The Story of Animal Crossing (Documentary)

[Music] animal crossing has become a globally known gaming franchise with over 50 million copies of its games sold and a successful app becoming one of nintendo's most recognizable games in their library but how did the series get here let's find out [Music] tokyo japan's capital is known for many things including being the world's most populous metropolis with over 37 million people here but out of all those people who have resided here there was one boy who was born here back on may 15 of 1965 who grew up to create a game that touched the lives of millions a game that was so different but even with its simplicity it has grown into one of the most loved gaming franchises with millions of players this boy's name was katsuya iguchi this is his story and the story of his creation this is the story of animal crossing ketsuya iguchi was born in tokyo but he grew up in chiba while growing up in chiba katsuya was said to have enjoyed playing video games with his first experiences in the arcades and even more soon after purchasing a personal computer this led him to seek education at a university eguchi attended college where he studied computer graphics at japan electronics college in tokyo this college education would come in handy as things were going to change for this young college student the year was 1986 and nintendo had just recently released the famicom in february of that year however nintendo was still pretty new in the gaming industry so they were looking for new hires and one of those interested in getting hired was the 21 year old katsuya who saw a job advertised for nintendo and this would be just the start to a long and storied career that has lasted over three decades but i'm getting a little bit ahead of myself before being hired katsuya was required to pass an exam that according to him was not related to nintendo products video games or computer graphics after being hired by nintendo katsuya had relocated from his home in chiba to nintendo's headquarters and kyoto once he relocated katsuya was quick to work now i couldn't find proof of this as he wasn't credited for it but his first projects were said to be a dungeon designer for zelda 2 the adventure of link and designer for the famicom grand prix f1 race in 1987. even though we weren't able to prove these as they weren't credited his first credit work was for the loved classic super mario brothers 3 in 1988 as a level designer and after being an area director for the 1990s super mario world he got his chance to be a director in 1993 and his directorial debut was a success as star fox received positive reviews and sold over 4 million copies of the game worldwide by 1998. the next game he directed was wave race 64 in 1996 which was a critical and commercial success selling more than 154 000 units in japan by december 1996 and more than 1 million units in the united states sold by december 1997. gucci was proving that he had the talent to create fun and successful games for nintendo and after being a chief designer for yoshi's story in 1998 and a advisor for 2000's mario artist talent maker aguchi was about to create something that would turn into one of nintendo's most loved franchises [Music] while katsuya was riding high on his early successes there was something missing katsuya was feeling something that we probably all feel in our lives he was homesick while his projects were successful he was rather lonely kyoto was pretty far from his hometown of chiba all of his friends and family were there and he missed the time he spent with them i personally know how this feels and it can drive you to do many things and for katsuya iguchi this would drive him to try to recreate that feeling of being able to play and spend time with his loved ones to recreate that feeling of home and that is why katsuya and a fellow nintendo game designer hisashi nogami got to work on creating dabutsu nomure or as we more commonly know it animal crossing there isn't a lot of detail out there regarding the development of the first game but we do know that this game wasn't the easiest to market as katsuyaguchi and hisashi nogami explained an interview with nintendo of europe it was unprecedented gameplay so we were worried whether it would be understood and accepted by the player base first of all it was very difficult to explain the gameplay what kind of game is it we were asked it was something that was very difficult to answer in a short phrase also it was hard for us to use a reference to say that this game was similar to another game for splatoon we could say it was like a third person shooter but it's different in this and that way but in ammo crossing we had nothing like that we didn't have a proper genre that we could use as a reference point it was very difficult to explain to the promotional staff on how to promote it how do you write a catchphrase for this game it's unprecedented but even with these challenges ammo crossing was being made and during its creation eguchi had three themes in mind when creating this game family friendship and community he wanted these themes as they were there to recreate that feeling he had back in chiba with his loved ones as he states in an interview with edge animal crossing features three themes family friendship and community but the reason i wanted to investigate them was a result of being so lonely when i arrived in kyoto chiba is east of tokyo and quite a distance from kyoto and when i moved there i left my family and friends behind in doing so i realized that being close to them being able to spend time with them talk with them play with them was such a great important thing i wondered for a long time if there would be a way to recreate that feeling and that was the impetus behind the original animal crossing and now the team got to work on the game with katsuya and hisashi at the helm takashi tezuka producing yohichioski as programmer naruko ikegawa and yoshija morimoto as artist makoto wada kenshiro uda and konniyo wantanabe as writers kazumi tokuta as sound director toru minegishi kenta nagata and shinobu tanaka as the composers and with the team now assembled they were able to begin work on animal crossing like i said before there isn't a lot of information about the development of the original ammo crossing but we do know that they wanted ammo crossing to run off of real world clock along with all players playing in the same town ketsuya explained in an interview with gamasutra how his family dynamic led to features like these being implemented another thing is that i'd always get home really late and my family plays games and i would sometimes be playing when i got home and i thought to myself they're playing games and i'm playing games but we're not really doing it together it'd be nice to have a play experience where even though we're not playing at the same time we're still sharing things together so this was something that the kids could play after school and i could play when i got home at night and i could kind of be a part of what they were doing while i wasn't around at the same time they get to see things that i've been doing it was kind of a desire to create a space where my family and i could interact more even if we weren't playing together animal crossing was coming together even if explaining the game to others was a challenge with kitsuya using his move and family dynamic as inspiration this was looking to possibly be another successful project for the two directors and the whole team now the real challenge came in could they make a game like ammo crossing with the current technology [Music] the n64 had some of the best games ever made like the legend of zelda ocarina of time and majora's mask along with super mario 64 goldeneye perfect dark banjo kazooie paper mario and the list just goes on and while these were loved and revolutionary games the issue was could a game like ammo crossing work on the n64 well there were several issues as the team want ammo crossing to run off a real world clock that's not going to work on the n64 i haven't been able to confirm this with sources but i've also heard that the first game had three times the dialogue of normal rpg games which would take a lot of space space at the n64 cartridges didn't have and lastly the n64 was at the end of its life cycle by the time the team was developing the first game so what option did the team have well they decided to make ammo crossing work with another project that was also in development however this project had been in development for a lot longer the 64 disk drive which had been in development since the early 90s served as an enabling technology platform for the conception and development of animal crossing as it had a real time clock and 64 megabyte floppy disk for writable mass storage and while this all sounded great the 64 dd ran into loads of issues and its own development the fact that it was announced in 1995 prior to the nintendo 64's 1996 launch and it was released only in japan on december 1st of 1999 just shows how troubled its own production was i mean when only 10 of the more than 70 proposed games get released you know it didn't sell well and yeah that's what happened with the 64 dd only selling 15 000 units nintendo considered this to be a commercial flop which led nintendo to discontinue the 64 dd on february 28 2001 and while this was a blow to nintendo it was also a blow to the animal crossing team as their game wouldn't be able to take advantage of the real world clock and extra space the 64 dd promised so what did they do well due to this the game's development was moved to the normal n64 game pack cartridges however this game pack cartridge contained a real time clock so they can still have the game run off real world time you would need to input the current time in the beginning however the cartridge also contained a controller pack for saving progress but with the less storage and time the team was forced to cut out a lot of features that they wanted for the game the designers ended up removing many of the goal-oriented elements from the game some of these i wasn't able to find confirmation of it being real but i've read that this may have included dungeons bosses and even monsters to fight man ammo crossing would be a much different series if this ends up to be true but a lot of things were removed due to space and time constraints there are literal lists online of what was removed and it would take a long time to list all of them in this video but i will say a few of the more important things that were left out of the final product for one the able sisters weren't able to make it into the game kind of a shock to even think about as they are really important and loved characters in the series there are no golden tools and the standard axe is unbreakable blathers and his museum aren't present but the textures for his character are in the code so he was definitely planned there is also a model for an unused cat villager referred to as cat 13 in the file names and lastly and probably everyone's favorite there are no sea basses in the first game this is the same with a large number of other fish and insects but yes in the first game you didn't have to deal with the curse of the sea bass after removing all that all that was left was the core aspects of communication with villagers and the idea of an environment that changes in real time and of course the three main themes mentioned before but even with all of the features removed from the finished product the game was still an animal crossing game as in dabutsu no more players assumed the role of a human setting out for a life of their own in a town of anthropomorphic animals and each town is randomly generated gameplay within each village is open-ended allowing the player to engage in a variety of activities players can pick fruit grow trees garden hunt for fossils and fish catch insects do favors for the villagers or decorate their homes all of these tropes would continue in future installments of the series this game being open-ended was a design choice by katsuya iguchi as he stated in an interview with gama sutra the games i made before ammo crossing were always pretty tough to finish and i was thinking as i got older these games are just too hard they were also pretty difficult to make so i wanted to make games that were a little closer to something people my age could play really that everyone could play and with that the team finished the game and dabutsu no mori or ammo forest was released on the nintendo 64 in japan in april of 2001. it was the last game nintendo released for the n64 and the second to last title released for the system in japan so finally ammo crossing is brought to japanese audiences so how does it do despite being released late in the n64's life cycle the game still managed to sell 213 800 units making it the 28th best-selling title on the n64 this was a success for the team and nintendo and due to its newfound popularity nintendo understood the markability of their new ip and because the n64 was at the end of its life they decided to release an enhanced port called dubutsu no mori plus which was released just eight months later for the nintendo gamecube dabutsu no more plus had a good amount more to offer as it contained extra features that were originally left out of the n64 version and also uses the gamecube's built-in clock to keep track of the date and time with the use of the gamecube's clock the passing of time affects the game even between play sessions this led to the game's slogan the real life game that's playing even when you're not this was also a successful venture as 92 568 copies were sold during its first week in japan with the success of the new series nintendo had finally decided to work on the localized version for the west the same copy that i played when i was a kid i also remember those weird live-action commercials for the game does anyone else remember those anyway when nintendo began localizing the boots in the moy plus for release in the west they decided to change the name to animal crossing but that wasn't the only change ammo crossing underwent a huge translation project which resulted in much more text than the japanese version not only did thousands of lines of text have to be translated but the translators nate bahildorf and rich amtower had to create new holidays and items to be relatable to the players from outside of japan and all of this extra work from the localization team paid off as on september 16th of 2002 north america was introduced to animal crossing and upon its release ammo crossing was subjected to critical acclaim receiving high scores and despite the gamecube's lackluster sales ammo crossings sold a good amount of units this led to 1.68 million units being sold in the us totaling at 43 million dollars made just in the united states the game was so well received that even won awards ammo crossing received awards for innovation and console gaming outstanding achievement in game design console role-playing game of the year and was nominated for console game of the year console role-playing game of the year game of the year innovation and console gaming outstanding achievement in game design and outstanding achievement in gameplay engineering all by the academy of interactive arts and sciences and nintendo of america's treehouse divisions efforts were noticed by their japanese counterparts as the version of the game released in america impressed nintendo's japanese leadership so much that they added the american content back into the japanese version and released it as dabutsu no mori e plus along with more new content it was released in japan on june 27th of 2003 with 91 658 copies sold during its first week due to this success nintendo had released animal crossing in australia on october 17th of 2003 europe in september 24th of 2004 and was released on the iq player on june 1st of 2006. oh yeah i should probably explain what the iq is really quick the iq player is a video game console that was manufactured by iq a joint venture between nintendo and chinese american scientist wei yen after china had banned video games the console itself takes form of the controller and plugs directly into television similar to the somewhat popular plug-and-play systems it was only marketed in mainland china as the console's unusual game distribution method is an attempt to curb china's ban on video games as it has marketed itself as an educational device this way nintendo games can be played in china no matter how you put it the first ammo crossing game was loved and nintendo had a new successful ip again directed by their talented employees katsuya gucci and hisashi nogami and the rest of the team who created this instant classic so the next step was obvious it was time to create a sequel and this sequel would have the simple name of animal crossing too [Music] animal crossing 2 was planned to be released on the nintendo gamecube just like the original however the game was never finished there isn't a lot of info on animal crossing too we mostly have to go off these screenshots in a screenshot it is shown that the wishing well is replaced with a bell shrine which was a feature in the japanese only games also ace and anikati are shown having a picnic another screenshot simply shows a female player by their house with peaches nearby it is unknown why ammo crossing 2 was cancelled but due to the immediate release of the nintendo ds nintendo likely decided making a game that could take advantage of the new hardware would be more worthwhile so instead the ammo crossing team now turned their efforts towards a sequel to work on the new console and this time the game wouldn't be held back by the end of a console's life lackluster sales of a console or being on a black market console this game will have the advantage of releasing on the second best-selling console of all time the nintendo ds and this new game would be called animal crossing wild world ammo crossing wild world was announced at e3 of 2004 under the name animal crossing ds where it was revealed to utilize the nintendo ds touchscreen and had multiplayer capabilities when development on ammo crossing wild world begun it was decided that nothing was going to be region specific in order to make the game easier to localize because of this certain events that were originally an animal crossing such as those based on halloween christmas and the japanese cherry blossom festival are not in wild world this rule was applied to a variety of fish and insects as well as development began there were some changes to the team as one of the creators katsuya gucci stepped down from directing and took on the role of producing leaving the other creator to direct wild world joining katsuya as producer was takahashi tazuka this time the artist's role went to koji takahashi and the writers were now takayuki ikaku arisa hosaka and tashi huro koabata kazumi totaka again served as the game's sound director and he joined asuka ota as composers besides the staff there again isn't a lot of information out there about the development of animal crossing wild world however i can tell you that the important features of the first animal crossing games return in this one but with improvements and many changes a lot of changes in fact like the new slingshot and watering tools being added increased character customization with the ability to change hats facial accessories hairstyles and umbrellas this came with customization with your village as well as patterns can now be placed on the ground outside as removable tiles this game also added new characters like harriet and celeste and speaking of celeste wild world introduced one of my favorite features the ability to draw constellations in the night sky and speaking of new characters animal crossing wild world added 72 new villagers into the game while i shouldn't say new because out of these 72 villagers only 18 of them were brand new the rest made their debut in animal forest e plus and lastly this is where the roost was introduced another one of my favorite features in the series along with all these features and many unmentioned ones this game also had another new thing added to it and that thing was airnet connectivity wild world is the first game in the series to feature online play and was the second game to utilize the nintendo wi-fi connection the first being mario kart ds this allowed players to visit other villages because players are required to exchange and register friend codes prior to visiting connection to random players was not possible at this time up to four players could explore the same village nintendo's wi-fi connection could also be used to exchange items and custom design patterns between players as well as receiving exclusive gifts from nintendo while connected animal crossing wild world had a lot of new things and changes to offer and many japanese players got to experience these new additions and changes to ammo crossing on november 23rd of 2005 and these players were eager as ammo crossing wild world sold 325 460 copies in japan in its first week beating the previous mark set by jump street stars and becoming the best-selling title for the nintendo ds until the release of brain h2 this could only mean good news when the game released in other regions and on december 5th of 2005 animal crossing wild world was released in north america and only three days later it was released in australia i was unable to find the sales numbers in these regions but i can assure you a lot were sold i can also tell you that on march 31st of 2006 europe got their hands on wild world and it was popular as it received the double platinum sales award from the entertainment and leisure software publishers association indicating that there were at least 600 000 copies sold in the united kingdom also to add wild world was the first animal crossing to release in south korea on december 6th of 2007 to clarify wild world sold a lot way more than its predecessor as wild world is the ninth best-selling game on the nintendo ds with 11.75 million copies sold worldwide as of march 31st of 2016 selling 9.43 million more units than the first game making wild world a big financial success for nintendo it was able to achieve this due in large part to great reviews as it garnered an aggregated score of 86 out of 100 on metacritic and game rankings and while the money and positive reviews were rolling in from the new installment it had its fair share of criticism as well some criticized the absence of familiar holidays which were removed to ease the localization process multiplayer was also criticized for its tedious implementation and its questionable restrictions specifically the requirement of a friend code and the inability to send mail to other players unless they are visiting that person's village other criticisms include the disappearance of all animal residents during the visit and the fact that north american and european players are unable to connect with japanese players these criticisms were explained by katsuya iguchi as he stated that these limitations were due to the hardware and memory constraints ram and hardware limitations really obviously we want a full animal crossing experience in the multiplayer but if you get four players in your village you've got four human models to deal with and have to keep track of all their items and what they're going to do that plus having animals wandering around it just got too much to track but even with these criticisms and other online issues that occurred wild world was a huge success for the series and it is still considered a favorite by many players and even won some awards as well as it won the editor's choice award and the best ds online game award from ign it was also named the 2006 video game award from parents choice animal crossing wild world did so well in fact that they even made a japanese exclusive film based on the game it was produced by olm incorporated and distributed by touhou the game was also so loved that was eventually re-released on the wii u virtual console in 2015 to 2016 depending on the region ammo crossing has had a great start from 2.32 million units to 11.75 million units sold and both games receiving positive reviews and rewards animal crossing was on the rise so could the next game live up to the expectation the conception of city folk began during the production of wild world it was confirmed that an animal crossing title for the wii then code name revolution was in development they planned on hyping up people with new features as katsuya gucci who is producing again suggested that wild world and city folk may be able to link up to one another at e3 2005. nothing else was said till next year when iguchi confirmed that city folk was still just a concept and very little work had been completed his time was being consumed by research and development of the wii console the team was researching ways to involve the wii remote in animal crossing they want the remote to have the ability for the player to use tools such as the axe shovel and fishing rod with the wii remote they also explored the use of the wii connect 24 in the hopes that a player could visit a friend's town even when they were not playing additionally they planned to use wi-fi connection to allow simultaneous play then in early 2007 nintendo of japan unveiled its video game lineup for the coming year which included dabutsu nomori or animal crossing which would soon be named animal forest let's go to town or as i know it animal crossing city full now again it was time to assemble a team to create animal crossing city folk having finished the me channel for the wii director of wild world and debuts and amore hisashi nogami joined the animal crossing city folk team joining him as director was iseo moro remember him for later as mentioned before ketsuyaguchi was producing again kunihoro komatsu was named programmer ryuji kobayashi tomomi marunami kiyasuke umida and rikuto yoshida as the artists kasumi again returned as sound director and composer along with monaka tominaga and shio fuji as composers and the writers were arisa hosaka and aya kiyagoku remember that last one also as she will be a very important person to the series later that year edge magazine reported that a trusted source confirmed that city folk would be a massively multiplayer online game but not much else was heard about the game until e3 2008 where reggie fisa may unveiled the title in playable form under the name city folk it was to be released in november of 2008. during that time the animal crossing team was hard at work on city folk adding new features and changes just like the previous game like the previously mentioned ability to link animal crossing wild world with city folk when moving in the player has two options to start fresh or to move in as their ds character moving in as their character will only keep the wild world characters catalog in appearance however not all items will transfer from wild world such as the royal crown bells or house size will be ported with the character if the player has an illegal game storage device such as an r4 card or a ttds the moving function will not work city volk also used wi-fi like wild world this feature gives players access to other towns enables them to communicate with friends towns with letters and also subjects them to special furniture items sent from time to time from nintendo which are usually references to other nintendo franchises it also allows players to experience a new character which in game is the mysterious cat blanca blanca is a character who travels via wi-fi into towns which promotes connectivity between players locally and globally however the nintendo wi-fi connection was discontinued on may 20th of 2014 thus making the wi-fi features of city folk unavailable through normal means there were also some new insects and fish that were added but the change that everyone really noticed was the city in city folk animal crossing city folk featured a newly accessible location called the city the city houses most of the characters most of these characters were considered to be special visitors in previous games these include gracie the giraffe and red the fox among other characters such as dr shrunk and lyle you can reach this area via captain's bus and is open at all hours of the day most of the shops close at 9 pm however except for red store and the recetti surveillance center the city also featured new characters such as phineas the sea lion and kicks the skunk the player can now find gracie in her store gracie grace who is managed by a new character named labelle and speaking of labelle this game also featured some rather detailed story lines which add a lot of depth to the characters the game also featured more holidays such as halloween the harvest festival christmas and many others most likely a result of the criticism of wild world so city folk was looking to create an animal crossing that would capture everything that people loved and add more to it they even fixed some of the things that were criticized from wild world fans of the series had many reasons to be excited for city folk so how was it received before it was released review copies of the game were sent out and soon the reviews came editorial previews of city folk from ign and game spy indicated that nintendo had made very few changes to the title and that some ammo crossing players who have played all of the past games might not find as much in city folk than other animal crossing games although the game is still fun it might appeal to newcomers because of this ign gave city folk a 7.5 out of 10 rating gamespot gave a positive review of the title noting the charm of the game but also gave the game a 7.5 out of 10 rating even with these reviews fans and newcomers purchased the game for the first time in america canada and japan in mid-november of 2008 and even more players bought city folk in early december of 2008 as it released in australia and europe the game was also released in south korea on january 28th of 2010. however it seemed that the user reviews matched the game critics ammo crossing city folk was received generally positive but fell short compared to its previous installments and even though early sales looked good as ammo crossing c folk reported to have sold 949 000 copies in japan by january 4th of 2009 is also the eighth bestselling game in japan in 2009. it was the 10th best-selling game of december 2008 in the united states selling 497 000 copies as of may 2009 however it is believed due to the only decent reviews ammo crossing only sold 3.38 million copies worldwide a full 8.37 million less units than its predecessor wild world a drop of around 75 this got so bad that the game's prices dropped the game was initially 49.99 on release but was later dropped to 1999. some copies of safehold concluded nintendo we speak these copies of safehulk were sold for 69.99 but were later dropped to 34.99 even though seafold sold more than the first game by 1.6 million units the game's drop in sales and positive reviews from the previous game made it a letdown for nintendo especially since it was on the sixth most successful console of all time even with its fans it seems nintendo decided that seifolk did not live up to its predecessors something had to change for this series to continue it took until 2010 to hear any news on animal crossings next installment as animal crossing new leaf was announced at e3 of 2010 for the nintendo 3ds new leaf later appeared at the 2011 nintendo world expo and again at e3 2011 during a short presentation where release date was originally announced for later that year in japan nintendo later pushed back the release to sometime in 2012 before the end of the fiscal year in march and eventually finalized a japanese release to fall of that year during a nintendo direct broadcast its english title was revealed in october of 2012 along with a release date in the west for early 2013 in february of 2013 new leaf received its definitive release date for the following june in north america europe and australia with these release dates ammo crossing needed a team and again there is even more changes to the animal crossing team this was most noble when the other creator hisashi nogami stepped down from directing the animal crossing games as he was working on a new series however he was credited with a special thanks this meant for the first time one of animal crossings creators wasn't directing however a director from the previous game aseo moro had returned as director for new leaf since iseo is a pretty important player in the animal crossing series we should learn more about him isaiah morrow originally joined the company on april 1st of 2002 at the ead department he started on the series as a debugger on the gamecube release of animal crossing e plus he later got the directing role on city full however another member from the city folk team joined as a director this person was aya kaya goku a writer from city folk let's learn about her as she also plays a big role in the animal crossing series kayo goku started working in the game industry in 2000 with atlas and continued working there until september of 2003 when she was hired by nintendo she got her start at the company as a script writer on the legend of zelda titles four swords adventures and twilight princess she later moved to work on the animal crossing series starting with city full then she was hired to direct alongside iseo moro for new leaf with these two animal crossing team veterans at the helm new leaf had its directors and even with hisashi nogami gone the other creator katsuya iguchi was still producing totaka was again the sound director for new leaf just like the previous games the main theme of the game was composed by manika katoka she also composed the rest of the soundtrack with atsuko asahi and makoto wada was the writer with the team assembled it was time to work on animal crossings next installment and with the change in staff came a big change in the game new leaf had a much different design than the previous games and this had some new challenges when developing the game because the game was being designed for a 3d display instead of a flat one like its predecessors the design team had to pay extra attention to how objects and characters appeared in regard to lighting and shading and that no obvious flaws could be seen from the different perspectives that wasn't the only obstacle as design coordinator koji takahashi admitted that it was difficult thinking up of new animal species to represent the town folk since they primarily want to stick to ones people were familiar with and had pretty much used up the most familiar examples in previous games alpacas in particular were chosen due to their recent popularity in japan the team wanted new leaf to be a different experience a more immersive experience and in order to do this the team worked on making new leaf a more personal experience to the players around the world so the development team researched customs and holidays from various countries including collaborating with nintendo offices around the world and include them in versions of games released in those regions as an example you can compare the variations of the in-game event of new year's eve which had you eating new year noodles in the japanese version drinking sparkling cider and the north american version and eating a 12 grape plate at midnight and the spanish language or european versions and with the game being made it was soon time to work on new leaf's english translations which began in march of 2012 by members of nintendo of america's treehouse localization group who collaborated with the company's headquarters in japan on creating in-game events the north american and european versions contained an extra feature not included in the japanese release the ability to download example home layouts and the happy home showcase from nintendo over the internet using the spot pass feature in addition to street pass which requires players to physically pass by one another according to localization manager rico nanomia this was added due to the difficulty players in those regions experience with meeting others in public who owned the game explaining that in japan street pass happens really really frequently people take trains it's a different community culture here you've got people living in remote parts where they don't have an opportunity to pass by people who have the game after doing all this work on new leaf its features were to be shown at e3 2011 during a nintendo press conference the ammo crossing logo among others appeared on screen as a list of upcoming 3ds games additionally a new trailer was released the trailer showed off many of new leaf's new features this is also where one of animal crossing's most popular characters a character who practically became a mask for the series isabel was introduced as the eager secretary that helps the player throughout the game interesting fact about isabel her english name actually comes from the fact that nintendo treehouse thought her head looked like a bag of bells after all this in october 2012 nintendo of japan created an official ammo crossing new leaf twitter account featuring tweets from the character isabel that included updates and promotions about the game with the english versions established by nintendo europe in 2013 and nintendo of america in may of 2013. later that month nintendo of america began to produce a series of roundtable video discussions with the english treehouse localization team providing information on the game's development and translations which were posted on youtube and then on the game's official twitter and facebook pages new leaf had already a lot of hype with it with the new features being announced a cute new character new graphics on the new 3ds system new leaf looked to be a successful product for nintendo and with all the new features there was even more things for fans and newcomers to be excited for the biggest new feature was the customization available as you are now the town mayor and this was intended by the animal crossing team as the idea for the player to become mayor did not manifest until a year into development which stemmed from the concept of giving the player much more freedom and designing and shaping the way they want their town to grow giving the players the ability to pass ordinances and laws that involve shops being open earlier or later in the day was included to accommodate for the more personal schedules and play styles of each individual player while still keeping the game synced with the passage of time in the real world more features are added were the return of the police station and the new campsite the campsite specifically allowed non-resident villagers to visit who can then be encouraged to move into the town new leave also added the retail store and the new characters rhys and cyrus this store is a recycling store which buys items at 25 percent higher than nook's old stores in previous games cyrus will also design furniture that you bring in the roost also made its return but at this time it had its own building another feature that was added was something similar to the city from city folk but this time it was called main street main street acted like a shopping hub for the player's town replacing the city back from city folk though kix now has his own store the marquis was replaced with club lol and dr shrunk and kk slider made appearances harriet returned with her own hair salon the able sisters have their own shop timmy and tommy run the knuckling junction while tom nook runs a realtor service this is also where you can find the museum some new characters were also introduced with stores on main street like luna and her dream suite where you can visit other players towns in a dream state and leaf the sloth and his gardening store and lastly on main street was the happy home showcase which is managed by another new character digby who happens to be the twin brother to the popular isabel the happy home showcase utilized the street pass feature in the 3ds by adding some homes owned by other players who have been within range of other players 3dss and of course with new characters comes new villagers this brought the total up to 335 but also two new species were added the hamster and the deer two new personalities were also introduced the smug and the sisterly along with new villagers there are new bugs and fish in this game as well totaling up to 72 up from the 60 in city folk and atop all this deep sea catches were introduced with diving and with this new game on a new system came with new customization options for players avatar player characters were taller than before allowing for customization of pants shorts and skirts shoes and socks could also now be purchased for the player another great feature was the addition of the island for players to visit where they can collect bugs fish and other sea creatures along with different fruit and last not forget the mini games you can play on this island as well with tortimer where you can even earn items with all that being said ammo crossing new leaf was looking to be the most innovative addition to the animal crossing series with all these new features graphics characters music on a new and popular system animal crossing new leaf seem to be on the right track for success could new leaf make up for the disappointing sales of city folk animal crossing new leaf was released in japan on november 8th of 2012 in south korea on february 7th of 2013 and in north america on june 19th of 2013. it came out in europe on june 14th of 2013 and both australia and new zealand shared the same release date of june 15th of 2013. new leaf was also the first in the series available through the nintendo eshop so fans and newcomers had access to the new installment in the series how did it do well new leaf debuted in japan with sales of just over 800 000 units sold with 200 000 of them being digital downloads it also became the first 3ds game in japan to pass 2 million units sold doing so in just under 2 months by march of 2013 3.86 million copies had been sold this fact is incredible when you realize new leaf sold as many copies as city folk within months by august of 2014 1.36 million copies have been sold alone in the united states if you couldn't tell new leaf was a financial success as all the changes and new features drew in a large crowd of fans and newcomers to the series along with it being on the 3ds the 11th best-selling console of all time new leaf really blew past expectations and this showed in the reviews as well ign giving the game a 9.6 out of 10 and receiving a 39 out of 40 from japanese magazine famitsu earning the publication's platinum award to say new leaf made up for city folk sales was an understatement it seemed to have shattered expectations as ammo crossing had never been more popular new leaf brought in new players as well as bringing back old fans with the ability to run and customize the town and the player ammo crossing had never felt so immersive players truly felt like these towns were theirs their avatars were them and all of this was why new leaf was so successful this shows in the sales figures as new leaf reached 12.55 million copies sold by march of 2020 making it one of the best selling 3ds games of all time ammo crossing new leafs showed yet again that the animal crossing name was a valuable ip in nintendo's library this could mean only one thing time to work on another sequel oh i should probably mention that the next animal crossing game is actually a spin-off in the same month that new leaf was released in japan on november 18th of 2012 the wii u was released in north america followed by a november 30th release in europe and in japan on december 8th i should probably mention that the creator of ammo crossing katsuyaguchi was actually the hardware producer for the wii u as well even though we were talking about the wii u nintendo's next home console after the successful wii we aren't talking about the next mainline animal crossing game yet we are actually talking about an ammo crossing app on the wii u and this application was called ammo crossing plaza this would be quick as there isn't a lot to say about ammo crossing plaza other than that it's a free-to-play social networking service for the wii u in fact plaza was actually released as a tie-in to the miiverse ammo crossing plaza was announced in a nintendo direct on august 7th of 2013 and was released digitally on the nintendo eshop that same day plaza was planned as a limited time application with nintendo stating in its announcements of the application that it would only be supported through the end of 2014 and nintendo stayed true to their word as on december 8th of 2014 nintendo released a statement confirming that it would cease ongoing support for the plaza the application was removed from the nintendo eshop on december 22nd of 2014 and the ability to create new posts within this application were removed on december 31st of 2014. plaza remains accessible to users who download the application prior to its removal from the eshop though its social features are no longer usable with that out of the way it was time for a real spin-off game but we won't see this until the year 2015. one of people's favorite things to do in animal crossing was decorating some found it relaxing some just wanted to be creative but could you take this concept of decorating homes and ammo crossing and make it into a game well as ammo crossing new leaf's director aya kayaguko explained happy home designer was inspired by the internal process of designing homes for the animal villagers and the main animal crossing games stating that we had to think about what kind of things would this animal like what kind of life do they lead trying to figure out what they would want was very fun and we tried to think of a way we could get this kind of experience to the players as well the idea for this game really sprung out of the development team thinking about interior designs in new leaf and other previous entries in the series it was decided to make a game based around the interior design after the development wanted to share the lives of the villagers with the players so it was decided time to create an animal crossing decorating game and like always it was time to get a team together aya kai goku the director of new leaf stepped out of the directoral role but decided to produce the game instead as she was busy with another project we'll get to that later she was joined in producing with the returning creator of the series hisashi noagami for the first time however katsuya iguchi's name was not on this animal crossing game however even with no katsuya and aya producing instead of directing newly's our director iseo moro was chosen to direct this new spin-off to join the team was gentaro takaki at programming akiko harino as the artist makato wada mitsuriyo takano and kunio watanabe were the writers and of course katzumi totaka returned as the sound director and composer with the team assembled again it was time to get to work on this next animal crossing project unlike other house decorating slash building games players were not tied to specific budgets when designing homes while the concept was considered the development team believed that such a limit placed too much of a burden on the player's creativity the first mention of this new game's development came in march of 2014 surprisingly from katsuya gucci himself as he stated that the next game in the ammo crossing series would need to fully integrate new features in order to create a new way of playing animal crossing more was released when producer aya kaye goku stayed that the amiibo was instrumental in the creation of this new game staying that the title was created in order to create a line of ammo crossing amiibos honestly we just want animal crossing amiibos we want the company to make ammo crossing amiibos so that's why we made the game that works for them it was soon pretty clear that amiibos were meant to play a pretty big role in this new game i've yet to name this game so i will tell you now the new game would be titled ammo crossing happy home designer it was announced during the nintendo direct broadcast on april 1st of 2015. as happy home designer was announced fans of the series were now able to see what this game was going to be like well this game was a lot different from the main line games as in this game there is no village to move into no bug or fish catching no building up a village instead the player is given a job at nook's homes and will be tasked with designing houses for the villagers who will each request a specific theme for their home the player then selects a plot of land for the new house to go to and then can design the interior with furniture carpet and wallpaper this game also introduced a new special character lottie who will assist the player with their job but is also the niece of lyle a character who was introduced in city folk and a big feature was the inclusion of the amiibos as you can scan any amiibo card and that villager would appear and then you could decorate their home well happy home designer won't completely fill that ammo crossing hole in your life it appeared to be a decent addition to the series and with the game releasing on the 3ds in japan on july 30th of 2015 in north america on september 25th in europe in october 2nd and in australia on october 3rd the game was finished and it was time to see if animal crossing fans would enjoy this spin-off so how did it do it was pretty clear that three years after release of new leaf fans in japan were eager to play more animal crossing content which is why ammo crossing happy home designers sold 523 000 units in japan during its first four days of release and it topped the weekly charts again in its second week of sales selling a further 181 377 units its lifetime total currently stands at 844 167 copies sold in japan and while this was a good start things quickly fell from there as the game didn't exactly catch the eye of other players in other countries as happy home designer only sold 3.4 million copies worldwide meaning happy home designer only sold more than the original ammo crossing game over a decade earlier a lot of this could be attributed to the average review scores as gamespot and game deformer gave it a 5 out of 10 and it has a 66 out of 100 on metacritic it's hard to tell if happy home designer was a failure or a success as is a spin-off game and while it didn't reach a lot of players outside japan nintendo was still riding high from the success of new leaf and ammo crossing still had another spin-off game to release later that same year in 2015 and this game would be even more different than happy home designer and it would be on a completely different console remember when i said that aka goku was busy with another project well this spin-off game i am referring to was that project a new animal crossing game for the new home console the wii u now before you expect me to say that ammo crossing fans were hyped for a new ammo crossing game on the wii u you got to remember this is a spin-off game not a mainline game so what kind of game would an ammo crossing spin-off game be on the wii u well a board game no i'm not joking director aya kaye goku has stated that this new game was conceived as a vehicle for the animal crossing amiibos the game was announced during nintendo's june 2015 e3 press conference for release in late 2015 during the holiday season later specified as november 2015. now when most people hear about a board game video game you would think of mario party however kyogoku distinguished this game from mario party by saying that the latter is more focused on mini-games while meebo festival is more of a board game the game uses nintendo's amiibo protocol to insert characters into the game with eight different amiibo toys bundled with the game's release the characters each have personal characteristics and while i wish i could give a list of the team who built the game the only names i could find were aya kai goku as director and hisashi nogami as producer but with the team assembled they got to work on this new ammo crossing spin-off for the wii u however there is also not a lot of information about the development of this game what i can tell you is the modes in this game the first mode is traditional board game this mode requires the use of at least one amiibo figure and any other players can use a human villager each game is set in a different month the goal is to collect as many happy points as possible during the month the game board has several different tiles which the player can land on pink spaces give happy points and or bells purple spaces would take away happy points or bells and green spaces are special event spaces that will appear when special villagers visit the town at the end of the month all bells will be converted to happy points and the players with the most happy points will win the next is balloon island after playing the board mode twice the balloon island game mode will unlock in this game amiibo cards are used to drop villagers onto balloons they will pop for points before landing on moving islands to multiply their points by one two or three if the villager lands in the water instead of the island they lose all the points they collected what was probably everyone's favorite game mode is the deserted island escape which you can unlock by using those happy tickets earned from the board game mode in this game three amiibo cards are used to send villagers on a deserted island the main goal is to search the island to find three logs and sail to build a raft and escape enemies are encountered and food must be found along the way there are other game modes that were added but we really don't need to go over those because in mid-november of 2015 animal crossing amiibo festival was released to north america japan europe and australia so how did this ammo crossing spin-off do on the wii u i'm not gonna beat around the bush for this one ammo crossing amiibo festival was a critical flop for the ammo crossing series and nintendo as it only sold 20 303 copies within its first week of release in japan as a refresher happy home designer sold 523 000 notes in the first four days in japan i couldn't find the exact sales records but ammo crossing a meal festival sold poorly and while you could put the blame on the wii u's lackluster sales the reviews for amiibo festival weren't pretty either as nintendo world report gave the game a 4.5 out of 10 citing boring and repetitive gameplay ign gave it a 5 out of 10 for the same reason making amiibo festival the worst selling and worst rated ammo crossing game in the series so with the game on a system that isn't selling too well with poor review scores along with fans being disappointed that instead of getting a new ammo crossing game they got a board game spin-off and yes there were no main animal crossing games released on the wii u which is a shame as it seems like a huge missed opportunity as who knows maybe a mainline ammo crossing game on the wii u could have sold more consoles but that's hard to prove after all hindsight is 2020 2020 we'll get to that but first the mobile gaming industry makes up 60 of revenue for the global video game market in 2019 generating almost 50 billion dollars in revenue and a profit of 16.9 billion mobile games have really taken the world by storm and some of the older game companies have even jumped two mobile games as well and nintendo is no different the most successful example for them i have heard of was pokemon go which when released blew up since its release pokemon go has fallen off quite a bit but apparently it still makes nintendo and publisher niantic hundreds of millions of dollars and with the massive success of pokemon go why couldn't the same be done with animal crossing this idea was thought of early on at nintendo as they planned a mobile game for the ammo crossing series among the company's first smartphone releases and it was announced in early 2016. the animal crossing series was selected for its wide demographic reach and with this it was time to assemble a new team for ammo crossings jump from console to smartphone to accomplish this nintendo assigned kaju oshi sensu to direct this new ammo crossing mobile app a little more information on the director kaiju yoshi was hired in 2010 as a planner for nintendo his first job was working on the dialogue for animals and the fireworks display in animal crossing new leaf he also worked on the dynamic camera for mario kart 8 and then was set to direct the ammo crossing app and the game was set to be produced by hideki kono he is known for his work as a manager at the nintendo entertainment planning and development more precisely on the smart device group the department responsible for the production of smartphone games with the team assembled again it was time to work on this new ammo crossing experience there again isn't much info on the development but i can tell you that the moba game was originally scheduled for release later in 2016 but was delayed as nintendo prioritized its release of super mario run and nintendo wanted to experiment with micro transactions in the mobile fire emblem heroes when the mobile app was originally announced in a press release on april 27th of 2016 nintendo did state it will be connected with the world of animal crossing for dedicating systems by playing both animal crossing games users will find increased enjoyment since this was ammo crossing's first mobile game what was it going to be like the game continues the series of social simulations that allows the players to interact with a small campsite with various villagers performing small tasks engaging in commerce and decorating living spaces the player can also gather materials such as wood and cotton from the surrounding area to trade for furniture orders the player character befriends neighboring animal characters who can visit the player's campsite as can other human players both invited and at random another thing that is new to the series in this app game is micro transactions the player can purchase leaf tickets which the player can use to reduce in-game timers or to craft without raw materials now you can't earn leaf tickets by completing in-game tasks as well this was unexplored territory for the series so fans had no idea what to expect but were excited when on october 25th of 2017 nintendo revealed animal crossing pocket camp during a nintendo direct presentation however most fans had to wait as pocket camp was just released in australia on the same day for ios and android platforms and was then released worldwide in 41 other countries on november 21st of 2017. so with the ammo crossings first mobile app how did it do while we can't look at sales records like console games the reviews were pretty positive as it has a 72 out of 100 on metacritic and it has been reported that ammo crossing pocket camp has surpassed 150 million dollars in sales as of may of 2020 not as successful as pokemon go but still a successful venture for nintendo as they were correct when believing fans would enjoy an animal crossing game on their phones and with this financial success the app also won and was nominated for several awards less than a week before its worldwide release the game won the award for the studio of the year which was nintendo epd at the 2017 golden joystick awards after it was released it was nominated for the best mobile game in ign's best of 2017 awards in gaming informers reader choice best of 2017 awards it took the lead for best simulation game it was also nominated for the a train award for best mobile game at the new york game awards of 2018. it also was nominated for the mobile game of the year award at the 2018 sxsw gaming awards and for the mobile game of the year at the 2018 golden joystick awards and then at the famutsu awards it won the excellence prize after the all right sales of happy home designer and the flop of amiibo festival nintendo had a win in the series with pocket camp and pocket camp even helped with new leaf sales as the week following after the release of the mobile app sales of new leaf saw 214 sales increase in japan and speaking of new leaf it was still very popular as it was still the most current mainline animal crossing game to play and four years after its release nintendo decided to add a big update to the game the update known as welcome amiibo was released on november 2nd of 2016 adding support for all amiibos even ones for different franchises which can be used to summon villagers and vendors to a new campsite area the update also features save data integration with ammo crossing happy home designer and back ports the game's touch screen controls for furnishing it also added the deserted getaway game from amiibo festival as a mini game you can play and while the app and the update were entertaining fans were growing impatient they didn't want another spin-off they didn't want an app and they didn't want another update they wanted a new mainline game for the series and while a lot of fans were very pleased with the 2016 amiibo update it was time for nintendo to release a new game and to do this nintendo would have to wait until their next console [Music] [Music] uh [Music] on march 3rd of 2017 nintendo released its brand new hybrid console the nintendo switch and it has been very successful as within three years it has already sold 62 million units making it the 12th most successful console in history and now that there was a new console animal crossing fans felt that there had to be a new mainline game to be released in the series as there wasn't one released on the previous console and this seemed to be the case as animal crossing switch was first announced on september 13th of 2018 during a nintendo direct with the 2019 release date the announcement of ammo crossing switch also occurred alongside isabel being announced as a playbook character in super smash brothers ultimate with the game being announced it was again time for the animal crossing team to gather together to create the next installment and that all started with ayu kaye goku director of new leaf and amiibo festival who was assigned to direct this new animal crossing game and an incredible thing occurred with this new game as both original creators katsuya gucci and hisashi nogami have returned to produce this new game also returning was kazumi totaka as sound director along with yasuaki iwata yumi takahashi shinobu nagata sayako doai and asato ohashi as composers makoto wada as the writer koji takahashi as an artist and lastly yoshita takashita and hiromachi miyake as programmers and with the animal crossing team yet again assembled it was time to work on ammo crossings new game for the switch and after loads and loads of work nintendo released the game's title animal crossing new horizons and its first trailer was in june of 2019 this trailer showed the first gameplay footage which showcased some of the new story and game mechanics a nintendo treehouse live stream followed later that day with more gameplay and additional features more gameplay was shown during the nintendo direct on september 4th of 2019 where he received a new trailer with more information on the game and what it would bring i can tell you this brought a lot of hype to fans of the series however some were sad to hear that during e3 it was announced that the game would be delayed until march 20th of 2020 but this delay was for a good reason with yosaki kozumi stating that in order to ensure that the game was the best it could be nintendo had to ask the players to wait a little longer than nintendo itself thought and nintendo of america's new president doug bowser decided a desire to avoid crunch and maintain a healthy work life balance for nintendo employees as the primary reason for the delay and while this was good reasoning nintendo's stock market value posted a 3.5 loss in reaction to the delay amounting to a total loss and value of more than 1 billion us dollars but even with the loss and the fan sand by the weight it couldn't stop the excitement it had been 8 years since the new mainline animal crossing game to say there was a lot of hype and talk about this game was an understatement and even more excitement was built up when on february 20th of 2020 and an ammo crossing new horizons direct an in-depth look in the game was given i personally remember watching this and was filled with anticipation i mean new horizons was adding a lot to the series the amount of customization added to this game was insane a lot of promises were things fans had been asking for for years let's go over some of the new features being promised crafting items and tools a new form of in-game currency town customizations such as moving buildings and houses and placing items outside to decorate fly to random islands to meet and possibly invite villagers or to scavenge for materials loads of new fish and insects to collect new characters new villagers you can have up to seven people online visit your island up to eight people can play on one island and last and most hyped was probably the ability to terraform and morph your island into whatever you wanted new horizons promised to be what all the previous games were and to add a ton of customization options that way your island really does feel like your island and as being part of the animal crossing community i can feel the excitement from players this is what we were asking for in this new game the stage was set for new horizons this was going to be awesome it almost felt like nothing can ruin our happy mood in early 2020 the world was put on hold as the pandemic spread around the world i don't want to go into too much detail about this subject but needless to say this locked a lot of people in their homes as a means to protect themselves myself included and while we had to get used to distancing and wearing a mask every day and video chatting fans of the ammo crossing series wondered if this would put a halt on the selling of the game well it ended up just being a rumor as the game was still being sold heck i still remember going into my local gamestop and picking up a physical copy of new horizons on the release date and almost no one was wearing a mask as places weren't enforcing it yet man that feels like that was so long ago but regardless the game was released right before the real craziness so new horizons released on march 20th of 2020 around the world the first time the game released worldwide at the same time so after all the hype and the years of waiting after all the craziness how did animal crossing new horizons do did it make up for the failure of amiibo festival did it make up for the delay it had to take it did and not only did it accomplish this it blew it out of the ballpark new horizons sold over 1.88 million physical copies at launch in japan breaking the previous record held by pokemon sword shield for the biggest switch game debut in the region then the game sold 720 791 physio copies in its second week in japan selling more than animal crossing new leaf did in its first week as of the 26th of april the game has sold almost 3.9 million physical copies in japan in north america it was the best selling game of march of 2020 becoming the second best-selling game of 2020 and surpassing the lifetime sales of all previous animal crossing games animal crossing new horizons january the third highest known launch month sales by any nintendo published game since 1995 only losing to super smash brothers ultimate and super smash brothers brawl in the united kingdom the game's physical launch sales were 3.6 times larger than those of new leaf making it the biggest single switch game launch in the region it also sold triple the units of the number 2 title new entry due maternal which was released on the same day by the way this led to fans of both series creating memes and interacting with one another it was a beautiful thing to witness nothing like seeing isabel rip through some demons anyway in germany new horizons sold more than 200 000 copies after a few days of release for which it has been certified with a platinum sales award by the german trade association it was also estimated by nielsen division super data that new horizons sold 5 million digital copies worldwide in march of 2020 setting a new digital sales record by selling more digital units in a single calendar month than any other console game in history it surpassed the previous record set by call of duty black ops 4 in 2018. nintendo then reported only after 11 days of new horizons release that 11.77 million units were sold and a total of 13.41 million units after six weeks on the market making it one of the best starts ever for a nintendo switch title as well as one of the best-selling games on the console and the best-selling game of 2020 and the best-selling animal crossing game in the series and as of june 30th of 2020 the game has sold 22.4 million units making it the second best-selling nintendo switch game only behind mario kart 8 deluxe then on august 9th it was reported that ammo crossing new horizons became the second highest selling game of all time in japan only behind the classic pokemon red and blue new horizons is already a smash hit for nintendo not only did it sell a lot of copies on its own it helped sell a lot of nintendo switches ammo crossing new horizons was a financial success for nintendo however some were quick to point out that nintendo had some help with this and that help came from something we've been all trying to avoid new horizons success has been partially crowded to its release during the pandemic with players seeking a sense of escapism amid the worldwide stay-at-home orders some theorize that new horizons and the nintendo switch itself sold massively due to people's needing something to do and ammo crossing new horizons was something you could spend literally hundreds of hours and for some even thousands as many craved that escape from the bleak reality that was outside and while i'm sure this did help sell new horizons and the nintendo switches i also attribute this to the long wait and build up of anticipation for the game fans of the series were dying for a new entry also the reviews for the game certainly did help as ammo crossing new horizons received universal acclaim after a release according to reviews on metacritic which was a 90 out of 100 becoming the highest rated game in the series new horizons received praise from critics and fans alike but it wasn't without its flaws as the game has been subject to review bombing due to its handling of switch profiles and multiplayer and not to forget my video talking about people's issues with the dialogue of the villagers there has also been other proms and nitpicks that have come up about the game but the game is still enjoyed by millions of players myself included and even though there is criticism to be had the game still has hundreds of hours of content to play and lots of fun to be had even with my own criticisms i believe a lot of positive reviews for new horizons were accurate it is clear even with the criticism many still enjoy this game and a lot of them think that this is the best in the series i even asked my viewers which is the best ammo crossing game in the series and new horizons won by a long shot although that may be just because a lot of players have played new horizons but haven't played the older games just keep that in mind new horizons may have been released just at the right time to have such amazing sales but there is no denying that new horizons accomplished what it intended to do the animal crossing team created a game in which you can escape reality for a number of hours a game where you can have fun building up and customizing your own island your house and your favorite villagers and characters are there a game where you can close out the rest of the world and you can just smile and have fun where you make connections with these characters along the way which is what an animal crossing game really is and with that we're at today there's been some new stuff that has happened with new horizons like the updates that have been released from nintendo these updates are free and have added things like the return of characters features and holidays they have also removed bugs and they have removed hack items like star trees and they've removed my favorite the secret entrances the game has also had an impact on current world events the game was used by the democracy activists in hong kong as a platform to protest containing protest slogans such as liberate hong kong revolution of our time and funeral photographs of the communist party of china's general secretary as part of a virtual protest in reaction the game has since been removed from online stores in china and in america on september 1st 2020 joe biden's 2020 presidential campaign released official digital yard signs for use in the game that players can use to decorate their islands also let's not forget all the businesses who have used ammo crossing new horizons as a marketing tool new horizons has truly become a gaming phenomenon with millions of fans businesses celebrities and even politicians playing it will it last though who knows but what this simple idea has turned into is truly remarkable and we have the many people who have worked on these games to thank like the creator katsuya iguchi who went from a simple game designer to creating a successful ip for nintendo and he has directed the first animal crossing game and has been an ammo crossing producer for most the series and now katsuya serves as a deputy general manager of nintendo's entertainment planning and development division and then the other creator hisashi nogami who started in my birth year of 1994 as a character and background designer who then helped create and produce animal crossing as well as producing on the splatoon series hisashi today also serves as a deputy general manager of nintendo's entertainment planning and development division we also can't forget kazumi totaka the sound director and composer for all animal crossing games who joined nintendo back in 1990 in the r d1 department where he composed on games like mario paint and super mario land 2. kizumi is now considered a veteran nintendo composer and sound director who has been behind the music of many nintendo games and iseo moro the director of ammo crossing city folk and new leaf who joined nintendo as a programmer in 2002 but soon turned into a planner and he first worked as an assistant director and planner of the legend of zelda wind waker where he then joined the animal crossing team iseo left nintendo in 2018 to open a programming class at a workshop at tier lear u in okinawa and lastly aya kaigoku who has directed ammo crossing new leaf and new horizons where she was hired by nintendo in 2003 as a scriptwriter and since then aya has directed two of ama crossing's most successful and critically acclaimed games in the series she now serves as the manager of nintendo epd for production group number five there's a lot more ammo crossing team members that i did and did not mention as i couldn't find information on every person who helped create these games but i have to think all of them thank you for creating such a wonderful series for us to enjoy which is why i wanted to make this documentary i know this is just a game with fictional characters created to have fun but growing up many forms of media played roles in our lives a good movie could help show you a different perspective and you can learn from it a book could tell you a story that can make you smile or cry you could listen to a song that pumps you up and inspires you you can play a video game that helped keep you company when you were lonely all these apply to any form of media movies books music and video games they can play a part in your life when growing up they can have a huge impact on who you are and who you become you can learn from these things you can fall in love with the characters these worlds these stories my point is that a simple game like ammo crossing a game that helped keep me company when i was lonely growing up a game with characters i was able to befriend a game that has impacted me and millions of others has a story and i wanted to tell that story the story of how a gaming franchise that has sold over 55 million copies and has made over 150 million dollars off its app is now a globally known game loved and even used by businesses for advertising had all came up from a man who just missed spending time with his loved ones that is the story of animal crossing thank you all so much for watching [Music] you

Channel: TheBigOReview

Views: 373,170

Rating: 4.9412184 out of 5

Keywords: TheBigOReview, The Story of Animal Crossing, Making of Animal Crossing, Animal Crossing history, creation of Animal Crossing, Animal Crossing, Animal Crossing documentary, nintendo, nintendo history, nintendo documentary, gaming, video game, video games, documentary, gaming documentary, video game documentary, New Horizons, Animal Crossing New Horizons, New Leaf, Animal Crossing New Leaf, Animal Crossing pocket camp, Wild World, City Folk, TheBigOReview Documentary

Id: kNW4fHb9C7w

Length: 81min 23sec (4883 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 02 2020