The Animal Crossing franchise is a life sim with a uniquely Nintendo twist. You’ll spend your days collecting seashells, decorating your home, fishing, creating custom designs and a whole array of other carefree pursuits.
Despite all the adorable anthropomorphic animals, though, the experience is also firmly tied to the real world. The clock and calendar syncs with real life and Nintendo has taken care to implement a lot of real festivals, events and holidays into the series. Let’s take a look at Halloween and some other events that are celebrated in the world of the 3DS’ Animal Crossing: New Leaf as well as our own.
10 Halloween: October 31
With the Animal Crossing calendar coinciding with our own (time traveling aside), one of the major events to celebrate in New Leaf occurs on the last day of October: Halloween! This event has been an annual feature in every game, but works a little differently here.
The special character Jack roams the town on October 31, willing to trade the player for pieces of the exclusive Creepy Set. What does he want to trade? Lollipops, of course, which are obtained by scaring the villagers who are in their homes. To do this, special masks must be purchased from the Abel sisters. Certain villagers are afraid of certain masks, so give candy to the residents who aren’t at home (they’ll chase you) in order to be given tips about another villager’s fears. It’s a lot of fun, and more “interactive” than a lot of Animal Crossing events.
9 Toy Day: December 24
Some will know this day as Christmas Eve, but Animal Crossing afficionados prefer the title Toy Day (for logical delivering-the-gifts reasons, it doesn’t occur on Christmas Day). From 6pm this evening, the lovable reindeer Jingle will appear in players’ towns. Hopefully, villagers have saved up their Bells, because Toy Day is one of the most expensive holidays of the year!
Jingle himself doesn’t seem to relish the task of delivering all the villagers’ presents, which is where you come in: if you’ve bought the Santa Claus outfit (available from Abel Sisters’ throughout this month), he’ll give you the task of doing so instead. Over the course of this month, your New Leaf residents will have been giving you clues as to which gift they’d like, which if how you know who gets which package. Complete your deliveries for Festive/Jingle items and get them all right for Jingle’s photo in the mail!
8 Bunny Day: A Sunday In March/April
Some Animal Crossing: New Horizons players found Bunny Day more than a little obnoxious; outstaying its welcome and clogging up the skies, rivers, and fossil spots with different colored eggs. Mercifully, New Leaf kept the festivities to one particular day (whichever day Easter Sunday happened to fall on that year).
The holiday was much the same as in the Nintendo Switch title, though. Different types of activities yielded different eggs, but New Leaf’s eggs could be eaten to collect the prize tickets inside, which would be exchanged with Zipper T Bunny for Egg Set items. All the while, the villagers would talk about these odd eggs, wondering where they came from. Sadly, they didn’t dress up.
7 Obon: August 15/16 (In Japan)
While many events take place across the world in Animal Crossing, some are exclusive to specific regions. One Japan-only holiday is Obon, which takes place in the middle of August.
Obon is a celebration in honor of each family’s lost relatives. In New Leaf, it’s more of an event for Isabelle than the rest of the villagers, as she takes center stage in explaining the meaning of the event and giving the player exclusive Obon-themed gifts. These consist of the cucumber horse and eggplant cow items, which she explains were made by children to honor their relatives.
6 Festivale: February 11 (Or March)
If you’re looking for the brightest, boldest, most joyous event in all of Animal Crossing, Festivale is the one for you. It takes place on a changeable date, but there’s one thing you can always be sure of: Pavé the excitable and flamboyant peacock will be in town and in the party mood!
In New Leaf, Festivale is more involved, as each resident dresses up for the occasion in an elaborate headdress and challenges the player to a range of simple games (such as Rock, Paper, Scissors). In a similar fashion to Bunny Day, there are a range of feathers of different colors to collect (use a net to nab them as they drift by) and giving Pavé the right combination of them will yield an item from the Pavé set.
5 Starcrossed Day: July 7
Another event only for Japanese players, Starcrossed Day takes place early in July. It’s an event inspired by the romantic tale of two lovers, Hikoboshi and his wife Orihime, who are fated to only be able to meet once a year on this day.
You may have seen a brief mention of this event in New Horizons, in which the seasonal item Bamboo Grass recently appeared. This same item is given to the player by Isabelle in New Leaf in celebration of Starcrossed Day, as the tradition of writing a wish on paper and attaching it to a branch of bamboo is a common practice in Japan on this day. It’s not a very interactive festival in the game, though there is a cutout to take photos with in the plaza.
4 Harvest Festival: Fourth Friday Of November
Another event aping a real-world holiday, Animal Crossing’s Harvest Festival coincides with Thanksgiving. In New Leaf, the villagers don’t take a very active role in the celebrations, but the player certainly does!
Franklin will stop by the town for the day, preparing to make a huge banquet. He enlists the player’s help in gathering ingredients for the meal, both by gathering resources as normal and by asking the villagers for event-exclusive necessities. It’s a lot of fun dashing around the town to gather it all and determining what each secret ingredient is, and, as usual, you’ll be amply rewarded for performing well with unique items and furniture.
3 Valentine’s Day: February 14
Valentine’s Day is an event that inspires all kinds of emotions. Is it a sweet, romantic, opportunity to show our significant others our love? Is it an arbitrary date that’s milked simply for candy sales? Well, yes to both, depending on who you ask.
In New Leaf, however, it’s a day as cute and delightful as everything else in this franchise. Villagers offer chocolates to the player, there’s even a cake, and the much-missed Brewster will serve hot chocolate in his café. It’s an understated holiday, but players still feel the vibe.
2 Labor Day: First Monday Of September, North America
Labor Day is a North American exclusive event which is also celebrated in the Animal Crossing series. As was the case with Obon, the town residents themselves don’t take much of an active role in the event, but Tortimer (in the original and Animal Crossing: City Folk) and Isabelle (in New Leaf) mark the occasion nonetheless.
In New Leaf, Isabelle awaits in the town square, with an exclusive picnic basket item as a gift for the player. With that and the standee the player can interact with, Labor Day is definitely one of the game’s more low-key holidays.
1 New Year’s Eve And New Year’s Day: December 31, January 1
Throughout the series, New Years has always been a huge deal. It constitutes a two-day celebration in every game, though much less fuss is made of New Year’s Day in comparison to New Year’s Eve.
In New Leaf, as before in the series, an hour’s countdown begins at 11pm on December 31. Villagers will assemble in the Plaza in the cutest party hats you ever saw in your life, while that shady Redd will also be on hand to sell party poppers and the like. Fireworks, countdowns, and excitement abound, followed by low-key musical themes being played the next day.
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