Anyone else concerned by "Last FREE major update"?

[DarthGohan1]

Am I a little bit unhappy there won't be any more fresh content updates coming to ACNH? Absolutely.

But I've put well over 100 hours into the game, my friends who have the game have put 2-300+ hours into it... so in no way do I feel like we got shorted by Nintendo. ACNH is a fantastic game, had some free updates for a year or so, and while I only play off and on now, can't really complain with what we got.

 

[Brumbo]

The issue that Nintendo sees with that - as well as other companies - is the one and done method leads to less discussion.

I'm going to use TV because thats an easy frame of reference for me. Netflix always drops their content with the full season at a time. Many people binge it - so theres a bunch of articles all at once, and discussion, and then...2 weeks later, its done. No more discussion (AKA free advertising). Compared to a weekly release - every week theres articles about that episode, and whats next. And people message their friends, and talk at work, etc etc. "Did you see what happened? Whats gonna happen next week?" etc etc. Often viewing numbers go up every week as people tell their friends to tune in or people want to know what everyone is talking about.

(Obviously Netflix prefers their all-at-once model, but its a big debate between consumers who prefer to binge on their schedule and the fact that most of the other streamers do weekly releases (Hulu, Amazon Prime, etc.)

Its the same with video games. Every time Animal Crossing does an update, Polygon and Kotaku and AnimalCrossingWorld etc etc etc write articles and people text their friends about the new things and post on Instagram with new features...Free advertising. With games, it also has a few other benefits - longer to work on specific features and player feedback on what they like/is important to them (like the changes to the Bunny day spawn rates).

Business is a tug of war between what is best for the consumer and what is best for the company. You may not want your experience to be effected by Nintendo (and most companies) wanting free advertising...but thats how big companies work nowadays.

Yeah but look at how long people played ACNL and all the older games, people STILL talk about and play them
I get what you're saying, but, if that's their goal it doesn't really make a lot of sense. If you have a great game people will talk about it.

 

[Orius]

Yeah but look at how long people played ACNL and all the older games, people STILL talk about and play them
I get what you're saying, but, if that's their goal it doesn't really make a lot of sense. If you have a great game people will talk about it.

Businessmen, even game company businessmen, don't go out of their way to make great products these days. They go out of their way to make profitable products. There's a key difference to that. "Great" is subjective. Profit can be more easily managed and calculated.

 

[QueenOpossum]

Yeah but look at how long people played ACNL and all the older games, people STILL talk about and play them
I get what you're saying, but, if that's their goal it doesn't really make a lot of sense. If you have a great game people will talk about it.

New Leaf sold just under 13 million in its lifetime, with the 3DS itself selling about 75 million.

New Horizons sold over 32 million (more than double) in less than two years. The switch itself has sold about 90 million.

Over 1/3rd of switch owners have NH, compared to like, 20% of 3DS users. ACNH is the second best selling switch title - beating out Mario, Zelda, Smash, and even Pokemon. (Pokemon is the BIGGEST media franchise in the world). (ACNL was the 6th best selling 3DS title).

ACNH was huge for the series. Previously, it was much more niche.

 

[Faux]

Yeah but look at how long people played ACNL and all the older games, people STILL talk about and play them
I get what you're saying, but, if that's their goal it doesn't really make a lot of sense. If you have a great game people will talk about it.

People played it religiously because it was the best for its time. Maybe to some people, it still is and will always be. Either way, NL is also easily accessible to almost everyone now due to the prices of the 3DS vs the Switch, and 3DS carts to Switch game prices.

Also, it's important to note that NL had a huge update right before the death of Nintendo acknowledging the game exists. The WA update brought back a ton of people, and brought enough content that people stayed for awhile.

Once the 2.0 update drops, give NH several years.
I guarantee you that the same people willing to keep playing NL for 9 years to now are going to find the same playability in NH, unless the ONLY thing that kept them playing was the multiplayer games, because frankly, that's the biggest difference in NH and NL at this point post 2.0 update.

Everyone getting burnout on NH is very likely because we've never been in this social situation. We've never been in a worldwide pandemic like this where the only thing to do is stay home, or go to work, or go to school. We're gaming more now than we had the freedom to when NL came out ( as a generic whole ).
So yeah, of COURSE you're going to hear a lot of people saying they're bored.

These situations just are not comparable and people need to stop pretending they are.
NH is a good game. Everyone and their mom who keeps pulling the whole but New Leaf had-- needs to get over the fact this game is not New Leaf Rebooted, it's New Horizons. A new game. It's not a repeat and expansion upon NL. It is literally its own thing, like every other game in the franchise has been. Things get added, things get dropped. That's the reality of life.

/sorry for the rant, I just get really tired of seeing these takes and this might have come off topic from your initial post, but wowie zowie.......

 

[Akeath]

Honestly, I feel like I could want "more, more more" forever. But Nintendo doesn't have the resources or time to put endless money, ingenuity, and effort into one project. And I think it's okay if they are trying to profit off all the work and effort they put into creating this game. I don't begrudge them that, and I don't begrudge their constantly looking toward the next big project, whatever that happens to be. That's how they stay viable as a company and that's how all the people they employ can make a living creating video games. I have nearly 700 hours on this game, which is really a huge amount of value per dollar spent even before taking into account the 2.0 updates and the DLC.
At the end of the day I think New Horizons is a cute, clever, imaginative game that balances well between having things Animal Crossing is known for and adding fresh things so that the game has its own flavor. They wanted the game to be a cohesive journey and so they had to choose one fork in the path over another to make it into a journey worth going on. With 30 million fans it's a give in that not everyone would have chosen that same fork in the road if they'd had the option. There are still some things that I'm a bit dissapointed that they aren't going to include - like models for diving creatures. But in a way, it's freeing to be able to stop hoping for particular things to be added month after month and instead just accept that this is what the game is and put my energy into enjoying what the game does do well.

 

[allainah]

Honestly I think everyone has their own opinion? and at the end of the day we're all kind of stubborn and trying to convince someone to agree with our side of the argument. Then they're doing the same thing. It's an endless cycle. Who cares. Why are we writing novels of arguments.
I will buy the new DLC because I think it looks nioce.

 

[-Blue-]

New Leaf sold just under 13 million in its lifetime, with the 3DS itself selling about 75 million.

New Horizons sold over 32 million (more than double) in less than two years. The switch itself has sold about 90 million.

Over 1/3rd of switch owners have NH, compared to like, 20% of 3DS users. ACNH is the second best selling switch title - beating out Mario, Zelda, Smash, and even Pokemon. (Pokemon is the BIGGEST media franchise in the world). (ACNL was the 6th best selling 3DS title).

ACNH was huge for the series. Previously, it was much more niche.

Covid played a huge factor in that. If it weren't for lockdown we don't know how well it would had sold or if people would had been so lenient on them and their barebone launch. I think people forget about that because I was working like crazy through all of that time and so I didn't need a game to fill in a time gap. So I rarely picked the game up as much as I did the previous entries.

Once the 2.0 update drops, give NH several years.
I guarantee you that the same people willing to keep playing NL for 9 years to now are going to find the same playability in NH, unless the ONLY thing that kept them playing was the multiplayer games, because frankly, that's the biggest difference in NH and NL at this point post 2.0 update.

If NH had this content since launch or dropped it evenly through the year/7months I don't think so many people would've had an issue. It did feel like early access for the game. It's cool that a lot of people enjoyed it for what it is, but a lot also wanted more that they knew was coming from datamines as early as 2020. So I don't know if they were done or just sitting on them or what.

The game has such a divide though. You can be on one side or the other and dislike the other group, but you can't ignore how divided we are/were. When this update comes it will definitely lessen the gap. A lot of this stuff coming in the newest and possibly last update are a lot of the things I wanted from the beginning. Like villager visits is something simple that I feel could had been implement so much earlier. But we are getting it opposed to never, so I am glad for that.

And there are things they stated they didn't show in the trailer. So it will be fun to experience those secrets to. Whether they are big or small and I'm going to try to stay away from spoilers so I can actually experience it spoil free.

 

[peachycrossing9]

Not concerned because its the last update we will be getting period. Nintendo has confirmed this. They aren't going to support the game after November 5th it sounds like. Do I want more? Eh, kind of but at the same time I'm very happy and grateful for what's to come on November 5th.

 

[princess.looking.for.frog]

well, it's the last major update, forever. I'm now sad about it, even though I haven't even played v.2 yet. gosh I'm disappointed. I would've liked even paid DLC after this update. I hope they still make updates though, because this one is so MAJOR I hope they still have room to make minor updates every now and again. not adding like 2 items, maybe some sets occasionally, or new villagers maybe? I doubt new villagers but I can hope. how much I hate Nintendo's business plan and treatment of customers :/

a article about it:

Animal Crossing: New Horizons Disappointing News Officially Confirmed by Nintendo

Nintendo has officially confirmed some disappointing news about Animal Crossing: New Horizons as far as Animal Crossing fans on Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch Lite, and Nintendo Switch OLED are concerned. On November 5, Animal Crossing: New Horizons‘ first paid DLC, Happy Home Paradise will...

comicbook.com

 

[Airysuit]

...
Not expecting anything from other farming games, like having animals, pets – or exploring mines, as it will not serve any purposes and would change idea of the game itself.
...

I know this won't happen and lots of people might not want this to happen, but how fricking cute would it be to have a little, simple animal crossing style mine and pickaxe to find ores and iron and gold (so stones would only deposit stone and clay). With little fairytale-like ore twinky lights and stone structure walls. I don't like mining per se but if they do it right and truly a la animal crossing it could be really cute and magical!

 

[Bugs]

A lot of people seem to be arguing about whether or not New Horizons is worth the money or if it's better than New Leaf

For me personally, I've got way more enjoyment out of New Horizons than any other animal crossing game. I think it's because for me I always felt restricted with new leaf (and older games) cause you couldn't really customise the town the way you wanted to without weird tricks and stuff.

I've put over 500 hours into the game, so I definitely got my value for money. I'll be buying HHP because I think it'll add even more features that I know I will spend a lot of time on (cause I played HHD quite a lot) and if they did make more DLC, I would buy it if it added the same level of substantial features

 

[Raz]

I'm at peace with it, really. I mean, even before the update and the dlc were announced, I already had 650+ hours of play.

For reference, in Battlefield 3, which is one of the games I played the most in a console (I'm not counting my time in the arcades because KoF alone took some serious years of my life, and I can't also count my time playing Diablo 2 or Championship Manager on pc because it wouldn't even be a fair comparison), I had around 600 hours. Mind you, that's a purely multiplayer game (I'm not counting the 5 hours in campaign mode) that I played religiously for three years.

NH is clearly one of the games I played the most in my life, and without a doubt, it makes my list of top 10 most played games in the last decade. I think it's reasonable to expect that I'll play it for at least some more 250/300 hours after the update and dlc drops. That means almost 1k hours of play in a single game, more than half of it during it's "early access" period. When I put all this in perspective, I can safely say I'm ok with it. I played a lot of NL, but I don't think I played it for 200 hours.

 

[Moritz]

I've put over 500 hours into the game, so I definitely got my value for money.

This is the thing that gets me the most when I see people say its not worth the money.
At 500 hours, if the game cost you £60, then you have paid £0.12 an hour.

That is absolutely incredible value.

I can understand people taking issue with the purchase if they gave up on it after a few hours.

But for those who have anything over 200 hours in the game, they got great value for their cash.

So this being the last update doesn't bother me at all.
Sure I'd like it to go on forever. But nothing ever does.

 

[windloft]

A part of me honestly doesn't want the updates to end, but I think a lot of us share the sentiment that it has to end eventually. I think people feel this way largely due to not only how well the game did, but also because the way they did updates made people feel like the game was lacking in content - barring the factor of the pandemic being a Thing that made people play the game a lot more than what they were 'supposed to'.

If this is the last content update that we get? I'm totally fine with that. We're getting a lot of features: cooking, growing crops, new furniture, and returning features 'n characters - this isn't even keeping in mind the DLC! Granted that even the direct mentioned that there will be 'surprises' they couldn't show in a 20-minute viceo, so who knows what else we'll get. Granted, we'll get small updates consisting of bug fixes and maybe QoL changes 'n inclusions, but... I do think that people'll be playing ACNL for a good while ; it's the case with NL, and will remain as such even when new mainline games release.

I'm keeping my expectations low : maybe they'll decide to add in some more content in trickles, or every once in awhile, but i'm otherwise happy with this update and what it may include. It's a nice 'last hurray'.

 

[StarlitGlitch]

Our Animal Crossing World published an article called, "Nintendo Re-Confirms No More Major Free Or Paid DLC Coming To Animal Crossing: New Horizons" which makes it pretty clear like the Japanese version. Glad we can finally put this to rest.

 

[Blueskyy]

I think it means they’re going to focus any future updates on Happy Home Paradise.

 

[Moritz]

Our Animal Crossing World published an article called, "Nintendo Re-Confirms No More Major Free Or Paid DLC Coming To Animal Crossing: New Horizons" which makes it pretty clear like the Japanese version. Glad we can finally put this to rest.

My personal opinion is they worded it that way so that no one could call them out should they chose to make a few cross over items later to promote another game or something like that.

I'm 95% certain the updates are fully over now.
And im great with that.

No more waiting around to see what happens

Those who loves the game get to keep playing it.
Those who don't get to move on knowing they won't get what they want so there is no reason to hold on to the game in hope of something

Its best for most everyone

 

[StarlitGlitch]

My personal opinion is they worded it that way so that no one could call them out should they chose to make a few cross over items later to promote another game or something like that.

I have heard other people say that too and it makes sense. Either way there could've been complaints *shrug*

As others have said, I'm pretty content with not getting anything new. Even though there are things I wish were added back to the game or that I think should've been different from the start we're still getting a huge chunk of new content.

 

[Moritz]

I have heard other people say that too and it makes sense. Either way there could've been complaints *shrug*

As others have said, I'm pretty content with not getting anything new. Even though there are things I wish were added back to the game or that I think should've been different from the start we're still getting a huge chunk of new content.

Yeah I really wish we had mini games back so we could play with friends.
But other than that I can't think of a single thing we are missing.

Sure people might say we are missing some npcs, and yes they're not in the game.

But the functions they served are.
So it's basically a few fun option menus we are missing.

With this update, minus multiplayer, wow did we get it all