The first English-language Animal Crossing game came to the United States in September, 2002, when I was 14 years old. Summer vacation was either over or about to be, and sophomore year of high school was just getting started. I read a glossy preview in an issue of Nintendo Power over and over again for months as the release date approached, and that was it for me. I was hooked before I ever played.

The game starts on a train, with a cat called Rover asking a bunch of questions that determine your name, gender, and facial expression. Boy characters have little horns and wear shorts, while girl characters have pointy hats and wear dresses. In the newer games, the world is more gender neutral. Everybody gets a round head and can wear whatever they want.

Things happen pretty quickly after that. You arrive in your village at the beginning of each game with no possessions and no home. Luckily, the friendly shopkeeper, a raccoon named Tom Nook, is always there to provide shelter. Sometimes it’s a one-room home. In the newest game, it’s a tiny tent. This is where the game introduces you to debt.

“There’s the land, the building, taxes, surcharges, various fees, and whatnot…”

The house, it turns out, will cost you thousands of dollars — “bells” in the AC universe. Never fear though, good ol’ Nook is willing to give you a job as a runner for his shop. That’s Nook for you. A raccoon so stingy, he even charges you for “whatnot.”

The job serves as a sort of tutorial. Nook gives you assignments like “Introduce yourself to all the neighbors,” “Write a message on the town bulletin board,” or “Send a letter to a villager.” His low-paying chores introduce players to the basic mechanics of the game before cutting them loose.

From there, it gets a little less linear. Events unfold in real time in Animal Crossing, so if a villager gives you something to sell at Nook’s Cranny after 10 p.m., you’re going to have to wait a few real-life hours for it to reopen in the morning. This gives the game a pace that, when I first started playing, was totally novel to me.

It isn’t a game you really sit down and binge on for hours. Sure, you could fish and catch bugs for as long as you want, but you’re generally able to check the shop’s inventory, talk to each villager, pick all the fruits in town, and attend any holiday events in about a half-hour. Instead of playing for a few hours each day and beating it in a couple of weeks, Animal Crossing is the kind of game you can play for about 20 minutes daily for, like, years.