animal crossings new horizons digital code

If you want curated lists of our favorite media, check out What to Play and What to Watch. When we award the Polygon Recommends badge, it’s because we believe the recipient is uniquely thought-provoking, entertaining, inventive, or fun - and worth fitting into your schedule. Polygon Recommends is our way of endorsing our favorite games, movies, TV shows, comics, tabletop books, and entertainment experiences. I played as if my time with the game was limited, when in fact, it was very, very not limited. Because I wanted to collect everything and expand as quickly as possible, I played it almost competitively, comparing my island to those of my peers, wondering which fleeting moment of time I had misspent to miss out on that forest-green sofa. They embraced time travel as a way to binge the otherwise chill game, playing as if New Horizons was a race to be won.

But it did, and, maybe as a result of that intense escapist focus, a lot of people played New Horizons furiously. No one can say whether we would have played New Horizons differently if it didn’t come around when it did. New Horizons arrived at exactly the right time to become the getaway we all needed. It was, in no small part, a safer alternative. We avoided other people, at least physically, and re-centered much of our focus on this digital canvas.

Many of us spent more time at home, while others - deemed essential - risked their health by trekking into an uncertain world. When New Horizons launched in March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic had just shut down large swathes of the globe. What has changed, though, is the circumstances we’re playing through. Despite Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ many, many updates - both large and small - Nintendo’s island-life simulation remains largely the same.

Animal crossings new horizons digital code