Present

Presents are a way of sending gifts such as furniture, flowers, and fruit to other villagers and players in the series. The present initially appears as a white box with a red bow around it, and can be opened in the player's inventory.

Presents appear in various different ways. Here is a list of examples -
 * The Player can give a villager a present on their birthday, while in their home.
 * Floating on a Balloon, which can be shot down with a slingshot. In the original Animal Crossing, you must instead wait for the balloon to land in a tree and then shake it. But, it sometimes does NOT end up resting on a tree and floats away instead.
 * A gift sent from a villager or the players mother, usually attached to a letter.
 * A delivery task on behalf of a villager - although intended for another resident of the town, who then open it to see what was inside. They appear as a white box with green bow. They can be opened by the player, but the villager who gave the player the delivery will get angry knowing it was opened. (Also, if the player does not complete the task the villager will ask for the present back to deliver it themselves.)


 * Other times, a present will not say "For (Villagers Name)", and will instead say, "What was that?" in which the villager who asked the player to deliver it will forget they even asked them, and you will not be able to deliver it.

Floating Balloons
Balloons sometimes float along in the air, but always carry a present along with them. In Animal Crossing, a player will have to hope that the present gets stuck in a tree, meaning that it can be shaken down, but in Wild World and City Folk, presents can be shot down with a slingshot. If shot down over water, and it lands in the water the player will show the emotion shock.

Balloons seem to float randomly over the town, but they in fact originate on the edges of the map at specific times, different for each town. The times they will appear will all end with the same minute value; for example, if you see a present float in from the edge at 5:45, you can be sure that each time it floats in will be a time ending in the minute value "5". Presents can then appear at times such as 7:55, 2:35, etc. They will not appear at times such as 6:22 or 2:17.

After shooting down 15 packages, a golden slingshot will float across the town on either a golden balloon (Wild World) or a group of three golden balloons (City Folk). These balloons have to be shot down in order to obtain the golden slingshot tool, which shoots three pellets and differs in appearance to the store-bought variety. When you enter a building the balloons will no longer be there.

In City Folk, the presents are the sole source for the Super Mario themed items, but common items can be shot down as well. The Mario items are all from the classic NES game of Super Mario Bros., and they are all 8-bit

In City Folk, Phineas the sea lion states that balloons actually come from the sky. This statement, however, cannot be proven.

Usually, presents appear just above the player, but in Wild World, they appear on the top screen.