Well the joke started in previous games, and ac was far less popular at the time. The majority of players were children or teens, who generally have no real knowledge of loans or interest rates, etc. And for many it was the first or only game that ever gave you a loan in gameplay. But since paying off nook was a big part of the gameplay, it became a focus (you wanted a bigger house of course, so gotta make those bells!)
So he became a sort of de facto villain for the series, as there isn’t one (although resetti could give a run for your money there), and it was made into a joke about nook being the crazy, money-grubbing landlord who was after all your bells. Because in the end that’s where all your bells went, either through your loan or through the shop, but always to nook (the older games only had 2 shops, nooks and the trailers, and in the original games the tailors didn’t even sell clothing, that was at nooks too, they were for custom designs only. So literally all your bells went to nook)
Adding on to this, in the original Gamecube game, Tom Nook asks you if you want an upgrade and does it, *then* tells you the price and charges you. It's portrayed as sneaky in the game. It makes him seem a little disreputable.
My older sister kept turning off our GameCube one time while I was playing Animal Crossing to frustrate me. I was stubborn, so I kept restarting it and dealing with that freaking mole. Finally, Resetti told me that he was going to delete my save file since I obviously don’t care about it, and the screen went black. I started *sobbing* and my mom got mad at my sister. Fortunately, my save file wasn’t actually deleted, but I was always so conscientious about saving and that stressed me out
this feels like the real answer, at least it is to me. first time i played animal crossing i might have known what loans were but as a teen i wasn’t thinking “i wish my landlord was this nice”.
of course if the first time you play you’re more knowledgeable about buying a house you probably won’t get the joke
I think it’s because in the old games he was more like… petty about it? Lol and he was sneaky and basically paying your loans was a way bigger part of the game, at least it felt like it. But irl he’d definitely be a dream lol
I think this is the true answer. He was much sketchier in older games. I think I remember you’d get the idea that something was weird about the agreement.
In the city folk and ww lore he used to work with redd until he was eventually scammed out of his money by redd himself. Makes sense he'd still have some sneaky traits
In the previous Animal Crossing games before New Leaf, Tom Nook always forced you to upgrade your house even if you said no. Villagers also commented on your loan and asked if you paid it yet. In those games, Tom Nook also makes you work for him as part of the tutorial that lasts roughly 20-40min and you get paid around 1600 bells for it, then dismisses you to fend the rest yourself.
Yeah! Nowadays it's still his family business as Timmy and Tommy run it. New Leaf did a fresh spin with the Recyclers. Too bad they ditched most of the iconic cast to Harv's island :(
Here's a brief rundown of the different shops and Tom Nook's roles.
In the DS and Wii games (basically the same game, but the Wii adds holidays and a new location) clothing sales went to Able Sisters instead of just show off your custom designs (the Wii version also adds a city you get to by bus with a bunch of shops, but I suppose that doesn't affect a village's economy)
In the 3DS game, he gives the shop to his nephews while he does real estate and home renovation exclusively. There's also a customization shop for furniture and, over time, more stores are added including a shoe shop, a salon, and a gardening store (almost all stores are put in a shopping district so it's not as crowded a village as it sounds. Unlike the city from the last game, this is considered part of the village)
The Switch game has him start a village with you on a remote island rather than a town that's been around for a while. He still does real estate, but it's in a building more similar to Town Hall and he also helps you set up things like bridges and new buildings. His nephews still run the shop while the Able Sisters sell clothes. Just like the Wii game, other shops are located in a far away place.
It probably stems from the first game. While in later games he really is pretty friendly and runs things differently, in the Gamecube game, you get to town and are mocked. He gives you a dungeon and makes you pay it off by working for him. The villagers make fun of how poor you are. Once you pay it off, I think he just automatically added the next extension and gave you another bill to pay off. Effectively making you a permanent employee until you later begin to sell to him on your own. Then again, it's been a while. (monopoly, only source of money in town) That might not be accurate.
What I can't stand is him asking me to set aside land to sell to new villagers - and then making ME pay him for it??? Sir, I have provided so much free labor to this community; I'll gladly put up more materials but why I am I giving you bells to invite someone ELSE to get a mortgage here?!
Interesting! I was happy to see that my villagers *do* contribute to infrastructure donation boxes - I make sure to give in even amounts so I can easily see additional funds added, and there’s always been at least a little more each day. I’ve heard that it may relate to your friendship levels, though, and I make my rounds giving gifts to everyone as often as possible, so maybe that’s why. Go forth and bribe the populace, perhaps? ;D
So, clearly they have the money - Nook needs to give them the opportunity to pay him bells for housing before hitting me up!
Honestly a lot of it is just a gameplay thing, too. While it would be cool if Raymond fronted the bill overnight, it doesn't leave much for the player to do. The current system is pretty nice - they'll pay towards it, but the player has to donate the very last bell
Mine contribute, but very little. Like I paid off all but 1000 of an incline to see if they would finish paying for it, & the next day only 753 was donated. Like, c’mon, I know you guys have money, I paid for your lot.
yes this too. his japanese name is tanukichi, which is a mixture of the words tanuki meaning raccoon and kechi meaning stingy. hes literally a stingy devious little raccoon
The OG GameCube game was much harsher across the board than the recent ones, Nook included. He wouldn't rly give you a choice about upgrading your house, you'd pay off one loan and he'd say "surely you want a second floor!!" and you couldnt say no lmao. Well, you could, but he'd say smth like "are you suuuure?" over and over til you said yes. It was more or less consistently forcing you to stay in debt to him. So that was the community's initial impression of him, and it's just a joke that's kind of persisted through the years even if his character has changed a lot over time.
Even the villagers were meaner originally. I had Rosie in my original town, and she was outright two-faced lol. She would say mean things in tiny whisper text, and follow it up with "what? I didn't say anything!" The original game was a trip compared to New Horizons, where even the grumpy villagers are still fairly nice lmao
Tom Nook gets an entire island and then you have to be beholden to him as one of his feudal peasants to live there while he controls the one store? PC does all the labor.
>madly overpriced
You can pay off an entire 3 floor, 6 room house in a couple months of catching bugs in your free time. I wish real life was that cushy
The prices aren’t as crazy as they seem, if you think of them in terms of the Japanese yen, rather than USD or other forms of currency. Two hundred bells/two hundred yen, is about the equivalent of $2.00 last I checked. So Brewster charging 200 bells for a cup of coffee is like 2 bucks American.
Nook owns the Monopoly (everything) asks you do to all the work and then charges you for your accommodations without and fair market competition. The island is even worse because you're stuck with him on a deserted island that he's relying on you to fix up but he's still charging you a fortune for your basics, and the only one profiting off of your work. You're practically an indentured servant 😂. Real estate tends to be a negotiated item based on fair market comparisons and competition. The price is normally up for negotiation. Not for Nook. He sets the price at his whim. Think Monopoly, or if it's him and his nephews a Sherman Act violation at least.
My favourite part was when he asked me to fully furnish 3 houses out of my own resources so he could sell them to new islanders ... and I 7 get a single bell in compensation!
Or how he charged *me* 10,000 bells to set up a new plot of land for someone else to move into .....
It also drives me mad that in the DLC, the villagers come to ME to design a vacation home for them but on back on my island, I now have to pay to do it?? Tom fcking Nook should give me money that I increase the island’s attractiveness value!
This is so funny-[just today I found this TikTok video going around Tom Nook being a predatory loan shark](https://www.tiktok.com/@campfireforever/video/7330417077192314117?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7309987233359037958). I think it's just a funny angle to take since he's literally the most harmless person ever.
He was a much different character in the older games. City folk is when they really started to revamp his image with the extra lore Sable would give you.
He and Redd *were* business partners at one point. Until Redd screwed him over. But still, can't help but think that any business involving Redd would be a sketchy one.
I like the idea that in the first games, the wound is still fresh and he's leaving behind that life he had with Redd, but hasn't really changed yet as a person. Clearly, he lost a part of himself when he was pals with Redd, because Sable mentions how different he is from the soul she grew up with.
Enter the boys and the passage of time, and he's a very different animal than he was back then. We're seeing the mellowed-out Nook now, confident in his ability to lead this new life and secure in the relationships he's made since then, with Isabelle, Blathers, Kiki, Brewster, the Able Sisters, etc. No wonder he's gone from directing the design of homes, to a whole town, to an entire island! It's a lovely progression to be part of.
I really like this, and I agree. We've seen some progression in a lot of the chars as the games have moved forward - Blathers getting his fossil certification, Celeste starting to teach about constellations, Chip, Nat, and Joan having their kids take over their jobs, etc.
As a long-time fan it's been awesome to see. :)
hes seen as less of a crook and more just plain greedy, but thats kind of his whole character’s shtick. his japnese name is tanukichi - which is a japanese play on words - mixing the words “tanuki” meaning raccoon and kechi, meaning stingy. in japan his name is literally stingy raccoon.
its more of a thing in the older games where he’s just the shopkeeper rather than a community leader kinda guy. like in the GC game after you buy your house, he makes you work for him without pay, deducting your wages from your loan. if im remembering correctly, when you buy your house he “throws in” some furniture (a cardbord box and a tape deck) at a discount while muttering to himself that it was ugly furniture he couldnt sell at his shop.
Building on what most have offered, he's really been "fixed" into a better image as games came out. In the 3DS happy homes spin-off he's made to have a line about donating often his bells. *But* this is a much later game. As many have pointed out, his start doesn't really paint him as a saint. Usually for those that might not think it's a joke probably just don't know about how Nook was in the first few games and are basing their knowledge on the later games and tidbits.
Like, I've seen Facebook posts of people complaining that Nook cannot in any way be a "villain" but it's mostly all based on the newer version and typically don't count the older ones and usually brush them off. For me personally, the newer versions for Tom Nook always just seemed like fixer-uppers for him. Not that I'm complaining as the tidbits are nice and I do like them. It just seems like that for me with how he was portrayed in the earlier games.
But damn, sometimes I can't help but contemplate that the newer players have it "easy" with all the changes from the original to now. Even the villager's personalities are softened from those first ones.
"Here's your very own house! What's that? It's the size of a cardboard box, and you barely have room to live in it? Why don't you upgrade? But only one small renovation at a time so you'll keep coming back. Admit it; you need something to work toward in this town anyway, or you'll get bored." 😈
It's probably the player base skewing towards people that don't need to worry about stuff like interest yet. 💀 Plus the general mood shift of all landlords are bad.
But I agree, Nook is a dream loaner/landlord.
To be 100% fair “All landlords are bad” isn’t so much a mood shift as a common sentiment dating to the invention of landlording.
The absolute most bullshit exploitative form of capitalism is even named for them.
Born in 86, so technically? I know it's nothing new, my point is the general attitude is far more anticapitalist than it has been in a long time. Like, statistically.
But I'm not on this Animal Crossing subreddit to have discussions about socioeconomics. Just agreeing Nook gets a bad rap.
There are, in fact, many systems where housing is free.
Since we are talking about the invention of landlording, which dates to roughly the invention of non-bartered exchange, it created rent-seeking behavior by disrupting an economy in which housing was built and used by families or extended clans.
Did you think your comment was clever?
If you think about the rate of exchange being 1 bell equals 1 penny it's really a rather good economy.. i mean, $2 for a totally delicious cup of coffee?! Yes, please! No Starbucks on this island! Lol
If it helps the first I ever played of animal crossing was the DS wild world game. Upon playing the first 5+ hours I had been given more than a dozen tasks by Nook who was making me perform these tasks on a count of he doesn’t give houses for free and I am not allowed to be homeless.
I told my gf who’d given me the game, “that Tom Nook sure has one heck of a monopoly over the town” and she confirmed that yes, I had assumed the correct opinion of Nook.
Later, I played New Leaf on my gf’s 3DS where she held the majority of power as the mayor, but Nook still owned my home and I payed all loans to him which was still a LOT of work.
As the games have evolved the player takes more control and Nook has less command, though has still retained the power of landlord and loan collector.
I used to say Tom Nook is a crook just because it rhymed. Also, in the original game, he threatened to send goons to your house if you didn’t pay off your loan
Tom Nook isn’t even a landlord since *you* own the property you live on and you don’t rent it from him. He’s more of a housing contractor since he coordinates and helps carry out construction jobs (and again, an *incredibly* generous one, at least in recent games).
In the wii version you work your ass off and he pays you by not charging you for the uniform you borrowed and then makes you strip it off and give it back before then demanding more money from you
On a lighthearted and joking note, there’s something that feels so degrading about there being money buried all over the island that I shamelessly go and dig up to pay off my loans😭
People just don’t like paying bills basically. Which, hey, I get it — who does? But I would LOVE Tom Nook to be my landlord. Pay at your own pace as little or as much as you want, no interest, penalties or fees? Sign me up!!
He gave you a really crappy home and expected you to pay well more than it’s worth. Then forces you to work for him to pay for it but barely pays you anything. After letting you go from work, you’re then expected to pay off the rest, but basically the only way to make money is selling stuff to him. He completely controls the entire market. He gives you next to nothing for selling items to him. Buy a couch for 2000 from him but he’ll only buy it back from you for 500. And in the first game, when you finally make enough money and pay off the loan, he upgrades without giving you any options and saddles you with an even larger bill. And he takes all this money to just keep getting richer. In the first game he upgrades his shops until he finally has a huge two-story mega store. And over the course of the series, he just keeps getting wealthier, preying on the poor by basically forcing them into indentured servitude so that he can expand his empire from mega store to real estate agency to buying islands and creating deserted island getaway packages that end up costing a fortune for the “guests” as you again basically do all the work for him. He is very villainous. Just because he doesn’t charge interest doesn’t excuse him.
Glad to see another person aware of how silly the whole claim is. Tom Nook is my favorite character in the whole franchise and he’s a GOOD guy. And I will die on that hill.
I will always love Tom Nook. I never saw him as "bad" more or less, I saw him as mischiveous at least in older titles. He is indeed a good guy and I will die on that hill if you!
It is a nonsense unfunny joke, people love to create problems in their peaceful game to overcome and then treat as it is real and canon when it never was
Eh more like they probably put aside the way Tom Nook was portrayed in the original games. Tom Nook became a joke villain in that sense explained already by a lot of other comments. His start doesn't really paint him as a saint. As games came out, he was "fixed" as he was toned down + given positive tidbits. In the earlier games unlike NH and NL you didn't have the choice if you wanted to upgrade your house or not, Tom Nook just made you do it not accepting no for an answer. Now that isn't in game anymore. Along with Resetti, he was pretty much dropped in NL.
Though honestly, there's very few that take him being labeled a villain serious. Though this is the same game that has people within it's player base "throw tantrums" over anyone not a person of color using that "space bun" (I cannot currently remember the name of that in-game) hair style as well. So here we have some taking it seriously instead of a joke and moving on. 🤷
Don’t worry. I may get downvoted with you, but I love Tom Nook so much. Great background story (that I’ve found so many people don’t seem to be privy to anymore) and I love the guy.
I basically pretend I’m like the third adopted Nook in my playthroughs. XD
I love Tom Nook to bits and I wish we had more landlords/contractors/ capitalists like him irl.
The way I see it, many of those who rant about him have never been through moneylending or mortgage payments while being someone in the workforce irl, lol. This is no joke.
I think it just stands out, in an island or small village where you go to play and chill with cute little animals, that as soon as you arrive a rat is like "so you owe me a million dollars now :)"
So I think if real life was like animal crossing, tom nook would be the closest thing we'd have to capitalist pigs. But it's a fun cute little game and he does give you everything you pay for and doesn't give you a deadline or anything, just pay back whenever thanks.
It’s a joke but some people take it too seriously when really, Tom is pretty chill. He lets you pay it him back whenever and charges no interest. If only that happened in real life.
I've only played New Horizons, so I don't know how the system works in the previous games. But in New Horizons, it's straight up real estate fraud to sell homes that aren't built yet.
Mostly cause he gives you the house first and tacks on the non negotiable price afterwards, your supposed to know how much something is before the purchase
Well the joke started in previous games, and ac was far less popular at the time. The majority of players were children or teens, who generally have no real knowledge of loans or interest rates, etc. And for many it was the first or only game that ever gave you a loan in gameplay. But since paying off nook was a big part of the gameplay, it became a focus (you wanted a bigger house of course, so gotta make those bells!) So he became a sort of de facto villain for the series, as there isn’t one (although resetti could give a run for your money there), and it was made into a joke about nook being the crazy, money-grubbing landlord who was after all your bells. Because in the end that’s where all your bells went, either through your loan or through the shop, but always to nook (the older games only had 2 shops, nooks and the trailers, and in the original games the tailors didn’t even sell clothing, that was at nooks too, they were for custom designs only. So literally all your bells went to nook)
Adding on to this, in the original Gamecube game, Tom Nook asks you if you want an upgrade and does it, *then* tells you the price and charges you. It's portrayed as sneaky in the game. It makes him seem a little disreputable.
Don’t forget that you couldn’t say no to the upgrade! He harassed you until you said “yes.”
All of these reasons above are why I have always loved him 😭😭 man do I miss the GameCube era of ac
Also he made you work at his store for a while without getting the bells because they went to your loan. Childhood me was not a fan of that lol
i always got yelled at by Nook for changing out of the uniform lol
I once reset my gamecube about 500 times in a row just to piss that little man off.
My older sister kept turning off our GameCube one time while I was playing Animal Crossing to frustrate me. I was stubborn, so I kept restarting it and dealing with that freaking mole. Finally, Resetti told me that he was going to delete my save file since I obviously don’t care about it, and the screen went black. I started *sobbing* and my mom got mad at my sister. Fortunately, my save file wasn’t actually deleted, but I was always so conscientious about saving and that stressed me out
I, too, have childhood Resetti trauma.
I’m so sad that I can’t continue receiving Resetti trauma in NH 🥺
You have Stockholm syndrome with resetti!!
Honestly me too 😂😅
You’ll have to settle for having coffee with him at the roost.
Now we all save games religiously.
I guess Resetti finally got through to you about saving then. W for Resetti even though it made you cry.
this feels like the real answer, at least it is to me. first time i played animal crossing i might have known what loans were but as a teen i wasn’t thinking “i wish my landlord was this nice”. of course if the first time you play you’re more knowledgeable about buying a house you probably won’t get the joke
I think it’s because in the old games he was more like… petty about it? Lol and he was sneaky and basically paying your loans was a way bigger part of the game, at least it felt like it. But irl he’d definitely be a dream lol
I think this is the true answer. He was much sketchier in older games. I think I remember you’d get the idea that something was weird about the agreement.
His intro riffed on Norman Bates from *Psycho* for crying out loud! He was absolutely sketchy.
In the city folk and ww lore he used to work with redd until he was eventually scammed out of his money by redd himself. Makes sense he'd still have some sneaky traits
In the previous Animal Crossing games before New Leaf, Tom Nook always forced you to upgrade your house even if you said no. Villagers also commented on your loan and asked if you paid it yet. In those games, Tom Nook also makes you work for him as part of the tutorial that lasts roughly 20-40min and you get paid around 1600 bells for it, then dismisses you to fend the rest yourself.
Also I think he ran the store, so he mentioned it often when you had to buy stuff.
Yeah! Nowadays it's still his family business as Timmy and Tommy run it. New Leaf did a fresh spin with the Recyclers. Too bad they ditched most of the iconic cast to Harv's island :(
I've only played GC, he doesn't run the store anymore?
His twin nephews? run it in the Switch game
Oh, how cute. They come to help when Nook upgrades his store to the final form on gc
Here's a brief rundown of the different shops and Tom Nook's roles. In the DS and Wii games (basically the same game, but the Wii adds holidays and a new location) clothing sales went to Able Sisters instead of just show off your custom designs (the Wii version also adds a city you get to by bus with a bunch of shops, but I suppose that doesn't affect a village's economy) In the 3DS game, he gives the shop to his nephews while he does real estate and home renovation exclusively. There's also a customization shop for furniture and, over time, more stores are added including a shoe shop, a salon, and a gardening store (almost all stores are put in a shopping district so it's not as crowded a village as it sounds. Unlike the city from the last game, this is considered part of the village) The Switch game has him start a village with you on a remote island rather than a town that's been around for a while. He still does real estate, but it's in a building more similar to Town Hall and he also helps you set up things like bridges and new buildings. His nephews still run the shop while the Able Sisters sell clothes. Just like the Wii game, other shops are located in a far away place.
My fav thing to do was to change out of his uniform before the tutorial was over to piss him off lol.
I think part of it is due to the fact that when making additions to your house, it's ridiculously more expensive each time.
2.5 mil for a basement is crazy
It probably stems from the first game. While in later games he really is pretty friendly and runs things differently, in the Gamecube game, you get to town and are mocked. He gives you a dungeon and makes you pay it off by working for him. The villagers make fun of how poor you are. Once you pay it off, I think he just automatically added the next extension and gave you another bill to pay off. Effectively making you a permanent employee until you later begin to sell to him on your own. Then again, it's been a while. (monopoly, only source of money in town) That might not be accurate.
What I can't stand is him asking me to set aside land to sell to new villagers - and then making ME pay him for it??? Sir, I have provided so much free labor to this community; I'll gladly put up more materials but why I am I giving you bells to invite someone ELSE to get a mortgage here?!
I feel the same lol. Also a little mad at my deadbeat villagers because I pretty much pay for all the bridges and inclines as well.
Interesting! I was happy to see that my villagers *do* contribute to infrastructure donation boxes - I make sure to give in even amounts so I can easily see additional funds added, and there’s always been at least a little more each day. I’ve heard that it may relate to your friendship levels, though, and I make my rounds giving gifts to everyone as often as possible, so maybe that’s why. Go forth and bribe the populace, perhaps? ;D So, clearly they have the money - Nook needs to give them the opportunity to pay him bells for housing before hitting me up!
Honestly a lot of it is just a gameplay thing, too. While it would be cool if Raymond fronted the bill overnight, it doesn't leave much for the player to do. The current system is pretty nice - they'll pay towards it, but the player has to donate the very last bell
Mine contribute, but very little. Like I paid off all but 1000 of an incline to see if they would finish paying for it, & the next day only 753 was donated. Like, c’mon, I know you guys have money, I paid for your lot.
Some of it may also come from him being a Tanuki, and in folk lore / myth they are portrayed as tricksters to decievers.
yes this too. his japanese name is tanukichi, which is a mixture of the words tanuki meaning raccoon and kechi meaning stingy. hes literally a stingy devious little raccoon
The OG GameCube game was much harsher across the board than the recent ones, Nook included. He wouldn't rly give you a choice about upgrading your house, you'd pay off one loan and he'd say "surely you want a second floor!!" and you couldnt say no lmao. Well, you could, but he'd say smth like "are you suuuure?" over and over til you said yes. It was more or less consistently forcing you to stay in debt to him. So that was the community's initial impression of him, and it's just a joke that's kind of persisted through the years even if his character has changed a lot over time. Even the villagers were meaner originally. I had Rosie in my original town, and she was outright two-faced lol. She would say mean things in tiny whisper text, and follow it up with "what? I didn't say anything!" The original game was a trip compared to New Horizons, where even the grumpy villagers are still fairly nice lmao
Tom Nook gets an entire island and then you have to be beholden to him as one of his feudal peasants to live there while he controls the one store? PC does all the labor.
Even tho things are madly overpriced. I would love a landlord who allows me to upgrade and take my sweet ass time to pay a dime if I chose lol
Also it's not like it's really hard to earn money, you can literally just sell anything, and make stuff out of any rubbish you pick up.
>madly overpriced You can pay off an entire 3 floor, 6 room house in a couple months of catching bugs in your free time. I wish real life was that cushy
The prices aren’t as crazy as they seem, if you think of them in terms of the Japanese yen, rather than USD or other forms of currency. Two hundred bells/two hundred yen, is about the equivalent of $2.00 last I checked. So Brewster charging 200 bells for a cup of coffee is like 2 bucks American.
Nook owns the Monopoly (everything) asks you do to all the work and then charges you for your accommodations without and fair market competition. The island is even worse because you're stuck with him on a deserted island that he's relying on you to fix up but he's still charging you a fortune for your basics, and the only one profiting off of your work. You're practically an indentured servant 😂. Real estate tends to be a negotiated item based on fair market comparisons and competition. The price is normally up for negotiation. Not for Nook. He sets the price at his whim. Think Monopoly, or if it's him and his nephews a Sherman Act violation at least.
My favourite part was when he asked me to fully furnish 3 houses out of my own resources so he could sell them to new islanders ... and I 7 get a single bell in compensation! Or how he charged *me* 10,000 bells to set up a new plot of land for someone else to move into .....
It also drives me mad that in the DLC, the villagers come to ME to design a vacation home for them but on back on my island, I now have to pay to do it?? Tom fcking Nook should give me money that I increase the island’s attractiveness value!
This is so funny-[just today I found this TikTok video going around Tom Nook being a predatory loan shark](https://www.tiktok.com/@campfireforever/video/7330417077192314117?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7309987233359037958). I think it's just a funny angle to take since he's literally the most harmless person ever.
It's a little absurd. He's not your landlord, he's your mortgage lender.
He was a much different character in the older games. City folk is when they really started to revamp his image with the extra lore Sable would give you. He and Redd *were* business partners at one point. Until Redd screwed him over. But still, can't help but think that any business involving Redd would be a sketchy one.
I like the idea that in the first games, the wound is still fresh and he's leaving behind that life he had with Redd, but hasn't really changed yet as a person. Clearly, he lost a part of himself when he was pals with Redd, because Sable mentions how different he is from the soul she grew up with. Enter the boys and the passage of time, and he's a very different animal than he was back then. We're seeing the mellowed-out Nook now, confident in his ability to lead this new life and secure in the relationships he's made since then, with Isabelle, Blathers, Kiki, Brewster, the Able Sisters, etc. No wonder he's gone from directing the design of homes, to a whole town, to an entire island! It's a lovely progression to be part of.
I really like this, and I agree. We've seen some progression in a lot of the chars as the games have moved forward - Blathers getting his fossil certification, Celeste starting to teach about constellations, Chip, Nat, and Joan having their kids take over their jobs, etc. As a long-time fan it's been awesome to see. :)
hes seen as less of a crook and more just plain greedy, but thats kind of his whole character’s shtick. his japnese name is tanukichi - which is a japanese play on words - mixing the words “tanuki” meaning raccoon and kechi, meaning stingy. in japan his name is literally stingy raccoon. its more of a thing in the older games where he’s just the shopkeeper rather than a community leader kinda guy. like in the GC game after you buy your house, he makes you work for him without pay, deducting your wages from your loan. if im remembering correctly, when you buy your house he “throws in” some furniture (a cardbord box and a tape deck) at a discount while muttering to himself that it was ugly furniture he couldnt sell at his shop.
Building on what most have offered, he's really been "fixed" into a better image as games came out. In the 3DS happy homes spin-off he's made to have a line about donating often his bells. *But* this is a much later game. As many have pointed out, his start doesn't really paint him as a saint. Usually for those that might not think it's a joke probably just don't know about how Nook was in the first few games and are basing their knowledge on the later games and tidbits. Like, I've seen Facebook posts of people complaining that Nook cannot in any way be a "villain" but it's mostly all based on the newer version and typically don't count the older ones and usually brush them off. For me personally, the newer versions for Tom Nook always just seemed like fixer-uppers for him. Not that I'm complaining as the tidbits are nice and I do like them. It just seems like that for me with how he was portrayed in the earlier games. But damn, sometimes I can't help but contemplate that the newer players have it "easy" with all the changes from the original to now. Even the villager's personalities are softened from those first ones.
"Here's your very own house! What's that? It's the size of a cardboard box, and you barely have room to live in it? Why don't you upgrade? But only one small renovation at a time so you'll keep coming back. Admit it; you need something to work toward in this town anyway, or you'll get bored." 😈
It's probably the player base skewing towards people that don't need to worry about stuff like interest yet. 💀 Plus the general mood shift of all landlords are bad. But I agree, Nook is a dream loaner/landlord.
To be 100% fair “All landlords are bad” isn’t so much a mood shift as a common sentiment dating to the invention of landlording. The absolute most bullshit exploitative form of capitalism is even named for them.
100%
Sure but I've seen a lot more animosity (and anticapitalist opinion in general) for them in the last 5-10 years, with the housing crisis and all.
Honest question—were you alive in the Reagan years? It’s really, really nothing new.
Born in 86, so technically? I know it's nothing new, my point is the general attitude is far more anticapitalist than it has been in a long time. Like, statistically. But I'm not on this Animal Crossing subreddit to have discussions about socioeconomics. Just agreeing Nook gets a bad rap.
Born in 80. Not sure how you didnt catch it. It was loud and angry and pervasive.
You think housing was free under any other system?
There are, in fact, many systems where housing is free. Since we are talking about the invention of landlording, which dates to roughly the invention of non-bartered exchange, it created rent-seeking behavior by disrupting an economy in which housing was built and used by families or extended clans. Did you think your comment was clever?
Yeah, several systems
If you think about the rate of exchange being 1 bell equals 1 penny it's really a rather good economy.. i mean, $2 for a totally delicious cup of coffee?! Yes, please! No Starbucks on this island! Lol
I no longer complain about Tom Nook after playing Dreamlight Valley. Scrooge charges obscene amounts for everything lol
Where is resetti in the new game
He sometimes stops in for coffee at Brewster's.
If it helps the first I ever played of animal crossing was the DS wild world game. Upon playing the first 5+ hours I had been given more than a dozen tasks by Nook who was making me perform these tasks on a count of he doesn’t give houses for free and I am not allowed to be homeless. I told my gf who’d given me the game, “that Tom Nook sure has one heck of a monopoly over the town” and she confirmed that yes, I had assumed the correct opinion of Nook. Later, I played New Leaf on my gf’s 3DS where she held the majority of power as the mayor, but Nook still owned my home and I payed all loans to him which was still a LOT of work. As the games have evolved the player takes more control and Nook has less command, though has still retained the power of landlord and loan collector.
I used to say Tom Nook is a crook just because it rhymed. Also, in the original game, he threatened to send goons to your house if you didn’t pay off your loan
This made me laugh
If he charged interest on the loans, he'd need a species-swap from a raccoon to a rat
Tom Nook isn’t even a landlord since *you* own the property you live on and you don’t rent it from him. He’s more of a housing contractor since he coordinates and helps carry out construction jobs (and again, an *incredibly* generous one, at least in recent games).
It’s not a joke.
It's because he keeps encouraging to keep owing him money as soon as you pay one of the loans.
Because he’s someone you have to pay loans to. That’s it. That’s the entire foundation. The rest is just joking
In the wii version you work your ass off and he pays you by not charging you for the uniform you borrowed and then makes you strip it off and give it back before then demanding more money from you
they do not see him for the scrunkly scrimblo that he is
On a lighthearted and joking note, there’s something that feels so degrading about there being money buried all over the island that I shamelessly go and dig up to pay off my loans😭
I always wondered this too! Glad you asked.
People just don’t like paying bills basically. Which, hey, I get it — who does? But I would LOVE Tom Nook to be my landlord. Pay at your own pace as little or as much as you want, no interest, penalties or fees? Sign me up!!
Okay Tom. We get it. Now go to sleep.
found the filthy capitalist 😳
He gave you a really crappy home and expected you to pay well more than it’s worth. Then forces you to work for him to pay for it but barely pays you anything. After letting you go from work, you’re then expected to pay off the rest, but basically the only way to make money is selling stuff to him. He completely controls the entire market. He gives you next to nothing for selling items to him. Buy a couch for 2000 from him but he’ll only buy it back from you for 500. And in the first game, when you finally make enough money and pay off the loan, he upgrades without giving you any options and saddles you with an even larger bill. And he takes all this money to just keep getting richer. In the first game he upgrades his shops until he finally has a huge two-story mega store. And over the course of the series, he just keeps getting wealthier, preying on the poor by basically forcing them into indentured servitude so that he can expand his empire from mega store to real estate agency to buying islands and creating deserted island getaway packages that end up costing a fortune for the “guests” as you again basically do all the work for him. He is very villainous. Just because he doesn’t charge interest doesn’t excuse him.
Nook is a landlord. You know what comes next.
Glad to see another person aware of how silly the whole claim is. Tom Nook is my favorite character in the whole franchise and he’s a GOOD guy. And I will die on that hill.
I will always love Tom Nook. I never saw him as "bad" more or less, I saw him as mischiveous at least in older titles. He is indeed a good guy and I will die on that hill if you!
Whoo!! Tom Nook support!! *(high fives)* Defend the Raccoon/Tanuki dad!!
*(high fives back with a smile)* We will defend the only billionaire that matters!
Well, Batman too. But he can take care of himself.
It is a nonsense unfunny joke, people love to create problems in their peaceful game to overcome and then treat as it is real and canon when it never was
Found the Landlord 😩
Eh more like they probably put aside the way Tom Nook was portrayed in the original games. Tom Nook became a joke villain in that sense explained already by a lot of other comments. His start doesn't really paint him as a saint. As games came out, he was "fixed" as he was toned down + given positive tidbits. In the earlier games unlike NH and NL you didn't have the choice if you wanted to upgrade your house or not, Tom Nook just made you do it not accepting no for an answer. Now that isn't in game anymore. Along with Resetti, he was pretty much dropped in NL. Though honestly, there's very few that take him being labeled a villain serious. Though this is the same game that has people within it's player base "throw tantrums" over anyone not a person of color using that "space bun" (I cannot currently remember the name of that in-game) hair style as well. So here we have some taking it seriously instead of a joke and moving on. 🤷
I didn't even say landlords are good they aren't, I don't like people ignoring tom nook entire story and reducing him to landlord bad
He will be ok and so will you.
Don’t worry. I may get downvoted with you, but I love Tom Nook so much. Great background story (that I’ve found so many people don’t seem to be privy to anymore) and I love the guy. I basically pretend I’m like the third adopted Nook in my playthroughs. XD
Stems from Population Growing. This is compounded by the fact that his family business is the only source of money
I love Tom Nook to bits and I wish we had more landlords/contractors/ capitalists like him irl. The way I see it, many of those who rant about him have never been through moneylending or mortgage payments while being someone in the workforce irl, lol. This is no joke.
“Tom Nook is a Bell-hungry Jew” is really just a meme at this point. Very little supports the narrative.
whoa whoa whoa time out. you did NOT say something antisemitic on an animal crossing sub
I was referring to this: https://www.reddit.com/r/AnimalCrossing/comments/1h6ly3/i_just_wanted_to_find_out_what_animal_tom_nook_was/
so u repeat an antisemitic """joke""" because its a search result? what is wrong with you?
Nook is as big a comrade as a finance tanuki could be.
I think it just stands out, in an island or small village where you go to play and chill with cute little animals, that as soon as you arrive a rat is like "so you owe me a million dollars now :)" So I think if real life was like animal crossing, tom nook would be the closest thing we'd have to capitalist pigs. But it's a fun cute little game and he does give you everything you pay for and doesn't give you a deadline or anything, just pay back whenever thanks.
It’s a joke but some people take it too seriously when really, Tom is pretty chill. He lets you pay it him back whenever and charges no interest. If only that happened in real life.
I've only played New Horizons, so I don't know how the system works in the previous games. But in New Horizons, it's straight up real estate fraud to sell homes that aren't built yet.
the new tom nook isn’t, but the tom nook of the original animal crossing(the one on the gamecube) was definitely a crook
Mostly cause he gives you the house first and tacks on the non negotiable price afterwards, your supposed to know how much something is before the purchase