Animal Crossing: New Horizons Island Expansion Update Seemingly Leaked

A possibly huge Animal Crossing: New Horizons island expansion update may have just been leaked thanks to dataminers. Digging through the files of the game, folks have reportedly found a variety of interesting tidbits about the game and what Nintendo is seemingly working on for it. Since the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons on Nintendo Switch last year, Nintendo has continued to update it in small bursts spread out with significant amounts of time between larger additions. Nintendo is relatively notorious for its shoddy post-launch support of its games, but given that the game sold over 30 million copies, it has led some to believe it would make an exception with New Horizons.

Digging through the files, dataminers have reportedly discovered that the southern line of the island has doubled in size, well, at least in the in-game code. There could be a variety of explanations for this, but the most obvious one is that there's some type of map expansion in the works or that there's going to be another island added. In addition to this, changes have been made to the game's camera in the files, suggesting either a reworking of the camera is coming or, more likely, new abilities and possibly angles are being added.

Unfortunately, at the moment, all we have is speculation. While the game's files suggest something is coming, including possibly a new island or an expansion of the current island, that's all they do. This isn't a confirmation of a huge new update to the game complete with an island expansion. Typically, datamining leaks are a reliable source of information, but the implications and conclusions of these files can be misleading.

Right now, Nintendo has not commented on any of this. And this is to be expected. However, if for some reason Nintendo bucks expectations and does comment on any of the information and speculation above, we will update the story with whatever it has to say.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is available via the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch Lite, and soon it may also be available via the Nintendo Switch Pro.

For more coverage on all things Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch Lite -- including all of the latest news, rumors, leaks, deals, guides, reviews, previews, and interviews -- click here. In the most recent and related news, a new Nintendo Switch leak has revealed an unexpected port. Meanwhile, yesterday the hopes and dreams of Metroid Prime fans were crushed by a former developer on the series.