Summary
The nextAnimal Crossinggame will have big shoes to fill after the massive success ofAnimal Crossing: New Horizons. However, the foundation for a newAnimal Crossinggame to go above and beyond its predecessor is already in place thanks to the new mechanics introduced inAnimal Crossing: New Horizons. While this title launched missing several features, such as The Roost and the Dream Suite, one late addition toAnimal Crossing: New Horizonscould be a major selling point for the next entry in the series to capitalize on at launch.
Gyroids are a staple of theAnimal Crossingfranchise, with these odd little noise-makers being around since the original GameCube title. While they didn’t come toAnimal Crossing: New Horizonsuntil the November 2021 update, the game updated their functionality to allow players to turn on as many of them in their house at once as they wanted, upping the limit from four in the previous entry. To further improve the functionality of these strange items and give players more of a reason to collect them, the nextAnimal Crossinggame could overhaul Gyroids to make them an exclusive collectible.
The Next Animal Crossing Game Could Make Gyroids a New Sought-After Collectible
A big part of theAnimal Crossingseries is how the games encourage player-to-player connectivity and interaction. The ability to travel to another player’s town has been a feature of the series since theGameCube entry allowed players to visit the town of another playerif a second memory card with its save data was inserted into the console. Throughout the series, players have been incentivized to visit the towns of others in order to obtain exclusive items like fruits, or even potentially convince a villager to move into their own town.
Animal Crossing: New Horizonsincentivizes players to collect Gyroids by allowing them to have as many turned on in their house as they want, and provides them with the means to easily obtain new ones using the newGyroid Fragmentitem, which can be buried and watered to become a Gyroid the next day. Previously, the main motivation for collecting these items had been to hear the different sounds they play when placed in the player’s house. However, the nextAnimal Crossinggame could put a new spin on this mechanic and create a new way for players to interact with one another using Gyroids as a tradable item.
How an Animal Crossing: New Horizons Successor Could Implement Tradable, Exclusive Gyroids
While it might seem odd for items with suchdark lore behind them like Gyroidsto become a fun tradable item, theAnimal Crossingseries already has the foundation laid for this mechanic for it to be a no-brainer inclusion in the next entry. Perhaps Gyroids would function similarly to fruits with only a handful of types initially available on a player’s island, requiring them to visit other players' islands in order to obtain all of the different variants. This mechanic could even incorporate Gyroid Fragments as the main method by which players obtain foreign Gyroids, keeping the player in suspense until they bury and water the item to see which variant they get.
Like obtaining foreign fruit inAnimal Crossing, there could be other ways of obtaining different Gyroid variants, like finding Gyroid Fragments in presents dropped by balloons or having them randomly sent in letters from the player’s mom. To further incentivize their collection, players could receive rewards based on how many different types of Gyroids they’ve collected. There’s clearly a lot of room to expand the mechanics surroundingGyroids in theAnimal Crossingseries, and the next entry would be smart to capitalize on these fan-favorite items.
