Animal Crossing: New Horizons

[Ararera]

On the bright side, you can keep the items in your mailbox until you need them to save on storage space.

Not so.  I'm at the 300 letter cap so often it hurts. I like writing and receiving letters, and I have a hard time knowing which ones to let go of to make space for new mail.

[Moonface]

I find a lot of letters from villagers are duplicates so I tend to try and find those to delete the extras.

[Karo]

I really should come back to it, but I'll admit my villagers are probably going to wonder why I disappeared for like a whole year already!

[ShiraNoMai]

I think the good thing about New Horizons is that villagers won't actually leave when you're away too long. The only real "punishment" is your island looks a mess from neglect. The villagers are like "man I haven't seen you in ages! Nice seeing ya!" And that's that

[Moonface]

Animal Crossing: New Horizons - Version 2.0 Free Update + Happy Home Paradise DLC Announced
The last major content update for Animal Crossing: New Horizons was detailed today during a dedicated Nintendo Direct, and it is bringing enough new content to fill an entire second island!



Here are the most notable highlights for the Version 2.0 free update. Keep in mind this list is not every single new feature coming in this update.

• Introducing Brewster's café, the Roost!
  Head to this quiet corner of the Museum to sit down with a cup of coffee and relax. Brewster will open the Roost after you've completed a certain favor for Blather's. You may even run into some island residents here, too. If you use the amiibo phone inside the café, you can invite other characters to join you by using compatible amiibo cards. If you’d like, you can even invite friends to your island and bring them to the Roost to enjoy relaxing cups of joe together.
  
• Visit mysterious new islands with Kapp'n.
  Take a boat tour with Kapp'n by finding him waiting down at the pier. During the trip he'll serenade you with sea shanties, and when you arrive at your destination you may find it has a different time of day or season to your home island, or it may even contain new flora that hasn't been seen before!
  
• Put together a tune with gyroids.
  Something new is waiting to be unearthed on your island. Dig in the designated spots and you may find a gyroid instead of a fossil! Use them to put together tunes with their unique sounds and customize them to match their surroundings.
  
• A market is coming to Harv's Island!
  Hate having to wait for the stores that inhabit your island plaza to come and visit? Are you wondering if you'll ever actually see Redd again? Wait and wonder no more because a market is coming to Harv's Island! Contribute Bells to the cause and familiar visitors on your island like Redd (who am I kidding this guy isn't familiar at all), Saharah and Kicks will have shops here now, and Reese & Cyrus’s shop will offer furniture customization that can’t be done through DIY workbenches. At Katrina’s shop, she’ll look at your fortune of the day, and Harriet can even teach you some different hair styles!
  
• Cook up new foods!
  Grow your own vegetables and use them to cook up brand new food items that you can use to decorate your kitchen or consume them to get a considerable number of strength points compared to eating the fruit that grows on your trees. You'll be able to grow tomatoes, wheat, sugarcane, potatoes and carrots to cook with!
  
• Decorate your house with new furniture and features!
  Jealous of those ceiling light's Brewster has in the Roost? Wish you didn't need to put that coffee table so far from the couch so you can still use the couch? Perhaps you'd like to divide a room up into more distinct sections? All your questions and concerns will be answered with the new decoration updates coming to interior spaces! You can now hang ceiling lights, erect dividing walls and pillars, and your villager can now squeeze into tight spaces. Check the video to really appreciate these new additions.
  
• Further support for island life.
  Nook, Inc. will offer further support for your island life. From group stretching at the plaza and bigger home storage, to the Resident Representative being able to establish ordinances like reducing the rate at which weeds grow or making all the residents get up early in the morning, there are more options to help you enjoy and adjust the island to fit your lifestyle.
  

Alongside the Version 2.0 free update, a paid DLC is also releasing on the same day: Happy Home Paradise! This DLC will cost $24.99, or you can access it as part of a Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack subscription, which will cost $49.99 for 12 months. Here are the notable highlights this DLC will bring to the game!

• Work with Lottie as a member of the Paradise Planning team.
  Clients with different dream vacation requests will visit a new resort area located in an archipelago, made up of several different islands, where the Paradise Planning team is located. You can talk to a client and find out the details of their requests for a vacation home, and then make their dreams happen!
  
• Design dream vacation homes.
  After choosing a location for your clients’ dream vacation home, you can design the interior where you’ll place designated furniture that was delivered ahead of time. As you continue designing vacation homes, you'll acquire various design techniques, from changing how the home is structured by adding partition walls and pillars to divide the space, to adding counters, ambient lighting and soundscapes to add depth to the room design, and more. The vacation home themes vary depending on the client, and many requests await your expertise. You can also decorate the exterior yard.
  
• Make remodeling and roommate recommendations.
  As you gain experience as a designer, more furniture will become available, and you’ll also be able to make more suggestions. These include recommendations like remodeling the vacation homes of clients you’ve helped previously with different furniture, or even recommending that two clients share a room together as roommates.
  
• Design facilities such as schools and restaurants.
  There are several vacant buildings on the island where Lottie’s Paradise Planning team is located. Lottie wants to make this island more robust and developed, so you’ll be able to help design facilities such as a school, restaurant and café.
  
• Get inspiration from the Happy Home Network.
  Capture photos of the vacation homes you design and save them to your catalog, which you can check out through the in-game Happy Home Network app in your NookPhone. From this app, you can also access the Showroom to view the building examples of designers from all over the world who have posted their creations online. You can follow the designers you like and view their samples for inspiration.
  
• Use amiibo to invite more clients.
  Usually your job is to look for clients on the resort who may be considering having their own vacation home, but if you use the current Animal Crossing series amiibo accessories, you can invite a specific client to discuss their vacation home. With amiibo, you can even design the vacation homes of busy individuals like Isabelle and Timmy & Tommy!
  
• Bring your techniques back to the main island.
  Techniques you’ve obtained through your work on the Paradise Planning team can also be used on your home island. Perhaps this will be a great opportunity for you to overhaul the design of your own home. And if you give island residents souvenir chocolate from Paradise Planning as a gift, they may become interested in what the archipelagos and vacation homes have to offer. Then, one day when you become a veteran designer with lots of experience, you will eventually be able to remodel residents’ homes on your island by making suggestions to them, too!
  

[ShiraNoMai]

Alright Nintendo, I know we've been bitching for like an entire year about your lack of support for this game. We were breathing that deep copium. You teased us Brewster for a direct coming up and we were ready to be happy there. But y'all came and delivered that and then some. That was honestly the tamest part of the direct.

[Moonface]

This Direct might be the best one I've ever seen just because it consistently kept raising the bar. Brewster went from the focus of the Direct to a footnote within the first five minutes.

The addition of interior ceiling lights and dividing walls makes me really happy because I hated the limitations no dividing walls had on bathrooms.

I'd like if the fast sculpting features of the DLC could be used on your main island because I hate how tedious making paths is, and I'd love to be able to lock trees into a certain age but that can at least be done by putting another sapling behind the tree at the stage you want it to stop.

Overall this update will definitely bring me back to the game. The amount of creative things on offer now is great and I like having more activities to do.

[queenzelda]

My only issue with the 'update' is that we're still are crafting one thing at a time and can't stack crafting more then one thing. Everything else I'm really looking forwards to. I also think it's funny that we're basically getting 'Happy Home Designer' with new npcs for New Horizons if you think about it (or if you decide to buy the dlc that is). xD

[Moonface]

Yeah, the lack of updates to crafting and inventory stacking is one of the main things I was disappointed to not see. It turned me off from fishing in the game because I hated that the clam things don't stack, and then you have to craft bait one at a time which does stack.
I'd also like to be able to release sea critters while swimming without having to catch a new one. It makes no sense that I can release something when I have a full inventory and catch something new, but I can't release them myself while swimming.

Are the new villagers only available with the DLC? I thought those would've been added for free since isn't there a feature where you can offer your villager to another player? My mind is foggy on it but I recall it slightly because everyone kept trying to sell off that one super popular cat villager.

[queenzelda]

Are the new villagers only available with the DLC? I thought those would've been added for free since isn't there a feature where you can offer your villager to another player? My mind is foggy on it but I recall it slightly because everyone kept trying to sell off that one super popular cat villager.

The super popular cat villager's name is Raymond.

The only new villagers you HAVE to buy are the Sanrio ones because those you can't find on islands and can only get through the amiibo cards. (Nor can you have the Sanrio characters to move into another town.) The new characters are a part of the free update, from how it came off in the direct. It's just people WANT them amiibo cards from season 5 cause the Raymond price on nookazon is outrageous. It's why Raymond in my town can never leave. XD

[Moonface]

That's the name. I've forgotten a lot of villager names from not following the game for almost a year.

Have you still been playing this game @queenzelda or did you drop off of it too at some point prior to this recent Direct?

[queenzelda]

Have you still been playing this game @queenzelda or did you drop off of it too at some point prior to this recent Direct?

No, I make Animal Crossing New Horizons a part of my daily routine. I get up, turn on my Switch and grab my mail, talk to my villagers, get the fossils for the day and buy what ever I don't have that's shown up in the Able Sisters. XD I've been doing nook miles stuff leading up to the update though so I can buy all the new stuff.

[Moonface]

Ah. Thinking of Nook Miles, I also wished this update would let you bulk buy from the Nook Miles machine and also not have to sit through the animations for the tickets that come out after every purchase. I'm just happy that I'll have something to spend my miles on again though; the regular island tours got dull really quickly and I just use those now to gather resources such as flowers and weeds.

[queenzelda]

I'm not sure if I like the farm aspect of the update but I do like the idea that I can at least cook food to eat if I want. XD But yea, getting nook mile tickets in bulk would be epic.

[Moonface]

I was already planning to make a farm area for pumpkins and flowers so being able to add more variety to that area is great for me, even if I never use the food for more than crafting furniture and decorations.

I really can't wait for the update though. I booted the game for the first time in 9 months the other day and was immediately bored because besides working on my island, there's just not much to do if there's no bugs and critters to catch for the museum and talking to my villagers is just dull because I've heard everything they have to say already.