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Animal Crossing: New Horizons has given us a chance once again to escape into a slow and peaceful countryside in a digital space. Eventually, the game ends, or for some of you who don’t have the Nintendo Switch, the game isn’t available, but luckily, there are alternatives to Animal Crossing.
A lot of video games these days have captured the very essence of what makes Animal Crossing so appealing. Cuddly talking animals, sandbox gameplay, and of course, the tranquil allure of nature and resettlement are all present in these video games like Animal Crossing, and most of them aren’t just limited to the Switch (whether OLED or not).
Stardew Valley
Despite being developed by one man, Stardew Valley has risen above a lot of other, more expensive video games (which is both amazing and sad). This passion project is now one of the most in-depth and addicting farming simulators and RPGs on the market. It’s also a dating sim if you want it to be.
As for its similarities with Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley is a game where you set your own goals or even pick your favorite thing, and you don’t have to pressure yourself into doing anything. In fact, you can even forego farming at all (though making money in-game might become a bit difficult).
My Time at Portia
My Time at Portia looks like a 3D Stardew Valley at first glance, but it has a narrower focus on crafting and building instead of farming. Like in Stardew Valley, you inherit a plot of land and its existing structures, which happen to be your dad’s old workshop. It’s up to you to restore everything to its former glory, including the whole town.
There’s a bit of everything here too, from farming, raising animals, building commissions, and even socializing with the locals. The game was primarily inspired by Studio Ghibli films so you know the developers are about to give you a picturesque and soulful treat upon starting up the game.
A Short Hike
If you somehow still find the sandbox mechanics of the previous games a bit too overwhelming, then a railroaded adventure might be a better start. A Short Hike offers that kind of experience. It has the same vibe and provincial nature atmosphere as Animal Crossing, but the gameplay is all about exploration.
In A Short Hike, you’re a bird, and you’ll have to do what a bird usually does (minus fleeing from predators and regurgitating your food to feed your children). Just fly around, make some birb fwends, and see the sights around Haw Peak Provincial Park.
Stranded Sails: Explorers of the Cursed Islands
Much like in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you’re stuck on an island in Stranded Sails: Explorers of the Cursed Island. And it’s up to you to make the most out of this unfortunate situation. And once you have your bearings, you can pretty much just chill around or relax in the entire archipelago landscape.
You can also form crews and explore the entire island if you ever get tired of farming and other maintenance activities or mini-games like cooking and interior decoration. There’s more linearity to the game, however, since there’s a main quest present to give you something serious to do. However, like most open-world games, the main quest to save the world or whatever is a mere suggestion.
Yonder: Cloud Catcher Chronicles
Yonder: Cloud Catcher Chronicles offers not only one but eight kinds of environments for exploration in this adorable and vivid adventure game. The game world is called Gemea, and it’s peaceful– there’s no combat at all in this game to ensure a focus on exploration and completionism.
Speaking of which, the game mostly revolves around completionist tasks such as planting trees, collecting cats, and other tasks that will compel you to walk far out to experience the game world. This makes the game accessible enough even for children.
Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town
Formerly known as Harvest Moon, Story of Season: Pioneers of Olive Town is one of the latest in a series of games that served as the progenitor for all farming simulators out there. For it was the first farming sim. Thankfully, it’s not backing down against the new bloods.
Pioneers of Olive Town is among the highest-rated and well-regarded Harvest Moon games right now. There’s also a Doraemon version of this game for those who are interested. As for the gameplay, well, you run a farm, and you also get to do a lot of other countryside stuff during the downtimes. This game franchise served as the prime inspiration for Stardew Valley and other successful farming sims.
Slime Rancher
Being surrounded by cute anthropomorphic animals is one of the strongest selling points of Animal Crossing, so games like Slime Rancher ought to appeal to the same audience. It’s about a woman who sets out on a faraway alien planet full of slimes which she can raise and sell back to her home planet for profits.
That’s a pretty dark and exploitative explanation, but the game’s cute and lighthearted. Don’t worry; the slimes here are the selling point, and they are adorable creatures that somehow keep the protagonist company. The game plays out in first-person view, however, but that ought to be a refreshing change of perspective.
Ooblets
Ooblets is similar to Slime Rancher but with a better emphasis on the weird but delightful titular creatures in its gamer world. On top of farming and ranching, it’s also a creature collection game where you have to hunt for ooblets and catch them so you can make them compete in dancing contests.
It’s the more humane version of Pokemon; at least they don’t beat one another until they faint. Anyone who likes Animal Crossing’s side activities and general visual style will appreciate this title. The uniqueness of ooblets themselves adds longevity to the game, along with some unprecedented RPG elements.
Cozy Grove
Cozy Grove is a camping game that takes place on a haunted and constantly changing island full of ghosts that you’ll need to appease if you ever want to leave safely. Sounds like a premise straight out of a horror game, but actually, Cozy Grove is, well, cozy. This charming game with cartoonish visuals more than offsets the horror premise.
Your job as a curious wanderer is to bring back the island to a lively state and make the local ghost inhabitants less cranky. You can do this through crafting goods for them and also foraging and collecting some materials in the most lovable exorcism adventure spree ever.
Garden Paws
Garden Paws starts out like a lot of games on this list, with the protagonist inheriting their relatives’ land or farm. The difference is that you control the animals here in order to rebuild the form to an operational state. After that, the whole town comes next.
All inhabitants of this game world are anthropomorphic and cool animals, and they live in harmony, in full defiance of nature documentaries. Be advised that there are no humans in this game, which is a plus if you don’t like humans because even humans don’t like humans too.
