't know they made us that big and most importantly I wonder what would happen if I ever played animal crossing because to be very crystal clear with you I never have and I'm terrified to pick up this game for a cascade of reasons for one it has an insanely dedicated following of folks that like it's and shouldn't like seriously when I say trailers for this game I feel like the target audience would be kids due to the charm and cute art style or older generations the farmville demographic who enjoyed quiet things like gardening and decorating and passive-aggressive homeowners association disputes which to me is a far reach from my demographic who typically enjoys the more action-heavy in-your-face gonna slap you a 20 megatons of adventure per second JRPG FPS MMO GTFO skyrim on your dishwasher core gamers category uh Nintendo comm leave an angry comment on an IGN review played dark souls blindfolded because fear is just a state of mind and a game that you beat your tents on rack but realistically this is just me being short-sighted because I know so many people my age that are ready to dive headfirst into a very wholesome debt with mcfar go just to keep up with the Joneses and because there are so many people like me that do love Animal Crossing I'm afraid that if I try it I will also love it and never look back now don't get me wrong time you enjoyed wasting is not wasted there are games I've happily picked up as essentially a part-time job like I'm 200 hours and about 60 PB and J's into firing three houses right now and still going strong but the idea of playing Animal Crossing specifically is terrifying to me because I know of a little something called the maximization paradox which I'll explain low materially though I will say since I've never actually played Animal Crossing before my concern is based entirely off of what I've seen from random Let's Plays trailers and small talk amongst the squad so to put my worries to the test and see if Animal Crossing is truly the endless spiral of despair I think it is I invited on two of my dearest friends Jack and Shane who have been seasoned Animal Crossing aficionados since the days of the melee machine to answer my burning questions about how Animal Crossing works hopefully quell my fears about it and maybe just maybe convince me to give it a try or at least get me to stop having tea parties let me paint a picture for you it's a Friday night in summer of 2004 your dad bust down the door of your room he's hype he just got off work it's the weekend and he says hey sport get your Healy's on we're going to blockbuster you can pick three movies but you're an ungrateful little dick dick and you've got specifics and you say but Dad I want to game instead he says are I fine the games are more expensive to rent so you got to pick just one filled with the disappointment of your dog when you don't actually throw the ball you reluctantly agree and run your little entitled ass to the video game section you start scoping out some games you might try the new Madden Prince of Persia is catching your eye your buddy Ted won't shut up about Knights of the Old Republic you already have Tony Hawk on the ground at the house but the disc is scuffed and you could swap it out with a blockbuster copy oh and they have Paper Mario in stock they never have that in stock there's a ton of great options and before you know it you're begging your dad to let you pick two or three because it's way too hard to pick just one analysis paralysis is real and we've all felt it especially in games character customization screens check weapon choices and Bastion check skill trees and salt and sanctuary check strategies and a chess match check mate I won't beat a dead horse here because a ton of great channels have already covered analysis paralysis but essentially too many options for players can be super overwhelming and may lead to either not making a decision or optimizing the fun out of a game with a ton of options we often get bogged down in that choice because we really want to make a solid decision but the more alternatives the more taxing a calculation for our sweet little noggins you may already be familiar with that idea if you've seen this extra credits video but what you may not know that how you handle analysis paralysis is greatly affected by the type of person you are because there are two types of people in this world maximizers and satisficers yes satisfice is a real word when you think maximizer think the Amy Santiago is the Jane V&O Eva's these Sheldon Cooper's these folks are so concerned with making the best decision that they exhaustively investigate every option available until they can safely arrive at the optimal course of action [Music] if you're a Maximizer who knew ahead of time that you'd be going to Blockbuster you might spend some of the week making a list of potential picks for when you go in on Friday set up some pros and cons of each title pick some alternatives in case they were out of stock etc etc satisficers on the other hand are the Nick Miller's the Drake Parker's the Shawn Spencer's they're going to see the variety of options and probably pick the first one that satisfies what they're looking for if it's not the best that's fine it'll still get the job done in his book the paradox of choice psychologist Barry Schwartz points out that only around 10 percent of the population is truly a Maximizer and every decision that they make more than likely most of us are some combination of the two which is why if you take a Maximizer slash satisfies your quiz online to see which you are you'll probably be somewhere in the middle you may be a Maximizer when it comes to decisions that are important to you like what you want to major in but a satisficer when deciding on a brand of toilet paper or you know maybe you see all the way around for you I get it you've got have got to preserve your tush but if there is a decision that you'd process with your quote-unquote Maximizer orientation it is possible that you will fall victim to the maximization paradox the term maximization paradox was coined in a 2009 study where a group of psychologists found that because maximizers are motivated to make the absolute best choice possible they'd be much more willing to spend resources be at time or money to have access to a larger array of options than satisficers in their study maximizers would consistently drive further spending extra time and gas for more ice cream flavor options or even basic cleaning supply options they'd even fill out extra paperwork to have a larger chocolate assortment to choose from the Maximizer rationale for this seemed to be that more options would provide a better decision and therefore a happier outcome of course the cruel truth from this study is that the maximizers who sacrificed to attain more options were ultimately less satisfied with their choice when compared to satisficers and even other maximizers who simply went with the smaller selection for maximizers it's pretty clear that in reality more choice equals rut row raggy and less choice equals root badoo badoo did I seriously write this that I seriously write back however what I find disturbing is this illusion that more choices will make you happier despite to real evidence to the contrary and this is what has me in a cold sweat to take out a mortgage with raccoon uncle Pennybags and his kids because Animal Crossing buries you in options now I hear what you're saying Darrell a ton of games give you loads of options and I've never heard you gripe about this before games like Red Dead Horizon Zelda and The Witcher have hundreds of hours of content to be discovered but it's not a problem name me a solid RPG or roguelike that doesn't give you a lot of strategic and aesthetic personalization and you're right typically this is fine but you see the key difference with these games is that most options are a means to an end at least in my eyes you do the side quests in The Witcher to get more crowns or crafting opponents to progress towards beating the game you take down the shrines and breadth of the wild to get stronger which gets you into more hostile areas and eventually into hyrule castle and sure there may be other reasons you do anything in these games but your true ultimate goal is to eventually be good enough to go beat the game even if you're a true Maximizer and aside to 100% horizon for every weapon and side quest at some point you will hit that limits and can no longer reveal more options Animal Crossing however doesn't exactly end from what I'm told plus all of the clothes accessories house designs personalization crafting possibilities and apparently landscaping doesn't progress you to some final goal or finish line defined by the game there seems to be no massive utility and an adorable new sweater most of these options are simply a matter of taste and this is scary to me because I am a Maximizer when it comes to taste not so much utility seriously just ask my wife well you're shopping for a new vacuum for example I'm not picky she can't even get me to give a good opinion and then this one is specifically made to clean up pet hair and they're all within $30 of each other like we just I don't know we need all of them I guess what do you think but if we go clothes shopping for me well we don't because I just want to check every store and every website for just the right sweatpants and as the study suggests I'm never truly satisfied with what I get same thing goes for restaurant menus unless I'm starving and the same goes for games I'm not going to over thank my weapons or materials on a game because I'm not a Maximizer for that this really just a means to an end for me I won't spend too much time on my build and Fire Emblem because really I'm just trying to make the squad good enough to progress the story and make the game fun I refuse to optimize the enjoyment out of it unless Ingrid dies in which case is resetti sphaghetti but I feel like if I picked up Animal Crossing I'd be consistently trying to unlock new stuff before I committed to spending money on anything I'd spend so much time trying to access more customization options under the illusion that more options will make my final decisions the best ones despite the fact that no matter what I pick I'll ultimately be disappointed that I missed out on another choice or I'll reveal so many options that it'll be like blockbuster all over again do I want the blue hats or the red one I don't want to spend money on both if I only use one ah meanwhile I will have spent a crazy amount of time getting to this point and not feel like it's been well spent and since the game never ends or defines a win I'll just keep repeating the process not really feeling satisfied and oh my god just hate me vacuum shopping you're not really alright I can feel your anger in the comments section already it's time to get the boys on the line and put my fears to the test will Animal Crossing actually send me into a maddening spiral of despair and disappointment or is it designed to keep that from happening one of the first things I asked Jack and Shane about was how committed I have to be to items and materials i buy in-game and how many there are available if there are too many options upfront and I have to pick just a handful those maximizer tendencies are gonna kick in holding out for more variety so the game just really truly rewards you for like playing it at all times okay [Music] so the ability to sell and archive items is nice because it keeps me from having to pick just one thing I can buy it try it out and then sell it back if I change my mind on it without losing it forever and the shops limiting the items available every day really makes it tough for me to hold out and Mack summize my options because unless I act now who knows and I'll see it again I think they're even going to double down on this and new horizons with these merchants that will drop by occasionally and sell special items you can't find elsewhere placing limits are forcing the player to make a decision without all of the info is a great way to persuade folks to just play Fire Emblem and into the breach for example will tell you how your opponent will move next turn but no further debt sales forces you to spin the sells you earn on new power-ups before you can move on to the next biome so holding up for more options ain't happening another great way games can keep you moving along is by rewarding your decision to make a decision from the direct it looks like there's this mileage program that will reward you for basic actions and purchases throughout the game and in previous animal Crossing's apparently this was done in the form of shops rewarding you for buying their items so when you say hit the money limit like you you spend a certain amount of money and then like the shop upgrades hearing this made me feel so much better because suddenly renting a game now means more games will be available next time purchasing items has a dual purpose one is that you increase your selection for later which maximizes your options and two they get you an item now without you having to make an overly tough decision it breaks the paradox because you don't have to pick just one just like stage components and mario maker you're encouraged to explore all the nuggets the game has to offer and rewarded by all the new possibilities picking just one or two things would be a disservice to what the game wants to do of course realistically there will be a bit of grey to make sure that I can get all the clothes and furniture I wants but apparently between the music and the ambience even grinding in these games is super relaxing and therapeutic and satisfying yeah I bet it is a journey like you look up one day and you just have a bunch of stuff but why am I still in the game I already kind of want it my friends I'll conclude by answering some questions where Jack and Shane able to quell my fears about animal crossing yes the entire series does offer a ton of options and customization and you can certainly maximize these options obsessively but the game rewards you for doing so along the way you get more ice cream options by buying ice cream and this removes the feeling of missing now that drives the maximization paradox do I think Animal Crossing is just for other demographics absolutely not it's clear that this is a tremendously wholesome experience that does a lot of good for a lot of people dude even the soundtrack makes me feel cherished and all warm and snuggly this song sounds like a hug Animal Crossing is certainly something I could see myself enjoying and I've got to say all my fears have melted away so will I be buying new horizons no I'm just oh playing Fire Emblem [Music]

Channel: Daryl Talks Games

Views: 662,663

Rating: 4.9166112 out of 5

Keywords: Daryl Talks Games, psych of play, video essay, video game essay, video game psychology, Psychology of Gaming, Animal Crossing, animal crossing new horizons review, animal crossing new horizons, animal crossing mental health, animal crossing video essay, video essay animal crossing, why you should play animal crossing, should I play animal crossing, choice paralysis, analysis paralysis, extra credits, maximization paradox, maximizer vs satisficer, maximizer vs satisficer test

Id: ffN6BP9Wq5c

Length: 17min 1sec (1021 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 21 2020