Animal Crossing: New Horizons, the latest title in Nintendo's long-running community-sim series, is finally here. Just like its 2012 predecessor, Animal Crossing: New Leaf, New Horizons has players manage a little community, taking care of Residents, running missions and gathering items.

While multiplayer has always been a part of Animal Crossing, New Horizons expands on the feature. Groups of up four local players or eight online can come together on a single island, and it's possible to send messages, postcards and gifts between them. Mailing things from one player to another is a fairly straightforward process, but there are a couple of different ways to do it. To bring together friends across the islands, here's our guide to sending letters and gifts in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

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Best Friends List

While communicating with players who are on the same island as the player character is easily done through the NookPhone, messaging those who aren't is a little more complicated. First players will need to wait until Dodo Airlines has opened for business, and then interact with Orville at the desk.

Asking the dodo to either visit, or open the gates to, friends will cause him to install the Best Friends List app on the NookPhone. This app can be used to interact with players that the main character has previously played with, either through Local Play or by sending a temporary Dodo Code.

 

Animal Crossing New Horizons Seaplane

Sending a Postcard

Another way to send messages to other players is through postcards, which can also be found at the Dodo Airlines desk. To send one, approach the rack beside Orville's desk and press A. A pop-up will appear pointing out that the cost of sending is 200 Bells, New Horizon's main currency, and then Orville will ask if the player is ready to send their message.

Postcards can be sent to Residents on the player character's island, or to a friend in the Best Friends List app. It's even possible for the main character to send a postcard to themselves in the future, though this may not work for those using the time-traveling exploit. When sending a Postcard players get to choose the background, the text, and even whether they want to attach a Gift or not, which can be handy for exchanging resources with online friends.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is out now, exclusively for the Nintendo Switch.

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