I want to understand why some people despise New Horizons

[John Wick]

Honestly, I think it's because it has the means to be the perfect game, and the devs didn't go with that.

Everything is there!
The items, furniture, house styles, dead trees, mannequins, the missing PWP's like the windmill and zen bell, etc.

I think they want to see how desperately we want the NL items back, then hit us with paid DLC.

At that point, I'm out for good.

 

[Jinglefruit]

@Jinglefruit this game is missing far too much to have been in development since 2012 Do you have a source for any of these interviews? The one from around the time of the game's launch gave me the impression that only the bunny day update was ready to go.

That's what my biggest gripe with NH is, that it's missing so much for an animal crossing title on switch. The fact that there's only been one Nook's Cranny upgrade is bizarre to me (although as others have pointed out in previous threads, what's the point of a bigger shop if there's no increased furniture selection to go with it).

The game just feels like it's stalled, for me. I think the update system sort of put an artificial time lock on things. I still play every day, but some days it's just to water flowers or check the post. With older entries, that stage of play took years to reach, not months.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/03/23/nintendo-explains-philosophy-behind-animal-crossings-big-changes-like-gender-expression-terraforming/

That is the original interview after NH released where they stated working on NH from 2012.
The villager development one was sometime over the summer but I seem to have gone past it when looking and can't quite remember when abouts it was. It came before the 'how we design villagers' showcase here:

https://www.siliconera.com/nintendo...-new-horizons-lovable-villagers-were-created/

This one doesn't call out timings, however it is suspicious that they bring this up with such detail when we only have 8 new villagers. It would have been a better fit for ACNL where they added over 100, and clearly put a lot of work into differentiating between villagers and even added 2 new species.

 

[bebebese]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/03/23/nintendo-explains-philosophy-behind-animal-crossings-big-changes-like-gender-expression-terraforming/

That is the original interview after NH released where they stated working on NH from 2012.
The villager development one was sometime over the summer but I seem to have gone past it when looking and can't quite remember when abouts it was.

Thank you! I think I know the villager development one you're talking about.
So... development since 2012... And this is what they have to show for it... OTL

 

[Jinglefruit]

Thank you! I think I know the villager development one you're talking about.
So... development since 2012... And this is what they have to show for it... OTL

Updated my previous post(s) with a bit more, and the villager deelopment one. I know there was something over the Summer where they went into timelines of designing new characters and it was vastly misaligned with everything we know about their development loop. But yeah, they clearly have a very short working day if it took 8 years to make a game with less to do and less content than the original N64/GC game.

I would also say, take it with a grain of salt (in all respects!), because the AC producers also forgot that WW had online capabilities in another interview: https://mynintendonews.com/2020/06/...-as-the-start-of-the-series-third-generation/

 

[Eureka]

I can never really understand when people say the game is underdeveloped or lacking content. I really don't think majority of us would have hundreds of hours if that was the case. What they mean to say is it is lacking the content they want, which is fair enough I guess.

So... development since 2012... And this is what they have to show for it... OTL

What they have to show for it is the second best selling Nintendo game to date and for good reason.

 

[Manah]

I don't hate the game, it's just that it isn't what I want out of an AC game. Mind you, I've only played New Leaf before.

I generally enjoy games that let me collect a ton of things and use them for customization, so no issues in that department. The big difference, though, for me:

NL was a game I played daily for two years, because it felt like a place to live in. There wasn't actually THAT much collecting to be done, and I didn't even do much of anything building related outside of my house. But I had fun just existing in that world.

NH, on the other hand, does not feel like a living world to me. It's a building project. It's mine to shape and everything (and everyone) in it exists to serve as a piece of my creation. Sure, it's great to be able to build a place just like I want it. But it's just that. It doesn't work as a world independent of you, and as such feels artificial despite all the pretty things in it. And if I don't have new pretty things to collect or a project to work on, I don't feel like spending time there.


Edit: here's a comment I wrote on another site some time ago:

I'm not sure if incomplete is the right word, but the game feels less organic than New Leaf.

In NL, things just happened occasionally. Isabelle gave you items for smaller events, the badge guy (forgot his name) showed up for achievements, someone gets an idea for a new building, villagers are looking forward to big holidays (and in some cases you make preparations before the events starts, like collecting Halloween candy/costumes.)

In NH it's all menus. You buy special items from the Nook terminal, there's a strict one visitor per day schedule (new shops/functions just get added to that), and instead of learning about upcoming events through your ingame villagers we get update trailers outside the game and then the event is just there, without any build up. It all feels very artificial to me.

 

[-Blue-]

I doubt anyone here really hates/despises the game. Otherwise they wouldn't be sticking around. Most people are just disappointed at the end result so far.

Yes, there are things coming back with the updates. But it's close to 7 months and we haven't gotten the basic stuff that we know will come back like the roost and nook's 3rd upgrade. Animal Crossing had you watch your town progress (more so in NL) but now you just have to wait until a update trailer possibly drops it. You can work as hard on your island as you want or just come back a year later and we will all be getting the same prize. It's not really that rewarding and if there are not any prerequisites to get the Roost like there was in the other games it's going to feel a bit cheap.

The villager's have also been gutted considerably (as has the furniture variety) and interacting with them in the many ways the other games offered was always one of my more favorite parts. Now I just run past them because I can talk to them until they force me out of dialogue and I never get them to say anything unique.

This is also the least chill the series has been so far, for me. I remember getting my first burn-out with the scripted tutorial. It droned on for too long, if you ask me. There wasn't any reason why music had to be locked. I feel like this could had been handled better. I have enough resources now, but that was a slog getting everything done. Especially having to craft the first 3 villagers houses. That really didn't feel like the AC spirit to me.

I could get behind the whole two starter animals only if the way the others came was a bit different. I don't know, like instead of island jumping to find one they occasionally were walking around your island or shipwrecked on the beach like Gulliver. As it was, I was decking out their houses before I even started to do that with mine.


With that said, I still like playing it. But it's definitely not my favorite in the series. That may change depending on what they add and or fix in coming updates.

 

[Corrie]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/03/23/nintendo-explains-philosophy-behind-animal-crossings-big-changes-like-gender-expression-terraforming/

That is the original interview after NH released where they stated working on NH from 2012.
The villager development one was sometime over the summer but I seem to have gone past it when looking and can't quite remember when abouts it was. It came before the 'how we design villagers' showcase here:

https://www.siliconera.com/nintendo...-new-horizons-lovable-villagers-were-created/

This one doesn't call out timings, however it is suspicious that they bring this up with such detail when we only have 8 new villagers. It would have been a better fit for ACNL where they added over 100, and clearly put a lot of work into differentiating between villagers and even added 2 new species.

this is the most pathetic news I've heard in awhile. It's like they stopped working on it from 2013-2019 and then panicked and released whatever half assed thing we got. With how little features we have and how many things are missing, I fail to believe they were hard at work for all those years. It just doesn't add up.

 

[Jinglefruit]

I can never really understand when people say the game is underdeveloped or lacking content. I really don't think majority of us would have hundreds of hours if that was the case.

Idk, I have over 3000 hours in New leaf, heck I have like 1000 in HHD, and not once did I felt burnt out. I was severely crashing in NH at 500.

and instead of learning about upcoming events through your ingame villagers we get update trailers outside the game and then the event is just there, without any build up. It all feels very artificial to me.

Actually, this is a huge point. I currently know there is nothing I'm interested in going on until 31st of October, and after that 1 day, nothing until the next trailer tells me what's next. As such, it's highly unlikely I'll play more than 2-3 days before the next update releases in like 4 weeks.

this is the most pathetic news I've heard in awhile. It's like they stopped working on it from 2013-2019 and then panicked and released whatever half assed thing we got. With how little features we have and how many things are missing, I fail to believe they were hard at work for all those years. It just doesn't add up.

Well we did get 2 splatoon games in that time, so I wouldn't expect them to be nose to the grind stone the whole time, but still.

 

[Corrie]

Idk, I have over 3000 hours in New leaf, heck I have like 1000 in HHD, and not once did I felt burnt out. I was severely crashing in NH at 500.


Actually, this is a huge point. I currently know there is nothing I'm interested in going on until 31st of October, and after that 1 day, nothing until the next trailer tells me what's next. As such, it's highly likely I will be play more than 2-3 days before the next update releases in like 4 weeks.


Well we did get 2 splatoon games in that time, so I wouldn't expect them to be nose to the grind stone the whole time, but still.

That's fair. I just think that releasing a game before its clearly ready is just bad practice. I would have waited another year to get a better product than what we got. To me, the game can be classified as "a great start."

 

[Jacob4]

i definitely don't despise it but there are a lot of things i hate about the game

- forcibly stuck with hourly music that a lot of people including myself find mediocre or just flat out bad
- bad QoL decisions that should have already been fixed but just haven't been, making the game very tedious in places (crafting/customising is hell since you can't do multiples in one go, dialogue being unnecessarily long in many places, changing room in able sisters being bad because you can't buy multiple of the same type of clothing in one go, tool durability being a mechanic that cannot be avoided, only being able to scrap/build one bridge/incline per day and move one building per day, not being able to move a building to a place where the same building occupies space meaning you have to move it somewhere else entirely and then back to where you want it if you want to move the building like 1/2 squares, co-op being dumb, etc)
- very little incentive to have people come to your island or for you to go to other people's islands (the only things i can think of are just burning time which really shouldn't even count as a reason, "look at my island it so pretty" which is already more conveniently done via dreaming mechanic, playing your own mini games that you've created because there aren't any in the game for ??? reasons, or trading/giveaways)
- general lack of content that otherwise existed in ACNL (more shop upgrades, more buildings, furniture, etc)
- villager dialogue being lacklustre, there are so many ways they could have made villagers unique and interesting but they just didn't
- probably more things that i've forgotten

it's annoying because almost all the fundamental ideas of this game bar the ideas for multiplayer (or rather lack of ideas in terms of online multiplayer) are absolutely very good in my opinion, but the execution in many places was just wrong or lacking

that being said, i can imagine quite a few of the things i've pointed out could be remedied in later updates, really the game can only go up from here

 

[-Blue-]

This kind of thread comes up every so often. We all just have to agree that everyone is not going to 'love' or 'hate' the game or whatever is in question. These kinds of threads are good because no one should blindly praise or hate on something. There are flaws that should always be addressed, as is there are things they did right.

But to say this game is 'A steaming pile of crap with no redeeming qualities' or 'This is the best game ever, I can't fathom why anyone would criticize it' isn't helping anyone.

 

[John Wick]

I can never really understand when people say the game is underdeveloped or lacking content. I really don't think majority of us would have hundreds of hours if that was the case. What they mean to say is it is lacking the content they want, which is fair enough I guess.



What they have to show for it is the second best selling Nintendo game to date and for good reason.

Stats don't mean it's a great game.
It means a crapload of folks bought it, expecting it to be at the very least, on a par with it's predecessor.

It doesn't mean they liked it.

 

[-Blue-]

P
Stats don't mean it's a great game.
It means a crapload of folks bought it, expecting it to be at the very least, on a par with it's predecessor.

It doesn't mean they liked it.

You have to take in consideration, this also came out during the beginning of the pandemic when states were shutting down. The huge sales were that of the old-time fans and those who wanted to try something during their lockdown. The pandemic definitely helped with their sale numbers. It would had been nice if we could look into some alternate reality where covid never happened and see what the numbers would be.

This was also the first game of Animal Crossing that really got a social media scene. Most of the other titles kind of just slipped through the crack. It became a total rat race with everyone trying to show off their perfect island. I'm not sure how heavily affected that was due to the lockdown or because of the Switch's built in recording.

 

[Imbri]

I'm willing to go along with some of the QoL items people have mentioned - dressing room and bulk crafting limits. Those would be great to have (although the badges for crafting would have to be adjusted to compensate), but I can live with it.

Short answer is that a lot of people seem to want this to be New Leaf: The Island Version. It isn't.

We aren't supposed to have everything right away. It was a deserted island, to start. Six months or so in, I think we have a pretty good variety of items. The idea of things rolling out and becoming more sophisticated as time goes on makes sense. Things shouldn't be done, set in stone, or completed yet. Even my museum is about half full. That's what I think makes it a good game.

 

[GothiqueBat]

As someone yet to play the game, but watched hours of youtubers game play/ streams, to me this looks like a game I would personally absolutely love and have been dreaming for. Just also hopeing most of the flaws mentioned in this thread are addressed in future updates. -like the lack of furniture and NPCs, I'm sure they will come back.. I'm sure..

Would just like to add a point that no one has seemed to have mentioned that was made by my friends a couple of days ago who got the game around launch but one completely dropped it, and the other plays it but have a love/have towards it; (both played new leaf, not sure if any of the older ones)

If your a kid or someone who can't afford to get the online membership every month, that is already limiting the social element to the game and then on top of that, there's no meeting strangers and being able to chat for hours like there was in New Leaf on the island. -- that's actually how I met these said friends, and I know for a lot of people that online meeting strangers and talking was a massive appeal to some new leaf players, at least on the UK servers there was a community feel and I'd encounter the same people pretty often and it was nice to gossip, catch up and just have fun. The people I got close to, we ended up exchanging friend codes and often used the BFF chat to message daily. The joy of the going to a friend's Island and then meeting someone new, I'm sure is still a thing in New Horizons, but there was 'drama' in role-playing and we'd often exchange stories and hear about other people, then somehow meet them through another friend?? That's a kind of magical community that isn't their anymore in NH and at least for my friends I met in New leaf, that really killed new horizons for them.

But at the same time, there's forums like the Bell tree, that do provide that community feel, although a lot bigger and global, it is still there.
And from my POV that island feature was an exclusive feature to new leaf, other animal crossing games never had that, in the same way there's other things that only existed in the other games, like the game cube inside mini games and house gyroids, the city with the bus ride in city folk.. And the..... Uniqueness.... of the wild world...? (Lyle asking for health insurance maybe?)

Just if they do put anything in nh behind a pay wall im going to start a riot, I'm too poor

 

[Eureka]

Stats don't mean it's a great game.
It means a crapload of folks bought it, expecting it to be at the very least, on a par with it's predecessor.

It doesn't mean they liked it.

Yes, I'm well aware of that. However, more often than not things get hugely popular for a reason (usually it is because a large group enjoys the game). New Horizons has stayed at top of the sales too. Not like it had a huge release then dropped off because it was bad. It isn't everyone's cup of tea, that is fine. We all have personal preferences. To one person it's the best Animal Crossing game ever made, but to someone else it could be the worst.

Edit to add: The game has good reviews too across the board, to go with the insanely high sale numbers. Again, that doesn't mean everyone is going to like it though!

 

[-Blue-]

High sale numbers doesn't always mean something is flawless. And that is what we are saying, which you are ignoring. You even brought up the same point about the sale numbers.

You know what else had huge sale numbers, had a fanbase raving about it before it came out, and a year later I couldn't get a read on if it was worth it or not? The OuterWorlds. It was hailed as the messiah of what everyone hoped Fallout 4 would had become. I liked Fallout 4, but yeah it could had been better.

It was made by the company that created Fallout NewVegas which is seen by many fans as one of the better entries in the 3D Fallout series. Obsidian was kind of screwed by Bethesda. So when they announced they were working on OW, the game hadn't even launched and reviews were pouring it praising something that didn't even come out yet. They were throwing it on a higher pedestal than it should had been. I played it. It's alright. 6/10 at best, but for the longest time people were all over the place with the reviews. And the pre-release craze did not help.

Same thing when I watched the season 1 finale of Korra. I hated how they handled it. I was so disappointed that I went to a forum I frequent to see how everyone reacted. They loved it. I was sure I watched something different. They just didn't come off of their glow yet, as a few weeks later they started to realize how bad it was.

I like New Horizon, don't get me wrong. But reviews from when the game first came out, 1 year from its release, and at the end of its life are going to tell a story depending on how the content and updates are handled. At this point, if this is all they would offer us for this game and no more updates came, I'd probably give it a 6/10.

 

[Eureka]

High sale numbers doesn't always mean something is flawless. And that is what we are saying, which you are ignoring. You even brought up the same point about the sale numbers.

Huh? Please show me where I said high sale numbers = flawless. I never did because it isn't true, so I'm not ignoring anything. I strictly talked about how something is usually massively popular for a reason (ie a large group enjoys it). That doesn't mean it is flawless!

 

[Noel_in_Sunrise]

I know that there are people that want to have faith, and that is a totally legitimate perspective/ way of approaching things, but I worry when I see these people count on the future updates so much. There is no roadmap for the updates and no guarantees about which features will be added. The fact that they have not added multi-crafting yet makes me concerned that they don't intend to. I do not have any way of gauging what the game will be, just what it is.
I read an interview at some point where a developer for the game said that they would like to do updates for the next three years, but my suspicion is that updates will be much lighter after the first year. If I am right, we might have seen a much larger chunk of what is going to be added than people are assuming. I would like to be wrong about that, but I think the possibility is worth keeping in mind.
My theory is that the updates were originally intended to add in all the festivals, and then additionally the features they had partially finished at the time of launch. I cannot be sure that updates were intended to add major new features beyond those that were bring worked on before launch.
My point is that for those of us who do not have faith in the updates (I can't be the only one, right?), potential future updates do not soothe us about current problems that we see.