Nintendo announces latest Animal Crossing: New Horizons features

Everything we know about the eagerly anticipated new Switch game

A new entry in Nintendo’s beloved Animal Crossing series is about to arrive on Switch consoles.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is released on 20 March, with Nintendo revealing a host of new features on its YouTube channel as part of an “Animal Crossing direct” video announcement.

The video confirmed that players will be able to construct paths, rivers and cliffs around New Horizon’s island location, and can choose whether to admit new residents onto their island.

The game follows in the footsteps of previous Animal Crossing games, which let players control a cartoonish character as they establish a life among talking animal peers.

In New Horizons, players will live on an island with up to eight friends. At the start of the game players can choose from a range of island shapes, and select which hemisphere to live in (which will drastically change the in-game seasons, which run parallel to real life).

In addition to the player’s house, there will be a variety of facilities in the game, including an “Airport”, which lets players visit other player’s islands online.

There will be a tiered “friend” system, in which players are only allowed to bring terrain-shaping tools to the islands owned by their designated “best friends” - such as shovels or axes.

The video also answered some frequently asked questions. Nintendo has confirmed that the game will support Amiibo figures from the Animal Crossing series. While visiting other islands online, the multiplayer will use temporary passwords.

Nintendo also confirmed they are working on a recovery system to retreive save files from the servers in the event of console loss or damage.

There will be free downloadable updates, with the first such update arriving on launch day. Seasonal events will be part of these updates, with the announcement video hinting at Easter, Christmas, Halloween and Thanksgiving content.