What is everyone's opinions so far now that it has been over half a year since release?

[Ananas Dragon]

How does it suck for you?

just my personal opinion, but the best part of ACNL were the villagers and the funny things they'd say

it seems very watered down and I've never seen new dialogue, its just repetitive now and boring.

Also lack of furniture sucks.

 

[meggiewes]

just my personal opinion, but the best part of ACNL were the villagers and the funny things they'd say

it seems very watered down and I've never seen new dialogue, its just repetitive now and boring.

Also lack of furniture sucks.

That is more insightful! I was just wondering which part you didn't like as much. Saying that is much more helpful than just saying it sucks, imo.

 

[mayortiffany]

Personally, I gave it .

I think the game is not developed enough for me to have a complete understanding of it, but in its current form, I find it to be relatively deficient in comparison to other Animal Crossing games in the series. There is a lack of progression in the game in terms of Nook shops, and there's just a lack of activities to do on the island overall (with less diverse furniture, fewer NPCs, etc.). And villager dialogue seems to be disappointingly dry.

I'm personally not a fan of the drip-fed update model because we have no idea if, or when new features are going to come in play.

I've had fun playing the game, but I personally would not recommend it to someone who's new to the franchise. I think New Leaf is, for the moment, still the best game in the franchise, and there will be a lot more to offer a player there despite the graphics being much older.

I do have 300 hours+ in the game, but I've not found myself playing very much lately. Usually, Animal Crossing games are able to hold my attention for much longer...

 

[BluebearL]

I'm not really sure tbh, it hasn't kept me hooked for any long period of time. I pick it up every now and then, some of that is just due to lack of time and general exhaustion but when I do have larger amounts of free time I don't really want to play ACNH. It has failed to meet my expectations in several areas but all of this being said it is undeniably a brilliant animal crossing game. It's not my favourite in the series but I love the HD graphics, the villagers despite dialogue problems have not disappointed, it is very different from WW/NL which were more similar and it has managed to bring some exciting new functions to the table that can be improved in future installations of the game.

My big issues:
-Not a fan of the constant updates, none of them have turned out to be all that exciting and it does just feel incomplete or as others have said, it feels drip fed.
-Not enough buildings to justify getting rid of the mainstreet function
-Terra-forming seems to have replaced a lot of daily activities and for some, design is not the focus of their game so it leaves us with much less to do. Especially in between updates.
-No interesting furniture: one of the things I was most excited about from this game was furniture, Nintendo had demonstrated just how good it could be in Pocket Camp so I thought NH would be a big upgrade in furniture. Instead it is worse than NL.
-Lack of NPC's: I hate having to wait so long to get my favourite NPC's back into the game but the ones that are here are... boring. There just isn't enough to look forward to in the game.
-No feeling of game progression (no shop upgrades, shops, challenges etc to unlock)

 

[DJStarstryker]

The game is pretty good. Customization on this game is top notch and is the best in the AC series so far, except for a few things that are Happy Home Designer only. Also, from the clothing and character customization perspective, the game is 100% number 1. I can't think of very much that I'd want to do for my character that I can't do.

My biggest issue is I gave the game a LOT of leeway for months and months. I was a huge defender of it against the haters at first. But I simply think the game doesn't have enough things to do outside of designing your island. I honestly didn't care about the island mini games, but I know others miss them. I miss the Welcome Amiibo mini games more.

The events in general don't feel that great in this game. They end up overstaying their welcome. It's not just Bunny Day, which is obviously the worst offender here. The June wedding season, while having good furniture and a good idea with a Happy Home Designer-like designing goal, was repetitive and grindy. Museum Day was cute, but ultimately was short enough that it should've only been 1 day. The August fireworks were fun the first time, but uninteresting after that. I can go on.

Also, there STILL isn't enough furniture options. It's especially frustrating in certain categories, like food. I have seen lots of people using hats to make "cakes" or "ramen bowls" and, while creative on the players' parts, I think it looks kinda dumb. I am not insulting any players because we don't HAVE anything better. I am frustrated that Nintendo hasn't given us anything better. It's very common to make a kitchen in your house or cafes or restaurants (indoor or outdoor) so I think we badly need more here. Food is just one example. There is other things that feel like a struggle. Some of these things are actually way easier to make in New Leaf.

The game actually is getting better as the year goes on, but it's not getting better fast enough. The number of stars that I would rate this game is going down the longer it's out because of that. I've been burnt out from gaming many times before, and this isn't burn out. This is just sheer frustration. I wish I had gotten a full game instead of an early access game that they're slowly patching.

 

[Eureka]

5/5 stars! 2020 has been an awful year for me and many others. One positive thing to come out of it and provide a much needed escape has been Animal Crossing New Horizons. Does that mean it's a perfect game? Not at all, but perfect games don't exist and I don't expect them to. All the positives greatly outweigh the few negatives for me. I've put hundreds of hours into the game and will continue to do so.

 

[Mairen]

My biggest issue is I gave the game a LOT of leeway for months and months. I was a huge defender of it against the haters at first. But I simply think the game doesn't have enough things to do outside of designing your island.

The game actually is getting better as the year goes on, but it's not getting better fast enough. I wish I had gotten a full game instead of an early access game that they're slowly patching.

I feel kind of similar to your thoughts here. When the game first came out, I was thinking "this game is going to be great! let's give them a chance to bring us some updates and new features and really flesh out everything! But when I look back over the past 6 months, I'm not certain if the number of updates really feels good for the amount of time that's passed.

I had experienced burnout after about 3 months of constant playing and had to set this aside for a few months. I've returned recently and I'm taking things a lot slower. The halloween update felt like the first really decent one to come upon us, with more clothing and hair/skin options, plus the farming feature (even if it is only pumpkins), I think we got a lot of what we've been wanting with this one. However, if we don't get more full updates like this, even with my current super slow pace, I could see myself running out of things to do again in another month or so.

That being said, I still like this one better than New Leaf. It would be too hard for me to go back to that game without all of the customization that I've grown accustomed to in this game. I'll take customization (villager appearance and the wonderful wonderful ability to rearrange our island) over more furniture options. But I'm still hoping for more to be added to New Horizons, and preferably at a bit of a faster pace. It's not the end of the world if I do get bored of this, though. Video games are a main hobby for Mairen, so if I need to set this aside again to go enjoy other games, I'm fine with doing so, I just wish I won't have to.

 

[Hanif1807]

Rate it 4.5 out of 5. I would give 5 if the game had better optimization (I'm talking about framerate drop), more buildings (Leif's Garden Shop, Brewster's Cafe, etc.), and Island Tour minigames just like in New Leaf so i have more things to do in the game and can compete with my friends lol

 

[Bulbadragon]

I voted 5 stars but technically 4.5/5.

Initially I was very disappointed in the game after the first few weeks and I ran out of things to do. I love so many of the improvements, but the gameplay got stale quick.

However, since more updates have been released, I'm loving the game again. Especially now that dreams have been added back, which was my absolute favorite feature added in New Leaf, I play so much more. I feel like there are things to do if I play every day and I'm loving the Halloween update. Currently, I'd give it 4.5 stars because my only gripe is the limited villager dialogue. I do get sick of seeing the same lines all the time, especially when I have multiple villagers of the same personality type.

Despite that, I would rather have waited longer for a fuller game to be released than have to wait for updates to make the game fun after the first few weeks. I have no doubt that once all the content updates are out, the game will be the best in the series. I just wish we got something closer to that point on launch instead of a game that felt very beautiful but empty.

 

[SmoochsPLH]

I love it alot! But I seem to get bored of it alot quicker then I ever did with new leaf. I feel like it's cause you end up not having much to do after you get used to the update (or maybe it's cause new leaf was my first ac game idk). I am glad nintendo made the decision to add updates to the game while it's out because it keeps people interested. Plus the game is beautiful and super fun.

I agree with most people in this thread; more furniture, buildings, bring back stuff, villager dialogue, and please let us buy clothes in bulk.

 

[ChanCake]

I gave the game 3 stars, mostly because of my playtime and because I do still play it a lot since my island is so incredibly far from finished - But if I didn't count the hours I played and the fact that I still log on, I think I'd give it 2,5.

While I do enjoy the game, there's no denying that it doesn't give you much to do besides decorating. The updates are fun, but even those have all come down to decorating (or collecting for the museum). It's nice to have new DIY's and furniture to work with but the updates get stale really fast, and I think it's also because they simply don't add enough for the timeframe they have chosen to pour them out. Take the most recent one with the pumpkins, for example. Yes, it added pumpkin farming and it's adorable but there's only a few DIY's to work with and most people do get all of those within a week or two. You'll craft the ones you like, customize them.. and after that, the pumpkin patches and farming aspect will sit dormant as decoration. There needs to be more incentive to keep using the updates. Besides that, for a game that apparently focuses so heavily on decorating, they have added very little variety of furniture over the past couple of months.

One could argue that it's because they want to support this game for many years to come but they are forgetting that they'll first have to keep players interested enough to still be playing all those years, and I personally don't see that happening if they do not start adding larger updates that actually contain more than two weeks of enjoyment or a more social aspect to the game (Brewster, mini-games, etc). Hell, it should've already been in there, especially the mini-games considering they want us to play online so much.

I also don't really enjoy the drip-fed content. I don't like the idea that if we do get upgrades to our shops, or perhaps a new building, that it probably won't feel like personal progression and something you've unlocked, since all of the updates so far have been; "Hey, there's this now." instead of actually having to work towards it or having to spend a certain amount of bells or time on your island, etc.

So yeah, the game is not *bad* - it's just severely lacking a lot of features still, which is a shame after 6 months, and the way they're going about it is too little, too slow.

 

[Hsn97]

I personally feel that the game sits at for me.

I was super excited for this game to come out. I adored WW and NL and I was just dying to get stuck in with New Horizons.

There are parts of the game that I really love. The graphics are amazing. I love putting furniture outside, being able to terraform and put down paths. But that’s as far as the positives go for me.

I hate the villagers. They’re boring and unique in their dialogue. It literally doesn’t matter if I have Cube or Papi because they both say and behave exactly the same way.

I hate the crafting mechanic. I hate that tools break constantly forcing you to stop what you’re doing to craft / buy a new tool in order to just continue. I hate that even golden tools break. Like seriously what’s the point in crafting them then?!

I hate the RNG in the game. I hate that I’ve played over 400+ hours and never found the Garden Bench. I hate that I’ve dug up hundreds of fossils and still can’t find the remaining two I need to complete the museum but yet I’ll get two T-Rex skulls on the same day.

I hate that the turnip prices change twice a day! Meaning that if you work, have a life outside AC or simply only want to play once a day the only way you can participate in the Stalk market is by TTing to check the am and pm prices every time you boot up the game, or by paying to use someone else’s shop.

I really want to love the game. And I do in a strange way. But the more I play it the more frustrated I get. So in the end I just put it down and go and play Stardew instead

 

[Feraligator]

I gave it 3 stars. I would personally rate the game between 6 or 7/10 so I was torn between giving it 3/4 stars, but I would say 3 for now. The additions to the game really are great and I've put 750 hours into designing my island. But there are so many missing features still.
My big problem though is the "smaller" missing features. I always thought "it's the little things in life" that honestly make me happy and I'd say the same for AC, but so many quirks and little details have just been forgotten in ACNH. My concern is that, the fact that these little details are "little" possibly means they won't be added back. I was happy to see tripping came back but that was only with balloons.

Many other complaints that have been mentioned are also ones I share so I won't elaborate on those. But I do miss when AC was about making friends with villagers and living in a small cosy town, not a design simulator. It would've been the perfect AC game if we had both but it just seems like villagers are decorations now and that the main focus of ACNH is to design your island.

Also, for a game that pushes customisation, I hate so much that you can't customise some furniture like in NL. Even worse, you're locked to certain colours. It seems like they pushed the online aspect a lot which has cut back on some features that were in past games.

In comparison, New Leaf would've been a 9/10 for me, ACGC would be 8/10, ACWW would be 7/10 and ACCF would be 8/10.

 

[PumpkabooPie]

3 stars It's very enjoyable in itself but I still want more and was expecting more tbh and here are the main killjoys for me
-Unable to store flowers
-Cannot buy in bundles
-Unable to access ABD or storage in other player's towns (multiple trips) and this is surprising since NL touched on that
-Missing sets ex: roccoco, sleek, sci-fi, gorgeous, gracie, minamalist, etc
-Missing npcs (WHAT HAPPENED TO MY PELICAN LOVE TRIANGLE, WHERE IS MY RICH GIRAFFE, My poodle is lost. )
-Tools break

I try to recognize that New horizons is a separate game on its own and that they're trying to do something new in the series and also that it's challenging to top the expectations we've had from New Leaf so in turn I've kind of been treating it as a work in progress game. The updates are nice but I feel like they withhold too much from us.

 

[JellyBeans]

I went for four stars (up from 3.5). The game in itself is very enjoyable, but when looking back at the previous games there is so much I wish that we still had so it kind of ruins the experience for me. Aside from that, some of the rating might just be part of my burnout - I played it so intensely throughout lockdown, as I'm sure most people did, and there just isn't enough new stuff in there to keep me coming back to it despite having played however many hours. since going back to school I've found I also just don't have a ton of time to play, but in the time I do have free I'm reaching more for stardew valley than animal crossing - that may just be because I got it more recently and there's still so much I haven't experienced in it yet, while animal crossing has reached a sort of standstill until they bring back some of the big stuff missing from previous games.

not sure if that made any sense but I'm more or less echoing the same things as the people above me have said lol

 

[LuluLove]

I love the game but it could be better! The graphic is so pleasing and it’s soothing to watch the season change or to listen to the sound of the rain while looking at the droplets on your umbrella. I love how the villagers look and all the little objects you can place around to make the island feel more lived in. But it could be better! I miss Brewster so much, I miss the vibe of WW more than the vibe of NL, which I’ve never really liked. I wish the villagers were a bit different in their dialogues and not always so nice towards you. Lastly, but this is completely personal opinion, terraforming for me it’s a no no. I’ve tried to emulate some of the youtube islands that look gorgeous but I’m not that skilled and I found myself with blocky rivers and cliffs. I wish I didn’t touch my starting layout

 

[Solio]

Rating:


Pros:
Outdoors decoration
This was very restricted in past games. Even in New Leaf had some limitations in what you could do with your town. New Horizons improves this feature vastly and it's amazing what you can do with your town. Even if you aren't into decorating
Villager interaction
While villager dialogue is less quirky and less involved than in older games, I feel like the villager interaction is overall better. They feel more alive because the actually interact with their environment. Instead of just roaming around aimlessly, they can fish, read a book or visit shops. Overall they feel more fleshed out and more like actual people.
Crafting
I like the crafting feature. While the constantly breaking tool can be annoying, it gives you something to do besides catching bugs and fish. It feels like a natural inclusion and isn't too grind heavy.

Cons:
Update-policy:
I didn't mind this approach at first. Continous updates can provide a great opportunity to keep the game fresh. However, we all soon realized that the updates came at the cost of several key-features like shop-updates, the café or Gyroids that where seemingly deliberately cut from the game, only to be intruced later through updates. I don't think it's entitled to expect these features in the base game and it feels like a cheap cop-out to hold them back to draw out the games lifespan.
Half a year has passed and the updates were a mixture of "new" old features that should have been in from the start (shrubs, Art, Diving), and seasonal content that lost its novelty very quickly. Overall, I am not impressed.

Online-pushiness
Several design-choices feel like the developers deliberately try to push you towards online-interaction: You're limited to 3 of 6 types of fruit unless you trade with someone, when in older games, there were ways to get them all by yourself, DIYs are designed to encourage online-trading, furniture colours are arbitrarily locked to the island and features like Celeste and Redd are so heavily RNG-based, that it might take you 20 years to aquire all the items without help.
Animal Crossing isn't a multiplayer-experience for me like games like Splatoon or Smash Bros. Please stop trying to push a playstyle on me. Especially if it is one that isn't the focus of the series.

 

[Jinglefruit]

It's a good game, but it's a bad sequal to New Leaf.

Not giving a rating as I can see that after the updates are done, it will likely be an improvement, but we're 6 months in and it's still quite a step behind NL in terms of content, and it still carries some of the flaws of NL - like lacking villager conversations, less interactions/games with the villagers and removal of the sidequest NPC backstories from CF. I also think the updates are increasingly undermining some long term aspects of the game, for example, all villagers default houses now only have items from the v1.0 game.

Also every update adds a new layer of disappointment when we get 1 new furniture series every 2 months, and Pocket Camp repeatedly gets about 6 times as many new bits of furniture in the same 2 months, many of which look like they had a lot more effort put into the designs.

 

[Dunquixote]

The update gave me hope that the game and future updates will be better, but I went back to 3 star rating because their decision making really concerns me. First the drip fed content, then locking some content behind subscription, fixing hybrid islands (sadly i never got to see), fixing the posters right before the amiibo cards are rereleased. Yeah... I’d like that to not bother me so much, but from having such a positive impression of Nintendo up until now and from talking to people who have played their games longer and who understand both sides of the arguments better than myself, I can’t help but see them as a very shady company and am still fearing they will turn to the gacha route or paid only dlc.

I did say the positive aspects outweighed some of the negative, though honestly now, I think some of that is not true. I am still spending hours and staying up late playing the game and enjoying it tremendously, but yeah, six months into the game, there should definitely be more than there is atm.

 

[Skyfall]

Like anything else in life, it’s not perfect. But honestly, it has gotten me/getting me through this pandemic and turbulent times. It’s gentle, stress releasing and I look forward to it everyday. I’m pretty happy with all the improvements and I thought NL was awesome but this game is really good too. I like their updates, each one comes along just in time to break the monotony