Nintendo continues to provide post-launch support for Animal Crossing: New Horizons, adding new content to the game. The last update added new spring events, paintings, and diving for players to enjoy, while the Wave 2 update focuses on summer activities. New Horizons will be getting weekly fireworks shows throughout August, adding the Dream Suite feature, and allowing for players to safely backup their island to the cloud, in case their system gets destroyed or lost. The backup capability will be available to Nintendo Switch Online subscribers, though it won't act like normal save cloud backups do--you'll be able to turn on a setting that preserves your island and player data, but restoring it to will require contacting Nintendo Customer Support. Another update is planned for later in the year, which will let you move your save data or character to another Nintendo Switch console.

Animal Crossing New Horizon's Wave 2 update will arrive for free on July 30th.

• Fireworks Shows – Enjoy atmospheric fireworks lighting up the sky above your island every Sunday in August at 7 p.m. Get in the spirit by redeeming Bells for raffle tickets in the plaza to get various festive items that you can use. Put your personal spin on the fireworks display by using your own custom design pattern to see it shot in the air as a firework in the sky!
• Dreaming – You can now choose to take a nap in any bed placed in your home.** While dozing off, you may find yourself in a strange realm where you’ll be greeted by Luna. Luna offers visits to other islands as a dream, and with her help, you can share your island as a dream with others too.*** She will grant those who share their island a “Dream Address” which players can exchange and use to visit each other’s island in a dream. In dreams, nothing is permanent because nothing you do is saved, so explore to your heart’s content.
• Island Backup & Restoration Service – Nintendo Switch Online members can enable the new island backup service, which automatically uploads island and user save data to the internet at certain times. If your Nintendo Switch system is lost or damaged, you may be able to recover your island paradise as long as you’ve enabled island backup. In the event of loss or damage, contact Nintendo Consumer Support about restoring the island and user save data on your new or repaired Nintendo Switch system. After your island data and individual player data is restored, you can get back to building your island community!**** Additional details can be found on the Nintendo Consumer Support page when the update goes live. The island backup feature is separate from the Save Data Cloud functionality offered for select Nintendo Switch games through Nintendo Switch Online. A function specific to Animal Crossing: New Horizons to move users and save data to another system is planned for later this year. Details will be announced in the future.

Source

 

[x65943]

"Nintendo customer service"
"I need to restore my island"
*Please stay on hold, your time is important to us*

This is the most inefficient way I can imagine to deal with cloud saves.

Nintendo seems to be stuck in the 90s sometimes.

 

[Seriel]

"Nintendo customer service"
"I need to restore my island"
*Please stay on hold, your time is important to us*

This is the most inefficient way I can imagine to deal with cloud saves.

Nintendo seems to be stuck in the 90s sometimes.

The issue is that most ways of doing cloud saves leave it open to abuse, if it had normal cloud saves enabled then people could effortlessly clone bells and expensive items, among other things. Nintendo is many things but they are overprotective of their games, they go to biiig measures like this just to protect against threats that may or may not exist.

It's kind of a pain but I'm glad they're at least offering something.

 

[banjo2]

Cool, but sadly not enough to make me want to get back into it

 

[godreborn]

lost or "destroyed"?

 

[Deleted User]

this is way too late to have come out. my sister had to get a new switch and she lost the island she had like 200 hours in
obviously, she's really annoyed that she had to start over

 

[OkazakiTheOtaku]

I know I'm going to get crucified for this on a largely Nintendo-oriented forum, but man I just really, really despise New Horizons. It's gotta be my biggest gaming disappointment in years. Especially considering how many hours I've put into the series (1000+ on New Leaf ALONE).

The nouveau-Nintendo paradigm of releasing games with little content and then drip feeding it in is infuriating. Just release the finished game.
I actually agree with the idea of having BCAT distributions for holidays and stuff; what I hate is this trend of taking stuff that was already in past games and then patching it in post-release. It gives the impression that the game should have been delayed, even though it already was. Not only that, but that's every Nintendo game now. Splatoon for Wii U started it, and it made sense there because it was an online shooter and they wanted to keep it fresh. Then they did it was Mario Maker for Wii U, and, fine, kind of annoying but at least the game was complete and they were just adding things that people asked for.

Then Splatoon 2 released and had less content than Splatoon 1 in some ways, with, again, a drip feed back in. Same with ARMS.
But what happens when it goes wrong? Super Mario Party released with an abysmal amount of content and everyone went "oh no they'll update it" and then they...never did.

But by far the most egregious so far is New Horizons. It's absolutely insulting that it released the way it did. Let's go over just a few things it lacked over New Leaf at launch:
- types of fruit
- furniture styles
- gyroids
- swimming
- multiplayer mini game island
- fortune cookies and Nintendo items
- Shop NPCs
- Dream Suite

Nintendo has charged $60 for essentially an Early Access game.

Then, they absolutely ruined the pacing of the game with stressful "features" like durability on all tools. Not even the gold tools are permanent.
You can't mass craft, you can't pull from your home inventory, the multiplayer is unstable. You can't have more than one save file on a console. (And don't tell me that New Leaf was the same; no, it wasn't, you could buy another cartridge for another save. You can't do that on Switch) I mean WTF? How do you make Animal Crossing so stressful? I'm on edge every time I play. Not to mention that the game launched with no online save backup. Which is, you know, a feature you have to PAY FOR with a subscription cost on the Switch.

And I could go on and on about missing QoL features that should be standard.

They also ruined the entire appeal of the villagers. Now everyone in a personality group repeats the same lines over and over and over. Isabelle has been reduced to a glorified News Reporter. There's no personality in pattern design like New Leaf. Everything is clinical, sanitized, and streamlined except in ways that it actually matters (QoL).
There is just absolutely nothing that New Horizons does that New Leaf does not do better, besides the visuals, in my opinion.

As a fan of Animal Crossing who even put 100+ hours into Happy Home Designer, I despise New Horizons and everything it does.

 

[TunaKetchup]

I know I'm going to get crucified for this on a largely Nintendo-oriented forum, but man I just really, really despise New Horizons. It's gotta be my biggest gaming disappointment in years. Especially considering how many hours I've put into the series (1000+ on New Leaf ALONE).

The nouveau-Nintendo paradigm of releasing games with little content and then drip feeding it in is infuriating. Just release the finished game.
I actually agree with the idea of having BCAT distributions for holidays and stuff; what I hate is this trend of taking stuff that was already in past games and then patching it in post-release. It gives the impression that the game should have been delayed, even though it already was. Not only that, but that's every Nintendo game now. Splatoon for Wii U started it, and it made sense there because it was an online shooter and they wanted to keep it fresh. Then they did it was Mario Maker for Wii U, and, fine, kind of annoying but at least the game was complete and they were just adding things that people asked for.

Then Splatoon 2 released and had less content than Splatoon 1 in some ways, with, again, a drip feed back in. Same with ARMS.
But what happens when it goes wrong? Super Mario Party released with an abysmal amount of content and everyone went "oh no they'll update it" and then they...never did.

But by far the most egregious so far is New Horizons. It's absolutely insulting that it released the way it did. Let's go over just a few things it lacked over New Leaf at launch:
- types of fruit
- furniture styles
- gyroids
- swimming
- multiplayer mini game island
- fortune cookies and Nintendo items
- Shop NPCs
- Dream Suite

Nintendo has charged $60 for essentially an Early Access game.

Then, they absolutely ruined the pacing of the game with stressful "features" like durability on all tools. Not even the gold tools are permanent.
You can't mass craft, you can't pull from your home inventory, the multiplayer is unstable. You can't have more than one save file on a console. (And don't tell me that New Leaf was the same; no, it wasn't, you could buy another cartridge for another save. You can't do that on Switch) I mean WTF? How do you make Animal Crossing so stressful? I'm on edge every time I play. Not to mention that the game launched with no online save backup. Which is, you know, a feature you have to PAY FOR with a subscription cost on the Switch.

And I could go on and on about missing QoL features that should be standard.

They also ruined the entire appeal of the villagers. Now everyone in a personality group repeats the same lines over and over and over. Isabelle has been reduced to a glorified News Reporter. There's no personality in pattern design like New Leaf. Everything is clinical, sanitized, and streamlined except in ways that it actually matters (QoL).
There is just absolutely nothing that New Horizons does that New Leaf does not do better, besides the visuals, in my opinion.

As a fan of Animal Crossing who even put 100+ hours into Happy Home Designer, I despise New Horizons and everything it does.

I don't like games as a service,

I don't want to play games for 2-3 years

I want to play the game for a week and be done with it.

 

[OkazakiTheOtaku]

I don't like games as a service,
I don't want to play games for 2-3 years
I want to play the game for a week and be done with it.

Not sure if this is sarcastic, but I'll take it at face value.

I don't think "games as a service" and "wanting to play a game for 2-3 years" are mutually exclusive. New Leaf had 1 major expansion in its lifespan. Yet, many many many people continued (and continue to) play the game.
Animal Crossing is not a game you speed through and go "ok cool that was fun." The fun is growing your village over time.
But holding back content until months and months after release is not fun. It is an artificial limitation because the game was not finished.

 

[Pokemon_Tea_Sea_Jee]

let people back it up to their pc for free u asshole.

 

[TunaKetchup]

Not sure if this is sarcastic, but I'll take it at face value.

I don't think "games as a service" and "wanting to play a game for 2-3 years" are mutually exclusive. New Leaf had 1 major expansion in its lifespan. Yet, many many many people continued (and continue to) play the game.
Animal Crossing is not a game you speed through and go "ok cool that was fun." The fun is growing your village over time.
But holding back content until months and months after release is not fun. It is an artificial limitation because the game was not finished.

From my independent investigation, I've found that many Animal Crossing players don't play the game how Nintendo originally intended them too.

It feels like Nintendo is just forcing this style of updates when the fanbase doesn't like it.

Typical Nintendo imo

 

[Pokemon_Tea_Sea_Jee]

games as a service is UGLY.

 

[OkazakiTheOtaku]

let people back it up to their pc for free u asshole.

I don't understand why people claim that save scumming is such a concern, or a justification for Nintendo's inadequacies. The PS4 and Xbox One both let you just copy and paste your saves to a thumb drive whenever you want. For free. And it isn't anarchy in games on those platforms.

Splatoon 2 was hit with save editing exploits because Nintendo was incompetent and didn't store user data online; it just trusted the client-side save. What modern online game does that? When it comes to anything online, Nintendo are a bunch of hacks.

 

[DSoryu]

"Nintendo customer service"
"I need to restore my island"
*Please stay on hold, your time is important to us*

This is the most inefficient way I can imagine to deal with cloud saves.

Nintendo seems to be stuck in the 90s sometimes.

The issue is that most ways of doing cloud saves leave it open to abuse, if it had normal cloud saves enabled then people could effortlessly clone bells and expensive items, among other things. Nintendo is many things but they are overprotective of their games, they go to biiig measures like this just to protect against threats that may or may not exist.

It's kind of a pain but I'm glad they're at least offering something.

Though an ineficient way indeed, this seems to be like this to prevent exploting to the game (anything cloning), they should have implemented this feature in-game instead of calling them just to do it, save corruption is very easy to detect and the restore option should be only allowed when this scenario is met, along with the NNID login credentials. For the transfer/restore from zero feature (which I see is still under development) just do it the same way as the downloaded games work, once it connects online, check if the save has been restored/transfered, and if true, proceed to close the game and delete it.

I really hope that the current solution doesn't take too much time and gives the players who lost their save data at least some hope to recover it.

And for the other features, though I am excited for them, these are still returning features that should been there since launch, as these were present in previous games since forever, I get the point of the events as they want to avoit time travels and the sort, but they should only update those parts of the game.

EDIT: I totally agree that the user should do whatever they want with their game and saves, and specially for this game, the lack for that is what originated the black market for viilagers and items.

 

[ChaosEternal]

"Nintendo customer service"
"I need to restore my island"
*Please stay on hold, your time is important to us*

This is the most inefficient way I can imagine to deal with cloud saves.

Nintendo seems to be stuck in the 90s sometimes.

Which is ironic, because back in the 90's they were experimenting with internet connectivity and streaming way before anybody else was. It's like their problem is that they AREN'T stuck in the 90's.

 

[Lacius]

Seeing dick patterns launched into the air as fireworks might be enough to get me to play New Horizons again.

 

[Seliph]

I just want more non-house buildings like a post office back so I can spice up my island a bit, is that too much to ask for?

Also would be really nice to have another shop upgrade.

sigh....

 

[Sneethan]

I just want more non-house buildings like a post office back so I can spice up my island a bit, is that too much to ask for?

Also would be really nice to have another shop upgrade.

sigh....

dont lose hope, they are supporting the game for 3 years

 

[mattyxarope]

lost or "destroyed"?

Yes, supposedly this means that this announcement is NOT about being able to transfer your save from one Switch to another. The original Switch must be "lost" or "stolen".

SO THIS IS NOT WHAT MOST PEOPLE WOULD CONSIDER TO BE CLOUD SAVES IN THE TRADITIONAL SENSE.

No word about what the details of this are - as in, if you say that your first switch is "lost" or "stolen" if the first Switch will be somehow blocked (banned?).

They haven't been banning consoles that are deemed stolen, though.

Which makes sense because if you buy a Switch then someone says it is lost, that would be bad for Nintendo.

 

[Coyote_Mao]

Yes, supposedly this means that this announcement is NOT about being able to transfer your save from one Switch to another. The original Switch must be "lost" or "stolen"..

How would one even go about proving that their console was lost or stolen?