A Trader’s World
Last month, Nintendo Switch owners across the globe were enamored with Nintendo’s new life simulator, Animal Crossing: New Horizons. The goal of the game is to make a happy, healthy community for your animal neighbors and yourself to live together on your island paradise. While this is the main objective, the game is also a very open-ended experience that evolves into a Minecraft-like game where your creativity can flourish. This has made it a fantastic playground for you, your friends, and animal neighbors. However, reaching your perfect island will always be somewhat of a daunting task.
There are a ton of items in the game. From furniture, to fish, to fossils, the amount of stuff you can place across your island seems endless. You may even find items you never knew existed on a friends’ island or through streaming media or social media that would work perfectly on your island. Obtaining these items for yourself, however, can prove to be challenging due to the random nature of the game.
You can never readily identify fish or fossils before catching or appraising them and some of the best furniture and coolest decor comes from infrequent special vendors, random gifts from your neighbors, or floating presents in the sky. The latest update putting in “Bunny Day Eggs” to celebrate the upcoming Easter holiday makes this task even more difficult as fish, fossils, trees and even floating presents are some of the items that can reward these seasonal eggs instead of valuable resources needed to craft your coveted decor. This has players asking the question, “what is the best way to get the things I want?” Well, one man has the answer.
A Man on a Mission
Jon Monath saw an opportunity. Using his creativity and a good amount of work, he has created what he calls the “Mega Trading Post,” a place for players to come together with a take-one, leave-one style approach to trade. To compliment this he created a Facebook group to spread the word to his friends about his innovative approach to a player-based market and within a few days has adapted to the ebbs and flows of his new venture. What started as simple item exchange has grown into that, plus a section for free gifts, donations and even player vendors. I was lucky enough to participate in the evolution of this process and as a vendor myself, I can confidently say this process is not only fun but a fantastic way to help out players looking for that special something.
I caught up with Jon on Facebook to talk about his trading post, the ideas for it all and his chops as a gamer. Check out the interview below:
Thorne Stone of Duel Screens: First Question! What inspired you to pioneer this player market?
Jon Monath: It first started with the creation of the Facebook group to exchange turnip prices and trade by communicating on that group. Then one day I thought it would be cool if instead of selling my extra furniture and other items I encounter to the Nooks, it would be cool for me to display it on my island, snap a photo for the Facebook group, and see if anyone wants to come trade. A few people came by and made trades so I made it larger, and streamlined it to be less inconvenient. As I saw more people come in and trade it gave me more ideas.
Each night after closing the gates I would just keep expanding, adding more space and new categories. For me it’s very exciting to be at the center of this and be able to build and design things. I think that’s my favorite part of the game for me personally. The cosmetic things about the game don’t excite me nearly as much as the practical things you can build. I thought it would be really fun to build something really social considering everybody is in the house right now all cooped up playing this game during the quarantine.
It was also inspired by a board game group that I run, which has 150 people in to support game nights at my house on Saturday nights that we were doing before the quarantine. So they definitely inspired me to make a group for this so I could socialize with many friends from there that I knew had the game. I am also a huge fan of Minecraft and that definitely inspired the mentality behind wanting to build these things to create a fun social experience.
DS: I can certainly see the Minecraft inspiration! Have you ever been a part of an in-game economy such as the ones found in MMORPG games or titles such as Diablo?
Jon: I have never been involved in that type of game. I have played a lot of Minecraft with a small number of friends over long periods of time. Sharing a world together keeping my Xbox running for us day and night, never one of those MMORPG games. It’s just not a genre I am into.
DS: Interesting! You’re a real creative guy! How do you feel about your trading post thus far? Has it been the trading hub you hoped it to be?
Jon: I am happy with it so far. It’s fun to see my friends stop in and swap things or trade with each other. Just the fact that that is happening at all is exciting for me. It’s a pretty fun game to play in a quarantine when you can’t leave your house haha.
DS: You mentioned Minecraft and your creativity yields amazing results. Are there any projects in this title or Minecraft that you are planning on next?
Jon: Next time planning to probably go back to Minecraft and make a realms server with some friends. Even in doing this Animal Crossing thing I have still been playing Minecraft regularly with my four-year-old daughter because I think it’s very educational.
DS: Tell me about yourself, Jon. Who is the man behind the Mega Trading Post?
Jon: Outside of gaming I do lots of other technology related things. I teach 3-D printing and coding at a summer camp. I also do a lot of technology stock trading. The thing that inspired me to even play Animal Crossing is to have togetherness with my friends. I originally was not even going to get the game because I only started playing video games again recently because my daughter can do it with me. I saw everybody playing Animal Crossing the first few days after launch so I decided “Screw it I’m going to do this!” Because I want to have more of a sense of togetherness during this quarantine considering I’m not doing my weekly Saturday board game nights right now. That is the most satisfying part about it, is I feel much more of a sense of togetherness with my friends then I did before I got the game. It brings me such joy to see them pop in on the island the way they used to pop in at my house for Board Games
DS: I definitely understand wanting a feeling of togetherness during this time. Animal Crossing has helped me personally stay in touch with my girlfriend and friends during this time. It’s a great thing you are doing, sharing your sense of togetherness for everyone during this time. Thank you!
Jon: Hey man thank you for all the positive energy!
