Animal Crossing: New Horizons players are being swept up in a wave of nostalgia, and it's all because of an old Animal Crossing feature referred to as "The Path." Players' wistful rememberance of this feature has translated to a whole bunch of new in-game ground patterns being used in terraforming mode.
Previous Animal Crossing games contained "The Path" feature; something that made grass wear down over time as players ran over it, creating paths in the most common routes that players took while running around their town. Originally, this feature used to bug many players, in part because it was something they couldn't control about their community's development, and in part because it did create a few issues for players.
However, it seems players are now feeling a little nostalgic over The Path now that it's no longer an Animal Crossing feature for New Horizons. In early June, a Japanese New Horizons player tweeted out a custom path pattern that resembled the traditional path found in previous games, and it took off immediately--helped, presumably, by the fact that this time players could control where this path formed. This pattern is different from the regular sort of ground patterns because it's not a geometric shape; instead, it takes on more of a worn-down, overgrown look that many players find appealing for their island aesthetic.
Unsurprisingly, after this revival of the original Path took off, players began making their own variations on it and sharing those with the rest of the Animal Crossing: New Horizons community as well. The basic idea of all "Paths" is to evoke a natural-looking sort of deterioration or old-looking walkway, but the variations are numerous: some look like old, grassy cobblestones, while others contain little flowers or similar plant life scattere about the dirt pathway. Just over a month has passed since Twitter user Denim2 tweeted out their path, and players are still creating new iterations of it every day. Here are some of the many custom designs players have come up with.
Of course, the trend has created some tension between path design creators who try to "copyright" their original ideas. However, many who have seen @Denim2_mori's post cite them as an inspiration when publishing their Animal Crossing designs, and even Denim2 themselves has acknowledged that other people had similar ideas around the same time as them. Basically, for all the tension created, many other players are happy to build off of one another.
For any New Horizons players ready to give their islands a bit of a makeover, The Path seems to be working for a whole bunch of players already. Twitter is already full of different path ideas, and with more coming daily, it'll be interesting to see all the popular island designs that are created because of this new trend.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons is available to play on Nintendo Switch.