Data Backup Digest

The Animal Crossing is a Nintendo staple, having first appeared on the GameCube and then every Nintendo console and handheld since. Many fans are now eagerly anticipating the next entry in the series, New Horizons, which is set to launch soon for the Switch.

The Switch is a great home for Animal Crossing, which has always been a game that people dip into at different parts of the day. The portability of the console makes it perfect for this, meaning players can explore their virtual villages while having a coffee break or on the commute home.

Nintendo are slowly revealing information about Animal Crossing: New Horizons in the run up to launch. One feature announced was that the game would have autosaving, which means that you no longer have to worry about running out of battery and losing all the cool stuff that you collected during that session.

In previous versions of the game, if you didn’t save then you would be greeted by Mr. Resetti, a furious mole who would burrow up and berate you. Since the game now autosaves, this particular character has had to find a different role elsewhere.

The gameplay of New Horizons revolves around islands, on which you inhabit with other characters. You are restricted to one island per console, which means that everyone who uses the same Switch will use the same island.

Since the Switch can only have a maximum of eight users, this means that an island on New Horizons can only have up to eight human residents. You can start a new island fresh, but this will mean deleting your save file. Of course, that means you lose all of your progress.

So far, so good. What has fans disappointed, however, is that New Horizons doesn’t support the Nintendo Switch Online Save Data Cloud Backup feature. You can’t save your islands to the cloud, which probably comes from the fact that your island is tied to the console.

Though, a page on Nintendo’s UK website does say that a function to move users and save data to another console is planned for later in the year, so hopefully that remains true – though it’s a shame that won’t be available for launch.

Nevertheless, this is all a disappointing move in 2020 when it’s standard to store game saves in the cloud for easy transferability.

Nintendo does plan to have a recovery service available at some point, though. According to Nintendo’s website, they will offer “a limited ability to recover Animal Crossing: New Horizons save data from the server in the event of system failure, loss or theft will be available to Nintendo Switch Online members sometime in the future.”

A video targeted at the US also revealed in small print that Nintendo Switch Online members can only have their save data recovered once due to loss or damage of system.

It’s not known precisely how this recovery process will work, nor when it will be available. But Nintendo are being purposely vague about it.