Animal Crossing: New Horizons is as perfect as an Animal Crossing game could be. Every day there’s something to look forward to whether it’s seeing my animal residents or checking what’s on sale. New Horizons is a beautiful little game that just puts me in a good mood. Could it be better? Will it get boring after some time? Probably and that’s why we’re excited to check out some new features that could be possible for Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

Note that some of this information was collected by dataminer Ninji and Oatmeal Dome. While some have actually been announced by Nintendo itself. Let’s check out what we could possibly be looking forward to in Animal Crossing: New Horizons!

 

Crazy Redd Returns

Even the most wholesome of games has a little shady character and Animal Crossing isn’t alone. If you have played previous iterations of the series you’ll recognise Crazy Redd, the black market dealer who’s as sly as a fox. He appears once in a while inviting you to his black market. In there he sells exclusive art, sculptures and furniture only found at his store.

The datamine information by Ninji shows that our foxy pall Crazy Redd has a ship this time. And he’ll be docking at the ‘secret beach’ north of your island. It turns out that this square area of the map has a very interesting name inside the game’s code. Specifically, the secret beach acre is named ” Nつねきち” internally. What is つねきち? Interestingly, that’s exactly the name of Redd in Japanese.

Fun Fact: It’s implied that Redd and Tom Nook used to be in business together. But ended their partnership when Redd wanted to sell forgeries and charge exorbitant prices. Given their history, it would make sense for Redd to be sneaking his ship at the back of the island.

If you’ve played Animal Crossing: New Leaf then you’re no stranger to forgeries and we hear that those will be making a comeback. A forgery painting usually bears some distinguishing feature or detail that is different or not present in the genuine article. You won’t be able to donate it to the museum and it’s selling price is 10 bells. Dammit, Redd.

 

A Museum Upgrade

did fang just leak the art dlc #AnimalCrossing #ACNH #NintendoSwitch pic.twitter.com/eKJxX9lobo

— ka (@sylvidia) April 6, 2020

Two extra museum upgrades might be on the way! The museum in Animal Crossing: New Horizons is absolutely gorgeous. According to the information found through datamining, all three levels of the Museum including the initial one we currently have, contain sections for art like painting or statues. There’s a little leak from @sylvidia about one of her animals mentioning the new art section of the museum. These new items will likely be obtained through Redd as previously discussed. We don’t know how to get the Museum upgrade yet but it could be similar to how the Nook’s Cranny store upgrades.

Additionally, there appear to be two more standalone buildings for a Museum Shop and a Museum Cafe. Presumably, the Museum Shop would function similarly to the version seen in Animal Crossing: New Leaf with custom exhibit rooms for rent and additional museum themed items for sale.

Brewster was mentioned… #AnimalCrossing #ACNH #NintendoSwitch pic.twitter.com/BgRZr02zcH

— Cheryl 🍙 Isle of le potato (@sliceofcy) April 6, 2020

As for the Museum Cafe, it would likely include the past special character Brewster serving coffee as a barista. Here’s a tweet (above) from @sliceofcity that shows a little leak on Brewster’s arrival. This cafe allegedly includes a section featuring Gyroids as well. Which would make sense as Brewster has a known fondness for Gyroids.

 

Bushes!

As many fans have been hoping for, plantable bushes will be returning to Animal Crossing: New Horizons. In New Leaf bushes could be bought at the gardening store and be used as a kind of fence. In the previous game there were five different types of bushes the – Azalea, Hydrangea, Hibiscus, Sweet Olive (Osmanthus) and Holly. It looks like all those will be making a come back including the brand new Camellia bush. Subject to change of course.

While we’re on the topic of gardening, an unused shop interface titled ‘cGardening’ has been found as well. This is the same system used to power purchasing from travelling merchants like Kicks. So I think we can expect a new Gardening Store to be making its way onto the island. Hopefully run by Leif.

 

Gardening

Having a new gardening store would make sense because new types of plants have been discovered in the Animal Crossing: New Horizons datamine. Not just flowers or bushes though these are vegetables! More specifically – tomato, wheat, sugar cane, potato, carrot and pumpkin. There has never been a gardening mechanic before in the Animal Crossing series. But since the success of Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley, why not add it in there?!

 

Cooking

Now that we have gardening and food why not cooking? With vegetables, there’s really only so much veggie craft items we can make. I mean I don’t really want a pumpkin chair… well maybe just two. But if they had cooking that would give the vegetables more utility.

Inside of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, there’s a ‘play report’ feature that generates reports for Nintendo containing aggregate data on what players do. The company can use this information for studying how the game is played. Three versions of this play report feature exist including ‘get_recipe_diy’, ‘get_recipe_clothing’, and ‘get_recipe_cooking’. Currently, only the ‘get_recipe_diy’ function is actually used though. This is probably the Cooking feature in the works for New Horizons!

 

Deep-Sea Creatures

Diving is one of the features from Animal Crossing: New Leaf where you can dive to collect deep-sea creatures. Back in New Leaf, diving is limited to the ocean, not ponds or rivers. So we’ll assume that it remains the same in New Horizons as well. To catch a deep-sea creature your character needs to equip a wet suit and once underwater you’ll be able to catch all sorts of marine life. Expect to see lobsters, shrimps, crabs, seaweed, scallops, octopus, oysters, clams and all that wet stuff coming back.

Excitingly a file for a new “Seafood” page in the Critterpedia NookPhone app was already found. Containing 33 different items, including the existing manila clam. This could explain why manila clams aren’t able to stack up in your inventory since fish and bugs don’t stack either.

 

A Nook’s Cranny Expansion

A second Nook’s Cranny expansion should already be available and we’ll be publishing a guide on how that works! The new store expansion will bring with it new items that can’t be found in the first shop. As well as nicer design tools.