Animal Crossing has been one of the most hotly-anticipated titles since the Nintendo Switch’s announcement, and it’s consistently been one of Nintendo’s top-performing series over the years.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons makes some massive improvements, giving players even more control over making their dream getaway. New options allow players to alter the environment by creating cliffs and rivers, import designs from past games, and craft furniture with materials they gather.
Yet for all these improvements, there’s one aspect of New Horizons that feels dreadfully behind the times, its save system and lack of cloud saves. It’s disappointing for fans and an indication of a larger issue.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons Has Strange Save Restrictions
Animal Crossing New Horizons will limit players to one island per Switch, no matter how many accounts they have on a system. That restriction alone is frustrating enough but even worse is that the game has literally no cloud save support, a major feature in the Nintendo Switch Online membership. To players, the thought of losing their Animal Crossing save can be catastrophic, as this is a game some put hundreds of hours and care into.
In the February Animal Crossing Direct Nintendo detailed that they’re working on the ability to let players recover their saves in the event they’re lost, but again this has strange limitations. Data recovery won’t be available at launch, but whenever it is available the fine print details that players will only be able to use the feature once. There’s no rhyme or reason for this restriction, and it feels a bit stifling for a series that has so many fans. To be fair, this isn’t the first big Nintendo game to not support cloud saves, as Splatoon 2 also didn’t feature them.
The whole crux of Animal Crossing: New Horizons is to build an island getaway; one that’s unique to each player. With that in mind, it’s baffling that Nintendo wouldn’t add a feature that makes sure players always have that unique island, and can share it with friends no matter where they go. It’d be much easier for players to log in to an account on a friend’s Switch, go to cloud saves, and jump into their island. Animal Crossing is an experience all about player freedom, and these decisions feel in stark contrast to that theme, illustrating a larger issue.
Nintendo Still Feels Behind the Times
Despite their massive success in recent years, Nintendo continues to feel behind the times in a variety of ways. The lack of cloud saves and recovery options in Animal Crossing: New Horizons is simply the latest step. To this day there’s no built-in voice chat on the Switch, instead requiring players to use the Nintendo Switch Online App to do so. Part of the concern is obviously about Nintendo’s family focus and harassment, but it still feels like a frustrating extra step.
Then there’s the Nintendo Online membership itself, which just doesn’t feel appealing in comparison to the offerings of Microsoft and Sony. The Switch Online service, of course, allows for online play but also gives access to a catalog of NES and SNES games. There aren’t always monthly consistent updates to these catalogs, however, and the offerings pale in comparison to the value provided by the free games of PS Plus and Xbox Live Gold.
The latest issue with cloud saves in Animal Crossing: New Horizons shows that Nintendo is still staunchly stuck in their ways. Players need to be careful with their save and while the limitations won’t be a problem for most, it will be a problem for some. Nintendo will always have their own unique appeal, but it’d be nice to see them adapt to the standard nearly everyone else works on.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons releases on March 20, 2020, for Nintendo Switch.
Next: The Biggest Announcements About Animal Crossing: New Horizons Made Today
