NintendObs Thinks: What's in store for Animal Crossing.
An overhaul of New Horizons "later this year," or further stopgap content before a brand-new game?
This whole conversation started from an announcement Nintendo made earlier in the week regarding Animal Crossing New Horizons, tangentially to the regularly scheduled announcement of the game’s August plans. The message of interest in full, from Nintendo of America on Twitter, goes by:
In addition to these updates, more free content for #AnimalCrossing: New Horizons is currently in development for later this year. More information will be shared in the future, so please stay tuned. Thank you for your support and patience.
The notion of “more free content” doesn’t seem like much at first, since it really could just be more of the same. However, that would bear the question of why even mention it if that were the case, why bother a community yearning for a long overdue 2.0 update if it’s just for tweaks to existing events and new seasonal items that have never needed a heads-up? To top it off, the fact that it is “currently in development for later this year” clearly alludes to a one-time sizeable drop rather than the aforementioned ongoing rollouts.
There’s also “free” in here that is a keyword, making it even more likely to be consequential modifications brought to the whole title. If the content was paid, by the discriminate nature of being only accessible via a further expense it would specifically focus on a selection of the game’s elements to enrich them in an optional manner. Being “free” means that these upcoming changes are meant for everyone, and therefore can address the game in its ensemble.