Straight off the bat, I will fully concede to GAF that I have never played any Animal Crossing game. Not a single one. The most I have seen of it at all was the Game Grumps playthrough in 2012 that lasted about 6 episodes. I think I got the general gist of it, that you join this little town where you buy your own house and start living amongst its population of unique and charming characters. It came across as a sort of Sims-lite, but I'm happy to be corrected on that point.
Is that really all it is? Because just going on off hand experience, that feels like it could get boring pretty quickly. What is the one element that keeps people glued to the game? Is there ever any special objective or task that you can or have to do?