Animal Crossing: New Horizons Players Are Getting Ready For Halloween

The change from summer to fall is a big deal in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. It means new weather, new fish and bugs, and one of the best holidays of the year: Halloween. Some players have gotten a jump start in decorating their islands for the jack-o'-lantern-filled holiday.

They've created custom clothing designs, candy bowl hats for trick-or-treaters, and custom lanterns with spooky outlines to spread around their towns. Several players have been gung-ho about revamping their entire islands into cutesy haunted houses and pirate ships (while others are just excited to go back to the Spirit Halloween store).

New Horizons doesn't have as many Halloween-themed decorations compared to Animal Crossing: New Leaf, according to players. They've had to get creative by using custom hat designs to fill out pumpkin patches and let weeds spread to create abandoned cemeteries. Others have made use of the haunted art that Redd sometimes sells.

Players are hoping that Nintendo's next New Horizons update adds a special Halloween event to the game, complete with spooky furniture, much like the developer did with the Bunny Day event for Easter. The official announcement video for Nintendo's second summer update did mention a free update coming in fall alongside an image of Jack, Animal Crossing's pumpkin-headed Halloween czar.

In the meantime players have gathered every spooky-adjacent item they can find for their designs. Items like the spider web from the Bug Off and the wedding pipe organ from the June in-game event have become popular for Halloween-themed decorations.

New Horizons expanded Animal Crossing's custom design features, giving players a lot more freedom in how they design their islands. Players now have a huge catalogue of player created designs, including everything from Nightmare Before Christmas dresses to detailed images of Pennywise the clown, to browse through and use. A ton of designs can be seen in both the Able Sisters shop and online on Instagram and Pinterest. Some players have even offered to help others create designs.

Animal Crossing: New Horizon's community hasn't slowed down since the game launched in March. Players have re-created Disneyland, built sets from their favorite shows, and turned their islands into playable Mario Party boards.