I’ve done it, folks!  I finally achieved that coveted 5-star rating for my island in Animal Crossing: New Horizons!  It took a lot of work…a lot of visits to Isabelle to see what she wanted me to do next.  And boy…does my island look awful!

For the longest time, my main goal in the game had been to pay off my house.  It took a whopping 2.5 million bells to pay off my final loan, which was quite the tedious experience, let me tell you.  (Though, if you’ve ever played an Animal Crossing game before, then you know what I mean.)  Every day, I would vow to earn at least 100,000 bells, though I was lucky from time to time when I got the tarantula and scorpion islands.  I mean, visiting an island absolutely infested with these beasties sounds more like a nightmare than anything, but you can earn boatloads of bells here.  I learned somewhere online that you can trap one of these bugs by surrounding them with holes, then provoke it by taking out your net so that it runs around in a fury.  Then, all of the other tarantulas/scorpions will be harmless and unable to attack.  And voila, quick bells…even if it’s a pretty unsettling experience, to say the least.  Wish I had some screenshots available at the moment….

Well, I paid off my house so quickly that two of my rooms are still almost empty.  Even though I upgraded my store, I still don’t have enough nice furniture to fill up my house.  While I’m now seriously considering time travelling in order to cycle through more furniture in my store, I had one remaining goal in mind.  Get a 5-star rating.

I started by cutting down probably 100 trees because villagers were apparently “getting lost in the woods” and “fearing for the worst”.  (Seriously?)  Then Isabelle couldn’t make up her mind whether I needed to pack my island full of furniture or fences.  I don’t know how many hours I spent buying furniture, building furniture, or placing fences absolutely everywhere.  Just today, as of writing this anyway, I spent a good deal of time expanding everyone’s front yards because Isabelle insisted I still didn’t have enough fences.  Afterwards, I spoke to her again and was informed that I finally achieved that 5-star rating I had so badly wanted.  I got my golden watering can recipe, and after making it, I promptly celebrated by building that golden toilet I had been eyeing for so long.  Charlotte has earned it, darn it!  Now Ankha’s not the only one living in the lap of luxury!

To be honest, I’m not too happy with how my island looks at the moment.  It’s packed with junk absolutely everywhere, so much so that it’s gotten a bit hard to walk around.  I was also so determined to get my 5-star rating as quickly as possible that I didn’t even decorate my island the way I wanted…I just placed whatever I could get my hands on outdoors and hoped for the best.  I do plan on gradually replacing all the unwanted clutter with more desirable items, but that will probably be some time in the future once I have more items available to me and when I’ve planned out the island of my dreams.

But yeah, moral of this story, if you want a 5-star rating, you need to put out TONS of furniture and fencing.  And I think you should have between 200-220 trees?  Basically, just do whatever Isabelle says, and you’ll get there eventually.

Who else has gotten a 5-star rating?  Have you been doing a lot of terraforming lately?  And who else has paid off their house?  Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments below!