TheNintendo Switch 2launched about a month and a half ago, and now rumours are swirling around what’s going to appear in the first-ever Switch 2-focused Direct. Top of the list is a newAnimal Crossing, which isrumoured to be set for a reveal in the showcase ahead of a 2026 launch date.
As someone who spent almost 1,000 hours playingNew Horizons, I’m ready to see the next entry in the series so I can do that exact thing again. But I’m also hoping it draws more from the previous entry,New Leaf, to fill in the gaps in New Horizons.
New Horizons Missed What Made New Leaf So Great
Decorating is the core of New Horizons. you’re able to customise your island completely to your liking by terraforming rivers, lakes, and cliffs, crafting and painting furniture, and planting flowers and trees, all with the goal ofearning a visit from K.K. Slider. But once you’ve done that? You can… wander around the island admiring your work, I guess.
Animal Crossing wasn’t always like that. In fact, for all the time I spent playing New Leaf, I barely customised my town at all, besides planting flowers and bushes and placing a few public works projects. There was so muchmoreto the town, the villagers, and what you could do.
Even just on Main Street, you could go to Dr. Shrunk’s night club, explore thethreefloors of the Nook store, or get your hair done in a salon rather than just with a mirror. Beyond your town, you could take a boat out with Kapp’n for a visit to Tortimer Island and do even more activities there. I know New Horizons’ whole thing is you’re on a deserted island and you make a small community, but the devs could have given us a bit more to work with than just two shops and the museum.
Even Brewster’s Cafe is relegated to being back inside the museum in New Horizons like older AC games, rather than its own building.
The Villagers Became Props, Not Friends
The most detrimental change to New Horizons, though, isto the villagers you invite to live on your island. After two or three conversations, you’ve pretty much exhausted all the dialogue you’ll ever get from them. To make matters worse, there are only eight personality types in the game, compared to the nine spots on your island, so you always have at least two villagers with the same personality, repeating the same few lines of dialogue, day-in, day-out.
While you’d eventually run into this issue in New Leaf, it wasn’t nearly as egregious. I had a lot of Normal and Peppy villagers in New Leaf, and didn’t really notice they were all the same personality type. If you have the same personality types in New Horizons, you willdefinitelyknow about it.
Why are all the Lazy villagers obsessed with bugs?
There also just isn’t that much you can do with your villagers in New Horizons, which makes the lack of dialogue so much more obvious. I mean, it took the 2.0 update for them to be able to visit your house without you inviting them first.
In New Leaf, you could play hide-and-seek with them around your town. They could even ask you to bury a time capsule somewhere, and then ask you to dig it up weeks, months, or potentially even years later. There’s a lot you may do with villager interactions, and New Horizons did… well, nothing.
What Was Even The Point Of New Horizons’ Multiplayer?
New Horizons’ multiplayer is similarly hollow. Up to seven players can visit your island at once, but what can you do once everyone’s there? Walking around and admiring the scenery is pretty much the only thing on the itinerary, plus a K.K. Slider show if it happens to be Saturday.
Seriously, where were the minigames? Fans started making up their own games to play on each other’s islands because the game offered nothing, which is pretty shameful. New Leaf’s Tortimer Island minigames would have worked perfectly here - they’re all already set on an island, after all. Throw a few new ones in, and New Horizons’ longevity would have skyrocketed.
Five years on from launch, all I can see are the glaring missed opportunities in New Horizons. Hopefully the next title, whenever it’s revealed, draws more from the series’ past to make it even better.
