After getting my Nintendo Switch 2 last summer, I transferred every game file from the original Nintendo Switch to the new console, including Animal Crossing: New Horizons. While I got the game the minute it came out at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, I haven’t really touched it since the 2.0 update and Happy Home Paradise DLC dropped in 2021.
I would’ve taken the time to revisit my island after transferring the game file to the Switch 2, but I didn’t want my villagers to scream some variation of “Where the hell have you been!?” after my being away for four years. Then came Animal Crossing: New Horizons - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition and the 3.0 update.
I upgraded my digital copy of New Horizons to the Switch 2 Edition, assuming that my data from the original Switch version would transfer over to the new one. Instead, I inadvertently restarted my island, complete with a new map, new name, and new villagers — well, except for Kody, who I was thankful to see joined from the get-go this time. The only new villager I gained in my accidental island reset was a hen named Plucky. I have since invited three new animals to my island – Tangy, Rex, and Peaches – and they have settled in quite nicely.
While I named my first island “Isla Utada” after my favorite J-Pop artist Hikaru Utada, of Kingdom Hearts fame, I decided to name my new island Isla Theia. This is because in Sonic Frontiers, all the islands around Starfall Islands are named after some of the Titans and Gods of Greek mythology – Kronos, Ares, Chaos, Rhea, and Ouranos – so I thought I would continue the tradition and name my island after another female Titan, who’s also the Goddess of sight and shining light.
At first, building a new island was difficult because I had trouble getting the shovel I needed to mine iron nuggets, and I didn’t have a ladder to help me grab weeds from high cliffs. But thankfully, I invited friends to my island who promptly gave me materials, as well as an axe and a shovel, so that I could get everything I needed to construct Nook’s Cranny and some furniture for the three villagers who moved to my island. This helped me start rapidly rebuilding!
Granted, there’s still a lot of work to be done, like building the museum, which I haven’t even started because I’ve been selling all my bugs and fossils for Bells. However, starting my island from a clean slate has given me some perspective on how starting over isn’t as hard as long as I have the help and support from the people around me. Friends may just be the most vital and precious material of all.
If you started New Horizons’ Nintendo Switch 2 Edition with the same assumption that your progress would automatically carry over, only to find that you have to start from square one as I did, you might want to take that piece of wisdom into stock and figure out how you can make your new island – and life – immensely better than the original.
