When Animal Crossing: New Horizons first launched in 2020, we didn't do a review for the game. It was the beginning of a global pandemic, things were a bit crazy and confusing, and I wasn't sure what was going to happen next. Being stuck in my home for weeks meant I had more "free time," but what was I going to do with it? Well, despite not reviewing it, Animal Crossing was my answer.
The day the game arrived was the day that would change a lot for me. It was the main way my friends and I were still able to hang out, and it was a game I would put countless hours in even after everything settled down. It would be the game I would introduce my non-gamer girlfriend (now wife) to, and it is the game that we both would continue coming back to daily for the next five years (and most likely beyond).
So after many major updates, an expansion, and thousands of hours of playtime between the two of us, I think it is finally time to sit down and give New Horizons a proper review. It is by no means perfect, and there are plenty of areas that could've been improved on, but this is a game that has changed so much since launch that I feel only now I can fully judge and explain exactly what it is. New Horizons truly did live up to its name in a lot of ways, and it is honestly still a game worth getting into today.
Starting a New Life:
When you first start up Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you find yourself beginning your new life on a deserted island. You get to select your character, pick a default island layout, and choose the name of your island as well. While your looks can be altered later, the island choice becomes the most important as there are a few key features that cannot be changed.
You cannot change the location of the river mouths, you cannot change the locations of the rocky edges, and you cannot change where your pier is located. The game features full on terraforming so other key features can be fully altered, but players need to be aware of what cannot be changed before making a decision. It might not be obvious when you first start the game, but these immovable areas will dictate what you can or can't do with shaping your island, so it is best to play ahead now... Or do what I did and just pick the first option and jump in!
After picking your island and landing on it for the first time, you are greeted by Tom Nook and Isabelle, your two island representatives. They will be your lifeline going forward, and all major decisions will be made through them. Your first task is to place a tent where you want to live (don't worry it can be moved later), and then place two tents for the animal villagers that have moved in with you. These villagers will be chosen at random, and will be used as the game's tutorial. Islands can have up to ten villagers living on it at a time, but this isn't something that will happen instantly.
Just like with your own tent, players have the option to place where the villagers will live, and this will eventually leading to placing more housing as well. Unlike past games, villagers will not move in without having a plot of land ready for them, and each of these locations are entirely up to the player to decide. This becomes a major theme throughout the entire game going forward, as this is a "new life" you will have nearly complete control over.
Once your islanders are happy with their new homes, the game moves onto general resource gathering, item selling, and teaching you the basics of crafting. This is a game where you start from scratch, and each day becomes a new adventure as you progress your island's development.
Daily Life:
Animal Crossing is a series that runs on real time, and that has not changed here. Whatever time and date your Switch console reads is the time and date it will be in game as well. Each day new events happen, villagers will go about a different daily schedule, flowers, trees, and other plants will grow, and your pool of resources will reset. Different aspects of the game will also be impacted by the time of day it is, with different bugs and fish appearing based on it being morning, afternoon, or night, and even some events are time gated.
This means shops will open and close at their specified times, and those wanting to partake in a festival or holiday activity will need to physically be there and play at the required times. Of course you can also change your Switch's clock to whatever you want, but this technically does go against the spirit of Animal Crossing... Not that most people don't do it anyway!
Of course time itself isn't the only thing that changes, as Animal Crossing contains all four seasons, and these seasons are controlled by the hemisphere you live in. This was a first for the series, as previously all parts of the world has to abide by the Northern Hemisphere's rules, and it allows for the game to fully sync up with each player's real life living conditions. This time around there have been some alterations to bugs as well, as they will now show up in Winter, but in general each season will provide a slightly different experience. This means players technically have to play every day for a year to fully see a complete year in game as well, and partake in every event, every holiday, and catch every bug and fish.
The game does reward you with a currency called Nook Miles for checking in each day, but the game is also designed for each player to jump in whenever they feel like it. Although weeds will grow up and clutter your town if you do not play too often, this time there isn't too much of a penalty for vanishing from extended periods of time. In previous games animals would move in and out if you didn't talk to them daily to stop them, but here that is no longer an issue. Instead they will directly ask you before making such a move, and you have the option to either stop them or let it happen; meaning you do not have to worry about coming back to a different town if it has been awhile or you forgot to talk to your villagers.
As for other daily life tasks to take care of, it really comes down to the player. Each day resets the resources, and it is up to you to decide what you want to accomplish with what you are given. There are many ways to customize the island, but only so much you can truly take care of within a single day. This isn't a game meant to be played for hours and hours each day, but rather one to visit when you feel like it, and that is honestly the best way to play. Of course the social aspects and online play add a whole extra layer on top of that, but we'll get to that later... As really the crafting and expansion of the island really comes first.
Nook Miles themselves are also a part of the daily grind. These points are given to you by completing daily objectives, and hitting major milestones. They can then be turned in to purchase additional items, recipes, hair styles, and more. They can also be used to visit the two different types of mini islands the game offers, and are used to initially upgrade your tent into a full house. They are much harder to come by than money, and are a very sought after currency for all players starting out.
DIY and Island Development:
After being introduced in the mobile game Pocket Camp, New Horizons is a game that fully doubles down on crafting items, and developing your island to fit your own wants and needs. While you can still purchase items from stores, a vast majority of the game's content does come from what you can make. In fact, the shop itself isn't even a thing until you place it, and that can be said for all island infrastructures.
Just like at the start of the game when you placed the tents, which later turn into houses, all major structures and objects need to be placed and built by you. This requires picking a location and donating funds to construct it, and then waiting the required amount of real time for it to finally be built. By doing this you can control what bridges are in town to cross waterways, you can pick where your two stores and the island's museum goes, and you can choose where to relocate buildings to if you decide to change your mind. This allows you to layout the island almost exactly how you want it (again river mouths cannot be moved), and that allows players to get quite creative.
Eventually you can also build ponds, lakes, and rivers of your own, and build the land up to create multiple levels. Of course these levels need steps to reach them, and that too is something you can control. The final major update also added the ability to lean ladders up against cliffs and place vines to climb as well, which can really help make traversal faster when placed smartly.
Of course these are not the only ways you can customize your island, as the game also allows you to hand design patterns to place on the ground to create paths (or simply create cool designs), and those with graphic design skills can even use a PC to create more in depth designs to then transfer to the game using a QR code. On the other hand those who can't call themselves artists can also make use of the in game path laying tool, which lets you place grass, sand, dirt, and multiple path types to create "true" sidewalks. These ground placement tools are also useful for changing the general soil type of your island, as placing objects such as sand will allow you to do things you normally couldn't; such as plant palm trees away from the beach.
The final "main" way to customize your island does come from the items you buy and craft.
When it comes to crafting, the system is pretty straight forward. Simply get the required items (wood, stones, shells, etc) and then take them to a DIY Workbench to make what you want. Of course you need the recipe before you can actually craft, which are typically given to you by animals or found washed up on the beach, but once you have it all you need to do is select it from the list.
There isn't any complicated mini games here or a "quality" system that you need to worry about, just trade x material items in for y item, and done! These items can then be customized further by changing their color or pattern (which uses the same pattern tool as paths), and that allows each player to put their own unique spin on things.
After crafting, or buying, items, these very same items can then be placed around the island freely. In previous games these items could only be dropped inside the player house, but New Horizons allows you to fully deck out the world with them instead. This means every island can be fully unique as players unlock their inner civil designer and landscaper, and go all out following their own theme. It becomes the most time consuming part of the game in general, and players can spend countless years making things "perfect," but it is for sure worth it in the end.
Trees, Plants, Flowers and Gardening:
While this might seem weird putting it in its own category, Animal Crossing has always featured an extensive plant system, and it has been expanded even more so in New Horizons.
The basics of the plant system begins the moment you start the game. Every island is assigned a native fruit tree, and native flowers. Deciduous trees and pine trees can be found and planted as well, but these trees will never produce fruit and instead will be home to wasps and sometimes furniture items when they are shook. As for the fruit trees, they can be grown by simply planting more fruit in the ground, and waiting a few days for the tree to develop. Native island fruit doesn't sell for as much however, so gaining the non-native fruit quickly becomes a must.
To gain other types of fruits, players either have to visit other player's islands, or visit the random mini in game islands and get lucky. This is also how bamboo can be found and grown, with chances for non-native flowers appearing as well. By bringing these trees and flowers back to your own island you can plant them, and eventually it is possible to get one of each type of plant in the game. However, unlike trees which only have so many fruit variations, flowers do require a lot more work to get them all.
Flowers in Animal Crossing use genetics. When this system was first introduced I was taking a high school biology class, and I was blown away by how it actually worked! While different species of flowers will require traveling to other island to obtain them, getting all the color variants comes down to crossbreeding, and that can take a lot of work.
By planting flowers next to each other and watering them, they will then cross breed as long as there is an empty space around them. This system uses the classic Punnett Square, where Bb + Bb would equal BB, Bb, Bb, and bb. B is dominant while b is recessive, meaning of the four outcomes, only one of them will have the traits of the little b. If this sounds confusing? Well, it only is if you are going after specific flower color types.
In general, it can be as simple as Red + Yellow = Orange, with the orange now having a specific genetic makeup that can produce other colors of flowers. The same can be said for the red flowers as well, as a red flower can be produced with unique genetics that can then be used to crossbreed even rarer colors; the Blue Rose being one of the hardest of them all. Of course the chances of a rare flower can also be increased by having multiple friends water your flowers each day, but solo players will not have this option.
Moving on from flowers, bushes exist and can be purchased and planted, and full gardens can be grown as well. The game features a decent selection of crops to grow, and once again watering them each day is key to having them grow to their fullest. Unlike in farming games crops in Animal Crossing never stop producing, so every other day they can be harvested and sold without worry. This feature was added into the final major update as well, along with the ability to use your harvested produce, and captured fish, to cook. Cooked dishes can be sold, used as decorations, or eaten to give yourself an energy boost, with energy being used to pick up trees, and smash rocks. (You can sit on a toilet to empty your energy if you don't want to accidentally destroy your rocks or something!)
In short, gardening is an effective way to make money in New Horizons, and it is a very simple system to use. Unlike trying to get all the flowers.
Collecting and the Museum:
Another major part of Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the collection system. The game has a large selection of bugs, fish, sea creatures, fossils, and artwork for you to discover.
Fishing is done by looking for shadows of fish in the rivers, ponds, or streams, and casting your line in front of them. Wait for them to bite, then pull them in before they get away! It can take some practice (and sometimes listening for the sound is easier), but eventually you can capture them all. Again, specific fish are out during set times of the day and during different seasons, so it takes an entire year to actually get them all.
Sea Creatures on the other hand are different from what you can catch by standing on the beach, and requires the use of diving. By simply putting on a wet suit players can dive into the ocean, and swim around looking for shadows. Dive underwater, chase the shadow until you catch it, and then come back your catch! This wasn't a part of the game at launch either, but was added in via an early update. Diving is also a great way to make money in the game, with me and my wife personally spending an entire afternoon once just diving for money. We were able to obtain over 5 Million Bells (the in game currency) with in a single day, which was more than enough to fully upgrade her house. Player 2's caught items go directly to the Recycling Box, so we just kept going together. (But more on how this works later.)
Fossils are dug up, and can be accessed at the museum. There are only
four spawns each day, and each one will make up a piece of an overall
dinosaur. It is complete luck what the fossils will be turned into, but
by turning four in each day, you can complete the entire exhibit in no
time.
Bugs, like fish, are also seasonal and depend on the time of day, and require a bug net to catch. Some bugs are fast, while others require you to sneak up on them to catch them. They also require specific conditions to be met, such as having tree stumps or snowballs on the ground for them to appear. Some types of bugs also cannot appear while playing in multiplayer modes, such as the flea, so this is the one type of collection that has to be completed solo at some point.
And finally, artwork can be purchased from the shady dealer Redd, or be given to you by animals in the mail. These are recreations of famous pieces of art, and they can either be real or fake. One who is familiar with art can identify the mistakes making them fake, or players can look up guides online. This collection is the hardest to complete as artwork is much harder to come by, and you have to beat the odds of getting something fake even when your missing ones do show up in Redd's shop. The final update did add a new "farmer's market" like setup to make Redd accessible every day, but this is still luck based as well.
After getting any of the above collectibles, players can either keep them as decorations, or donate them to the museum to complete the exhibits. The ultimate goal is to complete the museum, but players can always get more than one of each to save.
Oh, and we can't forget coffee! While it serves no real purpose outside of getting a handful of items after so many visits, it is still a fun little feature. If you are lucky you can find other villagers in there to talk to as well, or even summon your own by using the physical Amiibo cards. Again, it is just a fun little extra and helps the world feel a bit more alive.
Other Islands and Harv's Island:
Like I mentioned before, the game features mini islands to visit. These items can be accessed by going to the airport, or visiting Kapp'n at the dock. The airport islands offer resources such as trees to cut, rocks to hit, flowers to pick up, fish to catch, etc, while Kapp'n's islands have the chance of being different seasons. Some islands also have unique properties like being filled with rare (yet violent) bugs, or having rocks that give out cash when being struck with a shovel. You can only visit these islands so much, as they do require Nook Miles, and Kapp'n only allows for one visit a day.
Harv's Island on the other hand is unique. Initially it was a photo studio where players could place animals and items to create their own unique pictures, but with an update a "farmer's market" type setup was added as well. Here players can visit the unique animals that visit the main island each day, and make use of their services at any time. Their selections are a bit more limited compared to when they visit you, but it means players can simply check back each day to see what's new in stock. These shops require donations to open however, so it does take some work to open everything. This feature also reintroduced some missing characters to the game, with new haircuts and customization options being added as well. While it doesn't quite make up for the lack of a city like the previous entry had, it is a decent replacement... It's just too bad you can't visit this area when playing multiplayer.
Multiplayer:
Speaking of multiplayer, there are a few options this time around, including the ability to play co-op by grabbing a second controller!
Party Play is the first option, and lets you and one of your other family members living on the island play at once. In previous games players had to take turns, but in New Horizons you can simply be together. When playing with this mode enabled, the "leader" will have an arrow over their head, and the second player is forced to follow them. If the second player leaves the screen they will be warped back on screen, and any item the second player picks up is sent back to the Recycling Box at the Community Center. The second player also cannot access their tool wheel for quick tool selecting, but none of this is really a problem. By simply shaking your controller you can swap between leaders on the fly, meaning both players have full access to everything; they just have to take turns once in awhile.
Local Multiplayer is the second option, and requires the use of two Nintendo Switch consoles. This lets two or more players visit each other's islands, and run around independently. While items cannot be placed on the ground or moved, every other feature is in tact just as it would be playing solo, except you are with friends.
Online Multiplayer is similar to Local Multiplayer, except with up to 8 players online. These players can be set as "close friends" which allows them to dig up items and use tools on your island, or can be simply set as standard friends who cannot. This eliminates the fear of others visiting your island to destroy it, which was previously a pretty big issue in past games. (I personally fell victim to a friend who chopped down all my trees, killed all my flowers, and then forced an autosave.) Online play does lock out some events, but it allows for players to visit other islands and see just how creative others were with their islands. The in game text chat feature can be used to communicate, or the Switch Online app can be opened for faster typing. Messages can also be sent to online friends who are not on the island, making meeting up easier than ever.
With these features, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the most social Animal Crossing to date, and it truly was a life saver for many during the pandemic.
Changes from Past Animal Crossings:
With all of this being said, there are multiple other changes compared to past Animal Crossing titles, that not everyone may be a fan of.
First of all, all tools can now break. Nets, fishing rods, shovels, axes, you name it; all break with use. Thankfully you can cheat the system by changing the color of your items to repair them, but in general they will break if you keep using them.
The next major change comes from the housing. New Horizons allows you to expand your main room, add extra rooms to the north, east, and west, add a basement, and add an upstairs as well. This is a grand total of six rooms to decorate and make use of, with the option of adding counters, walls, and half walls (with the expansion) to split them up even more. The down side is, besides the main room, these rooms are smaller than in the previously released New Leaf.
Along with houses being smaller, New Horizons only features one shop upgrade. Nook's Cranny will increase in size once, and then never again. This lack of additional room and items is made up for by having a shelf to buy items from, but long time fans are sure to miss the previously ever expanding store.
On top of all of this a decent selection of furniture items are also missing from New Horizons, as the focus was put more on the DIY items instead. Updates helped fix this, but we never did reach the amount of furniture available in past games. While the Mario themed items did make an appearance, other Nintendo staples like The Legend of Zelda, Star Fox, and Metroid didn't make the cut.
Thankfully, the game did make some other major changes that greatly improved the overall experience, so it isn't too difficult to look past some of these missed opportunities.
When it comes to houses, a new design mode has been added as well. While you can drop items and move them by hand with your character, the design mode lets you see an overview of your current room, and then freely drag and place items until your heart's content. You can even access and place items from your storage, meaning you can unleash your full interior designer without having to go back to storage to see what you can use. Customizing your house has never been easier, and this carries over into the game's expansion as well.
Clothing has seen a major upgrade with the clothing store now featuring a dressing room. This dressing room has a large selection of items to try on and buy each day, and purchased items can be put on right then and there. Multiple outfits can be saved to instantly change into thanks to the new "wand" item, and simply going to a dresser lets you easily change your clothes at any time.
Each piece of apparel has multiple color options to purchase, and items can be sorted to easily find what you are looking for. This new storage setup also applies to your standard storage, which makes finding any item a breeze.
On top of everything New Horizons has to offer on its own, now with Pro Designs not only can you customize every part of your shirt's pattern, but you can also change the clothing type, and even create hats! This allows for some truly unique designs outside of what the game normally allows, and these designs can be shared with others online. Those who are less creative can also connect to the internet and download new designs as well, which can be done by simply visiting the Able Sisters.
Along with these changes, there are simply dozens of quality of life changes to help improve the Animal Crossing experience. A tool wheel, expanded pocket storage space, a mailbox that saves your letters, full auto saving, villagers that will not leave without asking first, grass no longer dies from running on it, flowers only die if you dig them up and sell them/throw them away, villagers won't change your roof color because they don't like blue, and there are a lot of little details that go overlooked that simply enhance the experience.
While it initially seems like villagers have a limited range of things they'll say, the reality is follow up chats with them open the flood gates, and they have countless lines dedicated to current events and what is near them. Sure they aren't as rude as they used to be, but their self-awareness does go a long way... And then you have the animals that flat out question their existence and how anything even makes sense unless they are in a video game.
New Horizons simply includes too many smaller touch ups to list in this review, and after playing it nearly every day for five years, I still discover something new from time to time. (Like how you can jump off of the pier and land on the beach depending on your island's structure.)
Happy Home Paradise:
Happy Home Paradise is New Horizon's one and only expansion, and it is nearly a full game on its own.
By going to the airport and selecting "go to work" players can visit Happy Home Paradise; a collection of islands where villagers can own vacation homes. You take on the job of being a landscaping and interior designing expert, and use your tools to create the vacation home of each animal's dream. This is done by selecting a lot, customizing the outside, placing the house, and then building an interior that meets the animal's requirements.
Each animal you help will unlock additional furniture and items to use on future jobs, and new features constantly become unlocked for the main game. Half ways, counters, full walls, the ability to add special effects to items, etc, all become unlocked from Happy Home Paradise for use in the main game. Once the expansion is "finished" players can even customize other villager's homes, but not change the size of them. Once houses are completed, they can then be saved and shown off to the world.
In addition to the housing, players can rebuild the main Happy Home island as well, which adds unique buildings like a school or cafe. These commercial areas will need villagers appointed to run them, and special events will occur upon visiting. (The school will even provide tips and teach lessons about playing Animal Crossing!)
Happy Home Paradise also has some unique furniture to purchase from its shop, and a new "glowing moss" material can be harvested from around the main island. These can be taken back to the main game for use in new recipes, or to decorate your existing island.
As an expansion, Happy Home Paradise needs to be purchased, but it can be downloaded for free if users are subscribed to Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack. Failing to renew the subscription will take away access from Happy Home Paradise, but it will not remove items brought back to the main game. It does offer countless hours of additional content however, so some may want to consider purchasing it if they get rid of their subscription. The only down side is that these locations cannot be visited in multiplayer, and that includes local co-op.
Playing Animal Crossing on Switch 2
At the time of this review there is no Nintendo Switch 2 version of the game, or a Nintendo Switch 2 patch; however, the game does benefit from the enhanced performance of the newer hardware, and that does go a long way. After spending close to 40 hours playing the game on the Switch 2, I can already say it would be hard to go back to playing on the original hardware.
The main differences here come from the performance when playing on fully developed islands, and the load times.
As a game where customizing your island is a main part of the gameplay, it doesn't take long for islands to become completely filled with objects, custom designs, flowers, trees, and more. While I didn't do anything too crazy with my own island, there was one particular area that always suffered slowdown, and it got even worse whenever there was weather effects such as wind or rain. This area was a subdivision of two houses, with paths, a garden areas, multiple trees, a mini circular river that formed a center island, and finally some steps that lead up to an outdoor "cafe" and hangout area; complete with lights, a jukebox, some walls, fire pits, a wall of fish at the back, and waterways that turn into waterfalls for the areas below. This proved to be too much for the Switch to handle, with frames dropping pretty low anytime I got anywhere near the location. Still I liked the design too much to take it apart, so I just left it and dealt with it... None of this is a problem on the Switch 2 however.
The area that once dropped to as low as 10 FPS now continues to ruin at solid 30, and it feels great. After over 1,000 hours of being used to the drops, it feels pretty weird to be able to run around the entire area without experiencing any issues. The random pop-in that would occur with some furniture items in this area has also stopped, and other parts of my island with minor issues seems to be fixed as well. Visiting other random islands via dreams proves that it isn't just my level of craziness that has been fixed, but islands that went "all out" with their themes seem to run better as well. It is really, REALLY, nice to see, and it encourages players to not hold back with their designs.
Still, despite how great having a solid 30 FPS is, my favorite improvement with the Switch 2 is none other than the loading times.
Loading on the Switch 2 is basically cut in half. As someone who does all of my "dailies" each day, this saves me a LOT of time. My typical day begins with starting up the game, which loads twice as fast now, calling my wife's character in for co-op, which again is twice as fast, and then we get to work. We water the garden, pick the garden (we have everything planted in a way that new things grow each day), go get coffee at the museum, talk to every villager, pick up all the shells on the beach, visit the community center for our daily Nook Miles, sell things at the shop, visit the clothing store, and then dig up anything we can find while picking any weeds that may have grown as well. We have invisible patterns placed to prevent flowers from overgrowing, but there are a few spots it is still possible, so we take care of those as well. All of this usually takes us about an hour each day, but it used to take even longer simply because loading was so slow.
All the houses we entered quickly added up, with the Switch 2 now shaving a good 5 to 10 minutes off loading alone (without any extra trips inside). That is huge, and quickly makes a difference as the days go on. Previously I wouldn't go back into the shop to sell items simply because I didn't feel like waiting for the load times, but now it is so quick I don't even think about it. It really is my favorite upgrade when it comes to playing on the Switch 2, and this is why I don't think I could ever go back to playing on the Switch unless I had to.
Of course if we ever do get a Switch 2 patch or Switch 2 upgrade I'll revise this section to include that information, but for now this is what we get... And I am perfectly fine with that.
Should you play it?
Animal Crossing: New Horizons is not a perfect game by any means, but after thousands of hours of playtime, and spending at least one hour each day playing it since launch, I can safely say it is easily one of my favorites.
Although I find myself wishing for features like the city to return, or get let down when I discover a piece of furniture is missing, over the years I've realized that what I like about this game outweighs what I miss. The amount of customization the game allows you to bring to your island is outstanding, and being able to use all of my furniture anywhere I want greatly changed how I viewed the items in general. Instead of simply looking at my new cool item and thinking "what room would this go great in?" I instead think about how I can work it into the island as a whole, and that is something I now have a hard time doing without.
On top of this, the quality of life features really did go a long way with this one. Having a massive and easy to navigate storage box is something I've wanted since they introduced a basic storage system, being able to change your outfits at a dresser or changing room is great, and all the new features like pole vaulting over a stream or climbing up a ladder greatly improved navigation. I personally designed my island in a way where you can easily access all areas without needing these tools, but that doesn't change the fact that they help a lot! Also being able to play couch co-op with someone is easily my favorite thing about the game in general, and something I had wished for since the original GCN release outside of Japan.
Instead of sitting around a TV with friends and family and watching someone play, you can now actually play together! As crazy as it sounds for a social game, this is a completely new feature as previously you had to either play together online, or own multiple handheld devices and copies of the game. Sure, there are limitations that need improved on when it comes to this new feature (why can't we at least go to mini islands together?), but it is a great addition nonetheless.
Looking at other features in the game, seeing diving return in an update was a nice surprise, being able to grow a garden and "farm" puts a new spin on the gameplay in general, and I really love the fact that running doesn't kill the grass or the flowers! It knocks the tops off of flowers for a day, but they come right back! So there's no need to worry about your friends, or you, killing your blue roses that took a month to grow. Of course there are many, MANY, more improvements the game brought as well, but it's taken nearly five years to even realize them all. And even then who's to say I've actually found them all? I'll admit that at first I didn't like that my tools would constantly break when I used them, but after exploiting the customization kit system, I haven't had to buy a new tool in years. I simply change their color about once a week and then I'm golden. Problem "solved."
Overall, Animal Crossing: New Horizons truly is a must play for newcomers and fans alike. Some fans will still prefer their old favorites in the series, but that doesn't change the fact that this game is packed with content and offers a new take on its gameplay thanks to island customization. Even without spending hundreds of hours making everything "perfect," there is still plenty to see and do in this game, and it is a great hang-out game to play with friends. The DLC expansion added enough content to be a game on its own, with a heavy focus on interior designing, but even the base game without the add-ons is more than enough. This is a game I personally plan on coming back to for years to come, and I really cannot recommend it anymore. This isn't how I felt about the game back when it first came out, but after playing it for five years straight, I've come to see it in a completely new light.
VERDICT: Essential
Reviewed on Nintendo Switch
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