Animal Crossing New Horizonstook over our lives when it launched in early 2020. Perfectly coinciding with worldwide lockdowns, its release filled a hole in our lives in a way thatNintendonever could have predicted. But all good things must come to an end, as New Horizons couldn’t remain the studio’s focus forever.In late 2021, it got its final update.
But now, over a year later,Animal Crossingfans are still starving for more content. Many players are even saying that they’d happily pay more for another update, sad to see the ultra-popularSwitchgame ditched less than two years into its lifetime. Others are frustrated as a bunch of quality-of-life issues remain unaddressed, leaving many irritating aspects of New Horizons doomed to remain unpatched, possibly forever.
Related:2023 Is The Year I Finally Stick With Animal Crossing
“I would Deadass PAY for an update at this point,” says Reddit user seraphim_ahren. This post has created one of the liveliest discussions in the Animal Crossing fanbase, with many in agreement that New Horizons shouldn’t have been permanently left behind in 2021.
Full of agreement, the thread is also being used to vent frustrations with New Horizons in its current - and final - state.
“I just wanna buy bushes in bulk man,” says itsamna2002. “I waste 30 minutes with Leif at least every time bushes go out of season.”
Others want to see the villagers themselves overhauled, preventing them from repeating so much of their dialogue. “Honestly, my dream expansion pack is just the character dialogue from all previous games shoved into New Horizons,” says LittleLemurian. “I want my villagers to be mean to me, I want them to get wicked angry. I want them to have deeper conversations with me. I want the more adult-themed jokes.”
Some are also frustrated that we never saw a huge expansion on custom clothing, including never getting the option to customise our trousers. Pretty disappointing, when almost every other aspect of the game could be customised to our liking.
However, not all Animal Crossing fans feel this way. While it was disappointing that Nintendo was fairly quick to announce that New Horizons wouldn’t get any more updates, it might have been better than the alternative.
“I’m glad they’re not turning Animal Crossing into The Sims with a bunch of paid DLC,” says sultrysisyphus. LemonSnowBro agrees: “Let the masterpiece be what it is. Stop begging for microtransactions, that shit is the worst.”
It remains to be seen if Nintendo decides to return to Animal Crossing New Horizons further down the line, just as it did with Mario Kart 8: Deluxe. Right now though, it’s safe to say that it will have its hands full with The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
