Even the greatest philosophers failed to describe why animal crossing is fun. Because based on the sober description, you can't help it than the most boring game since E.T. to keep the alien. Anyone who knows the steadily growing sales figures in the series should know that this cannot be the case. Animal Crossing is now a bestseller worldwide.
No game, an attitude to life!
Living on a desert island, having animals as neighbors, catching insects and paying off a steadily growing mountain of debt sounds like everything, just not fun. But that's exactly it. Animal Crossing: New Horizons is, like its predecessors, a life simulation in the more distant sense. The main goal is to expand and perfect his village and house and soak up the unique life-affirming atmosphere that this microcosm of joy exudes in the otherwise rather gray world we call reality.
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Whether as a simple Zuagroaster, as we say here in beautiful Munich, or as a mayor: The Animal Crossing series has already chosen different approaches to keep the game concept, which has hardly been changed to date, fresh. New Horizons combines the “normalo” feeling of the first parts with the mayor privileges from New Leaf, but this is not the actual novelty of the switch part. After seven years of waiting, that would be shockingly little. Instead, you start on the drawing board. You land on an island of your choice and have little more with you than your own clothes.
There is no existing neighborhood, no buildings and no economy. As soon as you leave the plane with two random animals, a strange breeze blows through the air. Where's the cozy animal crossing feeling? Don't worry, the cuddly familiarity that you long for as a fan sets in early enough. New Horizons is only good that the fresh start dustes off the somewhat stuck formulas.
Atmospheric shine
A key element since the beginning of the series has been the coupling of the music box to real time. Every day, every season passes like in real life. The times of day and seasons with their public holidays, animal occurrences and natural phenomena are very similar to those off the screen. The last days of winter, which we still experience, are like a dream ski vacation. When everything is covered with thick, glittering snow, the actually cloudy season no longer has to hide behind the more popular colleagues.
Towards the end of February, the frosty ceiling melts, but instead of switching to spring in a tough way, New Horizons has recently sprinkled in an extra portion of authenticity with smooth transitions. Gradually, grass and trees regain their lush green. Seeing how the island gradually opens up to the next season adds a lot to the atmosphere of the game – one of the pillars of the brand.
Where New Leaf had the richness of detail of a turnip cake, New Horizons presents itself as a sumptuous cream cake. When the wind leaves the leaves in the trees and the flowers prancing at different intensities depending on the weather, when raindrops trickle almost photorealistically onto water surfaces and chirp insects from somewhere, you feel right in the middle despite the colorful graphics. New Horizons is ridiculously wasteful of attention to detail that is reminiscent of compulsive behavior. On the Switch, the bourgeois life is so vivid, one wonders how one could live with the predecessors who seemed dead by comparison.
Even interiors – we don't even start with the overwhelmingly beautiful new museum – have textures in HD quality, which is a novelty for animal crossing, and clever lighting effects are cozy and atmospheric.