What are your hopes for the next Animal Crossing game?

[Squidward]

I'd just like to see this series return to its roots. Villagers with personality, a great soundtrack, little things to do every day instead of simply decorating your island and then promptly abandoning it.

 

[Dunquixote]

what I want the most besides better interactions and dialogue with the villagers is better furniture and no recycled items (like redoing some of the sloppy set items to make it look a little different; I didn’t like that). The events be more fun. I’d like it if some more npcs returned like Gracie, Resetti; I always thought he was funny when he got mad at us for not saving.

If not a new game, I wouldn’t mind New Leaf brought to the switch and if they sold welcome amiibo packs again (and do a better job managing that) since I’m still missing some and some series 5 cards.

 

[Nuguns]

back to the roots of AC where less is more, The phone which made everything available where ever you are made me feel lazy. Make me try for things! I want to bank at the town hall

For god sakes give us nookingtons again, we want to support small businesses to their flourishing glory

which brings me to this; the economy was so poor I was filthy rich in no time with nothing to spend on, I guess it was on an island. The crafting was ok if it were more simplified and less cornerstone. The whole game felt like an alpha test ground kinda where it lacked direction.

The truth is, the original AC is the best game, I grew up with ACWW and havent even played ACpg yet, I think the music is better which I never discovereduntil recently, which the music in each game has gotten less good each release.

Id bet that we all want the same game from where it started in a new iteration, better graphics and better mechanics. Im trailing off, maybe ill make my opinion more official later

 

[McRibbie]

tbh I think a lot of NH is going to be exclusive to NH, because the entire theme is “move to a deserted island, make things from natural resources, and do whatever you want with the place” and basically every feature in the game links into that, in the same way every feature in WW links into “move into a town and get to know the people that live in it” or the way every feature in NL links into “you’re elected the mayor, see how the town grows underneath your leadership”

I think there’s going to be a different central theme entirely, with different features relating to that.

I don’t know what it’s going to be exactly. As I’ve said before, I feel that if they treat NH as either a complete success or a complete failure and either coasting on that or rehashing an older game in the series, it has the possibility to end up coming across as kind of meh to me.

It ultimately needs to feel different enough to NH so that you’re not stuck with two very similar games playable on the same system, while not coming across as just horrible grovelling… and that’s a hard one, tbh. But I hope they somehow pull it off, nonetheless!

reposting what I said upthread because I ultimately think doing a big wishlist of stuff treats the stuff that's in Animal Crossing as just Content that's been put there because "hey, it's a good idea" rather than stuff that has a specific purpose... but at the same time, I can't resist going "hmm, what would I want?" even if I'm coming up with a bunch of Content because I don't really know what the game's focus or central theme is, and I don't know what the features of the Swuccessor that the game will utilise are so... aite, let's pull out the bullet points:

• I have mixed feelings on the house sizes in NH. On one hand, not having 8x8 rooms all over the house kind of sucks. On the other hand, for certain types of rooms (like bedrooms), having 6x6 or even 10x6 rooms are ideal. I tried remaking my bedroom at the time in one of the rooms at Harv's Island back in early 2021 and it felt weirdly cavernous, and when I moved it upstairs to the 10x6 room it worked a lot better when I'd put the partition wall in and built a little bathroom. But, I don't really want something like NL where you upgrade every room like you would the main room, because you end up having to raise so. much. money... so instead, I'd like something where once you've paid the main mortgage off and had your full house built, you could pay Tom Nook to resize the side rooms and other floors to whatever size you need (for a variable amount of Bells depending on the total floor size), similar to the house resizing feature in HHP. Make the left wing of your house a 4x10 hallway that goes absolutely nowhere, the right wing a 6x8 kitchen, the back room a 6x6 rumpus room, the upstairs a 10x8 attic room for your bedroom and bathroom, and the 8x10 basement full of random junk. Also feel like the main room of your house isn't going to be adjustable, and has either got to be 8x8 or 10x10, because having a 4x4 main room largely consisting of doors would be slightly silly.
• also mixed feelings on the whole "each individual wallpaper's got windows of its own" thing, because a lot of them... don't have windows at all! (Admittedly, I will freely admit a large portion of the ones that had windows when wallpapers were just simple textures also look hilariously awkward in hindsight) But others that have windows sometimes end up with windows that I'm often not a fan of. I like the green-paint wall a lot because it's quite a nice shade of green, but I'm put off from using it in my bedroom because there's no curtains on it whatsoever. Again, I'd like it if I was able to buy different curtains or be able to change the design of my windows somehow, even being able to put (purely aesthetic) large windowed doors in there somehow because god, they'd work so well with the lattice wall (you could create a little porch on the side of your house)
• weather vanes on your house (a la the one you can get in GC for completing your fish collection) would be pretty nice?
• while I think moving the game into a city setting in its entirety is very much No, This Is A Game Set In A Forest (if you're going "oh, but what about NH? That's set on an island!" The island's ultimately just a big forest without any cliffs surrounding it.) and I'm also going to be controversial and say "Animal Crossing should have at maximum 2 shops in the village, alongside something that functions as a post office, a museum and whatever Copper and Booker do", I'm very much up for having a city area that you head off to on a train or something (and I especially want something like Shibuya, because it contrasts with the sleepy village setting and I'm generally a fan of Inkopolis Plaza from Splatoon, which is also quite Shibuya-y). However, I also don't think that having shops for every NPC character in existence is a good thing! I think certain characters work better as travelling NPCs, like Saharah (who is explicitly a traveller from the desert), Kicks (he's so Cockney urchin coded that giving him a physical shop feels kind of off, tbh), Redd (you're telling me a dodgy black-market dealer stays in the same plot all the time? Where the cops can catch him?) and Leif (both because just having him as Flower And Plant Guy in the corner in NL felt kind of pointless given he offered a wider variety but overall smaller selection compared to Tom Nook, and because Leif's flower barrow's quite charming imo)... so I'd appreciate having a little market area (either a stall outside in the plaza or something similar to the Goldenrod Tunnel from Pokémon Gold/Silver) that turn up on a random day in the weeks they're not in your village, similar to how Harv's Island works (but without them being permanently there when they're not on your island, because it gives the illusion that they're out travelling elsewhere). Maybe even Katrina (but imo, she's a character that suits both Having An Actual Shop and a tent). But at the very least Gracie (or ideally, Gracie's Underling with Gracie very occasionally) or Label; Reece and Cyrus's combination Online Auction House/Customisation Shop and the Happy Home Academy as actual shops... maybe also give Shrunk and DJ KK a radio station? (again, this is coming from Pokémon Gold/Silver, but also Frasier given Shrunk is kind of Frasiery, isn't he?)

• once again, increasingly feel as if Tortimer Island's minigames are mostly comprised of stuff you can do online anyway if you're creative enough. Competitive fishing, competitive bug catching, competitive finding a specific colour of flowers... if not for the Whack-A-Cornimer On A Mower, the balloon-popping minigame and the "find a specific piece of furniture in a house" minigames it would be entirely composed of stuff you can do with friends anyway.
  
  So I'd really like something that felt minigame-specific, and more specifically something like the GBA minigames from e+, where you can play Red Light, Green Light; donjanken (essentially an athletic version of Rock, Paper, Scissors played in Japan) and dodgeball with villagers, but this time it's In Actual 3D and you can also play with friends who come round to your village (like group stretching or the Fishing Tourney in NH).

  this is still my feeling on minigames: if there's going to be any, they've got to both involve your villagers and not just be stuff you could do with your friends anyway if you've got a timer and an idea. However! If it does just end up being stuff that you could do in your village anyway: don't just have it be summer stuff! Roll up the biggest snowball possible and try and break the other player's! Catch as many cherry blossom petals or maple leaves as possible! Gather as many acorns as possible, but don't pick up any rotten acorns! Hell, even an Animal Crossing-related quiz a la Quiz Show from amiibo Festival! Have Tortimer have a grand old building covered in statues of himself in the city area to host it in, bringing back his slightly shady and egotistical sides (you remember giving money to Boondox? This is what it was actually funding)
• in terms of new K.K. music: alongside the title theme from WW/LGTTC (let's call it Wild World), K.K. City Pop and K.K. Doo-Wop, which are the ones we definitely know are coming, I'd also want to get an aircheck of whatever the theme music is for the next game, because I think getting Welcome Horizons from your first K.K. concert was a really good idea, and... let's throw some genres out there too. Punk and/or post-punk! UK garage! Minneapolis-style funk! Shibuya-kei! Opera! Big beat! Hell, even dubstep! I'm also generally of the impression that one of the new "you failed" K.K. songs might be the NL title theme, and we end up getting that as a proper K.K. song on the Nintendo Console That's The Successor To The Switch's Successor's AC in the best part of a decade's time.
• Also, once again: bring back live K.K. bootlegs! Villagers give you their default song when you have your first house visit in NH, and it's a good idea that'd be made better by bringing back live bootlegs, because it incentivises you to both get to know and cycle out villagers so you can complete your 100+ live K.K. song collection.
• patterns: I'd love to be able to have the option to either have the smoothing filter on or off, I'd love to be able to have the GC/NL-style signboard as an option to put out, and considering regular clothing patterns are now much more detailed, I'd love to be able to draw bigger 128x128 patterns like the ones Sable gives you (primarily because the wooden field sign'd be perfect for doing a Nook's Cranny sign a la e+, but also because clothing's now much more detailed than it was from GC-NL, and doing your own designs for clothing looks much worse because of it) or even give your patterns specific material characteristics (again, because clothing's now much more detailed)
• NH has been great for non-tool handhelds, and I really hope Next Game In The Animal Crossing Series For The Successor To The Nintendo Switch Family Of Systems adds even more. Bring back the glow wands and the toy hammer from NL, give us the broom, squirt bottle, magnifying glass, teacups, and other soda cans villagers have but you can't get, make it so you can change the colours of the pinwheel and the design of the uchiwa fan (with modernisations of the maple, plum, cloud and bamboo patterns from GC... or, y'know, make bigger patterns) and add some other stuff, like the Ultra Hand
• given LEGO Animal Crossing is very much A Thing now and is getting a second wave this summer, can we please get some LEGO collaboration furniture? A furniture set that's literally made of LEGO bricks, some LEGO Animal Crossing models in the game, or at the very least some posters?

 

[DreamPrince]

After seeing a mounted fish in my home in NH and the ability to catch diverse fishies, I hoping to have an ability to taxidermy fish species and pin insects would be an excellent way to create a new method of utilizing fish and insects in addition to museums, pets, and food.

 

[Shawna]

ALSO I WANT THE HHA SYSTEM TO BE LIKE CITY FOLK OR NEW LEAF! I BEG YOU!

 

[Rainy.Nights]

The ability to turn the camera left and right outdoors, having more than 10 villagers, and more buildings and features to interact with besides just decorations. Which all ties into a concept I had, I'd like to see more of an open world approach. I get a bit tired of being stranded on one island. It would be interesting if your main play area was an archipelago with varying island environments like HHP. Some inhabited with villagers, others maybe have shops, events, or features that change regularly. You can just hop on a boat, and travel wind waker style, to freely explore the islands. Add some fast travel points if you've visited an island before since you probably don't want to do that every time. You could catch unique fish at sea and find random items dropped in the water. Yeah probably won't happen and I know it's not everyone's preferred playstyle but it could be fun.

 

[Nuguns]

The ability to turn the camera left and right outdoors, having more than 10 villagers, and more buildings and features to interact with besides just decorations. Which all ties into a concept I had, I'd like to see more of an open world approach. I get a bit tired of being stranded on one island. It would be interesting if your main play area was an archipelago with varying island environments like HHP. Some inhabited with villagers, others maybe have shops, events, or features that change regularly. You can just hop on a boat, and travel wind waker style, to freely explore the islands. Add some fast travel points if you've visited an island before since you probably don't want to do that every time. You could catch unique fish at sea and find random items dropped in the water. Yeah probably won't happen and I know it's not everyone's preferred playstyle but it could be fun.

youre ideas have a lot of potential

 

[Nuguns]

The ability to turn the camera left and right outdoors, having more than 10 villagers, and more buildings and features to interact with besides just decorations. Which all ties into a concept I had, I'd like to see more of an open world approach. I get a bit tired of being stranded on one island. It would be interesting if your main play area was an archipelago with varying island environments like HHP. Some inhabited with villagers, others maybe have shops, events, or features that change regularly. You can just hop on a boat, and travel wind waker style, to freely explore the islands. Add some fast travel points if you've visited an island before since you probably don't want to do that every time. You could catch unique fish at sea and find random items dropped in the water. Yeah probably won't happen and I know it's not everyone's preferred playstyle but it could be fun.

Ive always wanted to turn the camera outdoors and at this point we should get it. OHH wind waker style would be so cool, making stylized land features to explore with reasons to be there sometimes being the way the land is, just cause its nice. Or like the islands could be crammed small regions of the world inspired partly by earthly cultures and towards imagined cultures that speak from themselves, echoing their own spirit like how the visitors to the town in all games brought unique things. Events of celebration that enbolden themselves; of course that could potentially move the idea of such events visiting your town which should remain. Like saharahs land and gracies city, they had Kinda done this with the hippie dog guy who I forget his name ehhhh which should be expanded upon like a whole new town of origin. We could bring all the games together with the strengths of them made stronger and larger

_______________________________

I tried to build on those but I think your ideas are better

 

[Neb]

1. Better, longer hourly tracks. New Horizon's hourly songs were mostly forgettable and bland (a few being outright bad) with like three exceptions. They also looped a little too frequently in my opinion. If every hourly song was like 2 and a half to 3 minutes long I'd be really happy.

2. Multiplayer minigames PLEASE. They were my favorite part of doing multiplayer in New Leaf and I missed them so much in New Horizons. Multiplayer in New Horizons is like "let's tour our islands" and "let's do the exact same things we do in single player like fishing and bug catching).

3. Bring back the Dodos. Their dialogue was some of the most charming in New Horizon's otherwise mostly lifeless script.

4. Bring back the quirky, funny dialogue. I've always been jealous of people who grew up with Wild World and GameCube since the villager dialogue is so much more interesting in those than my childhood game of New Leaf.

 

[michealsmells]

Its wishful thinking, but I essentially want an "Animal Crossing: Ultimate" where the best aspects of every game come together to make one extremely good game, with some changes of course. I can't give an exhaustive list ('cause I'm lazy) but here's a few.

1. More variety in dialogue. I don't want mean villagers like the original game cause I would rather not be ruthlessly insulted whilst playing a game, but I wouldn't mind some Crankies with more bite to them. Also, different varieties of personalities. I don't mean new types of personality, but in addition to the A & B types that they currently have, they could also have a C & D and even E type that have their own dialogue pools.

2. Another dedicated outer location with more to do. I love Harv's Island and all but it doesn't compare to the personality of Main Street or the City. God I miss the City. I know it was the whole point of City Folk so it's not something they're just going to bring back but it'd be the best case scenario for me. The random islands are fun and all but the RNG needed to get anything remotely interesting got old really quickly.

3. More things to do with villagers, and optimizations to things you can do with villagers. Locking your house door so they can't randomly barge in but an unlock feature so they can if you want them to! Them asking to play games more often, and a larger selection of games (x amount of time to catch this kind of fish or bug, treasure hunt, hide n seek, or even things like the NL Island challenges but with your NPC villagers instead of friends if you're playing alone!).

4. More furniture. I always want more furniture and item types though. There may be a lot in NH but it still feels crazy limited, especially since certain furniture items didn't return from previous games, and that's a real bummer!

5. More to do after reaching Perfect Town status. Like ways to upkeep town status. Participating in events, planning events yourself, planting or watering flowers. Kinda like the Nook Miles activities but in the form of little quests that do more than just give you NMs.

6. Speaking of Nook Miles- more reason for those. I love checking off the little cards but eventually the points are pretty much useless, especially when you don't go to islands for the exact reason I listed earlier.

I have said too much I just said I wouldn't make an exhaustive list and kinda did
I think that New Horizons is great and people (mostly) only dislike it so much because falling out of popularity happens with every huge game like it. That said, I think it is heavily flawed and could've done a lot better. If support wasn't cut off for it so quickly I think it could've really been up there.

 

[Shawna]

I posted in this thread already, but now I am back with a more elaborate list.

As Micheal said, we need some of the best features from each Animal Crossing game. ^.^

Animal Crossing: GameCube
* Semi-Annual Sports Fair
* Turning on the lighthouse for a period of time
* NES games or something similar
* Cherry Blossom Festival celebration
* An option to offer to do a villager a favor
* Sports balls (including villager favors that involve getting them)
* Buying/Getting foreign fruit from the villagers


Animal Crossing: Wild World
* I know NL and NH also has villager pictures, but Wild World handled them the best, IMO

Animal Crossing: City Folk
* Auction house
* The return of Serena and Fillard

Animal Crossing: New Leaf
* April Fool's Day event
* Working at the cafe
* PWPs
* Something similar to Main Street, with a lot of buildings to upgrade multiple times
* Starting villagers be only slightly limited (if at all)
* TORTIMER ISLAND!!!

Animal Crossing: New Horizons
* Placing and relocating houses (I'd also say buildings, but I would prefer them to be in a separate place)
* Moving trees and rocks (but the latter should not be randomized
* Terraforming (but less tedious)
* Seeing whether or not we donated a critter

 

[Giddy]

Not sure if this is the best place, but I just had an idea that would be useful for the new game.

What if, to make us speak more to our villagers and lessen the weight of doing everything, but we were able to let our villagers take control over a specfific build?
For example, if we had someone who could go to Tom Nooks, and get the roof colour changed without us wasting time. It will give us a chance to work on something else that needs to be doing, and we get to talk to our villagers to see how the job is going.
I think, like depending on our friendship levels, this could lead to the villager changing the colour to something we didn't want, making us have to go back and tell them to change it. Could also work on how long a specific build lasts too. If you have a high friendship with them, they will go instantly and take a day at most? Others may take another day or two.
ALSO a plus, is would be really cute to see them 'working' on the build (so you can't really talk to them that day, so you have to straedgies who does what) but also, it would be cute if they brought round some friends/villagers we don't have to help them make the build; and maybe at the end you could chat with these new villagers; and there's another way of maybe getting a chance to move villagers onto the town/island etc
The other villagers can be a variety and not the same personality trait as the one who lives there, so its more vibrant and fun to see.

Thats of course, if theres more objectives to do and not being able to get everything done in that day.