While the worldwide pandemic has been hard from many angles, one of the hardest has been being forced to sit around slothfully at home. The pounds seemed to just accrue of their own accord. And then I found Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
My children had been talking about it incessantly but it had mostly been background noise for me as I was pre-occupied with the health of friends and family and the future of work in a changed economic hellscape. Then in a bout of late-night insomnia I hooked up their switch to the living room TV and started playing. Before I knew it I was obsessed. A couple months later, I found I had lost 139 pounds. Here’s how:
1) The first thing is you have to find ways to stay active while you are playing Animal Crossing. One good way is to heavily use the A button when you are walking around in-game. The A button generally makes you sneak, but if you swiftly release it, it makes you swing your net. Spam the A button so while you are walking, you are also constantly swinging your net and building up those biceps and triceps.
2) Another important thing to do is to shake every tree vigorously, especially on mystery islands. You will burn a lot of calories by shaking trees. Additionally, shaking trees will occasionally cause a wasp nest to drop from the tree. You can then spam your A button to whip out your net and get some extra reps for your biceps and triceps.
3) The A button isn’t just for nets. By pressing the A button repeatedly, you can speed past those crafting animations. In addition, pressing B will let you zoom past conversations with the creatures in Animal Crossing. Basically, if you have no idea what is going on because you keep skipping past things with your A and B buttons, it means you are getting a good workout. No pain, no gain.
4) Break tools. Tools break easily in Animal Crossing so break as many as you can. This will afford you the opportunity to craft more tools and spam that A button.
5) Don’t spend all your time collecting turnips for the stalk market. Time travel is a better way to make quick money anyways. Instead, you should be spending most of your time collecting rocks and wood. Why? Because you can then use these rocks and wood to craft tools which you can then break while spamming the A button to speed through animations.
6) Combine these game playing strategies with a sensible diet and take reasonable breaks from the game. I typically start the morning with a breakfast bar, with nuts but no dairy components, and preferably hazelnut but dark chocolate will work in a pinch. Then I play Animal Crossing for about six hours. I take a sensible break in the afternoon during which I run eight miles through the deer crossing that starts in my backyard. When I get back, I don’t bathe because I find that the smell of my own sweat helps me stay sharp, and I play for another eight hours and finish the day with a simple meal involving a single non-GMO turnip flavored with half a teaspoon of margarine, accompanied by a simple glass of tap water dosed with Ex-Lax. Rinse, repeat.
I can’t guarantee that you’ll achieve the same results. I’m legally obligated to say that. But you might, if you fully commit yourself to the Animal Crossing Workout. What have you got to lose?