New Leaf vs. New Horizons

[Bui]

As a decorating game New Horizons is the better game, but as an Animal Crossing game New Leaf wins hands down.

 

[TN4U]

Well, I've spent many, many hours playing New Horizons, but I honestly think that New Leaf's gameplay execution was slightly better. Off the top of my head, there's certain things that I think each game did better than the other:

New Horizons

• Customization. I don't even need to explain in detail here. Though not flawless, it's pretty much a no-brainer.
• The ability to move (almost) every building. You can actually set up houses in a grid if you wanted to without it looking bad or hacking your save.
• Gifting your villagers things once a day whenever you wanted to (after building up friendship, of course).
  • You can also fully prevent villagers from moving out without your consent. A nice fix for those that only want the 10 villagers they choose and no one else.
• Storage for items, as well as item thumbnails when browsing your own home storage. In the older games, you had to cycle through each furniture item in your storage just to see what it is, and it was a pain sometimes when trying to look for a specific item, as almost every item used the default green leaf icon. Also, we really didn't need a 5,000 item capacity, but we got it anyways, and man, am I happy we did.
• The museum. It blows away the old museums by a country mile, and it's actually worth visiting multiple times now.
• The vaulting pole and ladder. I've used those items much more than I'd like to admit.
• The camera app is a very easy way to take in-game screenshots. You can even go into first-person if you wanted to (I hope you can do this more often in the next game; that'd be very cool)!
  • Also, Harv's Photopia. A very nice feature to re-create scenes almost how you want it.
• Being an HD game, some small details hardly anyone talks about is a nice touch. For example, the robot villagers make clanging sounds when walking (and some have glowing eyes), Coco's ears are completely stiff unlike other rabbit villagers, certain items react to being blown by a fan, and the game's lighting system is incredible. Small stuff like that.

New Leaf

• Villager dialogue. It was pretty good across the board. I actually thought that smug villagers flirting with female players was sort of interesting, but that had to go in New Horizons, and their dialogue sort of became cringy as a result. Don't get me wrong - I do like certain dialogue moments in New Horizons (mainly by lazy and cranky villagers), but it's mostly boring or insanely repetitive.
• Nook's being able to expand multiple times. It made it worth it to buy stuff there and complete Gracie's fashion checks in order to get to the final stage. The store hours even changed depending on what kind of building it was.
• Multiplayer. Yes, New Horizons has 8-player support and several small improvements, but in New Leaf, you could actually go to the island with others and play minigames. It was more fun than just visiting to admire looks and trade items.
  • Speaking of minigames, the Wii U and Nintendo 3DS in-game items could actually let you play two full-fledged minigames with multiple levels of difficulty. Even though they were ported from Amiibo Festival, I thought that was fun.
• The music. By far, the most nostalgic soundtrack out of all the games. New Horizons' music just sounded incredibly bleh after playing for a few weeks, and I've been playing the game for over three 1/2 years now.
• Golden tools actually having benefits and being unbreakable. Heck, even the silver tools had some benefits. New Horizons? Welp, thanks for your faithful service, Golden Watering Can...
• More special characters that had roles other than being invited with amiibo only.
  • Shrunk teaching emotions. This role was spread out to the villagers in New Horizons, which I thought was sort of lame.
  • Police Station lost and found. It would've been cool to have this building in New Horizons, but I suppose the social climate regarding law enforcement in the US was pretty bad at the time. All we got instead was a bin. Oh well.
• More holidays that were celebrated in-game. Not a lot of people think about this. For example, there are two days in the year during the equinoxes where it is all-daytime or nighttime for a whole day, which I thought was a fun change of pace (although unrealistic, but who cares!).
• The fishing and bug tourneys actually being somewhat competitive. In New Horizons, all you do is earn points for items; nothing else. The other villagers don't do squat.
• Monthly ABD interest actually mattered. New Horizons originally had it too, but I guess there was a flaw and it was reduced to a measly 9,999 bell max. It means nothing now.
• Expanding your house many, many times if you wanted. Each room could be the same size. New Horizons? What you see is what you get.
• More fruit choices. It was a major missed opportunity in New Horizons with that game's DIY system and fruit actually being useful.
• All of the ordinances were very useful. Beautiful town let you grow flowers more easily (since they can actually go bad in this game), Early Bird and Night Owl had dramatic time changes, and so on.

So, as you can see, New Leaf has the slight edge over New Horizons. They're both good games - don't get me wrong - but there's many things that the next AC game could re-introduce, as well as several other features that are already in New Horizons that can be improved on.

 

[Alolan_Apples]

The terraforming and outdoor landscaping, as well as the clothing customization and museum design, were the only things ACNH did better than ACNL, to the point that ACNL felt unplayable.

Other than that, ACNL is better than ACNH, for the following reasons:

• More shop upgrades
• Better ordinances
• More furniture series and themes, as well as the winter sports set
• Desert Island Escape and Puzzle League mini-games
• Kapp’n’s island and how its better than the additional islands from ACNH
• Tools don’t break
• Money making was easier
• Hourly music was better
• You could build additional buildings in your home town
• Early progression isn’t slow
• Presence of tropical fruits (although ACNH did have vegetables - I prefer to have both)

 

[VanitasFan26]

Okay what I am going to say something maybe very controversial but I am going to say it. New Leaf is not much better than new Horizions. Hear me out. While New Leaf has great features like Tortmier Island, Variety of Shops, and Furniture Sets it feels very dated compared to New Horizions. With that said after you played New Horizions and try go back to New Leaf you find that the experience is so different. You cannot place objects outside and have to rely on Public Works Projects, The Villagers seem to often repeat Tutorials that you heard so many times, while asking for favors is more apparent in New Leaf than New Horizions there is not much variety of them weather its like a villager asking for fruit or if they borrowed something another villager and deciede to not return it relying on you to do it.

The Decorating aspect in this game (New Leaf) is so limited and the storage space is also very limited. Since you cannot change much of your character since you have to reply on a questions system to choose how your character is going to look like. Same thing goes for the hair style when you go to Harriet to change your hair. Now with that being said New Leaf has a charm to it that seperates it from New Horizions. The Hourly music is great, the Main street is very lively when you see your past villagers visiting, and of course the feature to work with Brewster is really great. Its a shame none of this was brought back in New Horizions, although Brewster was brought back it just felt like a downgrade from what Brewster used to be in New Leaf.

Overall Animal Crossing New Leaf may have been the greatest game at the time, but if your first AC game was with Animal Crossing New Horizions it can be hard for new comers who have never played New Leaf to understand why it was beloved in the first place which can make it frustrating for them. I have to be honest if I played New Leaf before New Horizions maybe I would be more thrilled to play it. Not trying to say its a bad thing, I am just being brutally honest.

 

[Mr.Fox]

I say it all the time, but I do really miss Desert Island Escape from NL…

 

[Shawna]

I voted for New Horizons but truthfully, it’s really hard to choose between the two. They both have their pros, and they both have their cons.

But overall, they are the two best Animal, Crossing games <3333

 

[rocketspruggs]

I think New Leaf is better, New Horizons slightly feels like a downgraded version of New Leaf, if you ignore the added furniture, the ability to control villagers' homes, terraforming, etc.

 

[TheKryptoKnight]

Posted in another thread, but since that one is planned to be deleted...

New Horizons and New Leaf are close, but I went with NH because it's hard to go back to tiny inventory, bad graphics, no outdoor items, the cumbersome pwp system, bland dialogue, and having to monitor and hope you don't miss the ping that your favorite villager wants to leave.

And I know I listed a lot of NL negatives, but I'm playing it and NH side by side right now and it has a mountain of positives too! It is really close between the two, but my only real complaints about NH are that it took over a year for us to get back to a full game and some things are still missing like tour mini-games and upgrades/building progression/Gracie Grace. But NH is very very easy for me to put 100s of hours into while the myriad limitations and neutered villagers in NL make me fall off of it faster. I'll always come back to both though until we get a game that combines the best of both, because they have things that they do better than the other.

Also this is so minor, but I love rain/storms and the jingly music box background music in NL drives me crazy when it's storming! It's so tonally mismatched when there's a violent storm happening, thunder and lightning and rain falling at a 45 degree angle and you've got a music box playing. I hate it, but this is suuuuuch a nitpick

 

[TN4U]

After seeing several posts mention it, I can agree that New Leaf has not aged well graphically. After playing NH so often on an HD screen, I go back to the 3DS, take one good look at the graphics, and wonder why I thought that looked okay. Yeah, technology was different during the 3DS' release in 2010 compared to the Switch's release in 2017, but man, I can't get used to looking at those graphics again.

Considering that Luigi's Mansion 2 (Dark Moon) is getting a new HD release on the Switch, I wonder if a remaster would work for New Leaf if the controls were tweaked a little bit. I know it will never happen, but I like to dream.

 

[Bluebellie]

I really can’t say which I like more anymore. I really loved New Leaf when I had it. Now I don’t really play New Leaf anymore though. I really enjoy New Horizons now. There’s some things in both games that I love and hate.

 

[Hat']

Oh New Leaf by FAR. I would give up the ability to place furniture outside if it meant coming back to a more traditional feeling like ACNL had.
I love everything about this game and so many of the aspects I liked were removed in ACNH. The soundtrack is better, so is the furniture (although ACNH 2.0 kinda shifted things a bit), the villagers are lively, the houses look amazing and colorful, and last but not least the island was there.

 

[Shawna]

I am gonna make a list of what is better about the two games:
​

New Leaf:
* More upgrades and buildings to unlock.
* The overall dialog and spontaneous letters were better and more heartwarming (there is some good dialog in NH, though, do not get me wrong)
* Villagers had better initial shirts
* Lots of amazing PWPs to unlock (though poorly executed)
* Lots of amazing furniture series that got removed in New Horizons
* Writing letters actually improved friendship (I read that is not the case for NH)
* Villagers asked for favors more often (unpopular opinion, but I actually like this about NL)
* Easier to get villager pictures (in my opinion, anyway)
* Exterior for your house has more options
* House is more spacious
* Easier to make bells
* Gems
* No tedious Nook Miles to worry about (it can be tedious to get them in NH)
* Major holidays are executed better, holidays in NH relied a lot on crafting.
* The bug-off and fishing tourney are executed better
* Villagers will smile when you sit next to them, if their friendship is high enough
* Similar, the megaphone is a thing here. Villagers will wave when you call them out, if their friendship is high enough
* Just overall had more features like working part-time at the cafe
* Amiiboing villagers is instant, whereas it takes three times in NH
* Tools do not break (other than the regular and silver axes)
* TORTIMER'S ISLAND!!!

New Horizons:
* More creative freedom - You can terraform, move houses/buildings/trees, relocate, place furniture outside, break rocks, etc.
* The graphics, detail, etc. are mindblowing
* New bugs, fish, flowers, deep sea creatures, etc. (though some got removed)
* You can give gifts to villagers daily
* Apparently, you can comfort villagers when their sad, and calm them down if they are mad (I haven't done this yet, but I heard this was a thing from a friendship guide)
* The museum got a major overhaul, which it is absolutely stunning
* Diving is executed a lot better
* Although collecting Nook Miles can be tedious, it was still a nice implementation, as it encourages us to reach, well, milestones.
* No unnecessary inconveniences like the train passing by on Main Street when I want to get there, or tripping due to bad luck.
* Farming and Cooking
I always said that I prefer NH over NL, but that is probably due to the fact that NH is newer. Truthfully, it is hard to choose. They both have their own charm that makes them different in a good way. If Nintendo took what is better about each of these games along with some other features we as a community have been wanting, it would make for a very kick-ass Animal Crossing game.

 

[Pate and Ketchup]

I love New Horizons but we miss features from New Leaf or they took time:
- Perfect fruits, other fruits
- Tortimer's island and tours. Mini-games were fun. And I love that island always in Summer even if it's small.
- I enjoyed the shops in the street. And Nook's Cranny upgrates.
- I prefer trains. Planes are... I cannot explain. It's different, I feel I'm not really home.

Can we mix the two games?