The Animal Crossing franchise is well known for its adorable animal-inspired characters, cute art style, and game world filled with bright colors, customization options, and interesting things to discover. As a result, the games have more than a little in common with Pokemon, another franchise that focuses on adorable animals living in a massive world filled with secrets. Now, one fan of both games has created a video showing what the Pokemon Turtwig would look like as a villager in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
Turtwig is one of the three starter Pokemon players can choose from at the beginning of Pokemon Diamond, Pearl, and Platinum, and it makes a reappearance in Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. This little grass-type Pokemon resembles a turtle with a sprout growing out of its head and ultimately evolves into the mighty Torterra, a sturdy grass/ground-type Pokemon with a full tree growing from its armored shell.
TikTokker omuart posted a video showcasing how they transformed Turtwig's design – which, although round and adorable, very much resembles a non-anthropomorphic turtle – into a bipedal, clothed design fitting of an Animal Crossing villager. They started by blocking out the rough shapes of a villager while keeping Turtwig's official design at the side of the screen for reference. Soon, the drawing had taken on the distinctive shape of an Animal Crossing character.
In the final design, Turtwig is shown kneeling down to investigate a tiny sprout that resembles the one on its head. Its body features more elongated, humanoid proportions, though like most villagers, its hands do not appear to have any fingers. The artist decided to draw inspiration from the existing turtle villagers, known as kappa villagers in Japan, rather than from Animal Crossing: New Horizon's take on turtle critters. Turtwig is shown wearing a white shirt, what seems to be either a blue apron or a blue onesie, and a shell that looks like a backpack.
As of writing, it appears that fans have warmly received this design. One user asked if omuart thought it was okay to ruin Animal Crossing: New Horizons for them, as their island would never feel complete without this Turtwig villager. A second user requested that the artist turn this request on its head in future art by drawing Animal Crossing characters as Pokemon. Several other users began discussing what kind of personality, habits, and jobs Turtwig would have if implemented into an Animal Crossing game.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons is available now for the Nintendo Switch.