Animal Crossing: New Horizons exploded onto the scene in early 2021, eventually becoming one of the best-selling titles of the year. Animal Crossing: New Horizons tasks players with taking care of their own island village while managing debt, construction, and collection of wildlife.
Naturally, though this is supposed to be a calming experience, players can become overwhelmed by the sheer number of things that need done to progress, especially when certain actions require time to be completed. For example, Animal Crossing: New Horizons' museum takes a long time to complete, leading to frustration from players waiting to start their collections.
The same can be said for moving houses in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, which can also take some time to complete. For players focused on designing their perfect island vision, being able to move structures quickly is extremely beneficial to speeding up the process. However, because of the time it takes to move said structures, it can become an annoying task rather than an enjoyable one. However, players found a way to get around the issue of time, and one player decided to create an animation that makes light of this trick.
The trick, or, more accurately put, method, is time traveling in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. By changing the time on a player's Nintendo Switch, they can artificially change the in-game time for Animal Crossing, thus allowing them to speed up any processes that may take time to complete. Reddit user Densle decided that it would be fun to depict what this process would look like for the other island inhabitants, creating an animation that spoofed the process. The result was a hilarious montage of villagers and their homes being picked up and placed over and over.
Reddit users were equal parts blown away and doubled over in laughter, applauding the animation while joking about it as well. One user pointed out Dotty's funny quip about the player being a wordsmith, adding that they loved the animation. Another user noted the use of the gas mask to obscure the player's face as well as hide their emotions, leading to a slightly disturbing visage. Yet another user found it hilarious, especially because they had just initiated a move for a villager's house.
Though Nintendo eventually limited the time traveling exploit, even they had fun with the trick, adding a time travel joke into Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Still, players will remember the prevalence of the trick at launch as well as the more limited yet still helpful capabilities it has in the game today.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons is available now on Nintendo Switch.