Since its release in March, Animal Crossing: New Horizons has built a huge and dedicated fan base, as shown by the wealth of fan-made content that has shown up on social channels. A large part of this is due to the game's sheer freedom of creation, providing an empty island to model as players wish. However, the makers of fan videos have reacted with anger and disappointment at the latest patch, which removes a small glitch that helped them to craft their creations
Specifically, the latest summer diving patch removes the glitch whereby pressing + with A, when hovering over the camera app, would remove the HUD (Heads Up Display.) This allowed creative players to capture video that looks more cinematic, and has been used in pretty much all the most popular Animal Crossing: New Horizons fan content.
The HUD provides the player with information and context, which is important when focusing on the game itself, but gets in the way of more creative players who want to make their own content. As might be expected, reaction from the fan content community has not been positive, with many taking to Twitter to express their disappointment, and request a HUD removal option from Nintendo.
Given the number of reported glitches with the game, it is understandable that Nintendo is making an effort to fix them. It may simply be that the HUD glitch was related to another, more impactful glitch, but if this was the case, it is unusual that they didn't replace the ability to toggle the HUD. Particularly given the huge success of Animal Crossing: New Horizons fan content.
It's disappointing to see Nintendo appearing either inconsiderate or disinterested in the creative community built on the popular life simulation title. Making such decisions will ultimately only harm itself, as people will be less inclined to use the game for creative content and ideas, providing less free promotion and conversation.
It's certainly not the first time that Nintendo have shown itself to be out of step with the world of fan made content either, with a typically dated approach to fair-usage compared to most developers and publishers. Perhaps in a future patch Nintendo will surprise fans with a HUD toggle, or more advanced camera options. Creators and fans will have to wait and see, but until then, the number of new Animal Crossing fan videos is likely to drop dramatically.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons is out now for Nintendo Switch
Source: Polygon