50 Fun Facts About Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Which shooter launched the same day as Animal Crossing: New Horizons in March 2020, inspiring crossover fan art?

Doom Eternal also arrived on March 20, 2020, and fans of both games drew its armoured Doomguy and the gentle Isabelle as best friends.

Which US presidential candidate's 2020 campaign made official yard signs for Animal Crossing: New Horizons islands?

Joe Biden's campaign released the digital signs for decorating islands, and later that year Nintendo issued guidelines banning political activity in the game.

Which flightless bird runs the airport in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, its crew named after the Wright brothers?

Dodo brothers Orville and Wilbur run the island airline: Orville works the reception desk while Wilbur, the elder of the two, is the pilot.

Which vegetable does Daisy Mae sell every Sunday in Animal Crossing: New Horizons to fuel the 'stalk market'?

Turnips bought from her spoil the following Sunday, so players have one week of twice-daily price changes in which to sell at a profit.

Blathers, the owl who curates the museum in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, is disgusted by which of his own exhibits?

Bugs repel Blathers: he accepts each donation reluctantly and describes the species with open contempt, despite running the whole museum.

Activists from which city protested inside Animal Crossing: New Horizons before Chinese stores pulled the game?

Hong Kong activists including Joshua Wong protested on their islands, and the game then vanished from Chinese online stores such as Taobao, where it had been a grey-market import.

Which musician's concert rolls the credits in Animal Crossing: New Horizons once an island earns three stars?

K.K. Slider, a guitar-playing white dog, has appeared in every Animal Crossing game and is modelled on Nintendo composer Kazumi Totaka.

In which country did Animal Crossing: New Horizons become the best-selling video game of all time in 2022?

Japan saw it pass the first Pokémon games for the record in November 2022; as early as August 2020 it had climbed to second place behind them.

Tom Nook, called a raccoon in English versions of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, is based on which creature of folklore?

Tanuki are raccoon dogs, and his original name, Tanukichi, wears the origin openly, though overseas players mostly know him as the raccoon who holds their home loan.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons popularised which genre term, later given to farm sims like Stardew Valley?

Cozy games boomed after the 2020 lockdowns: one industry writer found only a handful of the dozens of Steam titles sold under that tag predated the island sim.

What does Tom Nook give new arrivals to live in at the start of Animal Crossing: New Horizons instead of a house?

A tent is the first home on the island; Tom Nook later arranges upgrades and expansions to a proper house, with the loan amount rising each time.

What can fall from a shaken tree in Animal Crossing: New Horizons and leave the player with a swollen eye?

A wasp nest releases a swarm that chases the player, and a second sting before the first is treated with medicine makes them faint and wake up outside their house.

Which of these is one of the five possible native fruits an island starts with in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Pears share the list with apples, cherries, oranges and peaches; whichever is native sells for 100 Bells apiece, while the other four fetch 500.

What must players wear to dive for sea creatures in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, a feature added in mid-2020?

A wet suit came with the first wave of the free summer update, which introduced swimming, diving and a whole new class of museum donations.

Which Super Mario item added to Animal Crossing: New Horizons lets players teleport between two spots on an island?

Warp pipes arrived for the 35th anniversary of Super Mario Bros.: two placed on an island link up, but with three or more the exit is picked at random.

Which shop do the twins Timmy and Tommy run in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Nook's Cranny plays on the phrase 'nook and cranny'; it was Tom Nook's own first store in earlier games before the twins took the name for theirs.

Mabel and Sable, who run the Able Sisters tailor shop in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, are which kind of animal?

Hedgehogs with opposite temperaments: shy Sable sews in the background and opens up slowly, while her younger sister Mabel greets the customers.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons was the first game in the series to match its seasons to which detail about the player?

Their hemisphere decides it, so a southern island gets its weather and seasonal wildlife on the opposite calendar from a northern one.

What washes up on the beach in Animal Crossing: New Horizons the day after a player wishes during a meteor shower?

Star fragments go into recipes such as the star wand, which Celeste the owl teaches the first time a player speaks to her on one of her night visits.

Which game is the only Nintendo Switch title to have outsold Animal Crossing: New Horizons worldwide?

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe stayed ahead even as the island sim passed 50 million copies, a total greater than every earlier Animal Crossing game combined.

Which award did Animal Crossing: New Horizons win at The Game Awards 2020, where it also contended for Game of the Year?

Best Family was its win that night, and months later it collected two trophies at the BAFTA Games Awards, one of them for multiplayer.

Development of Animal Crossing: New Horizons began in 2012, right after its predecessor launched on which console?

The 3DS hit New Leaf came out in 2012 and work on its successor began soon after, long before the Switch itself had even been thought of.

Nintendo of America's Doug Bowser said Animal Crossing: New Horizons was delayed to 2020 mainly to avoid what?

Staff crunch was the worry: Bowser cited a healthy work-life balance for employees, though the delay wiped more than $1 billion off Nintendo's market value.

On which platform did Gary Whitta livestream Animal Talking, a talk show staged inside Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Twitch carried the show from a set built in the basement of Whitta's in-game house, and one episode drew 339,000 individual viewers.

Which café did the 2.0 update add to the museum in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, serving coffee at 200 Bells a cup?

The Roost belongs to Brewster, a pigeon barista whom players must first find on a far-off island before the museum closes for a day of construction.

Which character sings while ferrying players to remote islands for 1,000 Nook Miles in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Kapp'n arrived in the 2.0 update and waits at the pier once an island has hosted its first concert; skip his song mid-voyage and he says how disappointed he is.

Which married alpacas pose for wedding photos on Harv's Island each June in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Reese and Cyrus want a new themed shoot each day of Wedding Season, and Cyrus swaps the heart crystals players earn for more wedding furniture.

What must a diving player hand to Pascal the sea otter in Animal Crossing: New Horizons to earn mermaid-themed rewards?

A scallop is his price: he trades it for a mermaid recipe, a piece of mermaid clothing or a pearl, then swims off to crack it open and eat it.

What does the washed-up seagull Gulliver ask players to dig out of the beach in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Communicator parts, five in all, lie under small spouting holes in the sand like clams, and he needs them to call the crew of the ship he fell from.

Which fox sells paintings and statues, some of them forgeries, from a boat in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Redd first turns up once a player has donated 60 items to the museum, mooring his Treasure Trawler at a hidden beach on the north shore.

Isabelle, Tom Nook's cheerful assistant at Resident Services in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, is which breed of dog?

Shih Tzu Isabelle was invented for New Leaf, whose makers decided the player-mayor needed an assistant and wanted one who was loyal, a little clumsy and very cute.

Saharah, the wandering trader who sells rugs and wallpaper in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, is which kind of animal?

Camel trader Saharah carries her stock in a white backpack, and overseas versions of the game have her speak in an archaic style, like a translated ancient text.

Which third Able sister, a fashion designer, sets outfit challenges in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Label went by Labelle in earlier games; in this one she explains that she has gone back to her real name while Labelle lives on as her clothing brand.

Which NookPhone app in Animal Crossing: New Horizons lets players build cliffs, rivers and paths after the credits?

Island Designer is Tom Nook's reward for hosting the first concert, and the player's character dons a white construction hat with the company logo whenever the app is open.

Which paid expansion for Animal Crossing: New Horizons has players design holiday villas for villagers?

Happy Home Paradise came out two days after the free 2.0 update, and decorating tricks learned there, such as papering a single wall, also work back on the player's own island.

Which noise-making figures in Animal Crossing: New Horizons grow overnight from a buried and watered piece?

Gyroids move and make noise in rhythm, syncing to any music playing nearby, and the 2.0 update swapped the old sets for 36 all-new designs.

The bank's interest rate cut in Animal Crossing: New Horizons was widely seen as a curb on which player trick?

Time travel means setting the Switch's clock forward to skip real-world waiting; the developers also tied seasonal events to updates so nobody could jump ahead to grab them.

Which mole, known for scolding players who skipped saving, runs the Rescue Service in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Mr. Resetti was laid off once the game began saving automatically, so he answers stuck players' pleas and airlifts them to safety for a fee in Nook Miles.

Which fish, a so-called living fossil, can be caught in Animal Crossing: New Horizons only while it is raining?

Coelacanth catches sell for 15,000 Bells apiece, and its very large shadow can turn up in the sea in any month of the year.

Which flower sprouts in Animal Crossing: New Horizons only once an island has held a five-star rating?

Lily of the valley is the one flower whose blossoms cannot be plucked, and earlier English versions of the series called the plant Jacob's ladder.

Who directed Animal Crossing: New Horizons, saying its ideas took shape before the Switch itself was conceived?

Aya Kyogoku and her team chose a deserted island so players could shape the world from scratch, a break from the ready-made villages of every earlier game.

At which event in Animal Crossing: New Horizons does Pavé the peacock trade prizes for coloured feathers?

Festivale is modelled on Brazilian Carnival and falls two days before Ash Wednesday, with confetti raining down while the villagers dance in costume.

Which ghost in Animal Crossing: New Horizons mistakes the player for a ghost and scatters into five pieces?

Wisp rewards whoever nets all five pieces with a choice of something new or something expensive, and a spooky Reaction performed in his line of sight sets him off too.

Which chameleon in Animal Crossing: New Horizons pays one and a half times shop prices for a player's insects?

Flick took over the summer insect-catching contest from his father Nat, and given three of one species he will sculpt the player a model of it.

Which tapir guides sleeping players through dream copies of strangers' islands in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Luna never appears while the player is awake; her service starts only when they lie down on a bed inside their own house.

Which wolf new to Animal Crossing: New Horizons may be named after a grandmother who logged 3,580 hours of New Leaf?

Audie was also the name that Audrey, 87, gave her own character before her grandson's video of her play log went viral in 2019; Nintendo has never confirmed the tribute.

Which shooter's record for digital copies sold in one month did Animal Crossing: New Horizons break?

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 had held the mark since 2018, until the island sim sold an estimated five million downloads in a single calendar month.

Which company's characters inspired six crossover villagers added to Animal Crossing: New Horizons in 2021?

Sanrio villagers such as Rilla, who is based on Hello Kitty, joined in a March 2021 update, and scanning their amiibo cards also unlocks themed furniture to buy.

Which sloth sells shrubs and flowers from a stall outside Resident Services in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

Leif also pays double the usual price for weeds, and since the 2.0 update he will clear an entire overgrown island for 100,000 Bells.

What grows when a player buries Bells in a patch of shining soil in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?

A money tree always sprouts in that spot and bears three bags of Bells, but bury more than 10,000 and there is only a 30% chance of tripling the stake.