I'm calling it : don't expect new villager species in New Horizons

[Boccages]

We are less than 3 months away from the release of New Horizons. BTW, Happy New Year everyone ! We've watched the first TV commercial coming from Japan, and we have now the box art of the game. We've had 2 very detailed look at the game, and numerous screenshots to decipher.

I think this is it. New Horizons will be an HD version of New Leaf in a different setting (island life), with the added ability to craft tools, and furniture. I am not expecting Nintendo to announce fundamental new features in New Horizons. Crafting is New Horizons' big new addition to this series. The game will also add polish to many secondary features of the game : proper paths, more customizable clothes, the ability to tell villagers where you'd rather them build their own houses, etc. It's all good and dandy ! I like it.

Do you know what I also like : no new animal has been shown. To be more specific, no new villager specie has been shown. Not even on the box art. Do you remember how eager Nintendo was to show us the new hamsters and deers when showing early build of New Leaf. Take a look at New Leaf's box art. Yup, that's a hamster, and a deer showing up under the town tree.

Have we seen any new villager yet in Animal Crossing: New Horizons? Nope. We're all pretty confident by now that Animal Crossing: New Leaf + Welcome amiibo villagers will all be back. Piper was on that pamphlet Nintendo printed for Nintendo Live 2019, and now Carrie is in the Japanese TV Commercial. Good. Welcome amiibo villagers are back.

My angle is pretty simple : if Aya Kyogoku's team had added a new villager specie in New Horizons, we would have seen it by now. Either in the E3 promo, the Fall Nintendo Direct, or the box art. Especially, the box art.

Oh! There might be new villagers added to the Welcome amibo roster that's brought back for New Horizons. But, none of them will be brand new. If anything, they will be old MIA Animal Crossing characters we have not seen since Animal Forest E+ like Koharu, Gen, or Carrot. But, don't expect new NEW characters this time around.

I like it. We actually don't need new characters.

 

[TheRealWC]

I agree that it's looking like we aren't getting any new villager species this time around. We do know there are some new NPCs however (the Dodo pilot and a new beaver). This makes sense. Wild World added Monkey villagers, and City Folk merely expanded on the roster. Then New Leaf added Deers and Hamsters, with Welcome Amiibo adding new villagers and reintroducing some. I'd imagine we'll still see a few new villagers here and there, but Nintendo will be holding onto new villagers species until the next next game presumably late in this decade if the pattern continues.

 

[Mink777]

No reason to jump to conclusions. There is still plenty more about the game that they haven’t covered.

 

[moo-kun]

I'm not too sure... They've been pretty deliberate about showing us well known and popular villagers. Then, they do a species reveal on a real Dodo pilot who works for Dodo airlines (not a villager, I know but if they bothered to work on him, they bothered to work on others once their creative minds ran on overdrive!) in the cover art! ( ✧︎Д✧︎) ｷﾗｰﾝ

I've been saying they'll definitely do a welcome back for characters that should not have been left behind! You might have to unlock some villagers (or species) with progress and others with cards which = ??? ଲ(⁃̗̀̂❍⃓︎ˑ̫❍⃓︎⁃̠́̂)ଲ

They put the date back for the release so I'm not going to say they aren't going to add more species yet until they point blank tell me they aren't adding any yet they could always do a big update like they did for new leaf - they might go down this path to keep us interested? _: (? ཀ`」 ∠︎):_
They could drop this on us next direct but I'm also not going to get my hopes up.
I'm a dreamer so I'll just keep dreaming until it happens one day〜 ˁ̡̡̡∗︎⁎⃙ ̫⁎⃙ˀ̡̡̡ ̩˳♡⃝︎

 

[DrewAC]

I wouldn’t rule anything out. We’re 3 months away from the release, and only today did we finally see the box art cover and two new characters who are going to be playing a big role in the game.

Nintendo has been holding out all this time, and I think we will start to see a big surge in Animal Crossing news as soon as this upcoming week until the game’s eventual launch.

 

[AlyssaAC]

We haven't seen very much as in for news, so I still believe there might be some new villagers. Nintendo kinda likes to keep things hidden till the game comes out, just to keep players interested in the game till release date. If they don't add any new villagers, then that's fine too. It doesn't really matter too much for me, but I know everyone else would love to see new villagers. So I'm not jumping to any conclusions.

 

[John Wick]

I've never expected a new species.

I don't really care if there isn't any.
Just keep the old ones.

 

[Ably.Saucey]

I'm inclined to agree with you, however I would like some of the older villagers re instated, I want huggy again! But the subject is now a dead horse, they're being very, very quiet about this game, there's no point guessing or making all out statements either way, there's simply not enough info yet.

 

[Ossiran]

Way too soon to make that call. There's still so much we don't know. I'd think Nintendo would wait until the last moment to reveal any new species because that will hook people. If they reveal it too soon, they'll just be bombarded with countless requests for X species and people will be upset if it doesn't happen.

 

[Dim]

Still on about this?

 

[Ably.Saucey]

Still on about this?

took the words out of my mouth.
Course! can't let a perfectly good dead horse go to waste.

 

[Boccages]

took the words out of my mouth.
Course! can't let a perfectly good dead horse go to waste.

I’m actually surprised that we will apparently not get new species of villagers. Are you? I’ve just read that the owner of this forum, Justin, has actually come to the same conclusion I have.

 

[Ably.Saucey]

I’m actually surprised that we will apparently not get new species of villagers. Are you? It seems this horse is alive and kickin’ and Nintendo even bet money on it.

I didn't mean to come of as confrontational, I'm sorry. The dead horse being if there's new villagers are not.
My point is, if you'd be surprised if they don't come out with new villagers, why go on about how there shouldn't/won't be new villagers? If there is, that's swell, if not, ok. there's nothing we can do.
They've added and removed villagers every mainline game so far, but like you said, it would be more surprising if they don't add anyone at all. We know nothing about villagers at this point, we know so little that same info keeps getting hackneyed about, discussed and argued over, that's it's become moot.
Do I expect new villagers? No, not really. It would be nice, but from the info we have, it looks like we can have only 3 or 4 villagers, which I dearly hope isn't the case because that would be a huge bummer.
I think people would be happy if there was just more spots for villagers, like 15 + as in Game Cube.
This game holds many surprises, for sure!

- - - Post Merge - - -

I would like snake villagers. if it were possible...

- - - Post Merge - - -

And foxes, lioness', ferrets...

- - - Post Merge - - -

, I know it probably won't happen, it's all wishful thinking and figments of my imagination.

 

[HopeForHyrule]

The only thing I was hoping for was an uchi hamster. But if they don't include one...whatev. There's plenty of pre-existing characters to choose from. And now that they're only allowing one town/island per Switch, well...just gonna have to be more selective this time around, lol.

 

[jefflomacy]

I wouldn't be offended in any way if this is the case. There are 76 villagers stranded in Animal Crossing/Animal Forest e+ still that I would prefer to see ported before I would want to see new villagers.

Villagers such as Rio, Belle, Huggy, Woolio, Rollo and others. Unfortunately some of them have conflicting names, such as Carmen the mouse versus Carmen the rabbit, so I'm not sure what they'd do about those. But all of the designs are great.

 

[grooviestbaby]

I think it's still too early to make that call for certain, but who knows? You may be right. I think Nintendo has a lot of new surprises under their belt for this game. They haven't given much information out at all about NH. I guess we will just have to see!

 

[Corndoggy]

i would be fine with no new animal designs, as i would love to see some of the retired villagers make a come back (since i haven't played gamecube i would especially like to meet some of the infamous villagers like woolio) and i would love for champ from wild world to come back. However, completely off topic, i had no idea that the hamsters and deer were only introduced in new leaf, so thank you for that bit of info, however it does make sense considering how clean and modern fuschias design is.

 

[Boccages]

To be more precise. I don’t think new species will be added. Nintendo could always add back in a handful of old villagers back and even a few new villagers in existing species. I could be wrong, and Nintendo could be holding back informations. But it seems unlikely to me at this point. Those are my thoughts.

 

[Abyrae]

I still want a smug cat villager. I don't care if it's a new villager or an old one they bring back and decide to change to the smug personality.

But yes, while I was hoping for fruit bats as a new species, the lack of news about NH having new villagers kinda put a nail in that dream's coffin.

Although yeah, now that I think about it... Lionesses! Would love at least one female lion villager. C'mon, Nintendo.

 

[nintendofan85]

To be completely honest, this wouldn't surprise if this was Nintendo's decision, and if it was, I wouldn't necessarily be disappointed. New Leaf, after all, was the first Animal Crossing game to ever introduce new species.