I’ve been saying it for years: the only things missing from Animal Crossing are rocket boots and super powers.
Okay, I never said that – but now I know it’s true, and I’m secretly obsessed.
“Floatopia” is a free “Animal Crossing”-like game launched by NetEase Games. It is like a toy box life simulation game combined with the theme of anime. The protagonist is the only ordinary person in a world with super powers.
Like Animal Crossing, the game is set against a real-life day-night cycle, and lets you build a floating paradise – this time in the sky instead of on a tropical island – construct and decorate your house, go fishing, and interact with a constantly rotating cast of visitors, each with their own “useless superpowers.”
Some characters, like the emotionally introverted Mistika, have the power to control the element of ice, while others have more practical quirks, like the ability to make plants grow rapidly. There’s also a bulletproof vest-wearing Chibi sheriff named Fluffy, who is one of the most hilarious, incongruous characters I’ve ever seen.
They’re all peachy and fuzzy like Sylvanian Families, and while I’ve seen a lot of people say they look a little scary in the trailer, in the game the look of the toy box – your house opens up like a playset – is actually quite nice, with lots of texture; a bit like Pokemon Concierge.
Apparently, in the world of Floatopia, these visitors fly through the sky on their islands and will park next to your home whenever they pass through the area. Day by day, different islands will orbit your central home, and you’ll meet new characters and discover new items and materials.
As a cadence, it’s a very interesting concept, and I’m curious to see how much Floatopia will resemble Animal Crossing. From the brief demo I played at Gamescom 2024, there’s a similar interface, you build furniture with resources scavenged from the island, move between shops, and participate in town events with other townspeople, with the same blaring horn soundtrack as Animal Crossing: New Horizons, but how much more blaring can it be? Will there be a museum filled with bugs and art, just as I already fish, chop wood, and suck rocks?
Mechanically, A Floating Nation is slightly different, thankfully. Fishing is more involved than the 1-2-3 minigames in Animal Crossing, but the biggest difference is traversal, where your character flies around in rocket-powered boots that let you fly from island to island. Because it’s using the Unreal Engine, A Floating Nation feels more open and interactive than a full-blown Animal Crossing, with more seamless exploration and a greater sense of verticality and vistas. You can swim in water and jump over obstacles, but I don’t know if that’s ultimately a good thing.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ limitations almost make it better, requiring you to pull out ladders to scale cliffs or take a long way around the island to reach the only bridge, which immerses you in the ordinariness of the island simulation and makes you feel like you’re actually there as you navigate relatively small spaces.
Since it’s more open and easier to move around, it’ll be interesting to see if you feel more restricted when playing Floatopia, even though it’s set in a larger space and the obstacles feel more artificial.
I’ve heard a lot of people lately talk about venturing back to their Animal Crossing: New Horizons islands and reveling in the joy of remembering the moths, sea creatures, and parts they’ve already picked up 100 times. But I think that’s what really gives Floating Islands the edge, not because it’s derivative, but because it’s derivative.
We’ve seen time and again that a large number of players want games that are essentially the same games they’ve seen before, just slightly different. So while you could easily classify Floatopia as an Animal Crossing clone, we don’t really see that with MySims, and when Nintendo is happy to make you wait eight years between sequels, new games will always rush in to fill that demand (just like Palworld did for its Pokemon-like survival game).
But there’s always the dark cloud of free-to-play monetization hovering in the distance for Floating Nation. One of Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ greatest strengths is its egalitarian ethos, with free clothing patterns, celebrity meet-and-greet sessions, and carrot-price parties all forming the basis of a truly comfortable experience.
Floatopia seems to be emulating the look and feel of Animal Crossing, but I’ll be keeping an eye out to see if it can nail the same vibe.
You can pre-register on Floatopia’s official website and claim your “free island package”.