Three years after Animal Crossing: New Leaf originally came out, Nintendo released a new version of the game with Welcome Amiibo added to the title. This updated version adds tonnes of extra content and, very nicely, Nintendo let owners of the original version gain access to all of it via a free update! They may have done many greedy things, but this, at least, was pretty good of them. Here are a few of the added features:
- The town gets a new area, a campsite run by a dog named Harvey. People come to visit this campsite inside camper vans, giving you a chance to meet special characters and buy furniture.
- Something called a CAT Machine was added to the town, this gives you MEOW coupons (which can be spent on exclusive furniture that Harvey sells) in exchange for you completing certain tasks.
- You can scan Amiibo in order to have new villagers visit. Using Animal Crossing Amiibo cards, you can get any existing villager, on top of that, you can also get several new villagers.
- Tonnes of content from the Legend of Zelda series was added to the game, including the option to have Wolf Link, Ganon, Epona and various other characters as villagers. There’s even an outfit from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild in the game, added as a kind of preview.
- There’s some good Splatoon content as well, where Amiibo can get you villagers who are huge fans of the series, as well as various pieces of clothing and furniture which come from the game.
- Furniture and gameplay features from Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer were added.
- The game Desert Island Escape from Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival is now unlockable.
- A new version of the game Puzzle League is also playable (and very fun too).
Overall, I love everything that was added to the game, particularly the new Zelda stuff. Nintendo could have very easily just released it as a new, updated version as they do with various other things and charged full price, but instead it was free. For me, the addition of this updated prompted me to revisit the game and I’m very glad I did. Now it’s even better than it was originally.
Rating: 9.6/10