For example, I think it would be cool if there was a BBQ event, where your neighbours sat around and BBQ'd. Maybe like, in June or something, but not to replace the solstice events. It'd be cool if you could find the ingredients, orrrr buy them, like with Thanksgiving

What do you all think? What would you like to see, but would probably never see?

More development of the main character’s through the games. For example, the Able Sisters begin with Mabel and Sable in PG and WW, then in CF we see the story between them and Labelle, then in NL we get them all working together in one shop.

They could potentially develop other characters like Tom Nook with Timmy and Tommy, and Nook with Sable as that was missed a bit in NL. I personally would like to see more with KK Slider, and Celeste and Blathers, and Isabelle and Digby.

I know the games give you little tasters throughout but I’d really love a whole secret backstory from all of them and maybe a future you gradually unlock and little changes that happen, like maybe Pete talks about a date he had and when you go into the post office Pelly (or Phylis) is blushing. KK Slider introduces his daughter who will sing for you once a month. Tortimer shares stories of past towns. Gracie talks of her humble beginnings and her plans for the future. Resetti... stays the same. Some things never change.

The ability to send someone on your friend list a letter without having to visit their town.

Nintendo would never allow it because of the potential for children to strike up conversations with strangers, but it would revolutionise trading.

^ I liked how they did that in CF, where you had to WiFi with them first in order to do it. I wish it'd come back...

Expanding on deeper relationships, I'd like to have that with the regular neighbors as well. Being able to have more meaningful connections with them.

Wow the friend list letter idea is too good. Being able to send items through online would be so convenient! I'm mostly concerned with how they are going to incorporate all the "permanent" villagers from past games. Like I want Postman Pete to be there, I want Wisp to be around, etc. I hope they don't do away with anyone!

^ I used to send my husband, then boyfriend, love letters through the online services
Just silly stuff like 'Hey! Come visit me!' and then I'd shove a candy in it. It was great! I wish we could do that again. I'd send my sister stuff all the time. She lives far away so that'd be great.

Also, streetpass is going away, and it was a HUGE motivator for me to get out, I wish we had something where people could randomly visit via boat or something, but it'd have to moderated somehow to stop trolls.

note in a bottle like in wild world

Bring back NES games they really should bring it back if the service is already there imagine playing a two player NES game with your friend it would be so cool.

HatakeSage I read somewhere that technically the Switch might have the hardware required for StreetPass, I wish it'd come back!

niniTheGreat - Oh man, how I want the messages in bottles to come back, too! I fondly remember going out to stores with a bottle at sea and trying to get the monkey neighbours during that one Animal Crossing: Wild World promotional event, back in the day!

tim1 - I agree! I would really like it if the inevitable NES and SNES furniture-items had an optional shim that would let you access their respective Nintendo Switch Online applications if you're a subscriber. That would probably depend on how memory-intensive New Horizons is, though.

StarlitGlitch - I'm not too surprised by that (it's just a particular wireless implementation, isn't it? If you've got a link, I'd love to read more about it, please! ), and I would love to see it - especially if they brought back messages-in-bottles, since they fit the deserted-island setting so well. I mean, as you know, Wild World used a per-game predecessor of StreetPass for that*, so it's not like special hardware is required, as far as I know. It's obviously feasible on both models, but the Switch Lite in particular lends itself very well to the concept because it's so much smaller and lighter, and because of its slightly different demographic skew. And hey, the alert light in the Switch's Home-button can't just have been put there for the alarm feature, right?

*For anyone who doesn't remember it or who wasn't into the franchise back then, this was called "Tag Mode", and it was accessed by leaving a compatible DS game running and in sleep-mode - though I think that the only major titles that used it were Animal Crossing: Wild World and Nintendogs, with the latter instead calling it "Bark Mode". This was what was later expanded upon for the 3DS' StreetPass feature, and I'm guessing that chances are that it was meant to be included in the DS but there just wasn't time to implement it.

I know that The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass also had Tag Mode functionality, although I don't remember what it actually was.

Being able to catch every bug while online, and having balloon presents spawn online. That would be cool.

Online trading post for furniture between real player.

I would love a toggle setting for “rude” villagers. I know this would probably never happen, but I wish the dialogue would be closer to the GameCube & WW days rather than the NL and pocket camp dialogue. I don’t have a problem with the new dialogue, and I definitely don’t want villagers being rude all the time, but having a cranky villager actually be cranky and have an occasional rude comment that’s just funny to look at makes the game so much better than everyone being happy go lucky. The reason I’d like a toggle for it is I know some people don’t want it to go back to how the dialogue used to be. I’d be really happy to see some form of rude villager comments reappear in NH

I miss the note in the bottles so much! I still have some saved in my main character's pockets and I sometimes log back on so I can re-read some. I was always so excited when they washed up on shore and I'm pretty sure I made a random friend on here because they'd attached their ACC username to the bottom! I love all the new features that came with NL but I really wish they'd bring this back!

More activities we can do with the villagers for sure.

I miss the events we had in animal crossing, but I wish we could actually participate in them this time around. Although we could do the morning aerobics at least.

I'd like to see a bunch of personality systems implemented that would give the individual villagers more unique traits. some off the top of my head would be

proper likes and dislikes - every animal has a style of furniture & clothing they love, and one that they hate. giving them things from either category either in letters or as fetch quests will result in special dialogue and different rewards. they could also have some favourite foods instead of always pulling from a big random list of foods. maybe as part of the crafting mechanics we can make food

hobbies - kind of like in WW when the villagers would have a new hobby every week or so, but make them permanent and make them have a bigger effect on how the villager acts. if they like fishing, they hang out near water more often, will pay more for fish than other villagers and often talk about fishing. if they like fashion, they'll change their clothes more frequently and give you clothing that they "think will look good on you"

relationships (not the dating kind) - maybe every villager will get along better or worse with certain personality types and species, and how two villagers get along affects the kind of gossip you hear around town

I think that adding a bunch of things like that could add so much depth to the animals without needing to make every villager truly unique. as it is right now, villagers are basically a species and a personality, but instead they could plug in and mix & match a bunch of traits to make everyone feel more unique while still reusing a lot of stock dialogue

The relationship system you described already exists on a personality and individual basis. In wild world, when you say how a delivery went, it would affect the recipients' relationship with the animal who sent the item. In Later games, you couldn't mess with the relationships as much but the eee
Certain personalities also get along better with some personalities (ex. Cranky and Lazy get along well), and some have a harder time getting along. (ex Jock and Lazy).

I miss the debit card feature in ACCF. Since they took it out for NL, I'l guessing there's a good reason for it and it probably won't return for NH.

Weedle_ did it really? I never really noticed my responses having any effect but maybe it was just too subtle to notice. I knew certain personalities got along better than others, but because every cranky got along well with every lazy for example, none of them felt especially unique for it.

I'm thinking more like every individual villager gets along better or worse with certain personalities. so maybe gaston gets along with lazies, but grizzly doesn't. you would need dialogue for when they get along well, don't get along at all and are neutral to each other for all the personalities, which admittedly adds up to quite a bit of unique dialogue, but AC is full of niche situational dialogue already.

basically what I'm saying is make it more obvious

I hope they make the atmosphere of thunderstorms good. Like in the gamecube one!

Also, I forgot about the debit card, I never used it tbh. I should have!

The changing weather conditions are one of my favorite Animal Crossing features. I always loved seeing towering clouds in August ahead of and after Thunderstorms. I hope with the wind in New Horizons Thunderstorms are a real event.

Some kind of expansion(s) for the game that adds tons of new content to explore (aside from items).

I'm not saying I'd want them to go the greedy route with paid DLC, but I just really want them to support Animal Crossing games a little longer beyond just dropping the game. Kind of how they added the campsite area with the major New Leaf update, for instance.

The gap is certainly growing between Animal Crossing titles. If we go by the Japanese release date, New Leaf was released in 2012, which means there is going to be a large, 7-8 year gap between it and New Horizons. I think it is definitely time for them to consider finding fun ways to support the games longer after release that won't disgruntle fans.  

If you think about it, technically during this decade we've only received one main Animal Crossing game...

Of course there's been spin-offs, the app, the update, and a new game coming out right away the next decade... but technically

"Some kind of expansion(s) for the game that adds tons of new content to explore (aside from items).
"

I honestly think DLC could be a pretty cool way to keep the game alive without having to make a completely new game. I'd be fine with paid DLC if they really put in the effort to add new things, though I suppose it may be difficult to implement with the online multiplayer since people can just yoink whatever from your island.

If they could get around that issue though DLC could really go a long way for NH since it's built on being played for a long time.