One of the more difficult elements of Animal Crossing: New Horizons is convincing villagers to leave the island so that others can move in. It can take a significant amount of time for villagers to ask to leave, and even then the process is mostly random, meaning that oftentimes the wrong villager will want to move away. It can prove frustrating for those players trying to fill their dream island with their favorite Animal Crossing characters. Luckily, there are a few tips and tricks that can help make the process a little easier.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons made it easier than ever before to move new villagers onto the island, a feature that's resulted in the game's relatively notorious online villager black market. Players can use Nook Mile tickets to travel to various mystery islands, where they can encounter different villagers from across the series and ask them to move in. Villagers may also move in from the islands of other online players, or can appear at the player's campsite about once a week. While some of these methods require players to have an empty lot in advance, others allow them to replace a current resident entirely.
Island personalization is also a large factor in New Horizons, thanks to the addition of customizable DIY recipes and extensive island terraforming options. Many players take the design portions of New Horizons very seriously, placing a significant amount of emphasis on collecting villagers that fit their island's theme or even just those that are more highly sought after by other players. Given that there are hundreds of Animal Crossing villagers to choose from, though, the process can be difficult - especially if unwanted characters seem to simply refuse to move out and make room.
ACNH: Time Travel And Other Tips To Make Animal Crossing Villagers Move Out
Primarily, there are two methods when it comes to making Animal Crossing villagers leave, the first of which involves time travel - setting the Nintendo Switch's clock either ahead or behind, usually days at a time, in order to make the game progress differently. Villagers in New Horizons tend to ask to move out about once every two weeks, meaning that repeatedly moving the clock two weeks ahead at a time will eventually let players move out the villager they like the least. Alternatively, players could time travel until their desired villager is staying at the campsite. From there, they simply need to save and then convince the incoming villager to move out their unwanted neighbor. As characters select a random villager each time, however, it may take several attempts to force the correct one out.
For those players unwilling to deal with the side effects of time traveling in Animal Crossing, the second method comes in the form of just ignoring undesired villagers. Some players tend to build fences or even cliffs in order to avoid accidentally interacting with certain neighbors. It's been speculated that villagers who are ignored are more likely to ask to move out than villagers who have a close friendship with the player. It's possible that more methods will be discovered in the future, but for now these remain the most popular option among Animal Crossing: New Horizons players looking to move their favorite characters onto the island.