Its no secret thatAnimal Crossing: New Horizonswas a smashing success for Nintendo, bringing in millions of new fans into the franchise practically overnight.Bringing the iconic characters and style from the beloved franchise onto modern hardware with the Switch was an easy recipe for success, although despite its positives,New Horizonswas far from the perfect sequel. WhileNew Horizonseemed to add even more customization than before with community content and terraforming, it fundamentally changed the gameplay focus of the series.
DespiteNew Horizonsexpanding on the scope of the franchise with even more ways to customize players' islands to their hearts' content,New Horizonswasn’t able to make up for its shortcomings in the long run. Even with its complaints from long-time fans,New Horizonsstill had plenty to love for years, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty of room for improvement. While mechanics like crafting and expanded world customization are likely to be improved in the next excitingAnimal Crossinggame, the series might need to make some drastic changes to avoid the failings ofNew Horizons.
Animal Crossing Wasn’t Always About Control
Joining A Unique Community Rather Than Ruling It
Regardless of how players feel about the changes made to the newest installment in theAnimal Crossingfranchise,New Horizon’s focus on control took it far from the roots of the series.WhereAnimal Crossingshined the most in the past was letting players become part of a virtual community, featuring fleshed-out villagers brought to life alongside plenty of fun-filled activities to pass the time. While some of this is still present inNew Horizons, they drastically suffered in favor of giving players more control over their game world.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons Fans Wish This One Major Feature Would Be Added To The Cozy Title
There’s already so much to do in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, but one helpful quality-of-life change would also be emotionally satisfying.
Rather than a casual life-sim,New Horizonsoften feels more akin to a management game likeThe Sims, offering a more detached perspective to the world without the advantage of easier or more expanded customization options.Many of the best aspects from previousAnimal Crossinggames weren’t able to make the cut intoNew Horizonseither, with the house customization sorely lacking in depth and flexibility of quirkier designs that better showcase each player’s personality.
While players could still customize their homes, foliage, and trees in previousAnimal Crossingtitles, they didn’t feel the need to give players total control of the overall village or its environment. Even if the level of sheer customization to create the perfect island was novel at first, it took away from the core aspects ofAnimal Crossingthat fans came to love, alongside being an intimidating prospect.
It’s easy to feel discouraged or entirely regret restarting the game.
Given the number of hours it takes to design an island and unlock tools,it’s easy to feel discouraged or entirelyregret restarting the game,which greatly aided replayability in the past, as players could start over with completely fresh faces and a new town to explore for the first time.
Casual Life Simulation Has Fallen By The Wayside
Taking Away From The Best Part Of The Series
Rather than simply enjoying day-to-day activities like visiting virtual friends or gathering,New Horizonsencourages players to strive towards creating the perfect dream island with its greater customization. While some players may argue the ability to completely customize theirNew Horizonsisland doesn’t take away from the experience as it’s an entirely optional feature, its clear it was a massive priority for the game’s development resources. While terraforming and the like would have been fine as a standalone addition,island customization likely caused the most important aspect of theAnimal Crossingexperience to be reduced to a disappointingly simple state.
One ofNew Horizon’s biggest complaints is the repetitive and often generic dialogue delivered by its colorful cast of characters.
Where this simplification hits the hardest is with villager interactions, as one ofNew Horizon’s biggest complaints is the repetitive and often generic dialogue delivered by its colorful cast of characters. Watering down the cruder elements of the villagers also took away from their uniqueness and personality, whilethe lack of meaningful interactions and favors gives little reason to talk to villagers as a whole. Players can still unlock more unique dialogue by interacting with specific villagers, but the reduction of activities and options to interact with them like scheduling house visits was sorely missed.
“Anime Life Sim” Makes Waves On The PlayStation Store, As It Appears To Be An Animal Crossing New Horizons “Clone”
More video game clones have hit the market, this time appearing on the PlayStation store and seeming eerily similar to Animal Crossing New Horizons.
While there was hope thatNew Horizonswould receive updates to add more depth to the island’s villagers, these updates were underwhelming and became more scarce as time went on. Given thatAnimal Crossinghas seen more competition withsimilar games fans would enjoybeing all the more common,Nintendo has a greater incentive to deliver a marginal return to form with the nextAnimal Crossinggame.
Animal Crossing’s Next Game Should Balance Both Playstyles
Providing Players With The Best Of Both Worlds
Given that the adorable life-sim elements ofAnimal Crossingwere toned down inNew Horizons, the series is at risk of watering down its core identity as a whole. With recent entries leaning much more heavily into the management side of life simulators,the belovedAnimal Crossingseries seems to be at a strange crossroads with an unclear future. Despite complaints overNew Horizons’direction, there’s plenty of room for its improved aspects or new mechanics in therecently rumored nextAnimal Crossing.
Animal Crossing’s Original Concept Got Completely Changed, But It Could Still Be Perfect For A Spin-Off
Animal Crossing was very nearly a completely different game, and it is time for Nintendo to give fans that experience in a spin-off title.
The nextAnimal Crossinggame has the perfect chance to build upon the foundation ofNew Horizonswhile putting a greater focus on the aspects that fans missed so much from previous entries, combining greater customization with a more homely game world. Even if the next entry in theAnimal Crossingfranchise does follow suit withNew Horizon’s focus on terraforming mechanics, it desperately needs some quality-of-life improvements to make it a more enjoyable experience.
A simple way to combine both aspects could be to separate the experience into separate modes, much like how theHappy Home ParadiseDLCadded drastically more freedom of decorating but in a limited context. It’s clear there’s still a great demand forAnimal Crossingto this day, with fans already imaginingwhat a sequel could look likeon the Switch 2.
Given thatNew Horizonwas the second best-selling Switch game of all time, its unlikely Nintendo will abandon the iconic franchise anytime soon, with the nextAnimal Crossingbeing a perfect way to showcase the Switch 2. Rather than pushing forward onAnimal Crossing:New Horizons' departure from the series,finding a balance between both control and life-sim aspects could make each playstyle equally satisfying to experience, while encouraging greater replayability.
