Animal Crossingis a delightfully wholesome and cozy franchise, but that hasn’t stopped fans from coming up with some ridiculous and outlandish theories about it. The various games place players in a city, town, campsite, and even a whole island and make them responsible for upgrading the area, inviting new residents, and generally maintaining the upkeep of the location. To make matters even more bewildering, although players appear human, all the villagers are animals who walk like humans.
The true explanation for why the game and its characters look the way they do is probably just for aesthetics. There is likely no deeper meaning or much lore to uncover behind Coco’s blank eyes or Tom Nook’s nefarious Real Estate dealings. Despite this,there are still many bizarre theories about theAnimal Crossingfranchise,and some can get downright disturbing.
10Islands That Are “Reset” Are Actually Sold Off By Tom Nook
Explains How Nook Can Afford Everything
As much as Tom Nook gets a bad rep for being greedy and even evil, the Tanuki real estate mogul isactually a great landlord. He lends players money with no interest and has no time limit on paying him back for making upgrades home upgrades. In reality, Nook’s scheme simply wouldn’t make any money for him.
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Unless, that is, he’s somehowmaking a profit off players when they abandon islands, asDarkMagickanon Reddit suggests. The theory suggests that Nook doesn’t make money off most players, but rather relies on people who fix up the island, make it look nice, then reset it to start a new one.
Nook uses fake money to keep players thinking that things are all above board, but he’s just biding his time, waiting for the player to finish their free labor on the island. Once players leave their current island, the theory posits that Tom Nook evicts the villagers andthe island is sold as “an expensive paradise to wealthy humans” for real money.This theory would certainly explain how Tom Nook’s business hasn’t gone under yet, despite him literally giving away islands.
9Rover Was Supposed To Be The Mayor In New Leaf
He Decides To Give The Role To The Player On A Whim
When the player arrives at the town inAnimal Crossing: New Leaf,they’re met by Isabelle and a few villagers and congratulated on being the new mayor of the town. The trouble is,the player seems to have no idea that they’re on the way to be a mayor, which seems like a detail that should have been mentioned to them at some point.
This has given rise to the theory that another character was supposed to be the mayor, which is more or less confirmed by a letter from the mysterious would-be mayor who was supposed to take on the role but “one thing led to another… and now it’s all up to you!” Although some players have taken this to mean that Isabelle was meant to be mayor, the more popular theory, proposed by Redditorxxx__xxx, is that the mayor was actually supposed to be Rover.
New Leafbegins with the player taking the train to their new home, where they strike up a conversation with Rover. When the player gets off the train, Rover continues on his way, and the player is eagerly met by the townsfolk, who have been waiting for the mayor to arrive on the train. Considering that Rover is the only other passenger on the train, it’s theorized that he was supposed to be the mayor butdecided to pass on that responsibility to the player after just a few minute-long conversation with them.
8The Player Character Is A Narcissist
Their View Of The World Is Clouded By Their Perspective
There’s been a lot of speculation about why the player is the only non-animal character inAnimal Crossingtitles, and RedditorMy1stUsrnameWasTakenhas a unique theory that may explain this. According to the theory, the other characters are human too, butthe main character sees things from a perspective clouded by extreme narcissism.This means that players only see the changes that they make in town and the donations they make to the museum.
Players also look down on the villagers, who are actually regular human beings. Because of the player’s disdain, villagers are portrayed as “the animals you think best represent them” after players judge them for certain aspects of their personality or appearance. Even thesnowboys reflect this desire for perfectionand beauty, as they’re “extensions of you, and therefore share your character traits.” Based on this theory, the player’s character isn’t on an animal island that uses Bells as currency, butis instead an unreliable narrator.
7Animal Crossing Is Set In A Post-Apocalyptic World
Radiation And Evolution Have Led To The World’s Current State
This was put forth by Reddit’sPiney-Cone, and it explains why some animals are human-like and others remain in pure animal form. TheACgames, according to Piney-Cone,take place in a post-apocalyptic worldwhere radiation and fallout from nuclear warfare have caused humans to mutate into human-animal hybrids. These new beings form peaceful settlements and co-exist in harmony.
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Elsewhere in the world, though,the fighting between humans continues. The player’s parents want to protect their child, so they send them away to live with the humanoid animals, far away from the ongoing war. If all this were true, it would explain why there are so few humans among the animals. It would also explain how there are also regular animals, since it was the humans who mutated), and why some villagers see nothing wrong with hunting their own kind, like Zucker fishing for octopus.
6Coco Is A Haunted Doll
Her Design Is Based On A Haniwa
Most villagers inAnimal Crossingare cute and cuddly anthropomorphized animals with a clear real-world inspiration. The character of Coco, however, is a pretty different story. Coco is a tan-colored rabbit villager, butin place of normal facial features, she has three black holes in her face for the eyes and mouth, resembling a gyroid.
Coco is assumed by many to be based on a coconut, a fact made more realistic by her English name. In reality, her design makes more sense with her Japanese name, Yayoi, which is the time period associated with the inspiration for her design: Haniwa statues. According toidkwhoruuu, bothCoco and the gyroids are inspired by Haniwa figurines, which were made of terracotta clay to be buried with the dead.
The theory is that Coco is an actual Haniwa doll that came to life when she was possessed by the soul of whoever she was buried with. InNew Leaf,she even has two bonfires burning inside her home, which some think could be used for cremation, putting a much darker spin on a seemingly adorable character.
5All Animal Crossing Furniture Items Are Illusions Created By Tom Nook
The Leaf Shape In The Inventory Reveals Their True Nature
Although some people mistake him for a raccoon,Animal Crossing’sTom Nook is actually a Tanuki(just listen to his name!). Takunis resemble a cross between a raccoon and a dog and areknown in Japanese mythology to be tricksters.According to the stories, Tanukis had the power to transform leaves into looking like whatever they want them to. The problem is that these illusions are only skin-deep, and not full transformations.
Nintendo also represents Tanuki lore in theSuper Mario Bros.series, where the Tanooki suit, represented by a leaf power-up, gives Mario the power to shape-shift into a stone statue.
This has ledPlagueDilophoto theorize that Tom Nook ismerely fooling players and villagers into thinking they’re surrounded by awesome furniture,“when in reality, us and our animal villagers are probably sleeping in piles of leaves that we only think are tables, chairs, beds etc.” This goes well with the Tanuki legends, and would explain why so many of the furniture items are only for display, like the bicycle, lawnmower, teacup ride, and otherACfurniture fans wish actually worked.
4All The “Real” Art In The Museum Is Fake
Redd May Be A Master Forger
RedditorDarkMagickanpresents anotherNew Horizonstheory, this time surrounding the island’s artworks. Players can purchase paintings and statues from the sly-looking fox Redd, but there’s always a chance that the artwork is a fake. However, DarkMagickan asks,what ifallthe art Redd sells players is actually fake?
The theory states thatRedd is actually a very good forgerwho makes silly mistakes in half the fakes he makes, “like putting eyebrows on the Mona Lisa.” The obvious fakes make players think that he’s bad at what he does and lower their guard. The rest of the forgeries are spot on, good enough to “fool a sleep-deprived owl.” This theory doesn’t just explain why so manyAnimal Crossingplayers all have museums full of “authentic” art, but it also explains how it’s possible to get duplicates of an allegedly real artwork.
3The Island And Its Residents Are Part Of A Child’s Game
This Is Lovingly Referred To As The “Winnie-The-Pooh” Theory
One of thelongest-standing and most wholesome theories for theAnimal Crossinggames is that it’s all just a game. The theory is a nod to the stories of Winnie the Pooh, where all the events that take place in the Hundred Acre Wood are merely products of a young boy’s imaginary play with his toys (as well as a real rabbit and owl, apparently). Reddit userThe_Rambling_Otteris one of many who have suggested this theory forAnimal Crossingover the years.
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If true, then all the events and characters seen in the games are justa game of make-believe played by a child in their backyard. Some of the characters, like Stitches, Paula, and Hopkins, are obviously toys, while many of the others could be made up by the child. This theory makes sense in light of some of the more unusual villagers, like thecharacters inspired by food, and it even explains where there are so few personalities despite there being many characters.
2The Island Is An Enrichment Area For Nearly Extinct Humans
The Villagers Are Doing Their Best To Keep Humans Alive And Engaged
Created by silverjirachi and shared to Reddit byBig_Recover_9631/Reddit, this theory states that instead of being a regular island, theAnimal Crossing: New Horizonsisland is, for lack of a better word, a zoo.According to the theory, humans are going extinct,so the animal villagers havecreated an enrichment centerfor one of the last remaining members of the species.
This theory explains why the animals always look so happy to see the Villager, and why they give the player character seemingly useless tasks to do, like hiding money in rocks and furniture in trees. The villagers are much too unbothered by the one lone human constantly redecorating the island and moving their homes, but their indifference would make sense if it wasall they needed to do to keep the endangered human specimen happy and healthy. Plus, the days in Animal Crossing are fairly formulaic, making the idea that this is a zoo entirely plausible.
The Darkest But Most Popular Animal Crossing Theory
While the last two theories were wholesome in their own way,the purgatory theory is a much darker take on the games. This is another theory that’s been floating around the community for a while now, and is based in part on the in-game letters players receive from their mom. The theory is based largely on the sometimes odd letters that the player’s mother writes, which mention things like hearing the child’s voice in the wind or remembering a nostalgic moment from their childhood.
The theory, as explained byDoctorsJennyon Reddit, is that the player is dead and theAnimal Crossingworld is purgatory, an in-between place where they live peacefully and help other residents (potentially as a way to make up for wrongdoings when they were alive). The mom’s letters and gifts are things left by a grieving mother on the grave of her child. Although this theory is much too dark for Nintendo and theAnimal Crossingfranchise to be true, it shows how a game can completely change its meaning from just the slightest shift in perspective.
