5 Things that New Horizons did better than the old games

[iamjohnporter67]

Okay I know this game has been getting a lot of criticism for the lack of content in the game and I fully understand it but lets try to acknowledge what this game did way better than the old AC games that nobody ever talks about so I am going to list the 5 things that New Horizons did better than the old games.

1. There is more Storage in your home: In old games you really had to use cabinets to store your items in it and it always felt limited on how much stuff you can store. In NH there is a whole lot more storage in your home and you can store a lot of things up to 2,400 items. Which is really cool. Would've been nice if there was a way to store turnips and diys but regardless the storage space was so much needed

2. You can shake trees while holding your Net: Something I found rather shocking is that in old AC games you couldn't like shake trees while holding your net so you had to put it away just to shake the trees which is bad because you can get a bee hive drop and then bees would chase you. If you download Welcome Amiibo in New Leaf you can actually shake the trees while holding a net so at least they got that right. In NH you can just keep your net and shake the tree at the same time. It felt so much better since you can catch those wasps if you ever see them coming at you.

3. Your villagers don't move out on their own without telling you: This is interesting because in old games if you don't play the game for quite some time one of your villagers sends you a letter telling you that they moved out. I can only imagine how people must've felt when their favorite villager left. In NH villagers will only leave when you see the thought bubble above their head, you talk to them they will ask you that they are thinking of moving out and you have the control to tell them yes or no. I made it so much more better to keep the villagers you want and not have the game force them out without you knowing.

4. Items stack automatically: I am really shocked when I replayed the old AC games that the items don't even stack on their own. You had to go into your pocket menu and stack them manually one by one. It felt time consuming to do that everytime. With NH the items you pick up like Fruits for example stack up automatically so you won't have to worry about stacking them yourself.

5. There is more Pocket Storage: I mean we've all been there in the old AC games where it was very limited how much stuff you can carry and you always have to go back to the shop to sell things that were taking up so much space and you always have to double check to see what you have in your pockets that are taking up space. In NH you can expand your Pocket space by using the Nook Mile shop when you first play the game. You can now carry up to 40 items which is really nice.

So yeah those are all the things that New Horizons does better than the old games. Just thought I would bring this to light because I get that this game is not perfect and there are stuff missing I will agree but lets just to take the time to appreciate the new changes made to the game if we are being fair. Are there any other changes in NH you noticed that improved from past AC games. I'm curious to hear the responses.

 

[Sara?]

I completely agree with you! and so i would not repeat your points my five take away from this game thus far are:

• Been able to decorate my island the way I want, I absolutely adore having control over my islands theme and been able to decorate the way I want for every season and season holiday, I just find this adorable.

• The ability to terraform, I mean this is just what many of us have been asking for ages now, I love to see all the different creative island variants that people create, I truly believe this is a 10 out of 10 feature.

• I love how Nintendo is apparently listening to its fine and adding bits here and there about things that fans like to have such as storage, hairs styles etc Hopefully we will se more of this engagement

• It mid sound a bit dummy but love how we can get Fish and Bug models, personally I don't like the fish that much but love the bug ones and really like to decorate the island with them. Fish and bug models is a new game integration, right? im not 100% sure.

• I also like the magic islands more than the one we had in NL ( Tortimer ) for the framing aspect i mean, i like having always different aesthetically island and to be able to find villagers to move it, giving us the control to choose, which although can be a bit tedious sometimes, is super useful for pp who do not have the amibo cards or the internet subscription.

I like that there is a threat of appreciation for the game, while there are tons of things we fans want to see and i guess will get it, It is also important to appreciate the things we have

 

[Serabee]

Yay, some positivity! Here are a few things I love (to add on):

1. Exterior decorating! Previous games had items that were literally made to be placed outside... but couldn't be placed outside. Sorry, I don't really want a sprinkler or pool in my house. But in my yard? Heck yes! The public works projects in ACNL were a start, but even those were so LIMITED. Now I can decorate outside however I please and I don't think I could go back to NOT being able to!

2. Having some input on villagers! (though them not moving without asking is probably the better change, thank GOD for that change) Before you MIGHT be able to ask a villager to move in from someone else's town, but you had to have a lot of friends or be active on forums like this. Back then, I wasn't. So I got stuck with a lot of villagers I HATED. Now the chances of a random move-in are much lower. Sure, it can still happen- but you can't say you weren't given a chance to find one on your own, even if it didn't work out. And you can do it all on your own, without involving other people unless you want to!

3. Being able to change your island's layout as you please, when you please! I reset my towns a lot in previous titles because I'd end up having something I disliked about the layout. While there are a few things you can't change in ACNH, more often then not, you can change whatever's bothering you! Even if I totally lose interest in my island, I have the option to basically "soft reset" and just terraform it all up and have a "new" island!

4. Going off the previous two- being able to place villager houses! How AWFUL was it to have a spot picked out for a second character, or the campsite, or a garden, or whatever... and a villager plopped their stupid house right in the middle of it before you could use it. Sure, ACNL lowered the chances with the update (since you could place down designs and villagers wouldn't move on top of them) but it still only gave you some influence, unless you were willing to cover your entire town and carefully measure out plots. And I know I wasn't going to waste time doing that.

5. CRAFTING. Holy cow, CRAFTING. It's SUCH a big part of this game that was 100% absent in previous games. Sure, there are ways the mechanic could be improved (like bulk crafting and more DIYs) but it still adds a whole new aspect to the game that I find really fun. It gives you a lot more to do, more stuff to collect, and more options for furniture (especially early in the game)

6. This one might be controversial, but... I actually like the updates. While I would have preferred more content in the base game (specifically the holidays, since I'm a TTer), I actually enjoy getting some content spaced out. In ACNL I had pretty much fully lost interest in the game when the Amiibo update was released- then I became obsessed again! Similarly, my interest in ACNH comes and goes, but having new updates and new content to look forward to really helps. There's also the fact that Nintendo updating means they can address bugs- I can't be the only one who remembers back when games shipped with bugs... they had bugs. And you just had to deal with them. Heck, it wasn't that long ago! Now, if there's a bug, you can pretty much rest assured it'll be addressed at some point.

 

[Bluebellie]

1. Expressions
2. Outdoor decorating
3. Easier villager house placements and easier villager maintenance ( not having them leave unexpectedly). This is by far the best feature.
4. Easier bug catching? I don’t remember catching tarantula and scorpion in the other games.
5. Ability to destroy rocks. I remember in new leaf I would have to plan out my whole map around the rocks.

 

[Sara?]

1. Expressions
2. Outdoor decorating
3. Easier villager house placements and easier villager maintenance ( not having them leave unexpectedly). This is by far the best feature.
4. Easier bug catching? I don’t remember catching tarantula and scorpion in the other games.
5. Ability to destroy rocks. I remember in new leaf I would have to plan out my whole map around the rocks.

Right !? i though i was crazy!!! catching tarantula and or scorpio in NL was like impossible !! they always attacked me asap

 

[Bluebellie]

Right !? i though i was crazy!!! catching tarantula and or scorpio in NL was like impossible !! they always attacked me asap

I know!
When the game first came around I caught the tarantula first and was upper exited! Then I just kept catching them. For sure I noticed the change right away!
The wasps are also easier since we can keep the nets equipped.

 

[Bilaz]

- House customisation and sheer beauty of the items actually in the game. I admit it took me a long time to get over the cut furniture but I’ve come to love my New Horizons house way more than any other houses I’ve ever built. There’s so much new stuff I really wouldn’t want to do without. I love how sophisticated all the furniture is.
- Villagers not leaving unexpectedly!!! I love this so much, this allows me to actually pick up and put down the game whenever. My New Leaf is sorta permanently on hiatus because I stopped a mover before I quit and I don’t want to bother finding the mover
- inclusivity!!! This doesn’t apply to me but I’m ridiculously happy about the new skintones and hair textures, this is such an important feature.
- Quality of life updates. I find it hard to play older games now without automatically stackable items and 40 pocket spaces.
- Crafting!!!! I love it!! I think gathering materials for furniture is incredibly fun, I really enjoyed building furniture myself!

 

[Splinter]

Place furniture outside.

 

[Darkina]

- Terraforming (LOVE it!)
- Destroying rocks (I spent a day moving all my rocks into my zen garden and I love it)
- Deciding where all buildings go, including villager homes (with the exception of Residential Services)
- Outdoor decorating - so much fun!
- Villagers don't move out without asking - I was so sad in NL when Stitches and Erik moved and there was nothing I could do

 

[Raven_]

• more storage space and inventory space, also more design slots
• the villagers feel way more alive than in new leaf even with all those repetitive lines. they compliment whatever you wear and even say that it's fitting for winter for example, they chase bugs and even have special dialogue when you talk to them during that, they look at butterflies passing by, they sing, workout, eat/hold things, they talk to each other way more than compared to new leaf.
even if some of these things were in new leaf as well, new horizons implemented them way better.
• being able to customize everything right away with the kits instead of having Cyrus do it (although I do miss him)
• being able to change up nearly everything thangs to terraforming and the ability to move buildings
• being able to buy clothes in different color variations thanks to the changing room at able's although it's tedious

 

[Coolio15]

Something I want to throw in that I don't think anyone has mentioned yet is the improved clothing quality (Looking back at older games, I never found most of the clothing to be appealing/didn't particularly care about how my character dressed or whatever, this game the clothing is so much more detailed, more realistic options, and is just really fun to mess around with!) AND the fact that we can dress up our villagers (I always hated when my villagers put on clothes that looked bad or ridiculous or whatever, so getting to change that this game is GREAT).

 

[iamjohnporter67]

Something I want to throw in that I don't think anyone has mentioned yet is the improved clothing quality (Looking back at older games, I never found most of the clothing to be appealing/didn't particularly care about how my character dressed or whatever, this game the clothing is so much more detailed, more realistic options, and is just really fun to mess around with!) AND the fact that we can dress up our villagers (I always hated when my villagers put on clothes that looked bad or ridiculous or whatever, so getting to change that this game is GREAT).

Yeah I will say now that we can change the way our character looks its a lot more better now. I feel like they made the customization to make your eyes and hair different just by answering questions really tideous. I'm glad they changed it to where if you want to change your look you can just use a mirror in your home.

 

[-Lumi-]

This is a really lovely thread! I can be pretty critical of the game, so it is nice to see some positivity and reflect on the things I do enjoy about New Horizons.

1.) Character customization. I love that they decided to change how our character's are customized and that we can continually change how we look, for free, whenever we want. I love that they added more than one skin tone, some new noses & mouths, and some new hairstyles!

2.) I love being able to break rocks. I love it so darn much, lol. It makes planning out pathways or little sections of my island for decorating so much easier and now my house placement can't be ruined by a rock.

3.) The clothes!! I love the clothes in New Horizons. In New Leaf I feel like 99% of the time my girl is wearing a QR code dress/outfit and the only item I've had to buy was my socks and shoes. They did such a good job designing the clothes and the shoes that I actually prefer to buy from the Able Sister's this time and I love the little bags!

4.) I love being able to move shops, the campsite, and my house. I remember being so nervous about placing my house, the campsite, and Brewster's in New Leaf because they were all permanent and I was afraid I'd pick bad spots and be stuck with it forever or have to reset. In New Horizons I love that if I have a new idea I can move the buildings to fit that.

5.) I love seeing my little villagers walk around with their cute bags, or with some soup/whichever food item, or do yoga/exercise or sing! It's adorable and it makes me so happy whenever I see it.

 

[maria110]

I agree that New Horizons does a lot of things right including all the things mentioned by iamjohnporter67 in the OP. I didn't play the old games though.

Here's the thing--I am a middle aged person who never played video games since childhood, except stuff like Angry Birds for the smart phone. (I tried Minecraft on the computer but never got into it; I don't like the art style.) For various reasons, I picked up ACNH. I had to get the help of a young person to learn to play it; I couldn't even figure out the controllers. I hadn't played on a console since Atari 2600, which had those simple joystick controllers. And I hadn't played a handheld electronic game since Merlin and Simon.

It allows for some creativity and building but isn't as difficult as Minecraft since you're not designing everything from scratch. It's somewhat open ended but not entirely since there are goals. You don't have to fight things or worry about dying. The graphics and art design are AMAZING for people who grew up with Pong and Space Invaders. (Yes, I had Pong. It was moving bars and a dot. It was thrilling to receive for Christmas but got boring very quickly.) ACNH is super cute for us oldsters that grew up with Hello Kitty and My Melody back in the day. I may be older but I still like things that are kawaii. But it's not too cutesy. A lot of the art and graphics are just beautiful.

I read an article somewhere in which someone from Nintendo is quoted as talking about how there is a mix of simple design and highly detailed design in the game and it's designed to evoke memories. It succeeds 100% at that. There are a lot of elements in the game that are reminiscent of good moments in life, like a visiting a great museum, seeing a perfect sunset or full moon, or hearing the sounds of the ocean. Plus, with multiplayer, you get to bond with your friends like in real life and share some laughs.

While I complain about the game's drawbacks a lot--not being able to craft more than one thing at once, etc--it's still for me a great experience and well worth the money.

 

[VanitasFan26]

As much as I given this game so much flack, I will say that yeah its true that every game of AC has its negatives and positives. I can appreciate New Horizons more for having better pocket/home storage, villagers with thought bubbles wanting to move out, items stack automatically, and you can shake trees while holding a net. Those things help shape up the gameplay a lot more better.

 

[Xara]

don’t believe that anyone has mentioned this yet but the graphics quality has improved so much?? i’m not dissing the previous games’ qualities at all okay, maybe a little but i’m genuinely still in awe of how gorgeous new horizons’ quality is.

 

[Masenkochick]

definitely agree that the new villagers moving out system is SO MUCH better than in New Leaf.

I’d add I love how they did clothing in New Horizons.
1) custom Designs are so much easier to make
2) sharing custom designs with others and searching for custom designs is so easy
3) I love the dresser and changing clothes in your home in New Horizon where you can try everything on and easily see how outfits look.
4) I love how the Able Sisters have multiple outfits you can try on before you buy in addition to ines in display
5) I love all the color options for clothing

 

[Sansy]

1) The graphics of NH are so beautiful! There was a moment over the summer where I didn't play NH for several weeks and when I picked it back up, I felt blown away all over again by how lovely the game looks.

2) Character customization is so much better than NL. Being able to pick from a variety of hairstyles and finally, being able to pick a skin color was a huge step in the right direction.

3) Speaking of character customization, I feel like there are so many really nice clothing items in the game. In NL, I really only rotated between like 2-3 different outfits but I find in NH, there is so much more variety of clothes I want to wear!

4) NO MORE PLOT RESETTING! Oh my gosh, I could not tell you how upsetting it was in NL when you'd not play for a little while, someone moves out, and then someone moves in and destroys your flower garden. Or your carefully planned orchard. Yeah, using custom patterns could prevent this but I always somehow messed up the spacing of my patterns and some random move in would plop down on sometimes I didn't want to see destroyed... Honestly, that was the biggest reason I hated random move ins more than the risk of getting an "ugly"/disliked villager.

5) All the ways we can decorate the island and the improved ways to decorate. You could use public works projects in NL, of course, but it was quite a pain in the butt to try to figure out where to exactly put the project. And sometimes you don't realize something doesn't look right until you've already spent like 100k+ bells to finish the project... That nooooooo one else in your town would donate more than 5 bells to. LOL

6) Seeing the villagers do more than just wander around.... Sometimes they'll be carrying little bags, or they'll have cute cups of tea, even soup in their hands! They'll exercise in the plaza, or you'll find one of them singing on the beach! I even went into Freya's house maybe a week ago and she was PLAYING the violin she had in the house to the music she had on her record player! I didn't even know they did that.

7) Being able to move buildings around including your own house. I always felt like I had to be ultra careful in NL where I was setting my house down because I knew if I didn't like it, there was no way to change it other than delete your whole save file. And while there are certain buildings you can't move in NH, being able to move the shops and museum is so great!

8) Being able to destroy the darn rocks. My NL town had some very lucky rock placement that never got in the way of my paths... except the ONE. ROCK. LOL Still drives me slightly crazy to think about.

 

[mirukushake]

A lot of what I like has already been said here, but the biggest improvement for me is to be able to give my character my natural skin color without having to tan in the summer.

 

[Monokuma73]

Okay I know this game has been getting a lot of criticism for the lack of content in the game and I fully understand it but lets try to acknowledge what this game did way better than the old AC games that nobody ever talks about so I am going to list the 5 things that New Horizons did better than the old games.

(...)

True, lot of criticism (valid one) is something, in some aspect every product deserves. But, what I truly believe most players, including myself only want to have ACNH better and better. Despite the criticism, obviously there are more than 5 thing this game is better than predecessors.

1. Exterior - decorating, terraforming - it something finally arrived and its really good. This should be implemented and it was.

2. You can shake trees while holding your Net: Something I found rather shocking is that in old AC games you couldn't like shake trees while holding your net so you had to put it away just to shake the trees which is bad because you can get a bee hive drop and then bees would chase you. In NH you can just keep your net and shake the tree at the same time. It felt so much better since you can catch those wasps if you ever see them coming at you.

I may be wrong, but if my memory serves me well, it was possible in NL as well as NH.

3. Villagers not moving out without permission. Not so sure if it's good or bad. From player perspective it's probably nice to have favourite animals forever, but for me it looks like taking away their freedom, where final decision is mine, not theirs.

4. Inventory management has been improved, but I would personally expecting more work towards it, but agree it's much better than before.

5. Pocket inventory is bigger, true. Good decision.