Animal Crossing New Horizons is Nintendo’s second best-selling Nintendo Switch game of all time. But did you know it has in-game content locked behind a paywall?
Animal Crossing New Horizons launched in March 2020. Since then there has been various in-game furniture items that require real-world money to be spent, in order to obtain them.
Since the launch this was limited to in-game Posters of Animal Crossing villagers. These can be obtained by scanning amiibo and cannot be catalogued by other players.
A year into launch Animal Crossing New Horizons version 1.9 was published. Version 1.9 introduced the iconic Sanrio Villagers and their corresponding items.
Like the Posters, this Sanrio Collection was essentially locked behind a paywall as they also required purchasing amiibo to unlock them.
Nintendo took this paywall a step further when Animal Crossing New Horizons’s Expansion Pass released in 2021.
In November 2021, Animal Crossing New Horizons: Happy Home Paradise was released. This was available as a standalone DLC purchase. However is also playable for Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pass subscribers.
The good news is, the vast majority of DLC items available as part of the Expansion were also added to the ACNH 2.0 update. Therefore completely free for Animal Crossing New Horizons players.
However, it turns out there are several items that can’t be obtained unless the DLC is purchased.
The youtube video above describes several categories of items that are behind this paywall. These include:
- Villager photos that require amiibo.
- Paradise Planning Furniture Series.
- Paradise Planning Clothing.
- DIY Recipes.
- Reactions.
In total there are 110 items that come packed with the Expansion Pass that aren’t available through the ACNH 2.0 update. Given the DLC is a paid Expansion Pass, this is considered an additional Paywall.
Despite this paywall, thousands of items from the DLC were added to Animal Crossing New Horizons as part of the free 2.0 update. Therefore players don’t really miss out as long as they update.
That said if you are a subscriber of Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pass, you can play the Happy Home Paradise Expansion for free and obtain the items that weren’t included in version 2.0.
Regardless it’s pretty interesting to know what items are exclusive to Animal Crossing New Horizons: Happy Home Paradise.
Did you know about these items? Will you be purchasing the DLC to unlock these additional features?
Be sure to share your thoughts in the comments below.
Furthermore, with the success of Animal Crossing New Horizons, Could Animal Crossing N64 come to Nintendo Switch Online?
