Whether players have burnt out after designing their perfect island, or still glowing fiercely as they breach their seven-hundredth hour decorating and laying out their absolute perfect town, Animal Crossing New Horizons has made an undeniable impact on an otherwise fairly bleak year and is still a strong contender for a lot of players' greatest-of-all-time.
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There are a lot of beautiful island builds out there, as is evidenced by some professional and dedicated designers who spend literally thousands of hours on their games. As payoff for this time dedication (or maybe a prediction of it), the devs have roadmapped a lot of updates to keep the game fresh and fun for both new players and veterans.
The most recent of these includes a few of New Leaf's more popular items, which act as an aesthetic crossover with some of Nintendo's other biggest properties. After getting a taste of these for Mario's 35th anniversary, we're curious as to what may come next, this being a solid look at our current wishlist.
10 Outdoor Zelda Decorum
Aside from the typical choices for gimmick items, like the previous games' Master Sword and Triforce model and Rupees, there are a lot of amazing options for outdoor decorations. Look at any Zelda game and its towns and overworld all have such a distinct visual value, from the smaller towns' cuckoos, signposts and gateways, to the market stands, traveling salespeople, pots, and even the old ruins of buildings and statues. Imagine how a beautiful island grove would look with some goddess statues, a gate leading to the Master Sword in the center, and a cuckoo or two just standing around in the corner under some old Hylian ruins.
9 More Soft Toys
A lot of players may have been disappointed with the lack of plush toys in New Horizons, with the few examples being from "Mom," or some stock teddy bears sold at Nook's. An equal amount of players will agree that plush toys are a perfect source of feng shui in real life, often forming an entire collection across any available shelf space. Nintendo's common motif of adorably drawn characters means that ACNH's soft toys would make a perfect crossover vessel for future updates, from Koroks to Yoshis and almost any of the current 900 Pokemon.
8 Pokemon Base Furniture
For anyone who grew up with Pokemon, which happens to be quite a few of us, we may remember a few of the older games' tries at online gimmicks, one of which was the secret base builder in the Hoenn and Sinnoh games.
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The player, at a certain point, was allowed to pick out a space that would effectively act as a kid's "secret base," where players could gather in their own pseudo-Animal Crossing decorated room. While the mechanic never made a huge impact on the games as a whole, the decorations themselves were top-tier.
7 Kirby furniture set
Kirby, as we all know, is extraordinarily soft. One might even go so far as to say... comfortable? With the obvious conversation regarding the Epic Yarn furniture, Kirby himself would also be a fantastic addition to any island space. With his malleable shape, he could take the form of quite a few in-house objects as well, from beanbags to plush toys. A plush yarn Kirby would also be a perfect shelf companion to a yarn Yoshi, so long as we're dreaming.
6 Retro Consoles & Arcade Machines
Animal Crossing is no stranger to retro representation, as evidenced by the first game's inclusion of NES consoles and playable cartridges. The arcade machines we have now, while a fun addition to our arcade models, are still fairly flat items in all terms but aesthetic.
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It would be a huge upgrade if these cabinets and consoles were playable, even if it was just a watered-down version of some minigames to beef up the immersive and multiplayer aspects of the game. A hi-score based pinball machine, or some multiplayer Donkey Kong or Balloon Fight action would have made last summer's island quarantine just a little more fun.
5 Display Shelves
This is a minor request on Nintendo's part. At the moment, we're more or less stuck with a few variations of bookshelves, more or less fitting of a library setting than an entertainment one. As consequence, players are stuck either settling for a semi-unfitting book-filled arcade display or making custom designs to slap on simple panels to make the illusion of game collections or console displays. It'd be nice to have a display case like the ones in New Leaf and Happy Home Designer, just to add a little touch to game rooms.
4 More Arcade Wallpapers
It's not a terrible reach to say that half the wallpapers and carpets in the game are fairly unfitting of any logical interior design, and getting the right sets for just one room is hard enough. That being said, while the Nintendo crossover ones we've gotten in the past are fun, they're equally unfitting of most room designs, especially with the current lack of cohesive items to round out the room's balance and overall vibe. Whether it's a classic 80s Pac-Man pattern or some more simple Hyrule interiors that actual buildings might implement, some new options would be great for themed islands or game rooms alike.
3 Pikmin Decorations
Following the advancements in outdoor decorations in New Horizons, letting some small Pikmin free throughout one's island would be a welcome and adorable addition to the already diverse range of island flora.
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Interspersed red Pikmin with island rose gardens, Pellet Posies in the tulip fields, or some sleeping Bulborbs under fruit trees. Even Wild World's Pikmin garden planter would be a cute addition. For a little extra environmental detail, maybe a crashed S.S. Dolphin could also work its way onto the island.
2 Model Buildings
Animal Crossing's dollhouses and birdhouses make for some adorable design choices. Anyone who's seen the tiny model towns and far-off city illusions knows exactly what we're talking about here. The inclusion of some small fan-favorite architecture would be a perfect touch for these model towns, or just for household decoration (reminiscent of New Leaf's HHA house models).
Options could include Samus' gunship, Peach's Castle, or Hyrule castle for that matter. The miniatures also add a lot of depth in outdoor areas, acting as little fairy houses much like Minish Cap's hidden homes and tiny makeshift buildings.
1 Paintings
Art is a much bigger part of Nintendo's worlds than a lot of people might acknowledge, from background world-building and decoration, to the level selection in Mario 64, to the entirety of Link Between Worlds. There are so many gorgeous maps and charts in the common houses in Zelda games, and any of Peach's Castle paintings would look fantastic as an added flair to almost any home.
There's also a distinct lack of poster representation in New Horizons, as a lot of the options are boring awards, charts, or the million villager posters that admittedly aren't that well-suited to most aesthetic room layouts.
NEXT: Animal Crossing New Horizons: 10 Tips For Achieving A Five-Star Island