As we look towards a new generation of Nintendo consoles and thus, a new generation ofAnimal Crossing, it’s time for the series to let its most annoying mechanic go. Although it’s gotten better today,Animal Crossing: New Horizonshas always gotten a mixed receptionfrom longtime fans of the series.
While it does take customization to new heights with the addition of terraforming, some fans critiqued it for taking too many liberties when it came to series staples, or for lacking certain content at launch. However,ACNH’s worst sin is far more frustrating - and far more pervasive. If we seeanAnimal Crossinggame on Switch 2soon (and I’m sure we will), it needs to leave this gameplay mechanic behind.
Tool Durability Was The Worst New Horizons Idea
AC Fans Are Destined To Suffer
Tool durability was the worst new innovation thatNew Horizonsintroducedto the series. Whatever the next game looks like, this one element has got to go.
ACNH’s tool durability mechanic works just like most survival games: each tool effectively has a hidden HP bar, which ticks down each time you use said tool. You can repair or upgrade them to restore durability, butwhen their HP hits zero, they’ll break, at which point they disappear and can never be used again.
Collecting and upgrading tools is a perfectly normal mechanicforAnimal Crossing, and certainly has its place. Improving your tools and gaining new ones makes you more efficient and unlocks additional resources over the course of the game, which is an important part ofACNH’s sense of progress.
Buttool durability has no place inNew Horizons. It’s wasteful, forcing you to devote the majority of your resources (at least in the early game) towards building new tools.
It’s also time-consuming and frustrating- your tools can break at the most inopportune times, prompting you to abandon your current fishing, mining, or bug-catching efforts, and completely disrupting an otherwise satisfying gameplay loop.
Here’s the thing: I’m not necessarily anti-durability. I thinkit can work in some games. It was frustrating inDark SoulsandBloodborne, but it’s part of the overall friction, and isn’t even super disruptive the grand majority of the time.
For another example from Nintendo,The Legend of Zelda:Breath of the Wilddoes durability really well. If your weapon breaks in the heat of battle, you’re forced to improvise, picking up a random stick or broom to defend yourself until you can find something better.
The crucial difference is thatweapon durability inBOTWdoesn’t force you to stop what you’re doing- just to change your approach. It’s actuallyexcitingwhen one of your weapons breaks, because you’re forced to adapt quickly.
By contrast,breaking/repairing tools inACNHis a disruptive chore. You either have to clog up your inventory with duplicate tools and customization packs, or rush back to your Workbench whenever you break one. It’s not dynamic, fun, challenging, or interesting, so this mechanic has to go.
ACNH Updates Should Have Addressed Tool Durability
This Could’ve Been Fixed A Long Time Ago
Animal Crossing’s next game will hopefully do away with tool durability, which is all well and good. But really,this problem should’ve been resolved much earlier, in an update toAnimal Crossing: New Horizons.
Simply removing tool durability would be out of the question- that’d actually makeNew Horizonstoo easy. You’d be able to craft most of the tools in the game within the first few days, then keep them forever. There’d be no sense of long-term progress.
A more interesting solution, though, would beto make tool durability actually meaningful and interestingto manage. Something closer toBOTW’s durability mechanic, where you have to make split-second decisions to cope with the effects of weapons breaking, would be infinitely more interesting.
But it’s likely too late for such an expansive update to alter how tool durability works - so instead, we’ll have to look forward to changes in the next game. Hopefully, the nextAnimal Crossingturns over a new leaf, leaving tool durability in the past.
