Now that October is over, I can finally talk about the latest Animal Crossing update! BACKGROUND:
After the August update, New Horizons had a month-long content drought, with September being pretty much uneventful apart from the seasonal change. This was not unexpected, however, as the tease for this particular update was explicitly Halloween-themed, so it makes sense that it came out closer to October. As much as I had fun with the fireworks stuff in August, the last update wasn't as meaty content-wise as I had hoped, so seeing the trailer for this new update gave me hope for more things to do. WHAT'S NEW: Halloween The biggest addition here is the Halloween event, which happens on your island on the 31st of October (makes sense). From 5PM to midnight on that day, Jack, the self-proclaimed Czar of Halloween visits the island, and he (along with all your villagers) will celebrate the night with the time-honored tradition of trick-or-treating. To participate in trick-or-treat, you naturally require candy. Throughout the month of October (and only on October), you can buy candy from the shop in order to stock up for Halloween, with the caveat that you can only buy one piece per day (which can be worked around by shopping on other players' islands). It's an interesting way to build anticipation for the event; I certainly felt excited to finally use the candy on Halloween after spending an entire month hoarding the stuff. Another thing you need for Halloween is a costume, and Animal Crossing has you covered there, too. The game adds a new assortment of horror-themed apparel to the Able Sisters' shop, from mage dresses to animal suits. There were already plenty of costume-type clothing before the update, but these new additions feel fresh and are a more than welcome addition to the expansive selection of apparel you can wear. Even Kicks gets in on the action, selling devil wings that you can wear on your back like a backpack. That's pretty much the first new thing he's sold since the game came out, and I hope this is a sign that the devs are willing to expand his selection in future updates. If you're not satisfied with all that, this update gives you all-new eye colors and skin tones to really get into the Halloween mood. The new skin tones are essentially "body paint," taking on unnatural colors as blue, green, purple, and bone white. The eye colors go the same route, and you can have irises in colors such as gray, pink, orange, and more. I really loved this addition; it adds a whole new layer to putting together your costume, and the best part is that you can use these even after Halloween is over. I hope they explore more ways to expand character customization in future updates; stuff like new hair styles would be neat. On Halloween, your villagers (who are all in costume) will walk up to you asking for candy.... or else. If you give them candy, they will give you something in exchange: DIY recipes for Halloween furniture, the Halloween furniture items themselves, pumpkins, and even new Reactions. A couple of these items are only obtainable during Halloween, but if you've stockpiled a lot of candy, you'll get them pretty quickly. The rest of the items can be acquired through various means from October 1-30, so if you've been playing regularly during that time, it won't take you long to complete the set. The villagers can ask you for candy multiple times, so if you have candy to burn and want duplicates/still have missing items, you won't have too much trouble rerolling. Once you have all you need, however, you may get a little annoyed by ten different villagers constantly asking you for candy. Not all of the villagers may be roaming outside during the event. The ones inside their houses actually give you candy when you talk to them, which feels more like how trick-or-treating usually goes. It's a good way to restock on candy if you find yourself low on the good shit. If you don't give a villager candy, they play a trick on you. The "trick" is pretty much just them switching out your current skin color with "body paint" and putting a custom face paint design on your face. It's rather amusing and all in the spirit of fun, so I found myself actively not giving villagers candy just so I can see what they do to my face. The only gripe I have with this is that you can't save the face paint designs they put on you to the Custom Designs app. Jack himself also participates in the trick-or-treating action, so you can either share your candy or incur his "wrath". What makes Jack special is that you can give him lollipops (something you can acquire from your villagers when you give them candy), and doing so will reward you with Halloween DIY recipes that you can only get on Halloween. In addition, he can also give you two special clothing items that allow you to cosplay as him. Not only is this a cool reward, there's actually a special interaction with it; talking to villagers on Halloween with these clothes on spooks them into giving you candy, which is hilarious to me. Jack himself is flattered if you talk to him while wearing the outfit. Overall, I thought the Halloween event was a fun time. The rewards are neat, everyone gets in on the festivities, and it feels like a good payoff to a month of "preparation". I enjoyed running around my island making sure all my villagers got candy, seeing Jack's excitement over lollipops, and even goading folks into pranking me. Once you have all the rewards, there isn't really a reason to keep trick-or-treating other than for your own amusement, but I think that's fine. There's no need to make what's supposed to be a fun event feel like a chore. Pumpkins The other big addition to this update is the ability to plant and harvest pumpkins. You can buy pumpkin starts from Nook's Cranny (during October only) or from Leif (available year-round), plant them like you would a shrub, and in a few days, pumpkins will be ready to harvest. Yes, you can be a pumpkin farmer now. There are multiple varieties of pumpkins, each coming in different colors. You have the regular orange, as well as pumpkins in yellow, green, and white. What you get when you plant a pumpkin start is random, but you can control what varieties you grow by planting the corresponding color pumpkin like you would a fruit. You can even water the plants, and this results in a more bountiful harvest. Aside from eating and selling, the main use for pumpkins is as a crafting material for the Halloween DIYs that also came with this update. The orange ones are the type you'll be using to craft, but the other colors are still useful, as they are what you use to customize the Halloween DIYs (instead of a regular customization kit). It's pretty cool that there's a whole furniture set you can make with these things, and I love the idea of using other color pumpkins to customize them, but I think it would be even more fun if you could do more with these pumpkins. That leads into why I gave this addition its own section: pumpkins being in the game opens up the possibility of other crops eventually making it into the game. While I imagine any new additions will be given the same DIY treatment as the pumpkins, I wager that adding all these food items will also lead to a sort of cooking mechanic being added to the game. Animal Crossing isn't really a full-on farming sim, but I think giving food items like fruit and veggies more uses apart from eating and crafting DIY items could be a lot of fun. VERDICT: Majority of the content in the latest Animal Crossing update revolves around a one-day event and is limited to only the month of October, and while it can be argued that more could have been added, I think what we got here is still pretty good. Halloween itself is a fun event, and all the things you get before and during it (new clothing, character customization, DIYs, Reactions, and furniture) meaningfully expand the ever-growing catalog of things you can collect and interact with in the game. Plus, the addition of pumpkins sets the stage for what may come next, possibly heralding a whole new game mechanic that could give players even more to do. The next update is due later in November, and it looks to be similarly holiday-themed with Franklin and Jingle being teased for the Thanksgiving and Christmas event respectively. I look forward to see what they add next! - end -
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