Animal Crossing New Horizons allows players to use their amiibo collection to bring new perks to the game. This guide will breakdown all of the compatible amiibo and how to use them in Animal Crossing New Horizons. Animal Crossing New Horizons has made a massive impact ever since its initial release. Just under a week, the game has been able to beat out massive gaming giants like Pokemon Sword and Shield and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as the best-selling Nintendo Switch game within a week of its release. This is no easy task, as Pokemon in itself is the biggest and most successful franchise to ever exist in history. In the case with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, every time there is an announcement about this series, this occupies the gaming world with discussion, theories, and excitement. The Animal Crossing series has always seen moderate success ever since its debut on the Nintendo Gamecube, but this is unprecedented for the cutesy animal life simulator. Regardless of the series popularity, the Animal Crossing series has its own line of compatible amiibo cards and figures that can be used in Animal Crossing New Horizons. Time to dust off those old figures, here is how the amiibo work in Animal Crossing New Horizons.
Figures like amiibo have existed from Nintendo ever since the lifetime of the Wii U. These figures when tapped onto the Wii U's gamepad would include small benefits for the player. In the case of Super Smash Bros. For Wii U, amiibo figures would act as a computer character in which the player can spar with. The amiibo would get stronger and learn their opponent's movements and become extremely strong over time. In the case of Animal Crossing, amiibo figures were introduced for the series with Animal Crossing Amiibo Festival. While the game was a critical and financial failure for Nintendo, this did not stop the series from continuing to produce amiibo for these characters. New types of amiibo called amiibo cards were created so Nintendo could place as many neighbors and characters on them as possible. Over 100 amiibo cards now exist since the release of Animal Crossing Amiibo Festival. These cards and figures were also made compatible with Animal Crossing New Leaf with a post-launch update. While the amiibo craze was initially insane when it first launched, currently the hype behind these cards and figures has died down. Although, for players who own Animal Crossing amiibo figures or cards, they serve a function in Animal Crossing New Horizons. Here is how amiibo is implanted into the game.
Amiibo in Animal Crossing New Horizons
For starters, only Animal Crossing amiibo is compatible with the game. No Mario's or Link's here. There are two major features that come along with amiibo in Animal Crossing New Horizons. The first involves Harvey. Harvey is a character that will eventually visit the player's island. When the player speaks with him, Harvey will invite the player over to his own island. Heading to his island will function as a photoshoot area. Players can customize the rooms with a wide variety of furniture and use the in-game camera to snap some photos. Players can invite their own neighbors onto the island or scan amiibo they have to bring that character along. This is great if the player wants a photo with a specific character, regardless of if the character has shown up on the island or not. It is a nice little distraction for players who wish to document photos with amiibo they hold near and dear to their hearts.
The next function of amiibo in Animal Crossing New Horizons is unlocked once the player unlocks the campsite. The campsite is given to players who have completed the renovation of the Residents Tent. Once the tent has transformed into a building, the player will be given a campsite to set up somewhere around their town by Tom Nook. Once the campsite is built, new characters will begin to make the trip onto the player's deserted island. Here, players can scan amiibo to get the character to visit the campsite and potentially move onto the island as a permanent resident. For starters, the character will not immediately join. They will provide gifts to the player to start off but the player can scan the amiibo only once per calendar day (players can skip this waiting period by changing the date in the settings of the Nintendo Switch). After a while, the characters will offer to move onto the island. This is a great method of unlocking a specific neighbor the player wants, as the only other method to get certain characters is by plenty of waiting and is completely random. It is important to mention that the main characters in the Animal Crossing series cannot be added as neighbors in the game and will not visit the campsite. Characters like Isabelle, KK Slider, Digby or Resetti will not appear, regardless of using the amiibo. This only works with minor neighbor character amiibo's and cards.
It is pleasant to see that amiibo is once again serving a major purpose in video games. During the peak popularity of amiibo, it was nearly impossible to collect any of them. These figures were high-value sellers online for scalpers and hardcore fans would camp outside of retailers for hours, rain or sunshine, to secure these elusive NFC toys. Ironically enough, one of the most valuable and rare amiibo during this era was the Villager amiibo. Villager, Marth of the Fire Emblem series, and Wii Fit Trainer from the Wii Fit games were known as the big 3 since they were the rarest amiibo to ever exist. One of these three would sell for 10x the initial retail price. Eventually, Nintendo got better about printing out these figures and getting them to retailers, decreasing the value in each one. Currently, amiibo has fallen into obscurity with all the other NFC figures to exist in that era. Many players may have a massive collection of amiibo from back when they were popular, but struggle to find a purpose for them for games. It is likely that players will seek out amiibo cards for Animal Crossing New Horizons to secure their favorite neighbors.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons is now available on the Nintendo Switch.