
It's been over a year and a half since I last visited Paradise, the colorful Animal Crossing town I once called home. I named it Paradise with dreams dancing on my glazed eyes, envisioning the whistle-stop suburb as something I'd one day build and transform into a picturesque city; grass green, girls pretty.
Despite my best intentions, Paradise never really was. Relationships, work, and other games took hold of my time, and a creeping anxiety thickened in me as remembered responsibilities built up with each day spent away. Those days turned to weeks, and eventually, that fog of worry precipitated, leaving a few minutes of light rain in its wake, taking with it my guilt and regrets.
I was at a crossroads in my life recently, and my therapist suggested that I return to Paradise before I made any big decisions. I spent my first afternoon back pulling weeds and chasing bugs out of the house, before flipping through this week's Paradise Press, our local paper, to catch up on town happenings. I was astonished to find that Paradise had been racked by scandal, tragedy, and financial woes.
As the Notorious B.I.G. once rapped in his chronicle of Brooklyn's decline, "Things done changed."




NCSX is selling
Animal Crossing is more interesting than we thought, it seems! Whereas we (read: I) found the improvements in Wild World a poor trade for NES games, and not enough to hold our interest after a year or so of Gamecube Crossing, academics are 

