Current Events > The Animal Crossing team and creator of the series were generalized by Nintendo

(+) Yeah! (+)

The creator of animal crossing and the producer of every animal crossing game is Katusya Eguchi.

There used to be a designated animal crossing team called Nintendo Entertainment Analysis & Development Software Development Group No. 2

They basically made all the Animal Crossing games and on the side, made the Wii series games then Splatoon.

Soon after, all the Nintendo EAD dev groups were combined into Nintendo's larger development team, Nintendo Entertainment Planning & Development.

Since the merge, Katsuya Eguchi produced the following games

Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer - General Producer (3DS, 2015)
The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes - Supervisor (3DS, 2015)
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD - Senior Producer (Wii U, 2016)
Tank Troopers - General Producer (3DS, 2016)
Arms - General Producer (Nintendo Switch, 2017)
Star Fox 2 - Director (SNES, 2017)

and the larger team worked on the following games

The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes
Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD
Miitomo
Star Fox Zero
Star Fox Guard
Animal Crossing: New Leaf - Welcome Amiibo
Miitopia
Super Mario Run
Tank Troopers
Fire Emblem Heroes
1-2-Switch
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Arms
Splatoon 2
Metroid: Samus Returns
Super Mario Odyssey
Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp
Nintendo Labo
Sushi Striker: The Way of Sushido
Super Mario Party

No longer does it makes sense to expect a new Animal Crossing game to come out just because there hasn't been one for a while and the team had to be working on something.

Going by this information, there's no reason to think there is an "Animal Crossing team" anymore. It seems like those developers are given all kinds of games now to work on, so if there's no Animal Crossing game it's probably because they are now working on something else or Super Mario Party.

It makes sense from a business stand point, especially after the Wii U, to do something like this but it still sucks tbh.
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I'm basically sharing this because I have this gut feeling that Animal Crossing Switch is not in development and isn't a priority for Nintendo.

They probably figured the mobile game would be good enough and shifted the team else where.

It seems strange that it wouldn't have been announced yet, but who knows. Maybe they haven't shown it because they recently changed their strategy on previewing games (as stated by Nintendo)

they have said now that the Switch has a library, they are no longer going to show games not coming out in the near future. So I suppose there is a chance it's being developed, but they are saving it for a later date as they are with Yoshi and Metroid 4

Smashingpmkns posted...

It makes sense from a business stand point, especially after the Wii U, to do something like this but it still sucks tbh.

does it? why not have a specialized team to focus on what they are good at, if their IP really sells well?

Animal Crossing is a top-seller.

It would be like assimilating GameFreak and making them make other games besides Pokemon

I mean, who am I to question them. I don't know the inner workings of the company.

I'm just saying it doesn't make sense just at face value

They get to work on more games, meaning more games will be made for their console. Nintendo is focusing on releasing games at a steady pace, despite their showing at E3, and they think this will help their console. A huge part of why the Wii U failed was the lack of third parties and right now they have to prove that their console is worth developing for. One Animal Crossing game is great for fans, but I don't think it's considered a huge console seller opposed to having a dozen+ other games.
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New Leaf pushed systems though. It sold 11.69 million copies.

this isn't the best comparison, but

the Switch version of Breath of the Wild sold over eight million copies, while the Wii U version sold over one million, combing for a total of 9.98 million, making it the bestselling entry in the series

Nintendo does weird things with some of their first-party studios sometimes. Retro made three outstanding Metroid games, got taken off the series then made some outstanding Donkey Kong Games, they'll probably be pulled from that series too to make something else completely random.
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I think they recognize retro as a quality studio and they are using them to make certain series relevant again.

They made donkey kong country and metroid relevant after it wasn't for years. Now new teams can follow what they did.

I know the soul/soulless meme was squeezed dry immediately, but New Leaf was a good example of a series losing its 'soul' for me
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There are a lot of shit games on that list.
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