Animal Crossing Direct roundup - amiibo support and customization details



Animal Crossing: New Horizons is almost here, and there's so much to the game that hasn't yet been revealed yet. Today's Animal Crossing Direct aims to give us a few new details as to what to expect when the game launches next month. Let's see what the Direct reveals!

  • Just like previous games, there are differences within your town throughout each season.
  • You can pick where your animals live now.
  • You'll be able to create custom designs on your furniture.
  • There's an airport, where you'll be able to visit other friends' islands online.
  • Nook Miles are earned from completing objectives, where you can redeem them for special items.
  • Gulliver will show up on the coast again on occasion.
  • You'll be able to upgrade your tent into a house, and the house decorating options from Happy Home Designer are back.
  • There's mystery island tours that'll take you to new islands with all sorts of exotic items you can bring home.
  • A new mobile app called NookLink will be released where you can use QR codes to share custom art designs.
  • You can build the Museum, Town Hall, and shops from the previous games.
  • Isabelle will help out in the Town Hall, where you can pick where to place your facilities.
  • Nintendo will be offering patches that add new seasonal events throughout the year.
  • You can build bridges and stairs to help you get around your town easier. You can even add land, or dig out chunks you don't like, to really customize your town to your liking.
  • You'll be able to have 8 different houses on one save.
  • Amiibo and amiibo cards are supported.
  • Photopia allows you to pose your favorite villagers in cute photos.
  • You can't use axes or shovels in other people's towns...unless you're marked as a "best friend".
  • Nintendo won't allow the use of cloud saves, but there will be a special save recovery service for those who might unfortunately lose their save file.
  • The game will have a launch day update that'll add an Easter event.
  • You'll get special items if you play the mobile game Animal Crossing Pocket Camp.
20th February, 2020 – Tom Nook has an eye for business. That’s why the staple Animal Crossing character took time out of his very busy schedule to host a new video presentation about his latest endeavour, the Nook Inc. Deserted Island Getaway Package. In the presentation, he details the ins and outs of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, launching exclusively for Nintendo Switch on 20th March. The video covers everything a potential Deserted Island Getaway Package customer needs to know to get started: an introduction to the new island life, the basics of home ownership, details about new neighbours, land development, exploration, crafting and much more.

For more details of the island getaway, check out the full video: Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Deep Dive Into Deserted Island Life (Nintendo Switch).

Some of the highlights of Tom Nook’s information session include:

Features new to the series:

  • Life on the Island: Nook Inc. confidently recommends a trip to a remote deserted island. On the island, life is as peaceful and relaxing as it gets. Since the island is deserted, everyone can create a new life from the very beginning. Time flows as naturally as in the real world, including seasons and day and night cycles that mirror real time.
  • DIY: By collecting specific materials around the island, residents can craft a wide variety of things, including tools and furniture. DIY workshops teach you how to enrich your life by crafting DIY recipes. As you become more familiar with DIY, you can even learn special skills like changing the colour of your DIY furniture or decorating them with custom designs.
  • NookPhone: Nook Inc. will provide some basic necessities and services, including your very own NookPhone. It has standard apps, like a camera and map, but over time, new applications will be added. The camera can be used to take in-game photos all over the island – even adding fancy filters is possible.
  • Nook Miles: Players looking for more concrete goals can take advantage of the Nook Mileage program. Fulfilling certain challenges and experiences will earn miles to pay off the cost of the getaway package or, eventually, to exchange for in-game rewards. Rewards range from in-game Nook Inc. merchandise and helpful items that can enrich your time on the island, to tickets usable to visit distant islands.
  • Party Play: With the Nook Inc. Deserted Island Getaway package, up to eight people can live on one island.* In Party Play, residents can call up to three other players to explore the island at the same time. Whoever calls the others will be the Leader, making the others the Followers. It’s easy to change out the Leader, letting others quickly take charge. Any creatures or items found by Followers will be stored in a recycle box at the Resident Services building.
  • Land Development: While crossing rivers on the island is possible by pole-vaulting and climbing elevated land using ladders, you can also change the landscape by adding bridges and slopes. Once your island is fully decked out, you’ll receive a permit to freely pave your own paths, as well as perform major construction like changing the paths of rivers or building and demolishing cliffs.
  • Island Tours: These “mystery island tours” are at the whim of the pilot, so players never know where they will end up. Once on these smaller islands, feel free to gather as many items – like DIY materials and creatures – as you want and take them back with you to your island.
  • NookLink: With NookLink, which is part of the Nintendo Switch Online app, players can scan a Custom Design QR Code pattern from previous games Animal Crossing: New Leaf or Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer with a real-life smartphone and then download them to Animal Crossing: New Horizons. When connected online, it’s also possible to talk with friends who also have Animal Crossing: New Horizons with the Nintendo Switch Online smartphone app, using the smartphone as a keyboard or for voice chat. NookLink will launch in March.


Detailed breakdown of the Getaway Package experience:

  • Choose Your Island: Before boarding your flight to the island, you will choose the island from a range of options. Choosing to live in the Northern or Southern Hemisphere, for example, will affect the timing of the seasons. When the seasons change on the island, so do the activities. For Northern Hemisphere residents, spring will just be starting when the game launches on 20th March, so residents can expect blooming cherry blossoms to show up soon.
  • Orientation: After landing on the island, residents will receive a helpful orientation session from the Nook Inc. staff. At this time, you’ll be provided with the tent that’s included with your getaway package. You can chat with other island residents about where you want to set up your new home and help them choose their home locations as well.
  • Resident Services: The Resident Services facility is available to support daily needs 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They provide services such as the sale of everyday goods, the purchase of unwanted items and helpful advice.
  • Become a Home Owner: The tent provided to you by Nook Inc. is great, but have you considered a house? Home loans have no deadlines, interest or assessment, and you can pay your loan back at your own pace. A house offers much more space than a tent and also includes storage space for any extra furniture and baggage. Once you own a home, you can channel your inner interior designer, setting up the walls, flooring and furniture however you like. You can also use extension and remodelling services to expand and customise your home even more.
  • Customization Deluxe: Animal Crossing: New Horizons offers more customisation options than ever before, from personalising the look of your character all the way down to skin tone, hairstyle and clothing, to placing buildings and items wherever you want on the island. You can even decorate the inside and outside of your home.
  • Airport: This is the first place you will land on the island. It’s also available to use 24 hours a day, beginning on the day after your arrival. At the airport, you can invite residents of other islands to your own island via the internet or local wireless. You can also travel and visit other islands yourself. Up to eight people can play on a given island at one time**, so feel free to get a good group together and make some fantastic memories.
  • Island-wide Broadcasts: At the start of each day, Mr. Nook, CEO of Nook Inc., will make a broadcast to all residents, updating them with the latest on important island events and advice about how to best enjoy island living.


Features and updates to further island enjoyment:

  • New Residents: When you first land on the island you will only have a few animal residents living there with you. But as you develop your island from the ground up, more neighbours will visit and choose to move in. You can even invite some of the new residents to live there yourself.
  • Free Updates: Free updates will be added after the game launches, with free seasonal events continually added throughout the year. The first free update will be on launch day, 20th March. By installing this update, you can celebrate Bunny Day with a special event in April.
  • Additional Facilities: As you grow your island, more facilities will be built. This includes a museum showcasing the rich ecosystem of the island, a shop full of ready-made furniture and goods you can’t craft yourself, a tailor offering clothing and fashion items, and a campsite where you can invite guests for recreational purposes.
  • Tourists & Events: Your island will not only be home to new residents, but also tourists as well! These temporary visitors are always welcome and can offer up items that cannot be crafted on the island. Visitors can also participate in fun events like Fishing Tourneys and Bug-Offs, which will pop up throughout the year. Through free updates to Animal Crossing: New Horizons, new special events and seasonal guests will be introduced.
  • amiibo Support: Animal Crossing: New Horizons supports amiibo figures and amiibo cards from the Animal Crossing series. You can also invite these familiar faces to Photopia, an island that exists in the game, where you can place models in creative photo shoots.
  • Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp collaboration: If you own both Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp for mobile devices and Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you’ll receive special items in each game. Details will be announced at a later date from the Animal Crossing Twitter account.
  • Tom Nook Twitter Takeover: And keep an eye out for social media-savvy Tom Nook, who is going to take over Isabelle’s Twitter account right after today’s video presentation.
In addition to the game, players can accessorise with Animal Crossing: New Horizons Carrying Cases for Nintendo Switch or Nintendo Switch Lite. A special edition Animal Crossing-themed Nintendo Switch console will be available in stores on 20th March as well. The system takes design inspiration from Animal Crossing: New Horizons, with pastel green and blue Joy-Con controllers that are white on the back, coloured wrist straps, and a white Nintendo Switch dock, adorned with images of characters Tom Nook and Nooklings Timmy and Tommy.

For more information about Animal Crossing: New Horizons, visit https://www.nintendo.co.uk/animalcrossingnewhorizons.
 

MarkDarkness

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No cloud saves is absurd. They could implement it in a very contained way... like you can only restore 2 times every year. Problem solved, took me 10 seconds to think it up.

QR codes only through phone are to be expected I guess without a camera on the Switch. Hopefully the community will step up with a tool for us to import patterns offilne.
 

pandavova

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Hmmm, im curious if someone will do a homebrew so that you can import designs without using the smartphone app (because you need a switch connected to the internet for that). But i like that it uses the old QR Codes, there is already software to create these. Also im really hoping time travling will be easy, there will surely be homebrew for that as well.
Im really hyped for this game.
 

Hanafuda

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I feel like on the switch Nintendo is getting more cocky and is becoming less and less consumer friendly. I think Doug Bowser has SOMETHING to do with it. Every since the “switch” between Reggie and Doug Nintendo has been becoming, slowly, less consumer friendly.


Iwata died. Miyamoto became a stage prop.

The changes are corporate in Japan. The North American Nintendo sock puppets you see just serve as mascots/characters, like Mario, Luigi, and the rest.

I'll probably end up playing the shit out of this game though.
 
Last edited by Hanafuda,

Pleng

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"Nintendo won't allow the use of cloud saves, but there will be a special save recovery service for those who might unfortunately lose their save file." This is just so confusing. Why won't it work with cloud saves?

Are cloud saves not linked with your online subscription which in turn is linked to your user account?

Animal Crossing uses a system-wide save with all users living on the same island. That may not even be technically possible to implement in the infrastructure of the cloud saves system. Even if they could find a way around it then multiple users with multiple cloud saves could end up restoring over each others' save files. A dedicated single point of backup and restore makes more sense in this case.
 
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godreborn

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not allowing cloud saving is bull shit. if you can't cloud save, at least let us put saves on a usb. it's not like achievements or trophies are going to be affected, so if someone abuses the system and cheats, that's on them. I mean who cares?
 

PokeNev

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Iwata died. Miyamoto became a stage prop.

The changes are corporate in Japan. The North American Nintendo sock puppets you see just serve as mascots/characters, like Mario, Luigi, and the rest.

I'll probably end up playing the shit out of this game though.
Oh, sorry I forgot about that thx. But yeah, this game looks really good I just hate that they’re still pushing amiibo
 

Espen84

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Was there any news on a general direct. I am so sick of this look a new figure to the smash roster. Look at this game that's already confirmed. I want to know about games to come. And when to expect them. And maybe show me some freaking game play of the games too.
 

DANTENDO

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Was there any news on a general direct. I am so sick of this look a new figure to the smash roster. Look at this game that's already confirmed. I want to know about games to come. And when to expect them. And maybe show me some freaking game play of the games too.
Go youtube and type nintendo switch games 2020 thts the best advice anyone can giv you at this present moment
 

anhminh

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You guy just don't understand do you? The game have autosave to anti savescum, it will never work with cloud save unless the game force people to connect to Internet to save which wouldn't bode well with the handheld aspect of Switch.
 

xdarkx

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Just an update to this article. Nintendo privated the original video and uploaded a new one

The most notable change is the small text at 25:42 from the original:
Only Switch Online Members can use this planned feature. You can only do this once.
to the new one:
More details on save data recovery functionality will be shared at a future date.

Most likely this was changed because of all the uproar from fans. Honestly, there isn't any good reasons to not have full cloud save support since this isn't a competitive game.
 
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entsd

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Can my sister and I play animal crossing in two separate switches through local play (No internet or wifi)?
 

Pluupy

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If you can only acquire patterns using the phone app, then if you pirate the game you might not be able to import patterns without homebrew...

I wish they had an option for people with mutliple switches to play on their own screens.

I am hoping we can customize our entire map. I want to make an archipelago or a desert town.
 
Last edited by Pluupy,

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