It’s an exciting time to be an Animal Crossing fan. With the upcoming release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons and a new Switch coming out themed after the game, what’s not to look forward to? Well, losing your save for starters. Nintendo has already made it painfully clear that the newest Animal Crossing game will be given the same treatment as Splatoon 2 – no cloud saves. But this time around there’s a catch.
If you pay for Nintendo Switch Online, Nintendo is going to have a feature planned so you can back up your saves in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. What it is, we don’t know. In fact, Nintendo may not even know yet. The statement they gave on their Japanese site is vague and seems like it was made in response to players asking about save backups. Here’s Nintendo’s statement, translated from the site:
“This game does not support Nintendo Switch Online Cloud Saves, but we are currently looking into a customized method for backing save data up that will be specific to this game in the event that your Nintendo Switch is damaged or lost. This function will be limited to Nintendo Switch Online subscribers. The timing of implementation is undecided and will be announced as soon as it is finalized.”
There’s a lot to glean from that statement. First off, it’s clear that the folks at Nintendo aren’t exactly sure how they’re going to pull this off. What’s being promised here is, in essence, cloud save storage. But what’s raising the most questions from me is that last sentence. It doesn’t seem like Nintendo knows when this feature is even going to be available, meaning it’s a brand new concept, not something they’ve been working on for Animal Crossing: New Horizons from the start. It also means that we might not even see save backups when the game launches. No set date is given, and there’s no mention of the game’s launch date. We’ll get this feature when it’s “finalized,” meaning as soon as Nintendo deems it ready for launch: that could mean anywhere from launch day to months or years down the line.
Multiple Switch titles currently don’t support cloud saves, including a large number of Nintendo’s own titles. That includes the previously mentioned Splatoon 2, Pokemon Sword & Shield and Pokemon Let’s Go Eevee! & Pikachu!. Nintendo’s reasoning for restricting cloud saves from these titles is the ability for them to be exploited by cheaters.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons launches March 20, and you can pre-order the upcoming title here on Amazon.
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