Prerelease and unused content in New Horizons

From Nookipedia, the Animal Crossing wiki

The following is a list of prerelease and unused content in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

Early builds[edit]

CEDEC 2020[edit]

A preview of an early build of New Horizons.

At the Computer Entertainment Developers Conference of 2020, art director Koji Takahashi, player and villager designer Asako Shibata, and item designer Hiromi Sugimoto spoke about the art direction regarding Animal Crossing: New Horizons. During their presentation, screenshots were shared of an early build of New Horizons. In those screenshots, the grass is shown to have a vibrant grass pattern underneath a grassy texture. The trunk of each hardwood tree featured no texture unlike the final build. Small pockets of dirt were featured, as well as dirt and stone paths. Villager houses had a small window on the top of the screen and feature a different roof and chimney, while the player's house appears to have been finalized in this build of the game. One screenshot showcases a building to the right of the player surrounded by stone paths, possibly indicating that the building was originally an older version of Resident Services. Another screenshot highlighted a different cliff texture, a white wooden fence, an early weed design, and an early stone bridge design. The screenshot also showcased a different water shader that is more opaque than the final build, as well as a different clock interface that nearly resembles that of New Leaf and an early build of the map UI.[1]

Concept art of some of the new villagers from New Horizons.

Later, the team addressed villager designs, in which various members began experimenting with various designs to see what would work out when developing New Horizons. The team also shared art concepts of the new villagers from New Horizons. In this art concept, Sherb wears an entirely gray sweater; Judy wears a different dress that nearly resembles a maid dress, lacks her blue-pink gradient, and has heart-shaped ears; Dom wears a dress shirt and does not have stripes on his horns; Audie's sunglasses are slightly smaller; and Cyd had a different hairstyle, wearing a skull tank and having a red tail.[1]

Concept art of retro fan.

Lastly, the team addressed furniture design, desiring to match the player's expectations whenever they decorate with any sets of furniture. They demonstrated with a retro fan, showcasing the fan's guard frame and buttons to make it stand it to players. In an early build, the guard frame of a Retro Fan had an equal proportion, while the final build had the front guard frame having more proportion than the back guard frame. The Retro Fan in the final build was also resized, heightened, and given extra details compared to its early build.[1]

Another design concept addressed by the team was to allow each furniture item to fit accordingly to the player's house. They choose a limit of 4 units, or 40 meters, and accommodated each furniture item to this new furniture system using a wooden simple bed as an example. Finally, interactions were done to certain furniture items, with one concept art regarding the usage of a bamboo doll.[1]

  • Various concept art of different characters featuring different artstyles

  • An early build of New Horizons.

  • Concept art of a retro fan highlighting the guard fence.

  • Concept art of a retro fan highlighting the buttons.

  • An early build of a retro fan prior to the proportion changes.

  • An early build of a retro fan after the new proportion changes.

  • A comparison of a retro fan and fan prior to the new proportion changes.

  • A comparison of a retro fan and fan after the new proportion changes.

  • A comparison of two different designs of a retro fan, with the right featuring a different fan design that uses more detail.

  • A size comparison of the wooden simple bed showcasing the different height comparisons.

  • A finalized height comparison for the wooden simple bed.

  • Various furniture in an early build of the game prior to height readjustments.

  • Various furniture in an early build of the game after height readjustments.

  • Concept art of bamboo doll.

  • Concept art of lighthouse.

  • Concept art of dolly.

E3 2019[edit]

A press screenshot of the E3 2019 demo.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons was formally revealed in E3 2019, although many elements of the game had changed from its reveal on June 11, 2019 to its release on March 20, 2020.

Notably, grass patterns are confined to a small circle and spread around the island, unlike the final game featuring a more uniform grass pattern scattered across the island. The snow also lacked a grass pattern in the reveal, with the final game featuring a circle pattern. The Call Resident app in this demo is called "Call Islander" and uses a different interface from the final game. The player also uses the Island Designer Construction Permit without a helmet in this demo. Snow in this build falls more heavy and notable than in the final game.

Fuchsia's house is different in this build of the game than the final version. While her wallpaper and flooring remained the same, Fuchsia originally featured a wooden simple bed instead of the loft bed with desk in the final game. Her house layout also changed, with the cute DIY table, ironwood cart, double sofa, cute wardrobe, monstera, wall-mounted TV (50 in.), cute floor lamp, and cute music player in a different placement in the initial build. Fuchsia's rock guitar was also in the Coral Pink variant than the Fire Red variant. Additionally, the red cute floor lamp's shade was colored white in this build instead of red in the final build.

At the end of the E3 2019 trailer, Tom Nook appears to the player to deliver them their itemized bill. During his conversation in this demo of the game, Tom Nook's voice is high pitched, matching similarly to the default voice for lazy villagers. The final game pitches his voice down significantly.

Nintendo Direct 9.4.19[edit]

Although much of New Horizons had been finalized in this build, there are some elements that differ a bit from the final game. Several of these elements remain from the E3 showcase, such as the player using the Island Designer without a helmet, the Call Resident app named the "Call Islander" app, and Tom Nook's voice sounding exactly as he did in the E3 2019 trailer.

New unique changes include several villagers with different name bubble coloring than the final game, including Bill (with his name bubble text originally yellow), Tammy (with her name bubble text originally orange), Rosie (with her name bubble originally dark blue), and Angus (with his name bubble originally colored brown). The dialogue that shows up when the player places down the tent, "I set up my tent! The island is feeling less deserted already.", was replaced with "I set up my tent! Now I have a home base for my new island life!".

Outside of the DIY Recipe app, item names were lowercase instead of the sentence case that was included in the final product. The interface that appears whenever a player eats an edible item is colored red and does not feature the "/10" denoting the maximum number of energy points obtainable.

New Horizons version 1.0.0[edit]

Despite version 1.0.0 being the final build of New Horizons, there were notable changes in the day one 1.1.0 update made to specific images for certain assets. These included:

Unused content[edit]

Special characters[edit]

Since version 1.0.0 and before the addition of all of them in various updates, data existed for the following special characters who were not present in the game outside of posters obtainable from Nook Shopping. This included an internal ID, the character's birthday, and their name bubble color.

DJ KK[edit]

In addition to other data, an icon for DJ KK was present in 1.0.0, before being removed in version 1.1.0. DJ KK would eventually be added to the game in version 2.0, albeit with a different icon.

  • DJ KK icon in 1.0.0

  • DJ KK icon in 2.0

Reaction[edit]

There are several unavailable animations within the game's code that can only be used by the player via hacking. These animations are either reserved for special characters or villagers or are outright unused. In addition, some reactions listed here were previously available in past games in the series.[2]

  • "Anger"

  • Begging animation

  • Animation used in the card game

  • Desperation animation

  • Disbelief animation

  • Salute animation used by Wilbur and Orville

  • Signaling animation used by Orville

  • Laid down animation used by Gulliver

  • A variation of "Happiness"

  • Acknowledgement animation used by K.K. Slider

  • Nodding animation used by K.K. Slider

  • Questioning animation used by K.K. Slider

  • Notice animation

  • "Outrage"

  • Rubbing animation

  • "Shrunk Funk Shuffle", unused in the game's code

  • A variation of "Intense"

  • "Sunniness"

  • Sweating animation

  • Talking animation

  • Scared animation used by Wisp

Vegetation[edit]

Vegetables were discovered in version 1.0.0 of New Horizons, with several strings being unused: VegetableTomato, VegetableWheat, VegetableSugarCane, VegetablePotato, VegetableCarrot, VegatableSquash, SquashOrange, SquashYellow, SquashGreen, and SquashWhite. The latter four also had some leftover icons before they and the vegetable names were removed in version 1.1.0.[3]

Internal references to vegetables would reappear in version 1.4.0 with the following strings: VgtTomato, VgtWheat, VgtSugarCane, VgtPotato, VgtCarrot, and VgtSquash. A new bush called Plumeria was also discovered.[3]

All of the vegetation referenced in version 1.0.0 and 1.4.0 would eventually be added to the game: orange pumpkins, green pumpkins, white pumpkins, and yellow pumpkins were added in version 1.5.0, and tomatoes, wheat, sugarcane, potatoes, carrots, pink-plumeria bushes, and white-plumeria bushes were added in version 2.0.

The Roost[edit]

Removed dialogue where lazy villagers, such as Punchy, mentioned Brewster in New Horizons.

References to The Roost existed in New Horizons prior to its addition in version 2.0.[3]

In version 1.0.0, a executable file known as IdrMuseumCafe00 suggested that the museum would have a room dedicated to The Roost. This was promptly removed in version 1.1.0, alongside the modification of any villager dialogues that reference Brewster.[3][4]

In version 1.10.0, assets regarding The Roost resurfaced, with evidence that a café entrance, a new string called cCafe, and a third floor of the museum that was highly suggested to be the location of The Roost. Version 1.11.0 introduced a new flag setting called cNpcMemory:TalkProgressMuseumBuiltCafe".[5]

Gyroids[edit]

References to gyroids existed in New Horizons prior to their addition in version 2.0.[3]

A 1.0.0 executable file exists as IdrMuseumHaniwa, suggesting that gyroids were to be given a separate room in the museum. This file, alongside any dialogue that mentions gyroids, were removed in version 1.1.0. Another string, 35_Gyroid, surfaced in version 1.4.0, once again suggested the inclusion of gyroids.[3]

Miscellaneous[edit]

Internal references to sewing (Ftr_Sewing) and cooking (Ftr_Cooking) could have be found in the game's strings prior to their removal in version 1.4.0. Cooking would eventually be added in version 2.0.

Event flows were found for Nat and Chip, suggesting that they were replaced by Flick and C.J. far into development.[3]

Internal references to a Portuguese translation of New Horizons has also been found in the game, with strings pertaining to both European (EUpt) and Brazilian (USpt) Portuguese.[3]

References[edit]

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 @PushDustIn on X (formerly Twitter) (September 9, 2020). Archived from the original on May 6, 2022. Retrieved August 29, 2021.
  2. ↑ Jaye (August 2, 2020). "All Unused Reactions in Animal Crossing New Horizons". YouTube. Retrieved September 7, 2021.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 Alexis. "Trivia". ACNH API. Retrieved August 20, 2021.
  4. ↑ Justin (April 9, 2020). "Villager Dialogue Hints at Brewster’s The Roost Cafe & Upcoming Shops in Animal Crossing: New Horizons". Animal Crossing World. Retrieved August 20, 2020.
  5. ↑ Justin (July 29, 2021). "Brewster’s Café Might Still Be Coming To Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Based On Update Datamine". Animal Crossing World. Retrieved August 20, 2020.
Prerelease and unused content
Animal Crossing: New Horizons
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