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Animal Crossing Halloween event announced, fall update coming Sept. 30

Pumpkins, costumes, and candy!

Nicole Carpenter is a senior reporter specializing in investigative features about labor issues in the game industry, as well as the business and culture of games.

On Sept. 30, Animal Crossing: New Horizons will be updated with a Halloween-themed event and all manner of new additions for the fall season. And honestly, I can’t handle how good it looks. It’s so good, in fact, that I’m eager to be shamed by my villagers for abandoning them.

The free update will add pumpkin farming, Halloween decorations and costumes, a Halloween night celebration, new options for revisiting dreams, and a NookLink App update. Let’s focus first on Halloween and pumpkins.

As seen in the above the trailer, it looks like players will be able to grow and harvest pumpkins from their very own pumpkin patches, then use these items to create seasonal decorations — stacks of pumpkins, bat-and-pumpkin arches, and plenty more. We’ll be able to buy pumpkin starters from Leif or at Nook’s Cranny in October. (DIY recipes can be found in the usual ways, like learning them from fellow islanders.) It’s also worth noting that New Horizons data-miners found hints for a farming feature in April — there may be more vegetables to come in the future.

Nook’s Cranny will also start selling candy, and the Able Sisters will start featuring costumes, like the Mage’s dress shown in the trailer. Body paint and colored contacts complete the look, of course. The best news, of course, is that your villagers will also don costumes on Halloween night. Speaking of which, the Halloween night celebration begins at 5 p.m. on Oct. 31 in your local area. “A mysterious guest, Jack” will visit, according to a news release from Nintendo. He’s, apparently, the “czar of Halloween.” We’ll need to give him that candy we’ve been hoarding (saving some for pals, too) to earn “spooky in-game rewards.”

It sounds incredible.

As for the NookLink App update, Nintendo said we’ll be able to use the Nintendo Switch Online smartphone app to perform Reactions in-game. Lastly, revisiting dreams — we’ll be able to “easily revisit dreams from a list making it even easier to visit some of your favorite islands.”

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